Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional 504/empathy -longish

Aaaah, I just want to hug every last one of you. Thanks for all the ideas and support. I will let you all know what we discover about DD.
BTW - DD so sweetly wanted to walk with me tonight after dinner. She reached for my hand as we walked out the door. We meandered down the trail and saw 3 bunnies nibbling in the grass.

Sending lots of hugs, greenlotus! We all want nothing more than to make our kids happy and see them thrive, and it can be so hard to see the obstacle pile in front of them seem to just keep growing. Labels, however - even if just in our own heads - can actually be a powerful reducer of obstacles if used constructively.

As it turns out, my own DS seems to be slowly but steadily outgrowing a lot of ASD-ish characteristics over the last year. However, as eco and others suggest, looking at his challenging behaviours through an ASD lens has been really helpful. Whether he is technically diagnosable or not, the behaviours were there and he needed help. I had to put a lot of effort into making myself explicitly respond to many more things as "can't", not "won't". And then react with "how I I teach him how to do this, and support him in the meantime?" rather than seeing behaviour as deliberate and therefore requiring discipline - or just the dreaded You Must Try Harder.

It really, really changed the way I see things, and therefore the way I respond to what can look like - but actually isn't - rudeness, defiance, ignoring me and other not-OK behaviours. And it's made a huge difference - in my sanity, as well as in my ability to help DS grow. Using an ASD lens and starting with a default assumption of "can't" not "won't" has also been quite helpful with a variety of DD9 challenges (and actually rather illuminating with DH - though he seems less likely to be growing out of any of it ).

On a different note, I have two kids with some notable social challenges (apple? tree? eep). DS is extremely shy, socially anxious, but seriously extroverted - he always wants other kids around (if if he doesn't quite know what to do with them). DD, in contrast, is not even slightly shy, will happily start up a conversation with complete strangers, eagerly visits anyone, anywhere - but is deeply introverted, exhausted by people, and needs major recharge time. While we tend to equate introverted with shy, I am really learning how big the difference is!

So what if a kid has an advanced sense of humor and thinks things that are absurd are hilarious? Enjoys sarcasm? Makes up jokes (which adults would think are stupid jokes but probably advanced for his age). Would that be impossible or unlikely if there is ASD? DS seems very advanced w/ his humor and loved books like Captain Underpants when he was only 5 or 6. He giggled all the way through Monte Python. Other kids who are 9 years old probably wouldn't get it at all. But other things about him scream out ASD, like his poor eye contact, awkward conversations w/ peers, etc. Part of what makes him come across as awkward, though, is his unusual voice prosody, but he was just diagnosed with verbal dyspraxia which would explain it.

blackcat- age peers can be scary for a gifted kid, especially if they don't get your sense of humor. Nothing like hearing crickets when you are telling a joke you find hilarious. So poor eye contact and awkward conversations with peers might be related to that.

His eye contact isn't great even w/ us. He makes good eye contact when he is listening to someone talk but when he talks he tends to make eye contact for only a couple seconds at a time.

But yes, he has mentioned that the kids in his class don't understand his jokes. He knows not to talk about certain subjects (like history) because they don't care and don't get it. On the one hand I'm glad he's no longer babbling about topics that no one else cares about, but on the other hand it makes me sad.

I'm pretty sure the teachers in the school all think he has Aspergers or something similar, just because of the more superficial characteristics like his voice, eye contact, how he says he has no friends, etc. I wish we could just rule it out once and for all rather than people wondering about it if that's not actually the issue.

blackcat have you read 8 Keys to Raising the Quirky Child? Someone else recommended it to me a while ago and it really helped me with regard to my DS...

My DS is hands down hilarious. His humor is his social language. I wouldn't discount an ASD possibility in a highly verbally gifted kid.

I agree with eco, my ASD son is hilarious. He was reading Captain Underpants at 4, and appropriately using the humor from it. (I will never forget him walking into the kitchen and saying, "Hey, Mom, what's 50 feet long and smells like pee?")

If you want to rule it out once and for all, get an evaluation from a respected autism expert. If he says it's not autism, make sure that his teachers know he has been evaluated and the expert says it's not autism. Our health insurance covered this with nothing but an office visit copay.

I wouldn't assume the teachers are wondering if he has Aspergers - but I wouldn't be surprised if the teachers don't understand what's up with him. As you probably already are aware of, there are quite a few overlaps in symptoms/behaviors between autism and dyspraxia. If *you're* wondering if he has Aspergers, then I'd suggest having him evaluated and dig into it - to answer your questions. If you're worried that his teachers think he's got something going on (Aspergers or whatever), the thing that's most likely needed there is education - give them information on what dyspraxia is and how it impacts your ds.

While poor eye contact and difficulty with communication with peers *might* be associated with ASD, they might also result from communication challenges associated with dyspraxia. If you've got questions yourself re which is it, I'd probably start back with the professionals who diagnosed dyspraxia and get a good understanding of why he has the dyspraxia diagnosis. Then if you're not convinced that dyspraxia explains his challenges, pursue an ASD evaluation.

Best wishes,

polarbear

ps - if he was diagnosed with verbal dyspraxia by an SLP rather than through a more global neuropsych type of eval, then a further eval may be useful. Dyspraxia can manifest in many different ways, and collections of symptoms/behaviors can vary tremendously among dyspraxic individuals.

We took him to a university neuropsych when he was six and he said autism was unlikely. His pragmatic language was good, the "Theory of Mind" test was good, and the parent/teacher rating scales were in the normal range for the most part, with some elevations (but nothing that would make a diagnosis clear cut). Neuropsych diagnosed him w/ DCD. He also had some informal autism evals when he was younger (a toddler and then again when he was three) and both times, we were told that autism was unlikely.

DS doesn't have any big sensory issues, except that he can't stand it when people chew gum. He used to flap his hands when he was excited. He has never had any repetitive behavior like lining things up, or obsessions with things. He loved things like carseat buckles and was fascinated with them, but if someone took the carseat away it wasn't a big deal to him. He does not have a lot of anxiety and has never had a real temper tantrum because he doesn't get upset enough. But he does come across as awkward. Sometimes silly when he shouldn't be, or doesn't continue conversations w/ people if he's not really interested in the topic.

I guess I don't really understand how a child with autism could have a good sense of humor if one of the main characteristics of autism is that they take things literally and have a literal use of language. Can someone please explain? I think that in an older child or adult, they could learn to understand puns and whatnot over time, but in a young child, you wouldn't expect them to actually be advanced in this if they have autism. Or at least I wouldn't.h

polarbear, you are right. There seems to be quite a bit of overlap and I did just give the school some articles. It turns out no one had really read the info in his file, for instance the neuropsych report, and I kept feeling like they were hinting at autism.