a time for healing

Our son was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome June 2008 and looking back now I often wonder why it was not more obvious to us because now it seems as though there could have never been a different diagnosis. I suppose it was because of our lack of understanding of autism and aspergers, not to mention the lack of resources available even now...there was really nothing to point us in the right direction. Things that I think of now that are so blatantly obvious, I had no idea they were a clue to this puzzle. I hope that whatever I find out through this journey, this process, I hope that whatever I blog here may help someone else.

Looking back now I can see that his quirky habits were much more than that. He was our first child so we were clueless. At a year he owned every possible toy you could imagine a one year old could own, but instead of imaginative play with these toys he preferred to play with batteries and remote controls. He spent endless amounts of time taking the remote apart and putting it back together again. Even to this day he is fascinated with batteries and gets nervous if a remote or controller is the slightest bit in need of a new one.

Batteries were his first obsession, next came Baby Einstein, but instead of obsessing over watching the videos he would obsess over arranging them. Lining them up, stacking them up all very specifically and he knew whenever one was the slightest bit out of order. He also obsessed over sleeping with the cases in his bed. At age 4 he struggled with writing his name in preschool, but could spend hours at the table writing the various Baby Einstein movie titles on paper...strictly from memory.

He could memorize anything and everything. It seemed as soon as he could talk he could navigate the car for us, telling us insistently that we were going the wrong way to a destination if we chose a different route. He could memorize music and songs with amazing ability. Schoolhouse Rock became an obsession and he could recite each and every song, even the obscure ones. My husband and I would joke that we could teach him physics if we could just sing it to him.

He was always so talkative, so much to the point that he would tell everyone our business, everything about us. In 4 y/o preschool he told us all about all of the friends that he had, but at the end of preschool the teacher informed us that he was the only kid to never make a friend. We thought she was crazy because of course he had made friends, he talked about them to no end. What we did not realize was that he wouldn't interact with the kids, but instead would watch from the sides and to him he had made numerous friends simply by watching them play.

He has a late birthday so the school recommended developmental kindergarten and we agreed that it would be beneficial. By the end of that year the teacher suggested that he might be autistic, but it would not be until the end of kindergarten that we would get a diagnosis.

We were so afraid to hear the words, so afraid of what the label would mean, but now we have realized that the label isn't bad at all. He is by far the coolest kid that we know and that most of our friends know. He has his quirks for sure, but beyond those quirks he has the most amazing abilities.

There is nothing "wrong" with a child with Aspergers, they simply see the world differently than the typical person. They are just as normal as any other child. Everyone is different, everyone learns differently, everyone has their own quirky thing...if we weren't all different, how boring would the world be?

We have to be advocates for our children and attempt to give them the means to be the happiest people they can become. My hope is to provide him with the tools he needs to feel comfortable and confident in his own skin and that should be the goal of all parents, whether their children are neurotypical or not.