Living with a teen with Aspergers

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I'm sure Jake would feel very welcome as a part of the Wrongplanet community. You should suggest he post on here sometime, or chat. There are many people here who will be able to relate to how he feels considering Asperger's Syndrome. I think what is going on with him being argumentative towards you, is that you're one of the main people in his life, and he is taking out all his frustrations about other aspects of life on you. I unfortunately did the same thing with my mom, when I was a teen.

Perhaps Jake would like visiting The Haven section of these boards, which are a place for people to discuss things that upset them and to blow off some steam. I honestly don't understand what is so surprising to people in general, that more and more people are choosing home instead of the outside world. There is a lack of community, as well as the bullying issue. I saw a news story about how more 20 somethings in general are becoming more involved with the nerd community, and that there is more difficulty in having face to face contact. It was bizarre, like so now there are so many more people becoming like Aspies due to technology? I'd say this would be something I'd ask Rod Serling to try and help me understand.

It took me 3 years after high school to finally understanding after being bullied for so long, that everyone outside my house wasn't having malicious intent towards me. Of course, it didn't help that the majority of people in my community are jocks or preps. Is your community like that, where most of the people are the "popular" kids. It's that much harder having Asperger's Syndrome in a community like that. I liked going to Chicago as a teen, because there was more of a individualistic community there. There's a section of stores on Belmont and Clark that are like the alternative clothing stores. They were like Hot Topic, before Hot Topic was created. Perhaps Jake needs to find a community like that. There are some issues regarding that too, like sometimes the people who are outcasts also do drugs. I hung out with the outcast kids in my school, but I also was wary because I knew they did drugs at the same time. We all were trying to survive against the popular kids though, so it was unique situation where I let that sort of slide.

I think the term Asperger's sufferer, even though I understand you used the term in regards to your son's suffering, is a misnomer. Most people assume that means they are suffering because of Asperger's, a lot of people on this site believe they are suffering more from NTs or "normal" people's intolerance of them. There even has been some controversy on this site, regarding NT discrimination, from Aspies being frustrated by the idea that NTs are seen as the ideal, when to us their behavior seems completely impratical and a basic waste of time. In other words, we view them in the way they view us. I guess it's simply a matter that they're the majority, so people are more tolerant of them.

I think what might help Jake is to watch the episode of the Twilight Zone called Eye of the Beholder. Wikipedia has a description of the episode here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eye_of_the_Beholder

You may be able to find a video of it on Youtube, it's also available on DVD as part of the 2nd season of the Twilight Zone. I've found that Rod Serling is brilliant when it comes to how he writes stories regarding the feeling of being outcasted, this may have come as a part of being Jewish during WW2, which he elaborated on in the amazing and heart-wrenching episode Deaths-Heads Revisited. Where the ghosts of concentration camp victims, torture a Nazi who returns to the camp to relive his heyday.

There also was an episode of Night Gallery, which I cannot recall the name of. A father has a son who appears odd, I mean like really odd like an alien. Kids tease the son everyday for being different, and the father who's so exasperated by the never ending torment his son goes through, agrees to send his son on an exchange program to another planet. When the son arrives at the planet, everyone looks like him and he meets a man who is human. This man says to the alien son, "Oh don't even start, I know I'm a freak! That's why I'm leaving this place, I'm the person who's going to Earth as a part of the exchange program which brought you here."

If you get DirecTV they have a channel called Chiller which re-runs episodes of the Night Gallery. They just started re-releasing episodes on DVD, yay!. I seriously just found this out looking up Night Gallery on Amazon.com. They have seasons 1 & 2 on DVD. Season 2 has the episode I described above, it's called The Different Ones.

the beginning is always difficult. trying to accept the possibility that your child has AS is difficult for some. through this tumultuous time, i'd suggest that you find some time for yourself.