What is best for our ASD children?

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I am self diagnosed ASD and my young child is awaiting diagnosis. I know what it is to live a life without any help, without anyone knowing the true cause of my shyness, or why maybe I have made poor choices, because I didn't understand fully the consequences, etc.

Now I must choose my child's future. I am afraid, as some have mentioned, types of conversion therapy. Because now that I know there are more people like me, I feel that I am normal, an alternative kind of normal, and I like our qualities.

On the other hand, I know the pain of extreme loneliness. And I would never wish it on anyone.

I am already overwhelmed by the psychologist and all of the very personal data they feel the need to collect. So much of it seems irrelevant. I fear they will use it against me. How can I give more?

What are the results of therapy? Are the kids happier? Can they cope better? Are their weird behaviors discouraged? Are they encouraged to fit in and be the same? What happens if you encourage their confidence and their unique strengths instead? What if you remove them from school and the bullies and ass holes? What if they are unschooled? Are they happier then?

This is actually a very complicated question and I think it depends on the child.

There are kids that you can ram through the system, and who are better off in public school, despite the difficulties. The end up being conventionally prepared for college and life. I don't know what percentage of kids that are severe enough to be diagnosed, fall into that category. I was not diagnosed, was very unhappy in school, but would have been miserable under my parents' thumbs all day and I would have been ill-prepared for life, as much as may have thought at the time anything would be better than being in school. For me, it became better in HS, and I can't imagine how stifled I would have been at home during that time. I was a rule-follower and needed to learn when and how to break rules--and no way I could have learned that at home.

In addition, I think there is presumption of a trade-off between happiness and functionality. You annot necessarily learn everything you need if you are never challenged to go beyond your comfort level and sometimes that can make you unhappy. The mainstream (even with scaffolding) school environment exposes a child to trials and tribulations, that they learn from and it is the easiest path to conventional success, if you emerge from it, sufficiently unscathed. That is basically the holy grail, but not all kids can mange it successfully, or ought to be forced to try.

For my child that clearly was not going to be the right thing, as he was already being tormented in second grade, and the school was making it worse by insisting he adapt more than he was able.

I pulled him out after that, detoxed him for a summer, and while we do not unschool, there is a lot of flexibility in his day. He is not at the moment ready or especially interested in interacting with peers, but at some point we are going to have to address that more directly. I don't know if he will or won't benefit from any part of the teen-aged experience, b/c while I needed some of) it, I don't know if he will or won't. Unfortunately there are types of learning that don't happen in a monitored home environment, but right now it is just not safe or beneficial for him to have that.

Edited to add: We never did ABA or any type of intensive therapy--certainly nothing like conversion therapy. When our son was in public school, we used speech (pragmatic and social speech) and OT (Handwriting and fine motor skills.) Speech was helpful when the teacher was good--disastrous when she wasn't. They had a nasty habit of switching teaches and not notifying us. OT was insufficient and offered grudgingly.

What kind of therapies are you considering? What are your child's strengths and weaknesses? Why tis the Pysch doctor asking you a bunch of personal questions. Sometimes they ask "screening" questions to see if your child's background correlates with what they expect, but they really should be grilling you on a continuous basis. They may want to know if there are family histories of certain things (which would include you) and what to know what kind of job you are, so that if it is in a tech field, they can nod knowingly to themselves. But the main things they should be interested in in is the child's.

The best outcome is probably for the kids who got respectful therapy.

http://abnormaldiversity.blogspot.ca/20 ... d.html?m=1

Therapy can teach useful skills, but you do need to watch that they're not teaching the kid to go against their own needs for the sake of fitting in.

As an ASD parent with two ASD boys ages 6 and 4 I can tell you that first and formost any type of therapy must honor who they are as individuals on the spectrum. I have come across quite a few clinicians that approach therapy by guiding patients to be more NT and that is only a bandaid and I would reccomend avoiding. That short term fix is limited at best, delays real understanding, and delays putting life long stategies in place in which the individual can be themselves in a healthy normal way.

I can understand that there a lot of questions. Try and think of it this way... the more a good clinician knows the better they will be able to understand the different charateristics of ASD that create the deficits that are being experienced in daily life.

Therapy helps. I see how it is helping my oldest son and myself all of the time. Early intervention provides the best chances of long term success for any Aspie child. In support of that, parents must be educated about ASD, ask questions, and ask more questions. There are a lot of people that say they know ASD and how to treat it..... based on my experience I would say out of ten clinicians I have been to either for myself or my children about two knew their stuff.... and I can say this because I know mine.

Love and support them for who and what they are. As Aspies our paths are different and that is o. k. because our paths can be just as and even more fullfilling. All the best in you efforts. I hope you find the insights you seek. Kind regards. Shark

I'd be inclined to concur with this.

I'm pretty mildly affected, so maybe my point of view isn't applicable, but... I've suffered as much from the energy I've wasted trying to "hide autism" at the expense of maximizing my own functioning as an autistic individual as I have from the condition itself. And more, much more, from having inadvertently learned that The Way I Am Is Wrong.

I'm choosing to continue pretty consistent ABA therapy for my 4-year old. He's been in therapy about six hours a day since he was two. Unfortunately, our kids don't learn skills the same way NT kids do. They learn them through other methods. And as hard as I try, I don't know how to teach him the skills he needs to thrive in this world. He's making a ton of progress. I'm sure there are awful therapists out there, but people get into these professions to help children, and usually it shows. I don't agree with everything about ABA. I wish the company could see less spreadsheets and statistics and more humanity. Are they trying to get him to behave more like a NT? Yeah, probably. There is some of that going on. But NT kids will learn to tie their own shoes, can communicate to others, and won't drop on the floor and scream bloody murder when they don't get their way. If becoming more NT helps my son get past things standing in the way of being a successful young man, Im okay with it. And they're still playing, it isn't like he's tied up on some shock table. I have to say the process has been way more positive than negative.