Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional new to forum, 2E thoughts ramblings

i only recently learned about 2E.
just found this forum.
i'm wondering- how accurate are these tests (SB &Weschler?) (spelling) for kids with autism?

i know that my ds5 w/ HFA - when he was being officially dx @ age 34mos, they did some type of test but it showed just avg IQ, at time i didn't care 1hoot about his IQ, i was stuck on official dx of autism. but i recall that the dr said that most likely his IQ was much higher but b/c he was mostly still nonverbal, at the time, and basically just seemed to stare blankly @ dr., there just didn't seem to be anyway to really know for sure- but she sensed his brightness. and she observed it in play. etcetc

my son is not at all hyper, overexcited etc, he is very calm. he is passive to the point it can be scary (he has been hit by a bully and he stood there allowing himself to be hit! and then he never said a word about it- instead he seemed to look like he was in shock, i am the one saw it and stopped the older boy from punching my child in the chest repeatedly while that kids dad looked on!)

the local schl district, went on to also confirm this dx with their own testing. however, in this mtg he was much more animated, and verbal even- he was able to participate more fully, i think they had questions/concerns re Dx, b/c he never reached any ceilings in many areas and i demanded they stop anyways b/c he had been testing for nearly 3hrs and was just then 35mos.
because of outward signs they went ahead w/ dx aut. they said his receptive and coding was off the charts. they told me he could read. (i knew this prior). i didn't know what coding meant. i am learning more now from this forum. i was never given any #s. nothing in fact from lausd re this test. just the dx.

now years later- he shows many signs if not all signs of being gifted. he hasn't been tested. but it is obvious. he must be, and he uses this intelligience to pull himself out of his autism. if that makes sense. at times i wonder if he was free of the aut, if he would be like some amazing child prodigy.
(ok that's a moms wistful wondering- and not sure i'd want a prodigy anyhow--they come with their own set of issues!)

does a test really matter? what i think really matters is that my son now has a more solid chance to make it in a world not ideal or maybe ready for kids/adults like him...

THAT SAID oops. he is completely bored in kinder. he can't be tested till age 6.9yrs so we've got about 10mos to go. he has been verified to be gifted for what this worth. oh--- he COULD be tested now of course! but I don't have the $$$ for it. so yes, will need to wait on schl district.

i'm not sure what the point of this post? if any, is?
i just felt like posting...
maybe i am wondering about other autistic kids who are gifted and how has that impacted their lives? has that made a difference w/ their autism specifically?
(and yes i KNOW it is spectrum disorder w/ HUGE range s/sx...
thanks in advance

I have a similar story! My son was diagnosed with autism at age 2.5 and the testing indicated average IQ. I didn't really care about that at the time (like you!) and was in fact happy to hear he was not retarded! Fast forward 3 years and the school did another set of testing and informed us he was in fact gifted. (It was one of the few 100% positive meetings we had had with the school...they were so proud...) Then when he was 7, the school did more testing and we found out he was extremely gifted. We contacted Davidson because, like you, had never heard of 2e. He became a young scholar and we hoped Davidson could be a help in our roller coaster journey.

As for autism affecting his giftedness, I see that as mostly positive. He thinks outside he box (or the polydodecahedron as one teacher said) which will serve him well in the future. He has had lots of therapies and we can compare notes if you'd like. Right now he is in 4th grade in a gifted school.

Welcome to the forum cc6 - you'll find good advice here. I can't help with the autism questions as my 2e kiddos have other types of challenges, but fwiw, if you are looking for further (private) testing, some of us here have been able to have neuropsych evaluations covered by our medical insurance - in our ds and dd's case, both were dealing with anxiety and the neuropsych was recommended by our ped to determine if there were causes for the anxiety (and there were, related to disabilities that impacted their ability to function at school). I also wonder if your ds has been evaluated by a developmental pediatrician at some point? That also would most likely be covered by medical insurance, and my understanding (from our ped) is that is the route that most families pursue here when there is a question of a potential autism diagnosis.

Even though they are potentially very expensive, I've found in our own family's journey, that having the private evaluations was extremely helpful in understanding our children's needs.

Re is your child gifted or not, I've found testing to be helpful in providing data that helps me understand my childrens' areas of challenge as well as areas of strength, and as they've gotten older it's been really important to be able to help focus on areas of strength in addition to accommodating and remediating and dealing with coping with challenges. OTOH, I've probably learned more about their strengths simply by getting to know them well, by being closely involved in their schoolwork, by watching closely as they navigate homework, group play, life in general etc than I have learned through testing - so if you can't get further testing for awhile, and if you don't need it right away for advocating or getting into a specific program, I wouldn't worry about testing and instead just spend time working with your child

Best wishes,

polarbear

ps - forgot to add - doing what you're doing here - asking for advice from other parents, has also been *extremely* helpful to me over the years

My 2e DS6.5-yr-old was tested with the WPPSI (Weschler) last summer when he 5. Neuropsych gave us a diagnosis of ADHD, Asperger's and anxiety disorder. She also couldn't say whether DS was gifted because the scores were inconsistent and scattered. However, DS had been in a private gifted school where he went through pre-k/k/1st grade in 2 1/2 months and we were told that he was possibly pg/eg. So we knew he didn't cooperate with the test or tester and that there was something going on.

In June/July, we saw a 2e expert and she dismissed the Asperger's diagnosis. Since August, my DS has been in neurofeedback (based on discussions with the 2e expert) - and I've found ADHD, and anxiety disorder were misdiagnoses too! And, yes, neurofeedback can cost $$$ - but it's been well worth sorting out the misdiagnoses.

In our case, it's pretty definitive from neurofeedback that my son never had ADHD, but since clinical psychologists are basing diagnoses off paper-pen tests, child's prior history, and observing a child's behavior rather than actual brain wave activity - then it's perhaps not surprising my son was misdiagnosed. I'm now in a position of actually informing the 2e expert on her misdiagnosis of ADHD since my son never had ADHD based on his actual brain waves which I've seen from his neurofeedback sessions!

I wish we had a taken a more direct route on treating my son or could give you an answer to help you. I can't say whether your son is misdiagnosed or not, but I can say that I knew as a parent that my son was being misdiagnosed and I stuck to my gut instincts and pursued any avenue possible. I'd also suggest reading as much as you possibly can and trying to form your own opinion, theory on what's going on with your son - even though others may dispute this method; It worked for me.

As a parent, you are legally entitled to testing through the public school system every two years, I think. I got my son tested that way and luckily it was the Woodcock Johnson test. You have to put such a request in writing, but it's something to bear in mind and remember what your legal rights are.

They are not necessarily accurate, especially if the person's language skills are heavily affected. Sometimes the Raven IQ test is given as a way to bypass that problem.

Our neuropsychologist told me that he usually sees IQ scores go up and become more coherent (less spiky) when autism is remediated through behavior therapy.


The test matters because it is a valuable way to know what's going on with the child, and how to educate him. It also gives you a benchmark to measure change over time. In our DS's case, we saw IQ go up over time as we worked on his autistic challenges; that told us, among other things, that what we were doing was working.


In the early elementary years, I would say the autism was a bigger factor for DS than the giftedness; now I would say they are both equally important in determining what he needs.

DeeDee

thanks all of you, this is very helpful information

cdfox i am not very familiar with neurofeedback but will look into it. i tend not to follow the more common approach to autism treatment, though my son is now in "social therapy" for 10hrs/wk...

and re my son ASD dx? aside from the dr testing him and observing him etc, and giving him the dx, i knew before that something was wrong...i think a parent "knows" just as you knew your child didn't have it. (good for you for follwoing up on that as well!)
so YES he does have autism. he now no longer shows outward signs of it... but it is there nonetheless...

ha! that said---- when he was less than 12mos, he hit his head 2times hard, he seemed fine both times and dr poo-poo'd it when i suggested it was possibly much more serious than we had thought, and perhaps he had suffered a type of brain injury (of course the ped didn't think there ever was a thing wrong with him, evenwhen he lost his ability to communicate!). and later as i did my research i learned of actual babies having strokes. everyone probably thought i was nutZ but even now- sometimes i wonder!

his voice before autism happened, was just a normal little voice, but i somehow barely recall it anymore, instead- i can and will never forget the last words he said at 12mos,
letting me know his baby einstein video was done playing..."all done" and said just like how an adult who is recovering from a stroke might speak, sorta low sound, garbled and gurgly and then silence. he looked like he was in shock and he tried to say it again and just this gurgly sound came out... he didn't speak again till nearly 3+ except for when he would read a word aloud around 2 1/2 ie "sun"... his speech therapist even once likened the therapy approach to the same as teaching an adult who is recovering from stroke!

we even briefly discussed selective mutism. but why would he have that? and their were the other signs ie lining up stuff etc

well. anyhow, speech therapy- it worked. he is an amazing talker now, but just needs help with pragmatics, he is still needing to learn how to and feel comfortable, with asserting himself. unless he is off rescuing some kid who is about to break a rule and get hurt, or 2kids being mean to each other-- he is not assertive at all. it's funny how that works huh?

well thanks again. and yes, i agree, knowing his strengths and weaknesses would be a very valuable tool to have. i am going to look into getting him tested as soon as i can.

one other thing, i meant that i attribute the strength of his mind to being what has helped him to overcome his autism. an example is when he was younger and he had an outward sign, well i told him to stop, it made him stand out, and made him look odd, and made ppl especially other kids- to avoid him. (i said this in a gentle way w/o hurting his self esteem etc), he was able to acknowledge this and stated understanding and you could see him work at NOT doing the motion or whatever, and a gentle reminder here and there and then nothing...

when i think of my son, i don't see autism. i never did yet yes i did, but i sorta saw thru it or past it or whatever- i just saw this amazing sweet child. yes i wondered the what if's but i can't imagine my son being any different than how he is. i'm glad he has autism. i think it brings something amazing to him, for him.... the profound statements he has made that seem too wise for his age, the way his mind works? i would never change it. it is who he is.

i know some parents aren't happy with the term recovery from autism, but i would have to say that indeed for my son, that is what we have experienced. he is indeed recvering if infact not nearly completely recovered. i hesitate to say complete recovered myself just because i think the autism is always lurking? if that makes sense.


i've read everything could get my "eyes" on re autism.
and now i am reading as time allows, everything re being gifted and 2E

thanks again

We sort of went the other way around, in that dd (who is 14 now) was diagnosed as profoundly gifted before she was officially stamped autistic. (She'd had several docs kind of scratch their heads and say "well, that kid ain't right", and pass on offering a concrete opinion. One would think the 50 point verbal suppression in her IQ testing might have been a clue, but...well, I digress.) In any case, for awhile we joked that her official diagnosis was "That Kid Ain't Right" syndrome. I think she was nearly eight before it got refined to Asperger's.
The thing I've noticed with developmental delays-- and ASDs can be characterized by delays rather than deficits in a lot of areas-- is that eventually, there is a certain amount of catching up/compensating/learning to "pass", and it looks a lot like "recovery". We've gone through long periods when I think dd was misdiagnosed, that she's just a kind of weird kid with a hefty side of "teenaged girl". And then we have a week like the one we've just had, wherein it is startlingly clear that I have given birth to the poster child for 2e. So my caveat is, much as it's tempting, don't break out the champagne just yet.

Bingo. My DS then 7, ADHD-combined, possibly spectrum, with a language processing disorder, bombed the Weschler (as in, the kid who could play chess at 6 and was doing fractions and negative numbers in grade one and who was starting to read at 3 etc etc etc, tested from "solidly average" to "well below average").

The psychologist was mystified, said several times "this isn't right" and "take it with a grain of salt" and "test him again in two years."

She wrote in the report that "due to his difficulty with sustained attention" and "language processing difficulties" that the results were "not reflective of his actual cognitive ability."

(sheesh. can we have our money back?)

She said that for each 2 hour session she could only get about 45 minutes of attention from him, and that basically everything was kind of suppressed. "He was really difficult to test."

Do I regret it? yes/no/maybe so ...I think I do regret it, especially since the school is after me for more testing (he's never had an ADOS, for example).

Anyway, are tests accurate? Sometimes, sometimes not.

eldertree, thanks for the great post, you made me smile-
i had to laugh lol i do not even like champagne hahaa so no worry about breaking that out. ever.

in all seriousness, i totally get what you are saying
that's exactly what i was trying to say-- that he has compensated for the autism
i know this is most probably directly b/c of his high intelligience.
and i am very thankful for that. for whatever it is.
but yes he will always BE autistic and i'm completely cool with it. again, i wouldn't take it away from him, it is him.
**not to be confused with the fact- i would never WANT this for my child or any child!! but it is what it is. i try to focus on the positive.

i would take away the gut issues though!!

there is a direct correlation between his gluten/cassein intake and his spaciness. he can have gluten no problem.
if he then has too much of the cassein- you can actually see him going off into an almost drug induced state. he's like spacey and just plain weird in an annoying way. *to the casual observer he seems like typical kid just playing but it is much more, as he can be "unreachable" at these moments. ((does any other child act this way? after consume the 2?))

and yes i would definitely take away the social difficulties he continues to experience on a daily basis--- whether it is because it is 100' @school, and he can't remove his jacket because the zipper is stuck- and he "forgets" (as he says) to ask for help, so he wears it all day (you'd think when you see a kid w/ a jacket on and it is 100+ and kid is visibly sweating/flushed etc--that the teacher would suggest he remove it right?)

but even considering all that and where he was? yes he is most definitely recovering, recovery is not in my mind the same as healed or no longer there.
an alcoholic can recover, hence recovering alcoholic, they may be off the booze but they are still an alcoholic. they will always be in recovery. but with the right choices they can stay sober.

anyways, happy weekend everyone
it's beautiful here on the west coast!!
it is breezy and only hitting low 90s, love it!