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Sufferers Stories:
Diane:
Asperger
Syndrome and Bipolar disorder New!
Gary: Asperger syndrome and OCD
Luis:
OCD, depression , Aspergers
syndrome and eye floaters
New e-mails October 2007
Steve:
Brontophobia
( fear of
thunderstorms)
Lynda:
Anorexia nervosa, agoraphobia, panic disorder GAD.
Zed:
OCD, Tourettes syndrome, Trichotillomania
Christine:
OCD, depression, social anxiety/AS, GAD, ADD, Hyphochondria.
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An Aspie's View
THE DSM-IV
definition of Autism is as follows:
Impaired ability to engage in social interaction;
Impaired communication skills; and
Specific behavioural patterns (e.g. preoccupation,
resistance to change, adherence to non-functional
routines and stereotyped and repetitive behaviours).
The DSM-IV is a
sort of bible used by the mental health profession to figure out
how to label people. Autism is a Pervasive Developmental
Disorder. Some of the other disorders under the umbrella of PDD
are Asperger’s Disorder, Rett’s Disorder, Childhood
Disintegrative Disorder and Pervasive Development Disorder (not
otherwise specified). Another thing that some professionals like
to do is to just diagnose symptoms and call them disorders. That
is your child has anxiety disorder, OCD, ODD, etc. instead just
telling you one of the above. The diagnosis process is very hard
on the parent. We all know this labelling the symptoms is just
confusing.
Let me
introduce myself, I am Diane MacNaughton. That is who I am first
and foremost. What we always have to keep in mind is that we are
people first. The children are the same before and after before
and after diagnosis. They didn’t magically change because the
doctor gave them a diagnosis. The diagnosis is a tool to get
them proper funding to get them the proper help to deal with
life. (Life in school, etc.)
A little
history about myself, I was first diagnosed with bipolar
disorder in 1997, about 6 months after my son Peter was
diagnosed with Classic Autism at age 6 in the fall of 1996. I
was then diagnosed in July of 2003 with Asperger Disorder. Peter
was rediagnosed with Asperger Syndrome in September 2007.
My son Peter
has taught me a lot. I started out as a parent who thought I
knew exactly what he was thinking when he was non-verbal. I was
way off-base. I have since decided that all children are smarter
than us parents and should be approached that way. That they
have known us all their lives and we have only known them for a
short time. For example I have only known Peter 17 and I am 50
so that is only approximately 1/3 of my life.
Peter was
non-verbal till about 5 he sort of talked in mostly echolia.
Echolia is when the child repeats what we say and we think they
are talking, but we can only understand what they are saying. We
adults do it too we repeat what it said so that we hear it and
can better process what is being said to us.
One day I
decided that I would look directly at Peter and speak in short
words or sentences. I also decided to tease him, I touched his
bum and said “head”, he looked at me like I was “crazy” and said
“bum”. It became the classic “Helen Keller” moment and we went
around the house naming objects. I think the boy had just been
waiting for me to give him a reason to talk. His T.A. in
Kindergarten taught him how to read and he spent his time
reading in bed, dictionaries by Richard Scarry and Sesame Street
and learned our language.
Most children
on the ASD are intelligent they just need to be convinced to
communicate I think. A lot of the time they have sensory
overload to overcome and frankly a lot of normal or
neurotypicals (NT’s) are boring. The magical, fantasy world that
many of us create is quite enticing. When I am destressing in my
room it quite pleasant, listening to music, talking to myself,
processing my day, I have been doing this since I was a
teenager. It is how I cope. My son has been shutting me out of
his room since he has been able to close the door on me, a
passion of his, closing doors. I can’t tell you how often I was
almost shut into the fridge when he was three, after all a door
is a door.
Most autistics
(I put everybody on the ASD in here) I think see everyone equal.
They find everybody other than their peers less boring probably
due to their intelligence. They find younger and older people
more fascinating, animals more fascinating. We are into social
justice and need to know why and understand. If we have limited
language and repeat something it is because we need to know why
not because we don’t understand.
The sensory
overload is a big deal and we stim to get over it. We rock, or
twirl our hair or it you are my son in second grade you chewed
through your t-shirts. Hopefully it is nothing too embarrassing,
we all seem to pick our noses but hopefully by the we grow up we
get out of this phase or actually learn to use a Kleenex. It is
because we are trying to distract ourselves from hearing the
electricity which is just everywhere now, because we are
sensitive to the lights, because we can hear much better than
most people and because we are trying not to run screaming from
the room. So teaching us not to stim is not the thing to do,
teach us how to stim so we don’t get teased or bullied by the
other kids. I find putting pressure somewhere on my body helps.
I cross my legs at the ankles, which seems to help a lot. Or I
slowly rub my thumb over the other one. Or I doodle a little
bit. I can listen better, or chewing gum helps me think. Little
tricks help me think, and sunglasses help with the lights.
There are
always ways to adapt, we do not need to change our “square pegs”
to fit into the round holes of society. We need to nourish them
to make them grow. We need to tell them what I told my son that
we “think outside of the box” so we are the great thinkers in
society. That we autistics can lead the world out of its
problems that it will be facing in the next few decades. That is
the reason so many of autistics being born. Our children are
like everybody’s children they are the hope for the future and
we have to give them a chance.
Diane
MacNaughton
Aspie
Autism Advocate
B.A. Psychology
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