Autistic or "slow"?

[onthepier]

My son who is 5, has recently been diagnosed with autism. We've been successful in obtaining a statement for his schooling, + this is really helping with the 1 to 1 help he gets.

Basically though, he's a bright, lively child, always on the go although has some speech clarity issues

My parents + SIL who have never really come to terms with the diagnosis, (don't think they understand autism!), often make comments like, "Are you sure the diagnosis is right, it could be that he's just a bit slow!"

I'd almost rather my son was known as autistic than "slow"! Anybody else agree, or am I in the minority?

Trikid - One of the problems of autism can be that the development of language is disordered. Usually a child's comprehension of language will be better than their spoken language. With ASD the opposite may be true. Ds2 is 5yrs old and has a dx of AS. His most recent language assessment showed that his spoken language is at least 3 years ahead of his age but that his understanding of language is very poor and below average for his age.

If you had said "Please don't do that or you'll break the book" he would probably have understood 'break' and 'book' and the rest would have gone over his head completely. It would be very difficult to reason with him in that sense.

However, like Amber, I would not have stood by and watched him damage the book. He understands "no" and is still small enough for me to remove him. If the book had been damaged I would have apologised and paid for a replacement.

Hi - just jumping into this thread here after reading the messages. I have 2 ASD children - now 14 & 12 - and they are both affected in different ways. My daughter is definitely "slower" to pick up on some things and is probably referred to as a "slow learner" by her teachers (although not to my face). However, for other things, she gets it straight away. My DS is a much faster learner but has a more severe language disorder. Of course, this has affected many other aspects of his learning and he often appears therefore to be more "disabled" than my DD, even though he can be very sharp & funny. I personally don't really like labels at all and only use them when I have to.

As for "bad" behaviour, the previous messages from Amber32002 and Coppertop were spot on. You've got to find a way to keep drumming the correct behaviour home to your children and be prepared to apologise to other parents/children when things go awry along the way.

My experience is also that it's been much easier to get my kids placements in mainstream school that I've chosen for them because they are behaviourally not a problem. Other children who may be academically more able than them will not be as welcome if they are perceived as being a "problem". I think this would also be the case for getting social invites etc. Sad but true.

Everyone (apart from the 2y/o!) of my children understand that a difficulty is a reason to try harder, not an excuse not to.

I have children with: ADHD, DYspraxia, Dyslexia, and autism.

My eldest son (ADHD) has learned from a fairly young age that bouncing on furniture, damaging property, hurting people and deliberately saying hurtful things is not acceptable... hes such a lovely person to be with, now...

My nephew who seems to think that saying: "dont you know I have aspergers?" is an excuse for ANY behaviour, is quite honestly, HORRID.