It's never too late

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Sorry for the length of this post but I have been keeping this story locked up for 22 years so please bear with me. Hi, my son is 22 years old and after all I have read and studied regarding Aspergers I am now certain that my son has AS and has had it all of his life. As an infant he fought being held, slept very little, avoided eye contact and was difficult to feed, but hey he may not have slept much but he spent much of his time quiet and content talking to his fingers and toes and seemed not to require much interaction, I always called him self entertaining. So in some ways he was a very easy infant to care for. As he grew he fought diaper changing so hard it took two to change him, one to hold him down and the other to change him. He would scream and kick and try to bite, this was every time you changed a diaper, it was exhausting. He fought bathing, clothing changes, putting clothes on or taking them off. He also lined up all his hot wheels and never wanted anyone to touch them, he did not want me to play with him, I could tell by his expression he found me to be an intrusion in his world. He did not like to have his play time interrupted. He never liked the company of other children and when ever he was taken to a kids party he would play alone rather then with others. He could watch tv for hours and barely blink or move, then came the video games. It was easier to allow him to play for hours then to have to have yet another battle of wills with him. He was without a doubt an exhausting child, somedays my husband would walk through the door from work and I would hand him the child and leave for fear that I was going to hurt him if I did not get some space. I took him to a therapist when he was seven who simply told me that he was gifted and that gifted could also mean different, that's it just different. No advise, no support groups, nothing. In school he would refuse to open his books and read with the class or take notes or do homework and sometimes when he felt like it he would lay his head down in the middle of class and just take a nap. I spent countless hours being called up to school and in conferences with teachers who all said the same thing "your son is bright and capable of so much more then he is doing, he is just lazy" I would go home and make his life a living hell, taking away the only things he enjoyed in order to force him to do homework or behave in school, nothing worked. He would just retreat into that little world of his like nothing were going on. All the while in his standardized testing he would score through the roof academically. Since he was never dxed I never knew how to react to him or deal with him. I thought I was losing my mind, here was what seemed liked a perfectly normal boy and yet in many ways he behaved as if he were learning impaired. Things others would just know by intuition or common sense seemed foreign to my son, it was as if things just did not compute. Five years after Chris I had another son, by three or four his younger brother seemed to understand things that were lost on my Christopher. Now he is a fairly well adjusted young adult and by his own admissions a complete nerd, he still lives home with us but has a full time job fixing computers, he loves his job. There were so many things I would have done differently had I known what was wrong with my son, I can not change the past but I pray that I did not damage his psyche too much by demanding he be like other children when it is so evident now he never was or will be, I am fine with that. I guess knowing now that he is an AS kid helps me know that I was not crazy after all, that he really was different and that I was not just being an overzealous mom. Thanks for giving me a place to talk about all the things I could never really share with anyone, not because I was ashamed of him but because I knew no one else would ever understand and that they would judge him and I never wanted anyone trying to put labels on my son. Thank you again for giving me a place to share my story, hopefully now I can come here to get advise on helping him through this second life phase, young adulthood. Now that I understand he is different I can quit expecting him to just become the average 22 year old and just love him for who he is now.

Nice to meet you, Chrisesmom. I am sure that by reading the articles and interacting with others that you will be able to gain some new insights on your son. Raising a child with asperger's can be difficult, but it sounds to me like you have done a great job.

Welcome to the forums, I am new here as well.

Celeste thank you so much for your encouraging words, this website has been a godsend and I am going to spend lots of time here reading and learning from others, who knows maybe someday I can save my grandchild a lot of heartache and my son a lot of frustration.

Welcome Crisesmom....as you say,better late then never....I just got a DX at 42!I was adopted at 5 and I know I put my mom through her own hell.My parents were very strict and Christian Scientist,so I doubt they would have done any thing but "pray"for me even if AS had been known back in those days.
I wasted years "resenting" my parents for their lack of understanding(even though I didnt know what was "wrong" with me either)We have made a piece of sorts,they have excepted that I am "me" and they can not change that even though they know nothing of my AS and wouldnt believe in it any way.

I was just reading in an out dated psyc. DX manuel(1989)I description of two children who had behavior similar to what you describe about your son(and to me,obviously aspie)and the "experts "DXed one with "attachment disorder" and the other with Pervasive Personality Disorder,though,oddly,the DX mentioned the word ASpergers but it wasnt an official DX yet.I am glad you have found the correct explanation for your sons traits.....many of us have been misDX over the years and it is hard to help someone when you are starting from the wrong "reasons" for traits.

Have you shared this information with your son?I think it might be very helpful to him.

Indeed your son can be very thankful. I'm 52 years old and my mom still hasn't figured it out even after I sent her the Wikipedia article on AS. Growing up she considered taking me to a psychiatrist but never did. When I mentioned to her that it was the right idea but thankfully she didn't as the right diagnosis was not available at the time she denied that she had ever considered it...as if there were something shameful about it. The family doctor had encouraged her to enroll me in a nearby military academy. The best I can get from her is he thought it would be good for me. She and my teachers were frustrated by my not doing what I considered unnecessary and needlessly burdensome... like taking notes. I did eventually learn to take notes in college when my World History instructor informed us that the exams would be "open notes". Mom tried to understand me by reading the liturature I read but I cannot see how that would have helped all that much. I suspect the only way she could truly begin to understand would be for me to be formally evaluated to make official that I am AS. Can you sense my frustration? Your son can be very thankful indeed.

Krex and Heavyweather, thanks for sharing your stories, hearing your late dx's really does give me hope that maybe it really is not too late. My son and I have a very loving relationship but I have always felt like a failure because I knew I did not understand him and I wanted to understand him more then anything else. I am a youth minister, could you imagine how hard it is to be able to counsel, understand and minister to so many kids but not my own son. That has been a killer for me. Finding this dx has beeen a tremendous relief. Here I can find ways not just to love him but to be a part of his world and that will mean more to me then all the riches in the world. I am sorry to hear that you both feel your parents would have no interest in becoming a part of your worlds by educating themselves about AS. I was a stay home mom for most of my sons life I did not want to miss any important moment in his life and now armed with this information I will never have to stand on the outside looking in again, by gaining understanding I can really become a part of his world. As for your parents they are the ones losing out, you both seem like sensitive wonderful people. God bless and thank you again for your words of encouragement.

your son should be greatful. my parents put me in fostercare. they didn't understand.

^lick^

jammie & lion

I'm very proud of what your Son has done for himself. I couldn't find the right type of Job for myself, so I've just given up. I don't want to be working in Factories for the rest of my life, unless it's one that builds miniature Buses.