connecting with other children | Autism PDD
Ho-lee, Nick ... you are brilliant. This is fascinating. I have never read anything like it and I think it would be unbelievably helpful to a wide range of people.
A friend of mine has a son with turrets and he masks his symptoms ... he's just about to go into his teen years and I know he feels alone in it sometimes. I think he feels like no one understands and I think what you wrote here would make him feel like finally someone "gets" him.
Now you have me wanting to find a publisher for your book!!! I feel so strongly about what you've written, it's such an enlightening look into your world, something most people would never have the opportunity to understand or never have the slightest clue about and you're so eloquent about it and so wonderfully descriptive so it's easy to follow your process. Amazing.
Interesting about the drugs too. I never would have thought of it but it makes perfect sense that that would bring all sorts of issues into your life which are the exact issues that are challenging to someone with any degree of autism. The rationale is really fascinating, how everything is thought out.
Thank you for sharing this with me.
Warmly,
Colleen
I was going to link you over to my initial post, which tells a lot of my story, but I could not find it when I tried to search it out this time.
However, I am currently working on a composition that I hope to turn into a book someday. I will give you an excerpt from the "social" section that describes some of the masking techniques that you are talking about. I copied this from a post I made within my meltdown thread back in May, and then modified it somewhat to fit the flow of my composition.
"One of the signature characteristics of autism is that of social delay. As mentioned before I took a long time – as in nearly 25 years – to iron out the whole social thing. In fact, I am still learning. I hear of so many autistic adults dealing with depression because of their lack of socialization, myself included. I’ve also talked to people who have turned to drugs in order to escape from their problems. Fortunately I have managed to remain drug free, but only out of fear. I doubt I would pass up the opportunity to escape if it weren’t for all the horror stories I’ve heard. Plus, now that I’ve studied science, I can see that the horror stories have merit, so therefore my repulsion from these substances is increased.
The main thing that has kept me off of mind-altering substances, though, is fear of the unknown. I remain stable by staying in control of my "world," which means being alert enough to stimuli that I can go into my "mental database" and pick the appropriate script fast enough to avoid looking dumb, getting injured, being in the wrong place at the wrong time, offending the people I'm with, etc., etc.. Street drugs would take that alertness away from me and I would no longer be in control of my world, and thus no longer in control of my actions. The less in touch I am with my environment (due to prolonged stress/overload, some medications, or whatever), the more prominent my autistic tendencies become. I experience a lot of stress when I do something "wrong," especially when I did not intend to do it. So it stands to reason that if I were on any kind of mind-altering drug, I would be even more out of touch, which means I would inadvertently do more wrong things, which means I would have even more guilt and anxiety around other people. Aside from that it could put me in trouble with the law, and since law enforcement procedures go on without allowing the suspect to know what's happening, it would add a perpetual "unknown" environmental condition that I would continuously stress over in addition to everything else. So looking at it from that angle it seems to me like turning to drugs will only magnify my current problem many times over.
I think my main crutch is that I have mainly "acquaintances," not "friends." In other words, I have certain protective barriers ("firewalls" if you will) about me that most people just can't get through. I never stay in social situations for very long, and I only go out often enough that people will see that I am willing to go out. All I really have to do is focus on *not* doing anything offensive, and then if I don't make much conversation the people around me seem to absorb the "blame" somewhat for not getting to know me in the brief time that they saw me. I have the ability to "mimic" the people around me and quickly learn to do enough to not appear the odd man out, provided I only make brief appearances. I usually do this by mimicking behaviors that I observe from members of the group. I just use my mental store of scripts to anticipate certain moments, then inject the scripted response when the opportune moment arrives. It's not always easy to do, but I only have to do that successfully a couple of times in order to appear "normal" to them, albeit quiet and reserved. Thus I am simply camouflaged or disguised from a social standpoint, rather than actually a genuine member of the clique. As long as I leave with a reputation something to the effect of "that one guy Nick, I didn't get to talk to him much, and he didn't stay long, but he seemed cool...." it puts the responsibility of being social on the other people, rather than me, because it makes them curious about me and interested in me. All I have to do then is not let them get quite close enough to see me up close, and I can hang with a group for a while.
Eventually, however, my quirks and oddities will begin to show up, people will stop greeting me, and the responsibility of being social will start to shift back to me. Once this happens I begin to withdraw, and at a certain point I will feel out of place enough that I will detach from that group of friends, be reclusive and collect my thoughts for a short period of time, and then when I feel ready or the opportunity presents itself, find another so that I can once again have a social "luster" about me. This cycle repeats about every 12-18 months. It sort of makes me a camouflaged social "parasite," but it's the best I can do.
And on a side note, if I don't let them get too close, it has the added effect of not allowing me to get emotionally attached to anyone, so it is easier to detach from them when the time comes.
I have a few people who know that I am autistic, and whom I feel comfortable enough to welcome myself around. These certain people are my social and emotional lifeline when my contact with the rest of the world breaks down. They are aware of my quirks, know how to read my shut down process, and quickly show forgiveness and support if and when there is a meltdown or social blunder. And it is usually through them in one way or another that I periodically find new avenues into the rest of the NT world.
I am prepared for failure at all times, and have measures in place to cushion myself emotionally. The only times I really go off the deep end is when I have several falls in quick succession, in which case I exhaust my emotional reserves before I am able to extinguish all of the problems that incur themselves. In these cases if it were not for my core of "close" friends, not to mention my Christian faith, I would be a very real danger to myself. There have been a few times when I have doubted that even those two safety nets would be enough to save me.
With all that having been said, there are some social skills that many autistic people simply cannot learn. It's just not wired into us. I can't tell you how many times I have been able to logically dissect the way I should approach a particular interaction with another person, what I should say, how I should say it, and how I should hold my posture, and be totally ready mentally, only to panic and shut down when the conversation takes a turn that I hadn't foreseen or my words were misconstrued. It's extremely discouraging to know exactly what you need to do and still not be able to do it."
Thats a hugh problem in our society, special needs cases grow but the budgets stay low, so that means low pay, few resources, and im sorry to say, that seems to result in mixed success rates in those affected later in life. I was 1 of the lucky ones, im very mildly effected and was able to work hard to get where I am and I feel awful knowing that many wont be able to reach the function level I have achieved despite having the potential to do so, u can make it happen tho!!
I cant beleive their are classes being taught about the subject, and I know from experience that it was difficult for me to interact with other kids when I was little, had they had more understanding (and myself) maby things could have been different in elementary school, I hope some of these kids u help will have it a little easier then I did.
I wish u best of luck, and welcome to the forum!
Colleen,
I enjoyed reading your post and could feel your sincerity in the joy you get from helping kids with autism. I hope you have much success in teaching our special kids and witness many more miracles...I have seen them in my child since she got diagnosed and that is how I feel too::) They are angels:)
Blessings!
Nick,
Is it ... what's the word ... not "hard" ... maybe something like "tiring" is the word I'm thinking of ... to mask those symptoms?
Do you ever have the desire to stim? Anna does ... or tries to do it ... incessantly. Every thing you give her is a potential stim tool ... you can stim off of a bunch of marbles in a bowl but you can also stim off of a single pencil you're supposed to be writing your name with, y'know? I should post this in a forum, come to think of it. People around me have all different advice on this and none of the advice seems to manage it well enough because it continues and it's not that it bothers me that she does it but it's a constant distraction to what she's trying to accomplish. For example, if I give her materials to work with and she's shuffling them around instead of working with them. Don't get me wrong, she's an AMAZING worker, she's eager to work! Sorry to go off on a tangent on that, I'll post it somewhere.
Do you mind if I ask what classical symptoms of autism you have?
Warmly,
Colleen
Hi Woodsman, Hi Shelley,
It gives me hope to hear from you, Woodsman, someone *with* autism. The people I know who have autism are children ... the oldest is seven ... so I don't know what lies in their futures. Anna is not high functioning but I have high hopes for her ... she's so smart. She amazes me every day. She really really tries, when you ask something of her and you just want to hug her for working so hard!
I've been reading "Engaging Autism" about the Floortime approach and inside the front cover it says, "the hope of preventing the full onset of autism becomes a real possibility," which really blew me away.
You mentioned low budgets and low pay and that's so true. Something I think people should really push for in their communities, and I hope it doesn't make me unpopular for saying this, in only my second post! is training. We get paid so little, it's really hard for me to even make ends meet, so I understand that it's difficult to get the right people to fill the positions under those circumstances, but I think that the kids can come so much farther when they're being given a chance to work with people who were trained in how to work with children who have autism. It would be so great if the school districts would train the people they hire for these positions. But I won't go on and on about it ;)
I was so happy when I saw that I had received both of your replies, thank you so much for taking the time :) Your little girl is precious, Shelley!
xoxo
Colleen
I'm what they refer to as an "aspie" but I feel like I am affected by some of the symptoms of classical autism as well -- I have just learned how to mask many of those symptoms when I have to.
Warmly,
Colleen
I will be working on it tonight and tomorrow.
Nick, clearly you have a strong self-knowledge -- one of the seven types of intelligence.
I see this in my daughter as well -- I mean for a 6 year old -- and put it in her strnegths on her IEP.
But I never have seen this mentioned as a part of ASD's strength. It SHOULD be, I think -- I see so many thoughtful introverts here!
Thank you so much! I'm so glad to hear about positive experiences. There's a school I've heard about where general and special education students learn together in the classroom with two teachers ... it's a 50/50 mix ... They say the typically developing kids gain compassion and also help teach the kids with autism ... it's a very unique program. Thanks for your words of support! :)
Warmly,
Colleen
www.annarosejewelry.com : : mothers bracelets : : autism support jewelry
My son was involved in an early intervention program that not only mixed regular peers but also children with other disorders other than autism...It was a wonderful experience my child developed more during that time frame and everyone benefits.I hope you succeed!!!
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