I may be seeking the impossible, but if any group will have solutions, it's this one. DS8 can be an oddball and has absolutely no idea that he can be an oddball. He has zero recognition that his behaviour can be unusual. Zilch. He is also very sensitive and at the least hint of criticism typically loses his composure. I'm trying to find a way to gently alert him to the benefits of being aware of how others see him, without having him conclude that there's something wrong with him. I don't want him to be self conscious, nor do I want him to try to be anyone other than himself.
His quirkiness hasn't been a social problem to date, because his schoolmates have known him since preschool and like him just as he is. He's at an age, however, where I expect that to start changing (it already can be an issue in outside social environments). I also see his lack of self recognition as part of a broader problem of engagement. If he's completely unaware of the impression he is making, how engaged can he be in his surroundings?
It may be that this is really a social skills problem that I'm misapprehending as youthful narcissism. I worry that one day he'll be mocked as a 'weirdo' and that I will have let him down by leaving him to be himself, warts and all, instead of letting him in on the hard reality of the social importance of appearances.
