cataspie wrote:
They stood and said things like famous singer and football players ect. I could hear lots of parents saying awww and making all kinds of laughs and things for every child except for my son. When he stood up and said in a very formal voice he wanted to be a famous inventor and invent a flying car everyone was quiet with exception to the slight mumbles and coughs
I've run into this myself when I was a kid, except I used to say: "I want to write programs on a computer". Keep in mind, that back then, in late 80's to early 90's, computers weren't as "normal" as they are now. So I got the same reactions from adults. I could never understand why. But when I'd ask: "what is so wrong about wanting to work on a computer?", people would never give me a straight answer. (If you think about it, it's kind of sad that a child needs to lie to keep himself from feeling embarrassed.) Although, my obliviousness to social cues due to AS probably softened the crushing blow of embarrassment from people's shocked silence.
So I came up with a fake answer, to save myself the mental anguish of the reaction you described. When anyone outside my family or my group of friends (who knew the truth) asked me what I wanted to be, I'd tell them I want to be a doctor. To make my answer even more plausible, I'd mention my pediatrician (who I really did think was a good doctor and felt comfortable being around) as an inspiration. Although I didn't like the "awww" reaction either, it was much more tolerable than a shocked silence. (Apparently, at some point along the way, I managed to learn that "awww" = "you said something that pleases us", and that a shocked silence = "WTF".)
If your son is troubled by people reacting like that as well, maybe you can teach him the same tactic. Yeah, it's lying, but after a certain age, lying becomes a necessity. If it saves him the embarrassment, and doesn't hurt anyone, I say it's fine.
[quote]I think he has started to do that already, he told his cousin that the icemaker was boring and why would anyone be intrested in it even though he had been playing with it for weeks and hours at a time.
07 Mar 2009, 3:26 pm
