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DS7 was telling me about his first day of school yesterday, and it all sounded pretty okay. He told me that several of the severely disabled 2nd graders spend part of their day in his classroom. Then he said, "I really think I'm autistic.my writing is really bad compared to everyone else's, I'm good at music, math, reading..." All this said in tears, and ugh, I started to tear up too.

Turns out they had read a book in class about autism, as part of the discussion about differences in kids (because of the kids they're mainstreaming). When I got this information out of him, it led to a decent conversation about the testing he did last spring, at least. And I emailed the EC coordinator to let her know we have a critical self esteem issue developing. I'm hoping this story works in our favor during the referral for services meeting this Thursday.

If either of my kids are on the spectrum it's my DD5; it is what it is, but so painful to see him label himself inaccurately, with all his strengths thrown in there as "symptoms". I hope I'm making sense, and not coming across as "autism is bad,"
Typing on the phone is not the easiest!

Monica

This sounds similar to what my DD9 went through last year in school; the class went through an exercise that was supposed to teach kids that everybody had strengths and weaknesses, but it ended up sounding more like an exercise in labelling people. She was a little bothered by that ("I have trouble making friends"), but was more bothered later in the year when the very unsupportive teacher enlisted the school psychologist to label her even more thoroughly. After a lot of discussion with DD about why she wouldn't be able to go back to that school next year and why we weren't having luck getting her into another school (which was the very negative report prepared by said psychologist, with the help of said unsupportive teacher), I ultimately talked with her about it pretty directly and said, people think you have these disorders (in this case, ADD, AS, and OCD) because of the way you behave, including not listening to other people's words, and if you change those behaviors they will stop thinking those things about you. I'm not sure this was the best way to handle the situation, but in DD's case I think a lot of her behaviors are more consistent with the gifted 'side-effects' discussed for example in James Webb's Misdiagnosis book, and that she can if she chooses improve her behavior in a lot of ways so that she doesn't have so much trouble getting along with other kids and adults. Now she has just started in a new classroom with a (so far) wonderfully supportive teacher and we are hoping this year goes well. So I'm not sure this would work for your DS--it sounds like the only thing he really mentioned was dysgraphia, so maybe he would just need some accommodations there?? It's great that *he* recognizes he has strengths (and has your support!), so maybe if he can understand that everyone has different strengths and weaknesses he'll come around to not feeling bad about being different, and enjoy that he has some really cool strengths.

MON, those are good points. Thanks!

We've just started a trial of meds for ADD; he has even more to say about everything now. It's a bit unnerving, actually.

Dbat, thank you! I'm choosing to remain cautiously optimistic about getting supports in place to address his dysgraphia this year...the EC coordinator seems like she's on the ball. Here's hoping.

I agree with mon on this. Remember also that you know a lot more about what autism is (I'm guessing) than your child does - his information has either come solely from one discussion/book read in class or from what he's heard indirectly on tv/radio or from other friends. One day when autism was discussed in my ds' elementary class he came home, and with the assistance of his youngest sister, "diagnosed" my older dd with autism. If you look at the narrow scope of what he understood symptoms of autism to be, she fit that narrow range of symptoms (from a 9 year old's perspective :)). Kids are curious, kids hear things, kids made connections.

What I would definitely follow up on with your dd is what it is that's behind some of his feelings. It sounds like he's worried about his handwriting. I apologize for not being able to remember everyone's story but it sounds like he's already got a dysgraphia diagnosis (?). My dysgraphic ds did have a lot of struggles with self-esteem in early elementary due to the way his handwriting looked and the difficulty he had producing it. I think that it was really important that we not only talked to him about his feelings, but also did everything we could early on to get him typing (and other accommodations), plus making sure there were times during his school day that he was able to take advantage of his areas of strength. We actually didn't do anywhere near as good of a job at all of that as I wish we could have, but every little thing helps.

Hang in there,

polarbear

Thanks, polarbear :-) he does have a dysgraphia diagnosis. (I sent you a PM awhile back but I don't think you got it.) I'm so glad this forum is here. Hearing from folks who've BTDT is invaluable.

I'm so sorry that I missed your pm!!! I get busy and don't remember to check them - I'll take a look later today - really, I would have tried my best to reply - I'm so sorry about that!

pbear

Polarbear, no worries at all! I was feeling bad that you might not have seen it because I never replied to one of your (very encouraging) forum replies...

I'm hoping I have some good news to report after the meeting Thursday.

Monica

momosam, can you check in with the teacher for more clarity on what was in the book vs what was discussed in class? I wonder if part of what he might have been picking up on was just being different than a lot of his peers.

For the long term, I see a lot of positives here. Not only are they placing kids with disabilities into classes for part or all of the day, they are naming the disabilities and discussing them openly. For the long term, this can go a long ways to building compassion amongst all kids to honor differences. This will help your son as he works through his writing struggles pairs with his talents.

Geofizz, thank you for chiming in. All y'all are going to be a big help in maintaining what's left of my sanity ;-)

I do think it's great that these kids are included. It's one of the bigger schools in the district and I think all the system-level special ed is done here, so quite a few kids are bussed in from all over town. It is a great opportunity for us to talk about differences.

He got pretty upset last year when we told him he was colorblind! That took a lot of processing and discussion. I finally convinced him that it didn't ruin my brothers' lives ;-)

Monica

My son, who also has dysgraphia and an auditory processing disorder, was described by his psychiatrist as having "multiple Aspergers-like characteristics", although the psychiatrist said he was not comfortable calling it Aspergers.

A lot of these characteristics can be present without it being Autism. That being said, I'm beginning to understand that it is my job to make my son comfortable in his own skin and help him embrace his uniqueness while also teaching him what is acceptable behavior and what is not. So whatever label is stuck on it, recognizing that sometimes our behavior causes us problems in social circles is an excellent thing, because then we're more motivated to learn new ways of behaving or coping so that we don't have an undesirable effect.

Since your child is recognizing differences, maybe it is a good window to talk about how some of those differences are unique and some may need a bit of "tweaking".

I have learned to say things like:

I understand you're very interested in what you're doing, but ignoring a direct question from someone is considered rude. Please stop long enough to make eye contact and answer my question.

I can appreciate how excited you are about the new projects you are working on with your friends in Minecraft, but people like to have you listen to what they're interested in, too. So if I listen to this, you will need to listen to something I tell you about my day and make conversation about it, ok?

It is amazing how much better things have been - and how much he has started to be more attentive to other people's reactions. He's still blunt, will run on for hours about his interests, and has all the quirks that him "him", but not getting upset but just calmly pointing out what is happening and what is expected has done a lot!

Thanks, Lisa! He really seems fine, socially. We adults who want him to do things that aren't interesting see the ADD, but his classmates and other kids don't have issues with his behavior. He doesn't do monologues...sometimes I think it would be less exhausting if he did:-D still there are lots of areas with room for improvement.

Momosam, one day my autistic DS came home and asked if had Down's Syndrome. For the same reasons as your DS asked-- it was covered at school, he was thinking about self and others and disability and the rest of it. It was an odd conversation, but I was glad we had it.

I think frank discussion--early and often-- of all the varieties of human talent and disability is very useful, but even with frankness and support it doesn't all come into focus at once. It takes kids a lot of years to figure out who they are. That kids' abilities also change over time also adds to the complexity of their trying to figure themselves out...

DeeDee

Thanks, DeeDee--another great perspective. This is the best place for a reality check :-)