To wonder whether this could be neurodiversity?

[VanillaMummy]

DD is in Year 8. She’s always been quite introverted and on the edge of things socially although she does well with her work. She has a good friend from primary at another school whom she still sees lots of. Other than that though, she rarely does anything with peers out of school.

Yesterday she was telling me how overwhelming she finds the school dining hall. It’s so big with so much background noise. The tables are for 9 or 10. She says she finds it hard to focus on conversation whilst eating at the same time. She can’t keep up and so tends to zone out instead and not even try.

She struggles with unstructured time with peers generally and doesn’t like break times. She says it’s not that anyone is unpleasant to her (mostly) but she finds following a group conversation really hard. She also has difficulty bringing herself into a conversation and so gets left out a lot. She prefers situations where there’s an adult in charge to structure things, make sure everyone gets a chance, etc. After lunch she’ll often go to the library to do her homework as she finds it easier to ‘focus on just one thing’ in a quiet place, rather than go back to the classroom and just hang out with others.

She’s a bit a maths geek, although at a selective school thankfully this doesn’t’t seem to be an issue and I’m not aware that she’s ever been teased. Her interests are not very mainstream though which I don’t think helps her socially. She’s quite child-like and doesn’t really follow teen pop culture. I’m not sure whether she’s just young for her age (her older sister seemed much more mature at this point) or whether there’s more to it.

She did see the school counsellor last year (at staff’s suggestion) to try to help her become more socially integrated. If anything I think this made things worse. The counsellor just put pressure on her to make more effort to talk to people, etc. without any appreciation of the things which make this difficult for her. She ended up getting frustrated and feeling like she was failing.

I’m wondering whether there’s a better way to help her? Does it sound as if there could be neurodiversity here? If so, what do we do about it?

Both my GDs are ASD and one in particular struggles with eating in noisy places so she is allowed to eat somewhere quiet with just one friend. Having a safe quiet place to go like the library sounds like she is adapting.

It’s interesting you say that @Cornishclio as the counsellor would tell her not to go to the library as she needed to make more effort with friends and could do her homework later when she got home. She did take this advice for a time. That particular counsellor has left now.

Sounds nd yes.

Yesterday she was telling me how overwhelming she finds the school dining hall. It’s so big with so much background noise. The tables are for 9 or 10. She says she finds it hard to focus on conversation whilst eating at the same time. She can’t keep up and so tends to zone out instead and not even try.

This sounds like auditory processing disorder, something which I have struggled with for my whole life. It also explains why she is at the edge of conversations since her brain can't process them!

During the pandemic when everyone was wearing masks I discovered that I was lip reading, a skill I didn't know I had picked up.

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/auditory-processing-disorder/

In my experience, having a diagnosis is not what will "make her feel something is wrong with her" at all. That will be caused by not having a diagnosis and feeling like she is always getting things 'wrong' or that everyone else knows what to do and she doesn't but has no reason for that so just feels stupid instead.

That is bizarre!

Ime, Autistic people have more empathy than NT people.
Many Autistic people have some eye contact especially girls.
Autistic people can struggle with social imagination not imagination in general.
You've put a strategy in to place that helps many Autistic people.

Whether or not you and your DD want to pursue a diagnosis, what you can do right now regardless of diagnosis is reinforce that it is absolutely ok to be her. The counsellor she had was clearly not skilled/up to date in neurodivergence and your DD does not have to mask in the way she has been told to.

What was revelatory for me being late diagnosed was unlearning all the things I had been told I was supposed to do. All those years I thought I was just weird or broken, when actually who makes the rules that says being constantly social is a requirement? That sitting in the library (something I still do for a breather when I am in town, but started at school) is the wrong thing to do? I have spent so much of my life ducking into toilet cubicles just to try and get some space from being overstimulated in social situations. All of those things were me trying to look after myself and that's a good thing! More of that! I'm not suggesting your DD shuts herself away forever with a maths book, but what she might find is that accepting her differences will actually make some of the socialising easier in the small amounts right for her.

Also wanted to add to my earlier post, the book ‘nurturing you autistic young person’ by Cathy Wassell was so helpful for me to finally understand my neurodivergent daughter (and to realise she is neurodivergent in the first place). It’s like my go to manual. Those reasons the nhs listed as indicating not autistic are all traits mostly masking girls (sometimes boys too) have.

I have enormous empathy and I'm actually a great communicator, but it is situation dependant.

Socially, I always struggled and could never get on the inside of inner social circles.

Noisy situations, such as the dinner hall, were overwhelming for me. I preferred to find a quiet place where I could read or draw. I joined the lunchtime photography club for this very reason.

I didn't have a clue about the unspoken social rules.

I could do eye contact, but found it excruciating.

I'm bright, but couldn't learn in the bigger classes, nor was the teaching style back then suitable for me. I'd zone out, then freeze.

Teachers couldn't understand how I'd do so poorly, then given a creative writing piece, would produce fantastic stories with loads of detail. English and art were my things. I taught myself to read and write before I started school.

This is only a brief snapshot of a very difficult childhood where I just couldn't fit in, and thought there was something wrong with me. This carried on into adulthood until my diagnoses of autism and ADHD, then bang! I had a very good reason for my difficulties.

I cannot even start to tell you the difference this has made to my life and the validation it's given me. My life and work are infinitely better, and I'm finally climbing the ladder in work as I have the right support in work.

Please consider assessment for her, it could really change how she continues in life.

I would also wonder about ADHD over autism.

I’m interested to hear why you say this.

My DD always said she was "bad" at school. I thought she meant she couldn't keep up academically when her results were actually good. She meant she was bad at the systems, structure, socialising etc. She was dx AuDHD at 15.

I'd wonder about a combo to be honest, despite earlier thinking they have a high rate of comorbidity.