All autistic children are..

[Hecate]

INDIVIDUAL CHILDREN!!!!

I bloody loathe the whole "autistic children like X, autistic children hate Y, autistic children are all Z" It drives me loco!

There are as many ways to be autistic as there are autistic people!

Do any of you get the whole "Oh, your child is autistic, they all don't they?

My boys are both autistic and are totally different. I bet if any of you met up with me and mine, our children would be totally different.

It just makes me [head blows up emoticon] that people see Autism and not a unique individual with a personality all of their own.

• - - - post inspired by "Oh, they're all really good at maths, aren't they" comment today.

Any suggestion of things to reply to stuff like the above, gratefully received!

www.amazon.co.uk/Sensory-Perceptual-Issues-Autism-Experiences/dp/1843101661/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=boo ks&qid=1216672221&sr=8-1 brilliant book about sensory processing

Unfortunately beautifulspectrum they were (although to be fair to them most research is on hfa/as)

DIL- I think sensory seeking behaviour is quite common amongst auti kids. DS1 is very sensory seeking and it was mentioned a lot in the sensory perception seminar that went on at IMFAR. It's just not well studied so the hyper stuff has made it into folklore

Just saw this thread. If anyone else tells me that DS must be good at maths or an amazing artist I will explode.

Another rant -a HV and a school nurse have both sat with my DS2, age 2 and cooed oh he makes beautiful eye contact, he's not going to be like his brother. Actually DS1 makes great eye contact too if you bother to speak to him!

The most irritating comment was from a paediatrician who was seeing my DS for an unrelated issue. After a 5min consultation he wrote to our regular paed to say he did not think DS was autistic as he made eye contact and responded well to his questions. Didn't he notice mum was rephrasing everything he said for DS, and I was standing behind him so that DS was looking towards him as he examined him. We hit meltdown as we went through the hospital exit. Where was the paed then?

Rant over - thanks for the therapy!

oh ds1's eye contact meant that he missed being diagnosed when he was 2 We were told that if he had anything wrong with him at all it was very mild and it definitely wasn't autism and he'd be all caught up by the time he was 5. So... aged 9 still non-verbal, SLD.s....... hmm Still makes GREAT eye contact mind

When my dd was first seen by a HV the HV said 'i dont think theres too much of a problem here'..... afew months later my daughter was dx as classic autism aged two. Shes non-verbal and severe now.

Its all down to knowledge and understanding and there is still not enough of it!

Widemouthfrog 'If anyone else tells me that DS must be good at maths or an amazing artist I will explode.' - With you on that one! The thing that bugs me when people say this to me is that my ds is really good at art - but why can't it be just because he's really good at art, why do they see it as an 'autism' thing? For the sake of argument say he did become a famous artist - he would probably always be 'autistic artist X...' Not that I'm ashamed of the autism or anything but why does everything have to be made an autism thing? It's like sometimes he has strops that are just him being a stroppy kid, but then sometimes he has complete meltdowns from frustration - Not Autism/Autism. I do appreciate some of these people are just trying to see a positve side to autism but I feel it negates any talent ds has because the praise goes to the autism.

Phew...breathe....

very good point seuss...

the op does make me think of the Life of Brian

Aefondkiss, I like the life of Brian reference. I hadn't really thought about it before, but living with AS means our life is very Monty Pythonesque IYKWIM . Yes, and it is an acquired taste with a warped sense of humour to.

Monty Pythonesque -that covers it well! Proving how different autistic children can be I remember going on a school trip and someone blowing a whistle - half the kids started screaming and covering their ears, some of them stopped still (as they were expected to) and the rest (ds included) used the diversion to try and scarper! That was quite Monty Pythonesque!

lol, I was thinking that after I posted, whilst worrying that I shouldn't have posted about the life of brian, but also thinking about autism and the sn world and the life of brian makes me feel better, which isn't a bad thing!

it also makes me think of another thread and they were talking about speech and saying how poetic people with speech problems can be, I like that too...

I also like the hand movements my ds makes, they are like ballet sometimes, fingers/hands moving to his own tune... it is so good to think of some of my ds's issues as something beautiful. (not that I don't think he is beautiful... but so are all children with Autism)

Ds1's main obsession is with numbers and he loves drawing so I'm afraid he does fit those stereotypes .

so bullet do you give people a big grin of pride or do you resent them linking your ds's talents to Autism?

But the stereotypes do annoy me. Because in some ways I fit them and other ways Ds1 fits them but in an awful lot of ways we don't. Eg as someone who's Aspergers I rarely make inappropriate comments, I am crap at maths, I have no technical or science awareness at all and I have very very few eating issues. However, I still have obsessions, difficulties with communication and interaction, repetitive behaviours and stims.

I like it when ds knows what he wants to say but doesn't quite know the stucture/words - the way he puts things sometimes can be very sweet! And he has quite a wicked sense of humour and on the odd occasion this comes out in language form it is hysterical.

Our days out always seem a bit slap-stick (but fun) they inevitably end up with one of us running madly after ds/trying to stop him dropping trunks and weeing on beach/telling him not to be Kung-fu panda in public...I could go on but I'm sure you get my point!

My DS1 has a thing about stripping off his pants to jump on the trampoline, closely followed by 2yr old DS2 shouting 'pants on, pants on' and waving the offending article around his head. Is that the autism thing or is he just bonkers!

I agree bullet - my ds doesn't fit a lot of the stereotypes(no huge sensory issues, not too much prob. with routines, quite caring/affectionate) but he then he definately has communication probs and obsessions and more. I guess it must be really hard if you don't really know any autistic people to realise how different everyone is.

(I didn't mean to imply above that I find it amusing when my child can't communicate - it's just some of the alternative words/phrases he comes out with are nicer than what he 'should' have said.)

Sorry Aefondkiss I missed your question before. To be honest nobody in real life has ever said "oh he's good at drawing or numbers" because he's autistic. They just say he's good with them and that's fine by me .

Naked trampolining does seem quite popular with ds' school-mates. Naked anything is fine with ds - unfortunately they have rules on these things in Soft-Play/Swimming Pool...My ds2 is quite good at alerting us to the 'incident' too.

rofl- I opened this thread to post 'Individuals'!!!!!
Thanks Hecate

'Oh - they're so good at art aren't they?'

PMSL at this thread.

My two are almost the opposite of each other.

Ds2 is Mr Sensory-Seeker who always has to be doing something. His teachers politely describe him as "a busy child".

Ds1 is Mr Sensory-Avoider and prefers to sit quietly in a corner somewhere with a book.

Ds1 is almost physically incapable of misbehaving at school. When ds2 came home from school one day with a tale of how he'd (ds2) been told off for something in class, ds1 almost swooned with the horror of it all.

Sometimes it's hard to believe that they are related at all.

Coppertop -'a busy child'

My three are quite different too but it seems to work quite well, and if all else fails they can unite against me - the evil witch who tries to ensure they don't die of malnutrition...but that's a whole other thread.

ds1 is good at art, but unfortunately he likes to express himself on walls while I'm out of the room- I'm pretty sure this isn't an autistic thing but just a devious little monkey thing.

DS2 age 5, (cp & asd) can't count let alone be a maths genius, he has no interest in Thomas the tank engine.
He does give eye contact, but only when he feels like it & he has a good sense of humour.

So he doesn't exactly fit the stereotype & certainly not going to earn us a fortune counting cards in vegas.

Christie - love the monster story - my kids would love that!

anxiousmax - my ds has never been interested in Thomas the tank either - even his school use that as one of their most common motivators.

Probably been said before but just wanted to add my veiw. I have worked with, at a guess, 100 or so autistic children and adults and no two have been the same, hence the name Autistic SPECTRUM. The same applies to people with CP, I have worked with about 30 odd and abilities vary widely.