I guess the big reason why I am so "shy" about all the therapy and special ed and all is that I see DS respond so much better to me than anyone else!
Often a child with autism has one person (usually the mom) that they do this with. As Mum3 says, it's part of the deal with this diagnosis. Often it means that they've trained you to give them what's easy for them and doesn't stretch their capacities.
Yes, being in the special needs preschool would be hard for him. It's serious work to learn social skills for any preschooler, and for an autistic preschooler this is very difficult. But it also gives him the best shot at having the skills to do okay in school and life later.
Keeping the medium and long term in mind, you need him to develop flexibility that he doesn't yet have. Doing things that you don't feel like doing isn't just an unreasonable chore, it's part of life, and if he doesn't learn to do that when necessary he won't be employable.
My feeling is, no matter how much easier it would have been on my DS to keep him home, it was much better for him to be forced to be flexible. And as with the food stuff I described in my other post today, he learned what we taught him: he is so much more flexible now, which opens horizons for him that aren't possible for a person with rigid habits that feel like "needs" but are really just rigid habits. Adults who are not able to bend to the needs of others aren't very functional or pleasant: they often come across to others as spoiled, selfish, and petulant, even if there's a good reason why they're inflexible.
This may sound hard-hearted, but it's not. It's just a matter of getting over the hump toward something that's really going to make his life better over the long run. If we hadn't pushed DS10 to overcome his fear of the woods, he wouldn't be an accomplished hiker and camper today. If we hadn't insisted he eat a varied diet, he still wouldn't, and we'd hardly be able to eat out or travel. Autism can shrink a person's world; if through parenting choices we can expand it again, it makes a better life.
DS is signing up for sleepaway camp this summer and thinks he might miss us *a little*, but he knows he'll be fine. I'm really proud of him; he worked hard to get to this point.
DeeDee
