My ASD Child

“My son wakes in a terrible, nasty mood. He goes to bed happy, laughing and loving. Nothing that I do can deter him from ruining his day and the day of those around him. I have tried everything to help him turn the day around - from being extra cheerful, music, ignoring, consequences, taking away privileges, talking about it, timeouts, etc... Although I do everything that I can to make sure that he gets adequate sleep (9pm-7am) he has been diagnosed with frequent night wakings. The doctors will not do anything about it. He was diagnosed with ADHD, age 5. However, I realized at age 7 that it was something much more complex than that. Finally, this past winter, he was diagnosed with mild-to-moderate ASD. We have provided countless hours of traditional and non-traditional therapy yet he still struggles a good portion of the time. His father passed away January '14 so that does not help matters -- and he has entered precocious puberty (being treated). Would you please be willing t

"My son, 17 y.o. with HFA, is no longer interested in trying to relate to his peers or do anything social. He says 'nobody' likes him. I would describe him as a recluse at this point. Is this something I should be concerned about, or just let him do his thing, which appears to me to be a very lonely way to live.?" Peer-group rejection occurs when a person is deliberately excluded from social relationships among his or her age group. Unfortunately, this phenomenon is common for teens with Asperger’s (AS) and High-Functioning Autism (HFA). Research dealing with the implications of peer-group rejection on later development suggest that AS and HFA teens experiencing continuous rejection often experience a decline in their self-image, a state of despair, behavioral difficulties, loneliness and seclusion – and in some cases, serious emotional disturbances. AS and HFA teens who experience peer-group rejection often choose to isolate themselves, which makes a bad

Can an Aspergers child’s anxiety play out as anger, and then morph to a meltdown?  Watch this video to find out: