I'm just stunned........

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The testing showed an IQ profile consistent with ASD,, with verbal and perceptual being quite high and working memory average, processing speed very low. The processing speed combined with Poor Executive Functioning skills are the known learning disabilities. I believe they thought they saw reciprocal conversation.

They said that they only saw 2 out of the 12 markers for autism spectrum. I think that I will pull out the DSM Diagnosis definition and provide examples of what I see in the areas that I believe fit. If they can address those, I will feel much more comfortable with the result.

http://www.ldaca.org/bookstore.php

You might benefit by reading some of the books on this page.

My son was Bi Polar from a young age and he had horrible meltdowns, I could not take him out when he was young and would have to hold him or sit on him when he got bigger.....he got to the point where he would scream at me to hold him or sit on him. He could not control himself, he had hypermania. he would tell me his arms were coming off, things were coming out of him. When he was not having a meltdown or an episode of severe mania he seemed very typical, he was social and he made eye contact. Everyone was his friend until they proved themselves otherwise. He feared nothing but himself and his own episodes. He knew he had no control over himself which is typical for people with mental illness. BP in children is very different than in adults....have you ever read the book The Bi Polar Child. I know that it is harder for people to understand and they say horrible things behind your back like, "thats the kind of kid who would bring a gun to school or slit his parents throat while they slept". My son was nothing like that, he was very loving and never did anything to hurt me. He did attack my husband once because he felt that he was getting in between me and him....I was everything to him as his biological father rejected him. I lost my son to an accidental overdose this past August after being clean for two years...my Dad always remembers when he dropped him off at the sober living house, he said he looked like a scared little boy even if he was 24 and 6ft 4in tall. He wanted to stay clean so bad and he wanted to do so many things but he was afraid, he was afraid of his impulsivity and having no one to help him, to remind him to take his meds.
Most people didnt even know my son had BP.....I am just saying this as you said your son was diagnosed as BP but that he had meltdowns, they do.....horrible ones, far worse than any of my ASD kids.

Did they perform the ADOS? What instrument were they using for the evaluation?

Thanks Lilome, I have followed your son's story and can't imagine the depth of your loss. It is crushing the mortality rate of Bipolar, a truly life threatening illness!

Actually, I started on this journey being convinced that DS had Bipolar, but after spending much time on the BP parent support groups (and reading the recommended books), their stories didn't match ours. Most notably was the social ineptness of DS, and his special interests when not in a meltdown. Further, after a meltdown my DS is exhausted and back to his normal, most of the BP parents would describe big cycling. those parents also had very little luck reducing meltdowns when modifying the environment, whereas when we have reduced stressors, DS's meltdowns vanished.

The Stanford Drs said that the above, coupled with the fact that he has been completely stable since last August when we finished weaning him off all meds and began homeschooling.

What I found was between the stories I heard here and the stories I heard on the BPkids support groups, we heard our stories more frequently here.

hmmm ... well, it is hard to say how much is due to their different personalities, but a few things I learned to do for my AS son just got me walked all over with my probably not AS daughter (the AS child was my first, so that set the family tone). She isn't logic and needs driven in the same way, not as internally motivated. She responds to rules and rewards much more than he does. And she will watch and observe and know what makes us soft and then play it; my son just isn't capable of that to any meaningful degree; he seems so oblivious to so much around him.

But she does have rages and tears that are similar in many ways to meldowns. I think anyone can have meltdowns when everything in their brain is colliding, or when nothing is going right, but for most people it would be extremely rare. With her I'm still trying to sort out where it comes from.

Don't know if that helps at all; maybe after my deadline I can think it through more.

Curiously enough, those two areas, processing speed and executive function, have never been an issue for me--which is one of the reasons why I have done quite well in school and making a living.

Though, to an observer, one might erroneously see some executive function issues in my life. For a very long time, I didn't know one goes about asking for, say, all the stuff needed to do a diorama for a class project, so it didn't get done until I could somehow get that stuff without difficult social interaction. Anything is hard if you don't have a clue as to how to do it. On the flip side, I became quite adept at doing stuff the hard way, since I'd get lots of stuff done in spite of obstacles that other folks didn't have. And, if I had a level playing field, such a written exam, I did exceptionally well.

Looks like you can rule out BP, though just because you don't have one psychological issue doesn't mean you can rule them all out--if only it were so easy!

I can understand your feelings somewhat.

My son has been diagnosed Aspergers/HFA. However, he is fairly high-functioning, and has his 'very good days'. I know if someone else evaluated him on a very good day . . . or let's say after a year of intervention and progress, they are most likely going to say he is not on the spectrum. However, approaching him as ASD is what is working and what works for us! It has started to change everything. So, if someone improves enough, are they just no longer 'ASD' or are they 'improved ASD'?

There are so many diagnoses' that are almost the same. I was reading about 'pragmatic language impairment' the other day and thought--well, that sounds just like aspergers.
According to Wikipedia, people with pragmatic language issues can have:
delayed language development
difficulty understanding questions
difficulty understanding choices and making decisions
difficulty following conversations or stories. Conversations are "off topic" or "one sided"
difficulty extracting the key points from a conversation or story; they tend to get lost in the details
Stuttering or cluttering speech
Repeating words or phrases

difficulty with verb tenses
difficulty with pronouns
difficulty explaining or describing an event
tendency to be concrete or prefer facts to stories
have difficulty understanding satire or jokes
have difficulty understanding contextual cues
difficulty in reading comprehension
difficulty with reading body language and reading/using nonverbal communication
Problems with nonverbal cues such as personal space between others
Difficulty with writing
difficulty in making and maintaining friendships and relationships because of delayed language development
difficulty in distinguishing offensive remarks
difficulty with organizational skills
It also says, "People with SLD often share additional characteristics consistent with high-functioning autism. For example, they may dislike or avoid eye contact. Many have rigid habits, a shallower range of interests than most people but not as bad as Asperger Syndrome or autism, (often with a deep knowledge of their areas of interest), sensory and eating sensitivities, coordination and muscle-tone issues. They may also display striking abilities in an area like mathematics, computer science, geography, astronomy, reading, history, sports, politics or music."

So, how do we differentiate what is what? I think that is why so many professionals have so many differing opinions. Much of this field is still a mystery. I say, as the others, go with your gut--sounds like there's more to it than 'just' anxiety. And what works for you/your child is what is important. But, yes, I imagine it rocks the world when how you have been operating is totally called into question (even though it may be based on professional evaluations). I am not looking forward to that day.

Our second son is one of those "borderline" kids - he wants to be very social, doesn't have a special interest, makes good eye contact, has very mild sensory sensitivities - has speech articulation and pragmatic issues. Our initial evaluation through a UM genetic study placed him clinically on the spectrum, all in the realm of communication. Part of this evaluation was based on the clinicians observations and not just our input as parents.

His school evaluation showed a lot of developmental scatter and they also assessed him as being on the spectrum, but having great eye contact. He does want to be social, but has a hard time following anyone's rules but his own. Robotic voice, can't identify facial expressions.

We just had a transition meeting on Friday, and of course none of his teachers/professionals there have seen the kinds of behaviors that we've seen. His behavior at home has greatly improved - probably because previous to this assessment we were just treating him like a stubborn, strong willed kid (which he is) but with horrible results. Being in an ASD specific class (10 kids, 3 teachers) with trained teachers, us backing off on letting him have his own rigid schedule (within reason and in the context of his own particular flavor of ASD) - of course his behavior is going to improve, because he's getting what he needs. They're going to transition him to a mainstream classroom (18 kids, 1 teacher, lots of transitions) over the next few weeks.

But half of the team wanted to remove ASD from his ESE paperwork completely. Fortunately we have a good ASD specialist, who already knows us from our older son and strongly recommended against that. There is no definitive answer - but from my own experience with this, every professional that you come across will have their own definitions and restrictions of where that line between ASD and NT is.

If considering him on the spectrum works to make life better for him and for you, than go with it.

The problem with a lot of "borderlines" is that they think like someone with ASD, but since often they don't show enough of the behaviours and symptoms to be diagnosed, most of them never receive the support they need.

I'm glad your son is getting the support he needs Covus.

Thanks Kjas - it was definitely one of those meetings where I was feeling kind of "refridgeratory". Nice word, huh. :/ But I did feel like they were implying that I must be wrong and had somehow manipulated the evaluations. It will be interesting to see what happens in the mainstream classes - I just know that if those behaviors continued at school (he externalizes when he can't cope - so he hits, headbutts, bites other people, and screams) I would be getting "those" calls and he would be treated as a behavior problem. The stronger you try to assert you will (especially in a BECAUSE I SAY SO) tone, the worse he reacts. If you give him a real. concrete reason to do something, he usually will, but on his own terms.

I've even guilty of pushing the no-tolerance, being more strict parenting angle even more, because I wasn't convinced that he was on the spectrum until we got some professional opinions. I don't have to tell anybody here how badly that kind of attitude went over. It was a rough couple of weeks.

My older son wasn't diagnosed until the end of second grade and so he spent 3 years at school being completely misunderstood. I'm not willing to let that happen again.