I am the mother of a 16 year old girl who was diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome two years ago. In many ways hyperlexia (a division of Aspergers', for those who are unaware) read like a description of her exactly.
However, in my research and experience there is one thing in particular that unnerves me.
Aspies seem to be often represented as sweet but socially clueless individuals who have strong morals, even if they are bit off-color. I have raised my daughter in a devoutly Catholic home, and aside from some divorce and brief instability in her childhood, she has been taught strong faith and morals. However, she seems to be missing something, a conscience? Something human. For one thing, she lies frequently and cheats and steals without remorse or limit. Her dishonesty is frightening and does not discriminate when it comes to even close friends and family. It seems she's doing this a little bit less as she gets older, but I suspect she's just getting better at not getting caught. She's seemingly incapable of leaving the house and actually going where she says she'll be. She shoplifts ridiculously and is never caught; over the past three years I'm certain she's stolen over a thousand dollars worth of cosmetics, books, food, clothing and other trinkets. She lies to such an extent that sometimes I've read her journal and found made-up stories in there -- it's as if she lies to herself.
A significant problem is with boys and men. My daughter has little to no social life because of her social awkwardness and also because of a lack of interest, but she is extremely pretty, tall and thin and a sharp dresser and goes through boyfriends, many much too old for her, with alarming frequency. She doesn't seem to care or have any interest in them aside from things that they can provide her with, such as money (she targets rich older men); and they always get over their initial infatuation and scram fast when they realize how "weird" she is.
Though she doesn't have much of an interest in the opposite sex, there is one serious problem. It occurred first when she was 13, and she developed what we thought was her first "crush", and we were honestly a bit relieved. However, she didn't go to school with the boy who lived in our neighborhood and didn't know how to approach him appropriately. Without my knowledge, she invented this insane story about being part of a secret government organization and took it so far with threats and craziness over the span of several months that the boy's parents ended up calling the police on her. At 16, the awful "crush" struck again, and she developed an obsession with this gorgeous Puerto Rican kid from her new high school. Through manipulation and sneakiness she was able to secure him as her boyfriend, but I was disconcerted by the way she referred to him in her journal as "the Object" and "it" and not a human being. This kid was a happy, healthy, normal popular kid and dumped her after about a month, as usual. My daughter could not accept this and started calling/texting him dozens of times a day. She spread vicious rumors about him and slapped him in the face in public. She went to his employer and claimed he had sexually harassed her, getting him fired; discreetly ruined his car; planted hallucinogens in his car before anonymously tipping off his college (we're not sure yet whether he'll be expelled and facing charges); poisoned and killed his new litter of shih tzu puppies; stole and destroyed his iPod and phone (that's a lot of damages on top of ruining his car!!); and finally broke into his house one night after purchasing a tarantula and giant scorpion for $15 each from the local pet store and released them on his pillow with a note reading "Hell Hath No Fury Like the Woman Scorned." In an e-mail to a very unhealthy friend, she made it clear that she had planned in detail many ways in which she could murder him and was confident she could get away with it, but wouldn't do so so as not to jeopardize her future.
Last year we sent her to boarding school with excellent security and she managed to run away. True to form, she was found two days later at the public library immersed in stacks of books. We think her time there was beneficial but I'm still worried since she's still doing these crazy things.
My daughter is extremely intelligent. She taught herself to read at three without my knowledge; I bought her a learn-to-read book to get a headstart on kindergarten, and when I went to teach her the alphabet she astounded us by clearly reading aloud all the words in the book. I send her to retreats and religious events, and I've had deeply intelligent adults tell me they've never met someone who could dig so theologically deep and profound, especially not at her age. She devours books of all types.
Extreme beauty and extreme brains, but there are so many dark sides. Despite her power to be intensely collected and calculating, there are times when I can't even speak to her because she explodes in temper tantrums and literally sounds like a 2-year-old, and you literally have to talk to her like she is one. She cries hysterically and pounds her head against the wall over the smallest things; completely irrational. She's obsessed with looking perfect and has that distinctly Aspergian(?) fixation with lists and schedules and rules; she can spend entire days studying complicated recipes for what type of clothing looks best with her body type and colors with skin tone and subconscious messages and such, she follows extreme beauty regimens that are planned with detail down to the minute they must be performed and precisely how many squirts of what should be used, etc. She's obsessed with the "perfect" body measurements and is never without her measuring tape to ensure that her waist doesn't expand past the specifications and the hourglass is maintained. God help you if something goes out of balance -- it's the end of the world. She has so many rules about what she has to do at what times, every day is intensely structured to the point that if we leave 10 minutes later than expected she pouts like a baby and acts ridiculous.
She has caused me so much stress that it is nearly unbelievable, on top of two older siblings with their own slew of issues. I'm worried also because she'll be eighteen soon and has proved to have very poor judgement. I'm afraid to know what she'll do with the independence she wants so badly.
This is all very stressful for me. I was wondering if anyone else experiences these types of symptoms/behaviours with their children.
28 Jul 2011, 5:30 pm
