Mild ASD

Thank you all for the reply.   The reason I said 'Midl ASD', is because when our daughter was assessed at the age of 4, the pediatrician neither confirmed nor completely denied not being ASD. They suggested social skill group and Language therapy will help her improve and also stated that she will struggle in social situations in the future and need further assesmement. That is why I said Mild ASD, Maybe it is a wrong phrase. Now the school (SALT) has requested another ASD assessment and we are waiting for this to happen.

I know there is no cure so I am only looking for some tips/suggestions to help her deal with the situations and for me to help her where possible as a parent.

JuniperFromGallifrey said:

Perhaps you can open up a thesaurus for her and help her find the correct words. And help her understand what makes people feel socially awkward.

And thanks for the suggestion on Thesaurus and for sharing your experience with Fast forward and the dictionary. Will try to adopt this approach.  

NAS72895 said:

autistic people need to be in a school which is designed for autistic peoples needs. and one which sees autism in a positive context while acknowledging the challenges it brings. where most or all pupils are autistic. 

I also think about the environment mismatch and feel that maybe she should go to a school which is designed for autistic people's needs. This is because she is upset and feels like no one is her friend in the class and the children who she thinks are her friends are not her friends anymore. I'm encouraging her to make new friends or play by herself but honestly don't know how to console her and advise her to overcome this kind of situation. Based on the assessment result I m hoping to enquire about the schools or EHC plan.   

I think in the meanwhile we will follow the suggestions given and try to find local support groups in our Berkshire area. And feel free to add if have more suggestions/ advice/ tips.  

Thank you

Best Regards

Jack

Repetitive questioning. Intriguing!! I wonder if this is how I've been described. 

I had extreme difficulty with language. And when I wasn't curious or frustrated or genuinely wanted to understand, I wouldn't pursue the question. BUT. I desired connexion and understanding. Often irritated that my questions or the exchange of my dialogue came back as a response that had NO-thing to do with what I was trying to state, or trying to express. This resulted in being called Pedantic. 

Fast forward and the dictionary is one of my greatest allies. I've come to realise neurotypical individuals DONT use words to communicate but to command or virtue signal. To This Day I will ask direct questions and have them responded to As If I am asking something completely different - avoiding saying something negative or redirecting the question. I'll then have to respond with a Very direct answer "what I hear you say is -- X, is that correct?". I'm in ny 40's and no longer 7. When I was 7 I would just cry from frustration.

Perhaps you can open up a thesaurus for her and help her find the correct words. And help her understand what makes people feel socially awkward. For some of us, every thing is a bit objective. We can feel very deep about these things, but nuances don't have destructive symbolic or associated meanings. Life is simply complex, we disintegrate at some point and that's OK. 

Whatever you do, don't discourage her questioning. Cures for illnesses would never have been discovered if parents stunted their child's intrigue, wonder and desire to understand. 

yes i agree with the other person. there is no such thing as a bit autistic. i've met enough autistic people to know this! 

i know you are worried about your kid, so i just want to explain these "behaviours" from an autistic perspective.

the autistic view, which many professionals now take, is that autism is not inherently negative, in any way. autism is a valid unique nuerotype, which means that the person "with autism" has a different brain and nervous system to the majority of people "nuerotypicals".

this means that the person will behave differently to "nuerotypicals", their entire body is wired significantly differently. they experience and interact with with the world differently as a result. and communicate differently.

in particular, these differences are much more noticeable when the person is around other people their age. it is very traumatic to be in a classroom full of people who experience and communicate differently (i know this from first hand experience). it makes the person feel like they are broken; and very left out, and that leads to "masking" or imitating nuerotypical peers. the problem with this is, it is primarily a trauma response (it is sometimes called autistic camaflouging).

autistic people need to be in a school which is designed for autistic peoples needs. and one which sees autism in a positive context while acknowledging the challenges it brings. where most or all pupils are autistic. 

eonstien, bill gates, steve jobs and elon musk are all certainly autistic. autistic people are the biggest contributors to societies progress. are most autistic people geniuses - no - but autism always comes with gifts, mostly creative or technical, which more than make up for its challenges (imo!)

there is no "cure" for autistic people- and never will be - try replacing someone's nervous system. the nhs has some clear articles saying this.

the biggest challenge of being autistic is not autism- rather person - environment mismatch - where most environments are designed with nuerotypical people in mind, leading to constant trauma of not having sensory and social needs met.

the repetitive behaviour is called stimming and regulates the sensory and emotional nervous system. it is similar to the way not autistic people breathe.

this is what i wanted to tell you.

Thanks 

There is no such thing as Mild Autism spectrum disorder. Your child is either on the autism spectrum or not.

Hi Jack,

We have some resources on the site you might want to have a look at that cover the diagnosis process and what to expect from the assessment, which you can find in our guide to diagnosis for parents and carers here - https://www.autism.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/topics/diagnosis/pre-diagnosis/parents-and-carers

If you need help and support directly, the information for our support lines can be found here - https://www.autism.org.uk/what-we-do/help-and-support - although our Parent to Parent line is unfortunately not taking new referrals at the moment.

You might also want to look in our Autism Services Directory, where you can search and filter for different types of autism services in your local area, to see if there are any parental support groups near you, if you are looking to speak to other parents about their experiences - https://www.autism.org.uk/directory

Hope this is of some help,
Ross - mod