Occasionally on a good day he will do something amazing, like go get himself dressed and get his shoes on with no prompts when we are going out. Normally I have to force him into his clothes even if he really wants to go where we are going.
Just a thought, but might he have sensory issues with some of his clothes? Some ASD kids are
really hypersensitive to certain types of touch (usually the light, fleeting kind), and hyposensitive to other kinds (often weighted blankets and strong hugs).
Everyone has a different idea what is wrong with my son. No one can offer any explanation for the good days and bad days and all of the regular days in between.
Why does an explanation need to be offered? Isn't it like that for all of us? We have good days, we have bad days, and we have days in between. It can depend on
so many things just what kind of day we're going to have... what we've had to do or think about recently, how much sleep we've gotten, what we're thinking about. It's likely not different for him at the core, it's just that: 1) he's 5 and hasn't developed the coping mechanisms that an adult has and therefore suppresses less, and 2) he likely feels the world much more strongly than most of us and gets easily overwhelmed. I'm not sure if you've ever heard of ASD being called Intense World Syndrome, but in a nutshell, the notion is that someone on the autism spectrum feels everything more intensely, and that this is often so overwhelming that it can send the personal into personal withdrawal (i.e., "shutting down"). Rather than being incapable of possessing empathy (something you hear a lot), it's more that the person is so overwhelmingly empathetic that it's painful and so not dealing with it is often easier.
I'd love to be able to say that I KNOW he is smart. The IQ test helped with that somewhat, but some of these moments make me doubt it all. He was a kid who hit intellectual milestones years early and was a very early talker, but all of this was always attributed to asperger's by the experts and I guess it will take a long time until I am confident that he really is gifted.
It doesn't make sense to attribute high intelligence to ASD as a means of discounting the validity of a cognitive test. Being gifted
is having high intelligence, no matter where it came from.
I'm really not familiar with what average 5 year olds are like and I have a group of "helpful" people surrounding us constantly focusing on everything that is wrong with my son and refusing to acknowledge anything that might be good. It's almost like they don't want you to have any hope. It's all let's focus on the problems and fix the problems we have right now. They are so negative and spend all their time with my son thumping their behaviorism bibles and bringing out the worst in him.
If other people are trying to "fix" your son, you should find new people to consult with. Many things labeled as an "intervention" in ASD world are from the "fix" mindset (meaning trying to make your son's behavior look "normal"), and this can cause a lot more harm than good. Not surprisingly, it's more effective to look for therapies that help your son cope with the way he interacts with the world. I've had friends have success with various forms of OT, and if you haven't looked into it, it might hold some promise for you.
My son is a nice child and he is extremely empathetic. When I had a headache yesterday he helped me lay down and rubbed my head and gave me lots of hugs. I could see the real concern in his face. When my eye hurt last week he ran and got a washcloth, ran cold water on it, and brought it to me to put on my eye. If a kid needs help climbing something, my son is the first to offer a boost. He walks up to babies on the playground and helps to stabilize them so they won't fall over. OTOH, if someone is crying loudly, he runs away. If someone is quietly sad he will try to help them or give them something to make them feel better.
Yes. This sounds
exactly like the characteristics I was describing. He sounds extremely empathetic but gets easily overwhelmed.
One of my absolute favorite resources for ASD online is the Thinking Person's Guide to Autism (
http://www.thinkingautismguide.com/). There's a ton of insight on there and it's worth checking out if you haven't already.
