If you're the parent of a child with Asperger syndrome, chances are you've gotten quite an education since you first heard that diagnosis. What would you say today to parents who are just getting the news? Tell them about that book that explained everything, that website full of resources, that e-mail group you still lean on, that experience with your child that made you see things differently. Those of us who have been there have important gifts to give those who have not yet done that. Offer your words of wisdom and experience here. Tell Your Tips
A term that gathers it together
- In explaining to my son that his sensitivity to light, touch and sound are his known reality and that Asberger's is just a name of a doctor who started to understand that there were important individuals with these basic traits, it is easier to understand how a "name" can actually be helpful to those who are trying to understand. Because of these sensitivities, very, very young, pre-verbal children will literally shift the sound stream to the left-ear to filter the sometimes loud speech around them with the right side of the brain. Even select hertz ranges can be filtered and unrecognized in sound "spectrum" testing by these wise and young sensitive people. Read the book "When Listening Comes Alive" by Tomatis. In finding that my son didn't hear all his words, I found a listening therapy that retrains the ear to the world of speech and sound. Physical and social coordination improves and even the need to avoid eye contact became less needed. Celiac disease (gluten) was also present.
- —Listeningup
school: Reading
- I made my grandson my project. He had to do second grade over because of his reading skills. I enrolled him in Nana School! When we were together I told him we were going to read. That just caused, what I like to call, a meltdown. I had to be inventive. He loves to play games on my computer so I would buy "Hidden Object" games and he would do them. I made him read the word and find the object. At first only minutes at a time would work. We progressively got longer in our sessions. It was against the rules to just click anything, most games will not let you do that anyway. He had to be able to read the object listed. I am happy to say my grandson received three awards the other day in school, one of them in Reading. It takes time and being inventive but Aspergers children can overcome and do great in school.
- —Guest Judy Byrne
They are still the same child!
- The main thing we felt after our eldest was diagnosed is that it didn't change who he was -- he didn't "become" the diagnosis! It did lead to many "aha!" moments, as we put together the jigsaw of behaviours into this picture. It also changed how we managed behaviour challenges -- having more understanding about the background for the behaviours helped us to redirect them (mainly helping him to find stress management behaviours which are less irritating to those around him, and gently leading him away from things which were becoming compulsions). Therapy options here are limited -- there isn't even a social skills group he can join -- so we do what we can with family discussions and modelling good behaviour. The hardest challenge is knowing when to push hard on an issue, and when to sit back and let him work it out in his own time and own way -- but I think that is also the hardest challenge for parenting any child!
- —QuicksilverHg
