Falling out with Houston over Aspie Boy

My husband is angry with me tonight. Aspie Boy said something, not thinking, and Houston took it personally.

Aspie Boy has a brain like mine. When I am focusing on something, and I keep hearing my name called, or people are talking, I get distracted and while I'm trying to concentrate, I feel more and more distracted as I try to maintain my attention, and suddenly I feel frustrated and react.

We were watching a movie and while we were watching it, Tom and I kept talking. That, I think, would be frustrating to anyone. But Aspie Boy suddenly said something like, "I wish you guys would stop talking. I can't hear the movie." Or something like that.

Houston automatically took it as being told to shut up by an 11-year old and became angry. Because I didn't immediately tell Aspie Boy that that's not how to talk to adults, Houston left. He'll probably spend the night at the office tonight.

If Houston had simply pulled me aside and asked me to explain to Aspie Boy that he shouldn't talk to adults like that, I would have handled it that way. Instead, I froze up because I became instantly sensitized to Houston's anger. I hate it when he becomes angry.

So, he left.

I get tired of trying to explain aspie behaviors to people. Teachers, my husband. I wish people would just simply understand that Aspie Boy isn't trying to be rude. He is just instantly reacting to a situation, and it can give the appearance of rude-ness. But he will understand if it is explained to him nicely how he should have handled something differently. I'm not going to punish him when I know he will act differently in the future if I explain how he should handle something differently.

He doesn't always get it. But I'm working on him. I get frustrated with Aspie Boy, too. But it's especially frustrating when I have someone ready to pounce on me if I don't immediately jump on Aspie Boy. I don't want to jump on him. He's got a really good heart and I don't want to jump on him all the time.

Results of Aspie Boy's IEP Meeting

We (me and Aspie Boy's dad) went to the IEP meeting on Thursday. We resolved problems, so things look good right now. From now on, they are going to inform teachers about his Aspie-ness, and if there is a problem in the classroom with Aspie Boy acting in any certain way that the teacher feels they can't handle at that moment, the teacher will send him to the counselor to talk about what's going on so that Aspie Boy doesn't immediately get in trouble for something that he shouldn't have gotten in trouble for.

But let me tell you about the improvement so far that even Aspie Boy's dad has noticed: Tristan is starting to enjoy school!

In the last couple of weeks, except for that one day in Science, when I ask Tristan how school was, he actually has positive things to say, and acts like he had a good day! This is a major turn-around.

I told him I would help get the situation turned around and when I reminded him that I had said that, and that it was actually happening, he grinned sheepishly.

I'm so relieved. Im going to keep checking in with his teacher when I pick him up to make sure everything is going okay. Going to keep my fingers crossed.

My son, my son!

That was actually the title of a book I read when I was about 12- or 13-years old, by Howard Spring, and it is a book that I read several times, so the chapters stay with me.

Tomorrow we have the IEP meeting at Aspie Boy's school. I'm not going in to rip anyone a new you-know-what. I just want to guide the teachers and the school to doing the right thing for a very bright kid who has some difficulties.

By the way, I met with the lady who offered to meet me at the karate class that is designed for kids with disabilities. One of the kids was blind. Several of the kids had ADHD and/or Asperger's. I like the guy who conducted the class. He seemed really in tune to the kids and there needs.

For instance, at one point during the karate class, one of the AS kids appeared to be having a melt-down because he had done something wrong and the teacher called him on it, as was necessary. But instead of yelling at the kid in front of the other kids, the teacher took the kid into a private room (I couldn't hear anything) and then brought him out and they kept going. None of the other kids acted like anything had happened, because it wasn't made to be a big deal in front of them.

I'm most likely not going to enroll him in that class, even though I think it would be good for him. For one thing, it costs $120 for 2 classes, and it's a two-class per week minimum. Um, that's $480 per month. I love you, Aspie Boy, but we gotta think of something else for now. Well, Aspie Boy didn't show a huge interest anyways. And for another thing, the instructor said that that class was closed because it was full, although they had a class in Irvine that was open for enrollment.

I stopped by Aspie Boy's classroom yesterday to see if the teacher had anything to tell me about my child that needs working on, but it appears that everything is okay right now. Interesting thing is that since the teacher has quit pinging on my son, the other kids don't seem to be treating him as badly as they were.

Something else I found out about Aspie Boy, by the way: Yesterday his dad picked him up from my place and me and Aspie Boy were joking with each other. He was making jokes about my big butt (I, personally, don't think it's that big, but Aspie Boy says it's a moon in its own right), and to get even, I was making fun of Aspie Boy's big head.

Let me interject here with results of some research I did recently. It turns out that kids with AS have larger heads, on average, than other kids. (I'm too lazy to go find a link.) Aspie Boy's head is definitely not a pumpkin-head, but it has always been a force to be reckoned with, even when he was a baby. HE HAS A BIG HEAD!

But it's not like you look at him and think, "Holy shit, look at the head on that kid!" It's just a little bigger than it should be, given the size of his body. I figure that as he gets bigger, his head will be more proportionately pleasing.

Anyway, his dad said that I shouldn't make fun of his head because he's self-conscious of it. His dad said that is why Aspie Boy wears his hair the way he does is to try to hide his head.

My feeling on this is that if I make fun of Aspie Boy's head, and he knows I love him to death, then when other kids make fun of him, he will be immunized.

Well, anyway, Aspie Boy got me good with jokes about my big butt, so I'm not feeling too badly about jibing him back about his big head. Hehe.

Asperger's, Autism and Amanda Baggs

I learned something these past few days. I have been studying up on Asperger's Syndrome (AS) and Autism in addition to past research because of the recent trouble with Aspie Boy's school.

I discovered something very interesting. Ever hear about Autism? Maybe even up to the last 10 years, someone born with low-functioning Autism would end up in a mental hospital. Remember "Rain Man"? Tom Cruise had an Autistic brother who had been institutionalized because he was autistic.

You would think that people who are severely Autistic, or low functioning, are, basically, retarded. Not so. Check out this video by Amanda Baggs.

Now before you go there, keep these things in mind. The video lasts for 8 minutes and 35 seconds. The first couple of minutes are without words. You are basically watching a low-functioning Autistic person be herself, and you might think, as I did, "This is boring."

But after you watch those first few minutes, Amanda begins to explain what you saw. She's able to do this, even though she doesn't speak, by way of a computer program that translates her typing onto a keyboard and it comes out as speech.

In fact, the first time I watched it a few months ago, I got bored in the first minute or so and I quit watching it. I didn't know there was an explanation coming up.

If you keep watching, you will be treated to the mind of a person who appears to be a retarded person who simply cannot relate to "normal" people, or Neuro-typicals ("NTs"), in their own language. Autistics, it turns out, have their own language that Neuro-typicals don't bother to learn.

That's fine because, thanks to computers and the internet, Amanda has learned how to communicate with us. It would be nice to be able to relate to Amanda in her own language, but I have a feeling that that is not possible unless you are Autistic.

I am at once ashamed and excited.

I'm ashamed because I have looked at Autistics (like Amanda) as if they are just retarded. I would never have spent any time trying to communicate with Amanda or anyone like her. I would have assumed that she couldn't understand me and was unaware of the world around her.

I am excited because I found out, because of Amanda, what the link is between AS and Autism. I have learned, up until now, that AS is a "high functioning" form of Autism. Yet I couldn't relate AS to Autism. How could there be a relationship between AS and Autism?

To me, AS looked like we (AS people) are really smart, we just come off like ditzes (to explain it shortly and loosely) whereas Austistics look retarded! Where was the link that connected AS to Autism, if AS is simply a high-functioning form of Autism??

The link between Autism and AS is intelligence. It turns out that Autistics are very intelligent (please watch Amanda's video) as are people who are AS, but Autistics can't function, physically, as well as people who are AS. But Autistics are as intelligent as people with AS (possibly even more so, but we'll find out as this door is opened even further into their world).

But the other thing that I am made more aware of is that my son has a real disability of which I have not been as educated as I thought I was, even though I have AS myself. Let me explain this.

I didn't discover that I have AS until about 5 years ago, when I was 45-years old. At that time, I learned that I had AS when I joined a forum for people with ADHD and someone on that forum contacted me privately and said she thought I might have AS.

This opened a whole new world to me. I had spent my life being ridiculed for various aspects of my personality, and I ended up with very low self-esteem. It started in my family, where I would hear things like, "What, are you stupid?" Or, my dad's favorite, "When God said he was handing out brains, you thought he said trains, and you bought a one-way ticket." (I still don't know what that means.)

My sisters used to gang up on me (I had 4 sisters).

In school, I was told I was bright, but that I couldn't carry out simple basic steps. I remember my 2nd grade teacher admonishing me that "It's a think and do book, not a do and think book!"

I have always been treated as if I am stupid, even though I ultimately became an attorney and have been very successful with my cases so far.

The most distressing thing that I read, in learning about Autism, is that people with Autism are treated as if they cannot perform at all in society. I think this is so sad.

This caused me to look back over my own life when I was told to "give up, you'll never succeed!"

I remember when I was at UCI and I was belittled by the professor in one of my classes who scoffed at me because I didn't understand something he said, and he was dismissive of me after that. It was obvious he was done with me after that. He focused more on the other student after that. It was a special class where there were only 2 of us.

While I was at UCI, I spoke with my then-ex-husband's dad, who was the City Manager of Chino, and when I told him I was going to ultimately go to law school, he started laughing. Then he caught himself and said he was laughing with me, not at me. I wasn't laughing, and I didn't understand why he was laughing. Well, I understand now.

After I graduated from UCI with a B.A., I entered into a paralegal program because I was afraid of going to law school. About a year and half into the 2-year program, the director of the program pulled me out of class and told me that I should quit the program because I didn't appear to be understanding simple concepts.

It was around this same time that I had started an internship in an attorney's office and that attorney told me to go to law school. I dropped out of the paralegal program then and there and started law school the very next semester.

In my first semester of law school, I was in a legal writing course and on one of my papers, the professor wrote things like, "What is this crap? Are you sure you are in the right profession?" She wrote more than that, but you get the idea. I didn't give up, and I passed with a 1.3 GPA in that course.

I somehow managed to finish law school with a 2.3 GPA, and then it was time to start studying for the Bar Exam. I had, to this point, never figured out how to write the way we were supposed to write. I didn't have a problem with the multiple choice exams, though.

I didn't take any of the bar review courses. I studied on my own. I failed the first Bar Exam, but because I didn't do well on the writing portions. Something interesting: For the multiple choice part of the exam (called the "Multi-State") the exam-takers are given 3 hours for each multi-state exam, and there are 2 of them. I finished both of them in 1 1/2 hours each, and passed both portions. Most students need the entire 3 hours for each exam, and many students don't finish.

After I failed the first exam, I hired a tutor in order to learn how to write a better essay exam, since it was because of the essay writing that I could not pass the exam. I paid $1000 for 5 sessions.

It was during the middle of the 3rd session that the tutor told me that he thought I wasn't getting basic concepts that 1st year students could understand, and he advised me to forget about the upcoming exam and study for 6-months in order to prepare for the next exam after that.

I was so devastated, but my husband said that instead of being depressed, just prepare for the upcoming exam even though I would probably fail. He said to just look at it as a "practice" exam that I was going to inevitably fail, but that by taking the exam, that would be experience for the 3rd exam that I would ultimately pass.

Interesting thing is that I passed the 2nd exam. The tutor had been tutoring 12 of us that season. Only 2 of us passed, and one of them was me.

I have thoroughly had it pounded into my brain that I am a ditz. Not only because of the above, but I have always been made fun of for the things about me that were different. I get lost, I lose things, I get distracted, I speak my mind out loud, and many other things.

I speak loudly. I don't have volume control. I find things funny that others don't, and yet I don't get jokes that everyone else gets.

Okay, I'll quit going on about me. Now, even though I understand that I have AS, and even though I finally figured out that my son, Aspie Boy, has AS, I didn't understand how simply knowing that he and I have AS means that I know what to do about it with regard to his school.

Well, I still don't know what to do exactly, but this is where Amanda's video comes into play. She has said that just because she knows how to do some things doesn't mean she knows how to do other things.

This is my son's problem. The teachers need to understand that just because he's not as impaired (physically) as Amanda doesn't mean he isn't impaired in some ways. I think this is why some people are calling AS the "invisible disability."

Aspie Boy appears to be normal. He doesn't limp, he doesn't flap his hands, he doesn't rock back and forth in class. He just has a difficult time with certain concepts, following directions, getting distracted, etc. He appears to be behaving badly when he's just merely thinking differently.

We have an IEP meeting coming up. I'm not going in to bash heads. I'm going in with the hope that I can help my son.

Home Schooling, Revisited

I posted about Aspie Boy's problems with school, and said I was going to take him out of school and home school him. His dad was almost in agreement. I had received a lot of responses to a post of mine on a forum devoted to Asperger's Syndrome for parents of kids with AS and for people with AS. The responses were overwhelmingly in support of taking Aspie Boy out of school in order to home school him.

But then, after I arrived at work this morning, I found an email from a mom who successfully was able to get the school to meet her son's needs rather than taking him out of school. She provided her phone number and asked me to call her, and I did. I am still amazed that I found this person, because she caused me to see that this could be worked out with the school without battling the school.

Her son is currently in middle school and is doing very well. He is getting straight A's. He actually LIKES school! Aspie Boy HATES school at this point. He has no friends, and the teachers have not been handling him well.

For starters on the road to helping Aspie Boy get on the right track, I am going to enroll him in Karate tomorrow night. I learned from the woman who emailed me that there is a karate teacher who gave up his job to devote time training kids who have disabilities, primarily kids who have AS.

At the end of this month, I'm going to meet with the teachers and principal and psychologist at Tristan's school to request implementation of certain procedures that will help Tristan.

My heart hurts that I have subjected Aspie Boy to the treatment he has received at school for the last 2 years, but I'm glad that I have found out that there are things I can do to change things.

Home Schooling

I am going to try to talk my ex-husband into letting me home school our 10-year old son, Aspie Boy.

We are having a lot of trouble at Aspie Boy's school. The teachers don't know how to handle a kid with Asperger's Syndrome. He's in 5th grade and he is absolutely miserable in school. I feel like I'm being so mean to him when I take him to that place.

Asperger's Syndrome is a really difficult brain disorder because it's like an invisible condition. A person can appear to be normal, but they have trouble in social situations, and they do things that appear that they are trouble-makers, when they are not. It's difficult to explain. They are singled out by teachers and peers and punished or bullied.

I think I can handle home schooling. Actually, I'll bring him to my office on the days I have him. I think his dad can bring him to my office on his days, too.

Aspergers!

I called Teeter and OCD tonight to discuss my posts and comments. It has arisen recently that my posts/comments have been considered "mean."

I post things that I consider to be either factual or funny. However, after posting something as either a comment or a blog, I have been told that I either sound funny or mean. As someone with Asperger's, I can't tell the difference.

I have belonged to different forums for people with AS and ADHD and have left because, ultimately, I have offended people.

I figure that this is a good time to start learning what sounds funny and what sounds mean.

This is going to be a good learning experience.

p.s. For anyone reading these series of posts, please feel free to post a comment if you think I am being funny or mean. I'm really trying to figure it out.