Hello and help!

Hi all, I've never used one of these forums before, but maybe some of you can give me some advice and support?

I have a 12 year old who has aspergers and has been selectively mute for a year now.   This seemed very much to coincide with starting secondary school, despite a really positive and confident start to year 7.    He joined in and communicated at primary school and had a select group of friends, but now at secondary school (mainstream) he has completely isolated himself and has no friends at all  as he doesn't communicate verbally or join in socially.  He was desperately unhappy and quite anxious for about 6 months of year 7, but genuinely seems content now, despite not talking.  The school have an incredibly strong learning support department and they have bent over backwards to support him.  He now uses a laptop at school so that he can type answers and join in during class (his handwriting is diabolical so that wasn't a successful way to communicate).   We have a link teacher for autism who is advising the school and we self referred to a specialist speech and language therapist who is also involved with the school.  I feel like things at school are being 'managed'  but I'm not sure what to expect or how much this is going to affect him long term. We are finding things out as we go along!

He talks to all of us at home and when we are with family and friends that he knows well and is comfortable with, but when we go out as a family, he often stays mute even with us, which my 14 year old daughter struggles with-  they used to do everything together, he's her wingman but she feels like she's lost him and gets very upset about how he is now.  I think as they've got older, the neuro typical/atypical differences have become more obvious.  She also feels responsible for him at times.

One of the questions we all struggle with is 'how far do we push him?'   He seems happy at the moment and is doing really well academically so does it really matter if he talks to other people or not?  I feel like we constantly test him with trips and outings (which we've always done as a family) that seem to make him increasingly uncomfortable.  However my daughter is getting more and more frustrated about things we can't do or don't do as a result of his aspergers and mutism.  Is there any specific support for siblings out there?  I'm very conscious that my daughter feels that it's 'all about him' and probably needs some support to accept that her brother will always be a bit different.

We feel constantly torn between keeping him in his comfort zone and just doing the things we've always done for my daughters sake!

Any advice from other parents of teenagers with autism? 

Thanks