Any advise?

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I´m walking behind my teenage son every morning when we take bus to school. Beside all the other troubles relating Asperger, he grew up really tall for his age, and he is very thin. His feet size is 13, he walks really funny, he has a lot of back problems, headaches...Of course, first thing that crosses one´s mind is sport!But he cannot be a part of any team so far (socializing, ´course), as for individual kind of sport, we live in a small town, and you can choose between football and handball which are very OK, but not for him. Ok, we live by the sea, we could force swimming, but we have nothing organized. does it make sense to do it by ourselves? Plus he´s in general not very obediant. Is it OK to do it even if he doesn´t like it every time? Fitness?Does anyone have similar situation?

Mamamoo

My daughter's (16) worse nightmare was sport. She would engage in self harming just to get out of gym classes, she hated it so much. Her current gym teacher is very a-typical, in that she is very understanding and has finally found a fitness routine my daughter doesn't mind taking part in.

First off she understood that gym involving other people just will not work. So my daughter has 1 class a week that is just her and the teacher. The first few weeks were going for a walk and a chat with the teacher, so that she would feel comfortable with the teacher. Now she spends an hour a week in the gym on her own with the teacher using the weights, cycling machine and rowing machine type stuff. She gets to choose the music.

We also have a rowing machine in the cellar which she now uses sometimes by her own choice. 6 months ago I wouldn't have believed that possible. I'm getting a cycling machine as soon as I can afford it. She loves cycling but won't ride a bike outside because she thinks people will laugh at her.

Rather than contact sports that involve "team" sportmanship and social skills, why not just try to spark an interest in other activities he may find rewarding and less "social?"

Prehaps, he may enjoy developing an interest in photography, astronomy, rocketry, model trains or woodworking? Does he enjoy music? Art? Why not encourage him to take up a musical instrument...piano, guitar or another one that doesn't require being part of an orchestra or band, if he doesn't like being part of a large group of people?

There are many activities he can engage in that will make him into an interesting and "creative" person to others...and these activities will not necessarily force him into highly "social" situations unless he wants to participate.

Best of luck to you!

Sports are less likely to fix the problems you see than add ones. Fitness, however, is a good goal and your child can keep active with things like hiking and biking. Those are my son's two favorites, and they can be done most anywhere.

My son did play soccer for many seasons and really enjoyed it, but it eventually got too competitive for his abilities, so he "retired" after a great last season. It was a good experience, but it didn't fix any of his physical issues. Neither did playing T-ball and softball; both basically just made it really obvious how different he was from other boys (thankfully we had coaches who made him feel appreciated anyway, and made sure all the boys on the team did so, as well).

Walks funny, very tall, back problems...are you certain that your son doesn't have Paget's or some other bone disease or hormonal imbalance?

Well, so far he´s OK with all that.The only thing orthopedic said is that he´s growing faster than his muscles etc. cannot fallow.He sais he has to do stretching and exercises, but he doesn´t understand that that´s as difficult to do as anything else because my son simply doesn´t cooperate.We realy tried.Even worse, my husband is a physiotherapist, one would think GREAT, you can help him 100%, but his reaction is very, very poor to all of that. Unfortunately, even though I think, someone else would do the job with him better, here comes the problem, there isn´t any organized help of that kind in the area that we live, and so far we are not likely to move because many other life circumstances.
Thank you for answering!! ! mamamoo

OK. Just wanted to be sure you had considered it.

Our youngest son was complaining about numerous ailments but the pediatrician kept saying it was just "growing pains." It wasn't until our son got really sick that we found out that he had Type 1 Diabetes.

By the way, he hates exercise too - what a battle! If you find a way to make your son do exercise, please let me know!

Hi my 11 year old aspie son also hates physical sport/exercise, infact any form of movement which will take him outside in the fresh air away from one of his consoles. I know its mean, but for his sake I insist on it. I make him walk with me for half hour to an hour a day. Its always worse the (complaining) if he doesn't tell me one of his game plots along the way. If I can get him talking he doesn't notice how long he has walked for. My son also has swimming lessons during school terms, he does much better at these if he is allowed to wear flippers. Its very hard for him to co-ordinate both arm and leg and breathing. Swimming is a great solo sport and should help with your sons back probs. Get him some flippers so its not so hard and his sucsess at swimming faster and for a longer period will be more achievable.

good luck

Tried wii fit? My sister's back always hurt but once doing the wii fit it corrected her posture, etc while exercising. And certainly has helped my balance.