I'm bookmarking this for interest, the whole article is not long and my mum will probably take an interest. Quoting the best bits.
Is autism just the new ADHD? - SmartPlanet:
"The real lesson here is we need to pay closer attention to individual children, as a society. Each one is unique, with unique strengths and weaknesses. Lumping them into groups, treating them as piles of identical symptom sets, does no one any good.
Autism may indeed be the new ADHD, the label du jour we need to give a kid the attention they deserve."
Thursday 3 December 2009
Conversation. Kinda.
There is strong likelihood that as he passes through various diagnostic assessments that things I record here will help build a fuller picture for the teams assessing him. So I'm going to start carefully recording the communication I have with him. The Tokoroth will ask for food and drink. He is now 38 months old. This is what passes for a conversation:
"Do you want a drink?"
"Apple Juice, please."
"Here you are. Say 'thank you'"
"Straw!"
"You would like a straw?"
"Oh, yes please."
"What colour straw would you like?"
"I would like a yellow straw."
"Here you are. Say 'thank you'"
*Slurp*
I'll ask another question, something like "what do you want to do today?" and might, possibly get a single answer ("go Grandma's house") but mostly we'll wait a while in silence before Little M will remind me: "he doesn't really speak, Dad".
As worried as I have become though, mostly about his social future, something about his quiet reserved, observant brightness makes me feel less like he is impaired and more that I am, that I am asking questions that are beneath him, insulting almost. Maybe I should dig out that troublesome quadratic equation after all...
"Do you want a drink?"
"Apple Juice, please."
"Here you are. Say 'thank you'"
"Straw!"
"You would like a straw?"
"Oh, yes please."
"What colour straw would you like?"
"I would like a yellow straw."
"Here you are. Say 'thank you'"
*Slurp*
I'll ask another question, something like "what do you want to do today?" and might, possibly get a single answer ("go Grandma's house") but mostly we'll wait a while in silence before Little M will remind me: "he doesn't really speak, Dad".
As worried as I have become though, mostly about his social future, something about his quiet reserved, observant brightness makes me feel less like he is impaired and more that I am, that I am asking questions that are beneath him, insulting almost. Maybe I should dig out that troublesome quadratic equation after all...
Wednesday 2 December 2009
I always wanted a dog.
I like dogs. I always always wanted a dog as a child. My Dad had them but I didn't live with him. I had proper imaginary dogs until I was about 11 years old.
Spending a week hanging out and playing with The Tokoroth I realised how many similarities there were with having a pet dog. You play with a dog, you feed a dog, you walk a dog, you get nervous when it is walking by the road without a lead (note to Childline: he doesn't really have a lead), it makes a mess, you toilet train it, it comes in from outside and makes muddy prints before you rugby tackle it to the ground and so on. Yeah, The Tokoroth is just like a pet dog. Where it should be different is the communication. I mean most dogs, even the crazy ones will come if you call it.
Tokoroth does not come when you call his name. If you walked up to him and said his name he's most likely not to look up or acknowledge you. He's not deaf though. If you whispered "chocolate" while you were in the kitchen and he was in the office with the computer on full volume, he'd hear and he'd be there.
Selective hearing, just like a dog. You tell a dog there's a bone, he's there. You tell that dog not to take the bone on the sofa, all of a sudden he's a deaf dog.
You can talk to dogs, you can tell them about your day and they will listen, sometimes attentively and sometimes a bit distractedly as they bait the cat or play with a toy and, well, I think you can see where I'm going with this. So far, so analagous.
The problem occurs when you want feedback. You know? Those times you curly up with your favourite labrador and explain this quadratic equation you are having problems with (you don't?!) and they just look a bit blank. In fact you can explain or tell them anything and they'll happily listen, even look like they understand but they just won't help you solve it.
Here's an example. I spent part of tonight reading a story (George's Marvelous Medicine, Ronald Dahl, if you were interested) to Little M and Tokoroth. Little M pitched in, asked questions and clamoured to see any pictures. Tokoroth lay there looking somewhere between me and the ceiling neither engaged nor disengaged. Just quiet. I stopped reading and spoke to Tokoroth.
"How was your day?" He cocked his head, glanced at me.
"Did you go to school?" No response (he was at nursery).
"Did you see your friends?" No response.
"Did you see Grandma?" No response.
"What would you like for breakfast tomorrow?" No response.
I applied a control question:"Would you like a cup of water?" He replied to this "Oh, yes please!" in his curiously squeaky little voice.
Nothing wrong with his hearing. I've no idea if he understood all of the questions I asked, or not, or only answers the questions he wants to. Possibly a combination of both.
I'll spare anyone reading the science behind this but it's a classic impairment not just of speech, and of an ability to communicate but also to understand my desire for him to answer. Never mind though, he's curled up at the end of the bed making snuffly noises.
I always wanted a dog, right? :)
Spending a week hanging out and playing with The Tokoroth I realised how many similarities there were with having a pet dog. You play with a dog, you feed a dog, you walk a dog, you get nervous when it is walking by the road without a lead (note to Childline: he doesn't really have a lead), it makes a mess, you toilet train it, it comes in from outside and makes muddy prints before you rugby tackle it to the ground and so on. Yeah, The Tokoroth is just like a pet dog. Where it should be different is the communication. I mean most dogs, even the crazy ones will come if you call it.
Tokoroth does not come when you call his name. If you walked up to him and said his name he's most likely not to look up or acknowledge you. He's not deaf though. If you whispered "chocolate" while you were in the kitchen and he was in the office with the computer on full volume, he'd hear and he'd be there.
Selective hearing, just like a dog. You tell a dog there's a bone, he's there. You tell that dog not to take the bone on the sofa, all of a sudden he's a deaf dog.
You can talk to dogs, you can tell them about your day and they will listen, sometimes attentively and sometimes a bit distractedly as they bait the cat or play with a toy and, well, I think you can see where I'm going with this. So far, so analagous.
The problem occurs when you want feedback. You know? Those times you curly up with your favourite labrador and explain this quadratic equation you are having problems with (you don't?!) and they just look a bit blank. In fact you can explain or tell them anything and they'll happily listen, even look like they understand but they just won't help you solve it.
Here's an example. I spent part of tonight reading a story (George's Marvelous Medicine, Ronald Dahl, if you were interested) to Little M and Tokoroth. Little M pitched in, asked questions and clamoured to see any pictures. Tokoroth lay there looking somewhere between me and the ceiling neither engaged nor disengaged. Just quiet. I stopped reading and spoke to Tokoroth.
"How was your day?" He cocked his head, glanced at me.
"Did you go to school?" No response (he was at nursery).
"Did you see your friends?" No response.
"Did you see Grandma?" No response.
"What would you like for breakfast tomorrow?" No response.
I applied a control question:"Would you like a cup of water?" He replied to this "Oh, yes please!" in his curiously squeaky little voice.
Nothing wrong with his hearing. I've no idea if he understood all of the questions I asked, or not, or only answers the questions he wants to. Possibly a combination of both.
I'll spare anyone reading the science behind this but it's a classic impairment not just of speech, and of an ability to communicate but also to understand my desire for him to answer. Never mind though, he's curled up at the end of the bed making snuffly noises.
I always wanted a dog, right? :)
/End Hiatus
Why haven't I written anything for ages? Good question. I set a bit of a precedent with the Space Shuttle post and sometimes I think I should just delete everything but that post and be done. That's what happens when your OCD and ADHD have a fight with your ASD (actually I'm probably, if anything, BAP but more on that later).
Lot's of things have stopped me writing. Mostly fear. Fear of the known and fear of the unknown. I have gone through a strange period of denial where I have started to think, or blindly hope, that The Tokoroth does not have anything wrong with him. This is because as a parent I have to consider a number of possible outcomes about the severity of his disorder. No matter which way the dice rolls it's likely he's going to end up with a Statement of Special Needs. At best he'll be a in a regular school but he'll be 'different'. Different kids get bullied. Fact. Autistic kids get bullied. Fact. Some of them can't even verbalise this enough to tell their parents or carers. All of a sudden I'm sad and scared.
This kid is beautiful, I love him, he's my son. If someone bullies him they really aren't going to want to meet me, even on a good day. But we aren't there yet. It might not happen. He might not even have a disorder, right? Hmmm.
The reason for radio silence for a while was because 'Mum' was away for a week in Barbados and I had a week off work looking after Home and Rugrats. In this time I spent a lot of one on one time with Tokoroth and built-up the strongest relationship I have had with him. In so many ways he is bright and funny that I started to do a "Oh yes he is, Oh no he isn't" dance in my head, one day thinking he was off the chart autistic and the next thinking he was absolutely-fine-just-a-bit-of-a-late-developer.
In fact if you use a Homer Simpson voice and say "he is, no he isn't, autistic, not autistic, yes he is, no he isn't, oh look a dog with two tails, wheeee!" you've pretty much nailed my current mental state.
Lot's of things have stopped me writing. Mostly fear. Fear of the known and fear of the unknown. I have gone through a strange period of denial where I have started to think, or blindly hope, that The Tokoroth does not have anything wrong with him. This is because as a parent I have to consider a number of possible outcomes about the severity of his disorder. No matter which way the dice rolls it's likely he's going to end up with a Statement of Special Needs. At best he'll be a in a regular school but he'll be 'different'. Different kids get bullied. Fact. Autistic kids get bullied. Fact. Some of them can't even verbalise this enough to tell their parents or carers. All of a sudden I'm sad and scared.
This kid is beautiful, I love him, he's my son. If someone bullies him they really aren't going to want to meet me, even on a good day. But we aren't there yet. It might not happen. He might not even have a disorder, right? Hmmm.
The reason for radio silence for a while was because 'Mum' was away for a week in Barbados and I had a week off work looking after Home and Rugrats. In this time I spent a lot of one on one time with Tokoroth and built-up the strongest relationship I have had with him. In so many ways he is bright and funny that I started to do a "Oh yes he is, Oh no he isn't" dance in my head, one day thinking he was off the chart autistic and the next thinking he was absolutely-fine-just-a-bit-of-a-late-developer.
In fact if you use a Homer Simpson voice and say "he is, no he isn't, autistic, not autistic, yes he is, no he isn't, oh look a dog with two tails, wheeee!" you've pretty much nailed my current mental state.
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