Autism in Teens | Autism PDD

Hi, I was wondering if anyone has any information on resources for autistic teenagers. My 16 year old son was diagnosed with autism at the age of 4 back in the 90's. Back then no one really knew anything about autism, and the only way that I was able to get any help for my son was by not revealing that he was autistic. There were no schools that would accept him with that diagnosis and if they did they wanted to put him in a self contained class with no guidelines for teaching him. No resources were available outside of your child being diagnosed. I live in Florida, so I was able to get my son enrolled in a private school that catered to children with mild disabilities like dyslexia as long as they did not have behavior problems. I had to hide the fact that my son was autistic because most people felt that autistic children were behavior problems. Thankfully my son was blessed with a photographic memory which helped him enormously in his school work. However I did have to explain to his teachers every year that he had a very good memory, and to make sure that he was understaning the concept. He would memorize math problems, books and anything else but not understand what those numbers or words meant.  Well long story short he has come a long way with the help of lots of determined family and friends and the tons of stories we had to make up with some of my son's behavior. Now reaching the teens there are new obstacles like, getting a driving license, girls, sex education, and life after high school. And I am feeling a little overwhelmed. The information out there for teens as well as adults is scarce and I would be so thankful for anything that you can share with me!Let me just say that im 25 years old and have definatly been down that similar road as you, in fact, i had even less as far as resoucres because I was DX'ed in the late 80's and so aside from special education had absolutly nothing to help as far as socialization and whatever else.

Indeed, I thank God I have gotton this far in life (good job, nice somewhat new vehicle, friends and a nice place all to myself, which I own) but it did not come with quite a bit of difficulty, struggle. .

I dont have a ton of advice, only that while i had even less to work with then your son, if an individual is high functioning enough, they can succed in life, while I am still young (25) my father, obviously had nothing growing up, and hes more aspie then anybody I could possible know, even myself, seriously, and because of him I was able to grow up in safety, security, and predicatibiliy, it can be done, keep fighting the good fight!!! You and your son can win!!

Thankfully my parents had, well... lets just say they are somewhat well off, and so not only were they able to help me while little, growing up, but even after I finished collage and finally they decided it was time for me to support myself, they even helped me financially to get to where I am now, been 100% independent for a few years now, never would I have succeeded without my parents.

Indeed, very little information exists for autistic teens, and all I know is my experiences, which primarly consisted of trying to fit in, then where I did fit it, it was generally with the wrong crowd, people who would then, and later in life bring me down, get me into trouble. Tho in hindsight I must say that had it not been for them, perhapse my social skills would not be as refined as they are currently, I had to learn much over those years (and I must say, all bad and good taken into consideration, my life has been quite good).

While many neghboors did not know about my condition (at least a few did ) I was able to slip under the radar due to very high functioning ability. Coupled with parents who, while they thought it was the right thing to do at the time, punished me for everything, every meltdown, or inapropriate social encounter, after a period of time, you learn much, it put me into shape, but still could not prevent the many errors I would make in high school and collage (the party scene). Tho, even doing all that I learned much (thru observation) how to behave, yet be yourself, have an identity.

I hear constant talk about 'self contained classes' and actually hear this comment thru my former special ed teacher I saw this summer, who I had not seen previously since 1991, before I moved to NYS. I dont know what this means, ill asume its some kind of incorporation into normal classes, an introduction perhapse (I was not mainstreamed until 5-6th grade).

I only have been thru the special education system in NJ (1987-1991) and in NYS (1991-1993). I dont know how florida operates, seems NY and NJ are quite similar to eachother.

Im sorry if I appear to be all over the place, i have much on my mind to try and convey on here, yet im almost outa time, i have work soon , i wanna get out as much as possible and this is the only way I can figure how to do it.

How old is your son, i assume he is in his teens, so hell be looking forward to a drivers license, well... my parents put this off until I was 17 , I was not happy, and they established "unfair" rules for me in compairion to my sister who had no such rules such as no passengers. I passed both my permit and drivers license test 1st time, however gettin access to my parents van was harder for me then my sis.

Girls or sex ed is tough, im 25 and I have a GF and guess what, IM A CRAPPY BF!!! heh, tho she sticks by me, she sees me as to predictable, scedual oriented, worried about the future (?), she told me I was often distant (?) whatever that means... Cant be helped to be honest half the time i dont even know how to, well... move, yet we have known eachother for a while, so I hope she sticks by me, because while I may not be the most promiscuous, I am indeed, a good provider, and know someday I want what my parents have, for now I do well enough, better then most my age really....

Life after high school.... well... to be honest my life, by then I owned my own car, had a part time job (i lived at home the first 2 years, and away the last 1.5 years, so my parents payed all my living expences, really, my $$$ from work went into my car, or, well my party lifestyle because I had friends and collage life = party . By this time in life I knew I had serious problems with socialization, and needed to imporove, i kept partying to learn, to mix, to make friens, to blend in. I wanted conditioning, exposure (later in life it would almost end up in me going to jail ) I dont recomed the party scene, it can lead down bad roads (now i know....) I recomend you try and keep your son away from bad crowds, keep track of him better (my parents once I turned 18 let me run wild, BBBIIIIGGGGG MYSTAKE!!! and I would later pay for). Keep your sons eyes focused on the big prize in later adult hood (i still stuggle with this) what does your sone want to be when he grows up? Collage? What kind of life? For me now I want a decent job that will be able to provide for my future family (i hope ) and allow me the american dream, home ownership!

I have quite a bit more, and had to leave alot out, im almost outa time Sad to here the help wasn't there back then for you 2 here.  Can you get some help now.

You are such an inspiration. And I am very happy to hear that you are doing well living on your own and that you have such supportive people in your life. It makes a difference to have people around that you can be yourself with and that understand you.  I didn't know if I wanted to laugh or cry after reading your response everything that you have gone through sounds so similar to many things that I have been and am going through now with my son.  But after reading it I feel so relieved and  encouraged. I don't feel so much like the horrible parent for making some of the same choices as your parents did in raising my son. And I feel much more hopeful about his future and eventually being on his own. I learned early that I had to stop trying to shield and protect my son from the world. I knew that there was no guarantee that I would always be around to protect him from people that did not understand him or bullies that took advantage of him, so I tried to allow him to experience life in all its forms good and bad as much as possible without my interference.  It was so hard for us both. There are so many times that I had to restrain myself from intervening and instead talk to my son and try to give him advice to figure things out on his own. Thankfully there were many teachers that really liked my son and worked with me to help him become more independant as well as help him with his social skills. My 16 year old son is in a private high school working to keep his grades up (he is an A B student) and wants to become a mechanic or a photographer. He has been a car fanatic since he was born (no kiddin!) And now works along side his uncle who owns his own auto mechanic business for tractor trailers during the summer and on the weekend.  He can drive a car(according to my aunt) and can also operate a fork-lift (according to my uncle). And from what my uncle says is very good at fixing cars and trucks.  But as you mentioned his social skills are what I'm really concerned about. I took awhile for me to realize how impressionable my son was until until he started working with my uncle. My uncle also has two of my cousins who are a year older than my son that works with him as well and they would get my son into so much trouble and talk him into doing anything they wanted.  Knowing that he knew better I asked my son why he let them talk him into these things and he said he just wanted his cousins to like him. I also talked with my cousins to find out why they chose to torment him so much. They responded that when he got tired of them bothering him he would learn to stand up to them. And guess what? He finally did! It took about 3 years but he finally did and while they still play jokes on each other, he is not as easily manipulated by them anymore.  But I feel at least like I have him on the right track after reading your message. He wants to go to college after high school so I'm trying to prepare him for that. (thanks for the heads-up on that!)   After receiving your response I feel energized,  just knowing that despite what so many may think about autistic children that they can grow up and have successful lives of their own.  I wish you continued sucess and happiness in your life you sound like a delight and I know your parents must be really proud of you. Your  experiences have really given me hope that my son will also be able to go out into the world on his own. I still have my fears of letting him go but,

http://www.autism-pdd.net/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=16099&am p;KW=puberty - puberty resources, focusing on sexuality and physical changes. 

http://www.autism-pdd.net/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=17860&am p;KW=transition - Transition to adult life resources, including a live-in program that helps students with autism attend nearby colleges.

Good luck with everything.

Get help from an Advocate in Fla.  TRANSITION TO ADULTHOOD services are more available now and IDEA 2004 REQUIRES decent Transition Plans.  The BEST site I've found on this is www.ncset.org

My son was born in 1991 and our story is similar to yours. Getting my son a volunteer job through his school, complete with job coaching, has helped immensely. Whatever you do, try to make sure your son DOES NOT GRADUATE FROM HS until he's at least 19.  If he gets a score on the Vineland II adaptive test (which he SHOULD have NOW) of 69 or less, he can qualify for adult services, complete with job coaching during his adult years.  Ask your District to give you as much information about Transition as you can drag out of them. But my best suggestion is to speak with your State Ed Dept. about it and also try to get the advice of a good, local Advocate.

Heh, he knows how to operate a forklift heh?? I am OSHA certfied for my job to drive a forklift, since I work in a facility that loads and unloads trucks. Anyways, ya socialization was very difficult growing up, the difference between being an adult and then is that now not only am I able to tell if I screwed up but for the most part (aside from people having to repeat themselfs for me to understand their language) I can go with it, yet put my own uneqness to the social scene, in past years, I was the most social I have ever been, however in recent history I have taken a liking to being online (typically on here or wrongplanet) so I dont 'get out' quite as much as I used to and thats cool with me. At this point, i dont need any more social practice, ill never get better, but dont feel I really have too anymore.

Ya, thats the thing, trying to protect your kid from the world, my parents, made many errors, but also did many things right, even at a time where their is little info to go by. For a while I was a bit behind the rest of the kids in my neghboorhood in terms of being allowed out at night, or to leave the area or whatnot, it was keeping me back from living an independent life as a teen, they knew this eventually and allowed me the same freedoms as the other kids, of course by this time we were gettin older (high school aged) and everyone was driving. It was also this time that my childhood friends began to ditch me, they say the weirdness in me all those years and i guess did not want a part of it anymore, that hurt for a while, but I found new and better friends, people I hang with today (on weekends).

The worse part of growing up I think your son will find is being 'ditched'. I bet he has friends, they may later leave and he will be faced with the prospect of having to find others, this was the most difficult part of growing up for me, to this day their is much friction between me and those others who left me in my neghboorhood. This was when the real problems started for me, tho I met new people, they were the 'bad crowd' that replaced my friends in childhood. However without the bad crowd, while I woulda refrained from any trouble, perhapse I could not deal with people the way I can today, they taught me much over those years inadvertantly.

Manipulation is another difficult thing, your son dealt with it for those 3 years, and so didnt I, the problem is you wanna be liked, but may not know how to go about it, in order to be excepted (and others can see this a mile away) they will mess with people like us, i spent years like this and only in high school did I put an end to it, realizing what was happening and deciding I dont need to take any of that anymore to be accepted by people I figured were not good friends, its funny looking back, but that so called 'bad crowd' made my best friends, and today, i dont talk to many, but I talk to a few. Even tho they may have been a bad influence, it was cause of them I had a 'normal life' during high school and collage.

I feel it is important for us higher functioning individuals to have the most normal life in childhood and growing up as possible, many mistakes will be made, people will hurt others, fights may occure, and of course ostrisizeation. No amount of theripy can replace experience in life, im so greatful to look back during those years growing up and have a smile on my face while I do it, because I lived life pretty normally, typical was what I needed, gained life experience, learned from mistakes and was able to keep on fighting and use my experiences growing up to build on in adult hood. I absolutly encourage parents to give their higher functioning kids the most 'typical' life possible, over time, they will learn how to adapt themselfs and I can only hope one day when they look back on their lives they will be as happy as I was during those years prior to adult hood.

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