My ASD Child

"My son has a terrible time getting to sleep, but then in the mornings, I have a terrible time getting him up and out the door for school. Any suggestions?" Unfortunately, it seems that virtually all kids with Aspergers and High-Functioning Autism (HFA) are likely to suffer from disturbed sleep patterns at some point or another. Sleep problems can be divided into three main categories: (1) settling problems, where the youngster has difficulty going to sleep at the appropriate time, (2) waking problems, where the youngster wakes repeatedly during the night, and (3) arousal problems, where the child has a hard time waking up in the morning due to such a restless night. Coping with settling/waking/arousal problems will require consistent reassurance on your part -- and a creative approach to your youngster's needs. Here are some tips: 1. Allergy and food sensitivities: Kids on the autism spectrum are perhaps more likely than their peers to be sensitive to foo

"Any tips on how I can help my child get more organized? He loses and misplaces many things, including homework and school books, which is now affecting his grades. Help!" Children and teens with Aspergers and High-Functioning Autism (HFA) often have deficits in what we call “cognitive function” (i.e., the intellectual process by which we think, reason, understand ideas, and remember things). So a child with Aspergers may have difficulties with: “executive function” (i.e., he/she may be detail-focused and less able to see the whole picture) predicting the consequences of an action (e.g., “If you do this, what will happen next?”)  processing information  understanding the concept of time One or all of these four examples can affect Aspergers kid’s ability to organize, prioritize and sequence (e.g., if they struggle to understand the concept of time, they will have difficulty planning what to do over the course of a week). Below are some ways in which ch