Autism - It's Hit My Home.

This thread is regarding a member's son who has been diagnosed with autism, and what positive action can be taken by the OP regarding his son's condition.

It is not, I repeat not about the speculation about how or why the autism occurred. Henceforth, such postings in this thread will be regarded as "off topic" and be removed, with a penalty to the offending poster.

Mod Note: Post On Topic – Please Review This Link.

lombozo

One of my close friends (he also is a transport nurse specialist in my department) has a son with Autism. They have been very agressive with therapy at home and the county that he lives in has been great with providing resources etc. Thier son has made huge progress because of this and in two years he is a totaly differnt child as far as I am concerned.

Some thoughs (many have been expressed)

Identify whatever resources your locality can provide for you. This will be a huge help. My friends son recieved speech threapy at home and the county even provided babysitting service so they could get out and take a break now and then.

Find support groups both on the internet as well as non virtual ones. Its nice to be able to sit and talk to someone who understands what you are going through and you can pick up knowledge and stay current with all the treatment options.

Medical help is indepensable but not flawless. If you are not happy with what a medical person is telling you, get a second opinion. Any medical person worth his or her salt will not be offended and if they are, perhaps its best to seek help elsewhere anyway.

If medications are being mentioned, make sure the person prescribing them has experience in dealing with Autism spectrum disorders. A family practice MD may not.

I have been working with children for decades now, both before I became a nurse and after and one thing has remained constant. many of the limitations placed on the children come from thier parents and not the child. As a parent you get to make a huge difference in your childs life.

Lastly, I cannot express how dissapointed I am that many would try to turn this thread into yet another vaccine discussion. You are free to debate that topic in any of the numerous and exhauxstive existing threads :shk:

My partners 8 yr old son was diagnosed aspergers about 18months ago . We initially went insane looking for stuff to help us 'deal' with what emotions flood his personality so much that everything seems like an extreme . A slight surprise and he'll throw himself to the floor in a dramatic expression of shock , loud noises take a lot of getting used to , a harsh sense of injustice at liars/cheats at school who don't get caught . I could fill the rest of this thread with examples . He still attends mainstream school , does no extra coaching or tuition , flies high a LOT , and does kick boxing twice a week . We have found that if , when he's having trouble withh a situation , we make him take a step back from it , explain what is happenning and if its put in plain English he is smart enough to follow our reasoning as to why the situation is not such a big deal .

Sorry for heavy text .

Example - He sprained his ankle at school and the nurse said she was going to put one of those sports support bandages , the stretchy ones , on his leg , but it had to be rolled up or it would 'cut his circulation off' - a few seconds of panic followed as he frantically searched for where his circulation would be amputated from . But once explained - how the heart pumps blood around the body in a circular motion and that a tight bandage might stop the flow , there was no prob .

Lombozo , if you want to chat about anything , share experiences/solutions pm me and I'll get my good lady to reply. Above all , we think its just a label , and that everyone is just wired differently . The 'normal' people have to label everything that's not like them .

My 10 yr old son has Aspergers syndrome, or high functioning autism, so i completely understand what your feeling right now.
Every day is a challenge, his condition evolves frequently so just when I think i have him all figured out it all changes! I love my son very much, but to be brutally honest i sometimes find it very hard to like him. I feel terrible for saying that. He doesnt feel comfortable with physical contact and will dig his chin in my shoulder if i try to cuddle him which upsets me. He doesnt seem to hear whats being said unless he is facing you, although he rarely makes eye contact. He doesnt show emotion even when someone close dies, although he can become violent and self harm when he is feeling stressed and anxious. Recently he has developed obsessive compusive disorder(among other things) so washes his hands and toys over and over again. I could write pages of the difficulties we have had but i would rather focus on the positives.

My son is an amazing, intelligent, creative, sensitive soul who people cant help being drawn to. He lights up the room when he enters it. I feel so proud of his achievements and the progress he has made. When he chooses to talk the knowledge he has would put many adults to shame!

Now your son has been diagnosed you should hopefully get some help and support, his condition can be managed quite well. In time the good days will outweigh the bad and your shock will subside. Your little boy will be fine because you love him and his "eccentricities" will be just that: quirks and not a lable of autism. Your absolutely right when you say your sons brain is wired differently, thats exactly how i explain autism too. He just sees the world differently to you and i. Your son is still the same little fellow he was before he just needs a bit more help and understanding thats all.
Its taken me a long time to come to terms with my sons AS and to stop asking 'why me?' Im at a place now where I love and accept him just the way he his and I wouldnt change him for the world.
I wish you luck as you have a lot of challenges ahead but you can overcome them. Parenting is the hardest job but its also the most rewarding. Your son is worth it!

xtr3m3paranoia, as well as many others here.
Wow! I am actually misty eyed as I write this reply.
BTW thanks mirthful - I appreciate, more than you know, your intervention.
I must say that my sons condition is not my "dirty little secret". I am not embarrased, or ashamed in any way WHATSOEVER. He is my son, my blood, and literally my best friend.
For those who've asked more about him, perhaps asking about symptoms, here goes.

He is extremely focused on several things. Vacuum cleaners being one. At 2 years of age, he could tell you everything about every vacuum there was. Although not yet able to read he could tell you the name of a particular vacuum if you showed him the logo. Although he loves vacuums, he will cover his ears and scream if you turn one on. Hypersensitivity to sound.
Music. Oh man is he gifted. I play guitar (not very well) and was a lead singer in a popular local band for many years as a younger man. Literally, when we have the radio on (all the time) he can tell you what song is coming on with less than one second of it playing. It's eery. From Jimi Hendrix (my personal hero), to Nickleback, to Frank Sinatra, to Carrie Underwood, and EVERYONE in between - he KNOWS them! I'm trying to teach him guitar, and piano, but his motor skills are lacking. He has a little microphone, and the boy can sing! Not always, well not usually on key, but he knows the words, often times after hearing it just once.
He's very clumsy. He can walk and run, but it is more than obvious that he's different.
He needs to smell everything. For whatever reason he attaches the smell (and I mean of everything) of things to whatever he will consider likable, and non likable.
He believes that everything, both animate, and inanimate objects are the same. If he pinches his finger in a door, he wants to punish the door. Trust me, that's not a laughable small affair. To him it is extremely real.
He is extremely shy when around those he's not familiar with. To the point he will try and hide. He will try and copy his friends when they do something which is "athletically" superior to him. He tries so hard. God I love this kid SO MUCH!
I've never really believed in a photographic memory before, but I'm starting to wonder. He can go somewhere once, and tell you specific details of the most minute details. Things I would have never even see. We'll drive by a place where we visited when he was several months old, and he'll throw out some fact that I frankly forgot about, but is dead on accurate.
He arranges his toys in perfect symetry. Perfect lines, same number of pieces on each line. When something excites him, he jumps up and down, flapping his hands uncontrollably.

I've said it mre than once here in this thread, but THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU all. I'll take some of you up om your offers to have discussions.

Allright, time for me to go read 'Goodnight Moon' for the eight billionth time. Awesome goodnight story.
Goodnight everybody, and I'll catch you around soon.

sorry , I was going to post a comment on a (cause thoery) I watched on TV but after reveiwing MirthfulMe's post on causes I've recanted my post mayby later if I can get a mod to reveiw it first.

[edit on 14-4-2007 by the_sentinal]

[edit on 14-4-2007 by the_sentinal]

Yes I bet he has photograhic memory. Its something I have, and can garentee you its real. I memorized a 24 digit number after seeing it once because I dialed it on a phone. I still remember it to this day.

As for his organization. I would suggest math. Chances are, like me, he has a strong point for math. I can hardly work a computer, in fact, I still can hardly navigate MS paint, but I can teach myself pre calculus in a month. I am not autistic, but I can tell you I do share some of it's signs. I can safely say I am not, but given the characteristics your child displays, I can relate to those, and I suggest that introducing him to math whenever possible may be a good idea. Puzzles and other things may work as well. Word finders and cyptograms may be of interest to him. I know that I could do a word finder twice as fast as everyone around me like the words would jump off the page, and that made me feel good when I was little.

Anyway, just giving some suggestions at what helped me realize what I was good at. I had many difficulties as a child that autistic kids have. Not to say I can come close to relating, but that I realized I adjusted better by realizing what set me apart. That was the ability to solve things and see things that other people didn't.

I watched a show the other day on a national television news channel (which one I cant remember) inwhich a doctors young son was diagnosed with autism, he did some research and found that nationally the autism diagnoses in young children is skyrocketing in numbers of cases, he further began to suspect that television was a trigger for autism in young children because of his own sons apparent fixation on the TV, after not allowing his child to watch any TV for a lengthy period of time his sons diagnosis improved and the symptoms all but disappeared, the doctor went on to state that he suspected TV(in theory) to be the cause of the soaring autism numbers nationally, I asked my wife who is in the medical profession what she thought of this doctors theory and she stated that she thought that he was on to something.

Her reasoning was this, Video games come with a warning that they could trigger seizures in some children, she said it's possible that TV could be doing a similar thing in young children causing symptom's of autism which if left unchecked could develop into full blown autism over a period of time. this is mearly a theory and at the risk of being punished by the mods for purposefully stating a possible cause after being asked not to post on causes. I feel that the risk is worth the punishment because if it were my child, I would want to know if there was anything that I could do to improve my childs condition through something as simple as cutting off the TV. and for this reason I thought that posting this info was worth the risk. my apoligies if this post offends anyone. Lombozo if you think this post is out of line I will delete it if you like....................sentinal

Yes indeed, he does see things differently. He will ask the same question a dozen times in 2 minutes. If you tell him that we're going to do something, like say a party, next month, he will bring it up a day or two before the actual date. "Tomorrow's the party?". I wish I could do that. Chrimeny, I write everything down on a calendar, and still can't keep it together.
Every now and again, he will mabsolutely stun me with something from his recollections. When he was just a couple of months old I dropped his bottle sterilizer and broke it, so I had to get a new one. He couldn't have been more than 4 months old. About a month ago he said out of the blue "Dad, when you broke my bottle maker why did you buy a new one? You can fix anything. Did you buy the new one at Target?"

He amazes me every day.

I didn't see this link posted yet...I think it's pretty interesting, talking about learning habits of autistic children:

10 Things Your Student with Autism Wishes You Knew

The one that jumped out at me was #3...it made me think about your son's heightened senses and amazing memory...

3. Look for sensory issues first.
A lot of my resistant behaviors come from sensory discomfort. One example is fluorescent lighting, which has been shown over and over again to be a major problem for children like me. The hum it produces is very disturbing to my hypersensitive hearing, and the pulsing nature of the light can distort my visual perception, making objects in the room appear to be in constant movement. An incandescent lamp on my desk will reduce the flickering, as will the new, natural light tubes. Or maybe I need to sit closer to you; I don’t understand what you are saying because there are too many noises “in between” – that lawnmower outside the window, Jasmine whispering to Tanya, chairs scraping, pencil sharpener grinding.

Hey Essedarius,
Excellent post. I can't put myself in his head, but it seems like #3 is exactly what he's feeling.
Thank you!

hey, a little update for you.
This guy didn't speak his first words til 5, and although I am unsure if he is autistic, his ability leaves me wondering if there could possibly be any explaination. This is his ability:

www.topyoutubevideos.com...

My heart goes out to you.

My son was diagnosed with Asperger's when he was 5. He is 19 now. Up until the age of 4 the only word he would say was "bye-bye". If you touched him, he would act like you were about to assault him. The hypersensitivity to sound, lack of eye contact, and lack of interaction with other children, led to the diagnosis.

Once he did start talking, from the get-go, it was like speaking to a small adult. One day he said "bye-bye", then the next day he was not just talking about, but fully discussing one of the shows on televison.

When it comes to math, science, and logic, where there is only a black and white answer, (binary on or off..), he is amazing. on the common sense end, (gray area type of solutions), he'll walk outside in sleet and rain in a tee shirt, wnd have to be told it's cold out, and to put on a coat. It seems to be a disassociation from what's happening around him, and what's happening in his mind.

His motor skills still aren't up to par, but as he got older, his social skills improved greatly. His social skills improved greatly with a lot of exposure to other children.

We've given him as much support and independance as we could, but he still needs to have supervision for some things that we take for granted.

I would give everything I have to be able to be inside my son't mind for a day, just to understand how it ticks, and how to reach him better. It's one of those things you'll always wish for.

someone once said "Some years are days, some days are years.". Just keep in mind that you're not alone.

metallion - Thank you. You have been where I am right now. I live my life for him. I mean that in every single way there is. I would give my life if it would benefit him in any way whatsoever. I've never said truer words.
I'm doing every thing I'm able to do to help, but it is a fine line between helping and creating a smothering cocoon.
It is so good to hear from all of you. At the risk of being incredibly redundant, I thank you all.

Lombozo, I saddened to hear of this.

My own Son at the age of 18 months nearly died from a reaction to the immunisations. Anyway, from that point on, our lives changed. He soon after was diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

I devoted everything I had to my Son. Now, the Autism Assoc were very supportive and yet, restricted with their approach... just accept and deal with it. I could not accept this and so, thanks to much research online I found a fantastic Environmental and Nutritional Doctor who *with the permission of our family Doctor, carried out extensive and may I say very expensive tests. It was in hindsight worth the thousands of dollars spent on an unknown quantity.

The Blood Panel came back with very interesting results, he had high level of mercury in his blood and so, we commenced the alternate route. It was scarey as ****** to go outside the square BUT although a slow process (the results are not overnight), my Son had an Occupational Therapy three month review and the auditory processing had improved beyond scientific explanation. His health improved dramatically, his system could not tolerate any gluten or caesin after the reaction. If he had the smallest amount, he would end up with a severe rash that ended up looking like severe bruising. His legs would swell and he could not walk for long periods of time at all. The thing is, he improved dramatically, even to the point of tolerating certain foods. The Autism Assoc did not want to know or at the time, I felt, I did not fit into the 'acceptance' line of thought. I had gone outside the conventional methods.

As for the Govt, there was no support at all. No assistance offered up. I was outside of the typical avenues. My husband and I split up during this time. It was a very stressful time, not financially but emotionally, he wanted to stick with mainstream treatment and I was adamant that it wasn't enough. Anyway, we of course had private health cover, much of the treatment was not covered by either medicare or medibank private. The Auditory Processing tests were 400 dollars + a shot. I was thankful that a) I had the finances to go the alternate route but I kept thinking b) how the hell would anyone who had a moderate income, afford this? It would imo be unobtainable.

The fact was my Son was overcoming ASD with the alternative treatments and no one wanted to believe it. He is now, wonderful and can even eat whatever he likes. He is not permitted at all to have further immunisations for obvious reasons. He has overcome ASD. OT assessements of my Son are all the proof I need and of course the last blood panel result. It is very funny, now the referring Doctor 'claims': he must not have had ASD to start with. What a joke. The truth is slapping them in the face and they still reject or minimise it.

I urge anyone, not to stay within the confines of conventional medicine, don't accept when one medical opinion or a medical body tells you 'there is nothing that can be done'... go outside the square and get a 100 opinions if need be.

Autism can be treated and cured.

Originally posted by Mirthful Me
It is not, I repeat not about the speculation about how or why the autism occurred.

I just wanted to add with respect to this, that I shared my experience and yes, I did raise the issue of immunisations and mercury. Please note though that I did not raise it to speculate anything. I just wanted to share some of my personal experiences and offer up how I approached Autism when my Son was diagnosed.

Aside from that, I consider myself so fortunate to have a special gifted child My Boy is so loving and has this pureness about him. Even though his health has improved he still demonstrates certain Austistic qualities and I don't see them as a negative at all. The only concern I had was with his health and when it all happened, to see my Son so sick and in so much pain, is just heart wrenching and that is what I couldnt cope with.

Autistic children tend to be hyper sensitive and can be unsettled from the smallest thing, that takes time to find out what is unsettling him, for eg, I would get my Son dressed when he was about 2 and he would be happy, once dressed he would start to cry and I would ask him "what's wrong"... crying he would answer, after sometime.. "I don't know". I would just hug him then. After sometime of this happening, I decided to dress him slowly, like put his shorts on and singlet...let him run around and he was still happy. Then I would add his tshirt and he was still happy, no crying. This went on until we got to the last part of putting his shoes and socks on, as soon as I put his socks on, he started to get emotional. It was the socks. He was sensitive to the fabric in the socks. I know it sounds like such a little thing, but it wasn't. I changed to 100% cotton socks and it was sorted.

Even now, he is pedantic about certain clothing. But, he is old enough now to understand if he doesnt like something. The other thing about occupational therapy is that they introduce certain irritants slowly which helps the child to deal with it so to function without an emotional reaction or shutdown mode. The shutdown mode is the childs way of withdrawing from over stimulants... well this is what I noticed my Son would do. So, eye contact and quiet time, one on one is crucial during those times. I took my Son to a show and learnt very quickly that I would in future go to a beach and make sand castles with him instead. That incident for me was a exellent example of him being over stimulated.

My Son would stand and scream crying over getting his hands dirty, he hated the way it felt. So, OT focused on getting him to touch all types of things that feel irritating.

I don't see these kind of Autistic traits as a problem at all. I don't view them at all negatively. He is functioning extremely well. The health issues are sorted but some of the Autistic traits are still there...and I really do feel I am fortunate to have a child this gifted and Autism children are very gifted.
We can really learn a lot from children who have Autism.









[edit on 21-4-2007 by NJE777]

Hi NJE777,
Thank you for the insight. It sounds to me that you have an outstanding outlook. Our situation sounds similar, and I agree with you that it is wonderful being the parent of our kids.

Lombozo, here is a good video of a girl who has Asperger's syndrome. Of course, Aspergers are only partially autistic, but a good video nonetheless.

Here is another video by the same girl. She seems very intelligent. It seems that autism is extreme "shyness" or someone who takes being a "loner" to the extreme. Anyway, enough from me, here is from someone who knows what she is talking about. She lives with it.

SoT - Thank you!
I'll tell you what - even though you're a Dallas Cowboys fan, you're OK in my book.
All kidding aside, thank you. Your thoughts mean more than you know on this particular subject.