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Newly diagnosed 6 year old

NAS84931

Hi,

My 6 year old daughter has just recently been diagnosed with autism and is also being referred by the school to look into possible ADHD or dyslexia etc. The diagnosis was given during a brief phone call with the paediatrician and as you can imagine trying to process the information meant I didn’t ask as many questions as I wish I had. He did explain that he would contact my daughters school and the local autism outreach team would be in contact at some point, then I would have a face to face appointment with himself in the summer. 

I know it’s probably different for everyone but was looking for someone to give me a rough idea of what the process is from here. I’ve tried to look up as much information as possible but I haven’t found anything that gives me an insight as to what happens going forward or what I need to do myself, if there is anything. I’m not sure if I’m getting ahead of myself but just want to make sure I’m doing everything I need to. 

TIA

Parents

  • Autistic thinkers might all think about different things, but share the intensity of how we think. We are typically Deep Thinkers, Slow learning vs Fast learning.

    All young children have potential with strengths and weaknesses. Focus on helping grow her strengths. There are always ways to learn to navigate around a limit. Every human has this. In fact, one of the reasons Autistics are said to have 'super-powers' is because often, our strengths are limits for others and vice versa. The best advice to remember is Very Few Things are Matters of Consequence. 

    Our Salience Network - the little busy hub in our brain, works different. We don't filter out Sensory - Perception the same. In fact, we accidentally see the world as 'Too Real'. If your daughter can Sense Perceive something which you cannot, be sure to not dismiss it! It's always best to ask her to help you understand.

    Many - if not all of us - as young children had excruciating difficulty with Verbal Language. Accessing it, in our brains, past a wild imagination even - can be difficult. We're literally a different design of brain. I finally felt a little sense of liberation when I took a Logic Class in College. I didn't feel I had a good command of an internal dictionary till mid 30's after YEARS of reading The Times, reading philosophy, reading excellent authors. I might be told that sometimes I use archaic words, but at least I don't feel as understood as I used to growing up.

    We use language as a Function: to exchange information. I'm told Non-Autistics use all kinds of seemingly imaginary social symbols - which I might call a bit of theatrics or like mime and use verbal communication to echo one another to create Meaning. I believe this is a KEY difference that can create all kinds of problems. 

    And on that, often most of us have difficulty assessing how we feel. We feel too many things all at once and they don't conflict but like colours just blend into a pool of colour. Like a blob of oil on the ground. I so appreciate when someone doesn't demand I tell them "how I feel" but ask "what is happening". Again - Function seems more obvious than Meaning. Meaning can be anything, and that doesn't feel helpful. 

    When I was young I was overwhelmed by the idea of an infinite universe. So nothing is stable. Everything is in this possibility and moment of flux. The sun is pulling us closer, things will expand and contract, rise and fall... a mind in this big of motion always requires Grounding. 

    Finally, learning to properly balance helped. Rules to help craft my natural ability to focus. Yoga, the balance beam, theatre movement, ballet. It is always the principle which is below the surface, the physics of a thing, the deeper rules or laws at work in the microscopic or metaphysical realm which help make sense of the world and create a much better fluidness to life. 

    Always seek understanding and openness and you will have earned her trust. Everything else is navigation. 

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