You've received excellent advice already - and all of us will have different perspectives on this. We told our 2e kids about their diagnoses as soon as we found out - but that's just us, our family, and we're dealing with a different set of diagnoses, although my 2e ds was dealing with severe anxiety at the time he was initially diagnosed 2e. FWIW, a few rambling thoughts for you that might not have been mentioned above:

1) When I have a question like this, I like to think ahead 10 or 20 years, and think through how my child will possibly feel knowing we knew about the diagnosis at a certain time but *didn't* tell him at that point. It might all be fine - your child might totally understand your reasons for having done so, but I had a concern that my child might instead feel like I'd withheld important information, and that weighed in my decision to be forthcoming about the diagnosis.

2) The diagnosis may be harder for you to process than for your child - for our kids, it was a relief. Not a happy thing at all, but definitely a relief. They understood that there wasn't something inherently *wrong* with them, and they were able to ask questions related to the diagnosis that helped them understand their differences in a logical way, rather than comparing their abilities to other neurotypical kids and coming up short in their own minds.

3) Our kids already felt different, so knowing their diagnosis didn't give them anything extra to stress over - they were already stressed. Having somewhere to look for answers actually eased their stress.

4) Your son is going to hear the word Asperbergers somewhere, sometime, most likely more than once. He might hear it in the context of someone referring to him - and if that happens, I would want to have been the first to have told him. It sounds like that's already happened with your ds, so the door's been opened and walked through - I'd think at this point in time the best thing to do is walk all the way through it with him, and help him by finding him books or looking up answers to questions about Asperbergers etc. He also might hear it in terms of just general things like a radio program or tv show or whatever, and he might find signs of commonality, things that ring familiar for him - those are good things! But he can start looking for and finding those things now with a full knowledge of what his diagnoses are.

5) I agree with the idea of emphasizing the strengths that come with a diagnosis, but I also see a very narrow line with respect to this - I am not sure I'll explain it well, but hopefully this will make sense. I'm going to frame it from a dyslexic's point of view (only because I have a dyslexic dd and a dysgraphic ds). There is a book called "The Gift of Dyslexia" as well as a lot of focus "out there" (Eides etc) on the strengths shared by dyslexic people. It's true that dyslexics tend to have strengths in certain areas, and it's important to recognize those strengths, but the reality is not all dyslexics view dyslexia as a "Gift", and for all the incredible areas of strength they may possess, it isn't easy *at all* to be dyslexic in our society. From my perspective, it is what it is, and you need to acknowledge both the challenges and the strengths. You'll probably find initially you'll need to *really* focus on the challenges and how to accommodate/remediate/etc - and that's really important to do, so that later on your child will be able to really live up to his full potential and enjoy his ability to pursue the areas he is strong in.

6) My kids also don't tend to think of themselves as "being" dyslexic/dysgraphic as much as they see themselves as "having" dyslexia/dysgraphia. They (and I) totally understand the idea that "having" makes it sound like a disease, and we've heard quite a bit of discussion about the "having" vs "being"... but they also don't see themselves as being defined by their challenges, hence they don't refer to themselves as "being" dyslexic/dysgraphic. I've heard them use both terms when they need to refer to it.

Last thing - as I mentioned above, my ds was *extremely* anxious when he was first diagnosed - so anxious he was having panic attacks, imaging bad people breaking into our house, afraid to go into his classroom at school, so anxious he was slipping into a clinical depression. Having the words to put to his diagnosis and seeing that the adults he trusted (primarily his parents at that point) immediately started making a few changes happen for him at home and at school based on that diagnosis helped ease his anxiety tremendously. At 10 years old, I'm guessing your ds has enough personal insight that he can help be a part of thinking through - how to accommodate "x" so that I feel better, or something else works better in my life, etc.... so being able to discuss his diagnoses with him might actually be a very helpful part of the process of working toward accommodations that are successful.

I'm also sending you and your ds a huge virtual hug. I hope that as you learn more about his challenges and help him with accommodations his anxiety will ease a bit -

Best wishes,

polarbear