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Permalink Reply by Brian R. King LCSW on July 15, 2011 at 9:38pm

Outstanding beginning to this discussion. Thank You Michele.

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Permalink Reply by Jacki Prettyman on July 17, 2011 at 2:32pm

I want to be able to understand my boys better and find the line between making excuses and making necessary adjustments. My 13 y/o is by far the most difficult d/t his arguing constantly, his "I know it all" attitude, his nasty mood before the meds kick in and all the other attendant differences that children with Asperger's have. I have got to find a way to make parenting him much more agreeable for him and I both. I want to learn a way to teach him when he doesn't think he has anything to learn. I have managed to do a great deal of the above with the 12 y/o but our other son is just a totally different child and nothing seems to be working.

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Permalink Reply by Michele on July 17, 2011 at 2:59pm

You are not alone Jacki -

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Permalink Reply by Michael Crosby on November 1, 2011 at 5:46pm

 

autism is a developmental disability.  this basically means that you often have to wait for the autist to grow up.  however, it also means that some parts of him or her are unusually mature.  it`s important to be able to identify all the parts, and play to the strengths, while supporting the weaknesses.

 

you can pretty much rely on there being emotional and social immaturity, and the emotional part can trump all the other parts when it gets extreme.  i had temper tantrums up until high school.  i was so angry, frustrated, confused and depressed that it wasn`t until i decided that things were so far out of control that i had to fix it myself, no matter what it meant i had to do.

 

this was in the 80s.  i don`t think things necessarily have to get that extreme for most kids now, but based on my own experiences in special ed, i think it still happens.

 

anyway, my point is that it was extremely frustrating and maddening for my parents.  but they hung in there until i came around and eventually were able to see progress and happiness in me.

 

for my own part, i had to learn to recognise the progress i was making, no matter how small it was, and no matter how much other people didn`t appreciate or see it.  i had to break what most people would call normal steps down into increasingly smaller parts until i got to a step i could handle.  i also had to learn to switch goals alot.  often there would be some other step i would have to take in some other problem before i was ready to take another step in the main direction(s) i wanted to go.

 

it took a lot of hard, concentrated work that looked to others like i wasn`t doing anything at all.  and i had to learn to be ok with that.  i had to learn to accept people who were unable to accept me.  that in itself took a long time.

 

it`s only been in the last 5 years or so that i realised what a positive effect certain people had on me.  these people always accepted and encouraged me no matter what.  i always knew they had my back, even if i didn`t realise it.  in fact, those people were somewhat frightening to me because i didn`t feel comfortable trusting them in a world that would turn on me in seemingly random ways.  there were only a few of them, and none of them were my parents.  my parents were too close to it, and i was too close to my parents.  the relationship didn`t allow them to behave unconditionally because they had to live with me 24/7.

 

don`t get me wrong, i do appreciate everything my parents did for me.  it`s just different.  i needed to be able to see that people who didn`t have to care about me, could and did.  and that`s something only i could do for myself.  there are some things that only the person can do for themselves.  and only when they`re ready.

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