IS A EARLY DIAGNOISES BETTER THAN ONE IN LATER LIFE ?

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Hi all, just wanted to know if being labled aspergers ect in early teens, is better for the person than finding out in your mid 20s -30s. I ask this question as i was dx adhd in my 30s which i suspect is aspergers. i suspected something was not quiet right in my 20s after i had my son, who was dx aspergers when he was 10. When i was growing up i always had a lot of friends, which i suspect was due to my crazy ways & acting the fool, which continued into my late 20s.

If i was dx earlier, i belive being labled then would of not made me the person iam today, but having the dx later on in life is more of a relife & easier to understand, i choose to keep it to myself so iam not judged & find it easier to work round

Because of this i did not tell my son he had "aspergers" but that he was just shy. which worked fine, untill at the age of 11 a child psycologist said he has "special needs" & everything went downhill from there. Resulting to my son becoming very self consious & thinking i was lying to him. To make matters worse 2 years later he was told he had aspergers which has made everything ten times worse & given him a great complex.

So what age should you tell your child & is it good to use a lable ? :roll:

When I was 5 and 6, I ate lunch by myself. I asked the teacher repeatedly how to make friends. Nothing worked. I spent years with kids calling me weird. If I had known I had AS, I could have understood.

Adolescence is the roughest part, because everyone else grows up emotionally first. It's hardest on an aspie. I think your son needs to know about his condition as soon as possible.

This way, he won't get into "bad groups" trying to fit in. He can get involved with other people in AS support groups and stay out of trouble.

Well, a lot of it depends on:

1. What kind of parents you have
2. What kind of school you have

If the parents are the overbearing, defeatist type who assume that any "special needs" child must be helpless and ret*d, then an early diagnosis would be a disaster.

Similarily, is the school the type of school to offer "invisible" accomodations, or are they really "out there" about the kid being disabled? If they make it too obvious, then the child could just be more alienated from their peers than they already are.

Yeah it's better to be diagnosed earlier.

I was told at 9 and I'm very glad a was because if I wasen't then school would be complete hell - even more than it already is - at the moment.

Not having your parents tell you your diagnosis makes you feel horribly betrayed.

You'll find out eventually. You already know you're different; but you're telling yourself you're shy or not trying hard enough or maybe just stupid.

But then you find out you have a diagnosis and your parents have been lying to you about it... suddenly you can't trust your parents. And the diagnosis seems horrible because why else would they have kept it from you, if it weren't something to be afraid about, if it weren't something shameful?

Whereas, if you find out, Okay, I'm different; here's why; here's how I think; here's what I can do about it... then that's a lot easier. Knowing you have AS is a big relief, too, because suddenly you know it's not your fault people are bullying or ignoring you; and it gives you a reason to hope that now that you know why you think the way you do, you can use that to your advantage.

But if you get the idea in your head that it's a shameful, horrible thing; that you're completely disabled; that you can't do anything for yourself; that you're helpless against "your autism"... then it's a really bad thing. People can get defeated the same way, believing that it's their own bad character trapping them like that; but getting the idea that you're hopelessly impaired can be even worse.

The earlier you know, the more you know, and the more you understand it's a neutral part of you and neither shameful nor something you can't use to your benefit, the better.

This is actually a question for those who answered. How old were you before you realized that you were different? and did you go to public school and is that why?

I ask this because I honestly believe my 7 year old doesn't know he is any different from anyone else. He is in a special school where he fits in, and I really don't think he knows he's different. I am struggling about when to tell him. The advice I have been given here suggests I tell him early, but I don't want him to feel different because I told him, rather than the other way around. I have told him about his early birth and showed him pictures of when he was in the hospital for 3 months, and I told him that he is really good at Math, better than most kids his age but that is as far as I got. I know he knows that language is difficult, but I don't want to make a big deal about it because I don't want him to be insecure because of it. I don't even call therapy "therapy", because to him it's just something he has always done since he was born.

I believe I knew when I was about six, when I entered the first grade. At that time, it wasn't a source of anxiety for me; I just didn't understand why everybody else was so interested in socializing and playing with each other. I didn't start trying to socialize until I was about ten.

Before I started going to school (I didn't go to kindergarten or day-care), I had only my younger sister for comparison; and it was easy to write her off as "silly" because she was younger than me.

Tell him his diagnosis. Just don't make a big deal of it. He most likely doesn't have all the huge associations with autism that adults have--the idea of disability being inextricably connected to shame, the idea of being inferior to others, etc. probably aren't linked to the fact of having a diagnosis yet. Whereas, he will pick up on it right away if you act like it's something to be ashamed of, or something that's too frightening to tell little children...

He goes to a special school already. He most likely knows that his classmates have difficulty with various things, and is used to that fact. If he understands, "Oh, I have problems understanding/doing X because of diagnosis X", it shouldn't be that frightening because he knows kids who have similar problems with other things. Put it in terms he understands... "See, you have (whatever), which is why it's hard for you to (whatever), and which is why your parents and teachers are giving you extra help to learn." Just stick to the facts. Kids deserve to know what's going on; but there's no reason to confuse them with all the social and political stuff. (One thing: If he has the misconception that it's like being sick--having a cold or whatever--then you'll need to clear that up by explaining that his diagnosis is a name for the way he thinks, and that there's nothing wrong with the way he thinks.)

Then wait for questions. He may not ask right away. Maybe it'll be a matter of, "oh, okay", and going back to whatever he's doing. But this is a part of his life already and having a name for it, and knowing it's not your fault and that you're not a bad kid helps.

If I had a aspie child I would want him/her to know as soon as possible so that he/she would have some time to know what to expect. I grew up knowing my life was much harder than most of my peers. My family gave me the impression that I was just not trying hard enough. I am now very sad and wish I could do my life over with the correct knowledge.

Later life, because the younger you are the more you use it as an excuse

People need to be told the moment the information is available. Whether the aspie is 5 or 45, they need to know the first moment they can.

The important thing to consider here is that Asperger's will affect a person regardless of whether or not they know about it (or, for that matter, whether or not they accept it, or whether or not they like it). Asperger's doesn't care what you think of it. An aspie's an aspie, end of story.

The only real effect of not knowing is that their own behavior (and the reactions of others) will be that much more confusing. Aspies tend to be quite baffled by other people, and others are often equally baffled by them. It's important to avoid compounding the confusion by "shielding" a person from an understanding of the cause-and-effect relationship between their condition (which, as I said, will inevitably affect them regardless of how much they know and accept it) and their own behaviors.

In addition, self-acceptance takes time, and the sooner that process is out of the way, the less turbulent it will be, and the sooner a person can feel in control of their life. Granted, there will likely be turbulence either way, but a child is in a much better position to process an unpleasant truth than an adult who has spent years on end wondering what the hell is wrong with their brain....

I was diagonosed with AS at seven in 1994. Even though knowledge about Asperger's and how to teach kids with it was in it's infancy, I was able to get out of a lot of things such as having to write "My Libary Day is Monday" a hundred times when I forgot my libary book. I was allowed to bring my special plush toys (I would have a panic attack if they were not with me) to school (and even on a feild trip) when the teacher had banned toys. I think she was just a good teacher though. If AS was more common as it is today I probably would have had more acodomations and a better time in public school.

My mom told me about my diagnoses the moment I got it but I did not know what it was or what it meant so how could I use it as an excuse?

Living your whole life and not knowing is terrible. I would give anything to go back and know the truth. I just found out I am an aspie. I am 43 and my family doesn't even think its any big deal. I feel like a house just fell on me and nobody cares.

Hi all & thanks for all your replys. First i Just wanted to say iam not ashamed of my son having aspergers or anyone who is by all means & appologise to anyone offended.
My son was DX with dyspraxia age 8 I told him what he had & he was ok about, until he was told he had a special need. ( before dx of aspergers ) from then on he refused to co operate with physio, occupationl therapist, who tryed to reassure him of his condition. So when he was dx with aspergers 2 years later i did not tell him, instead i gave him a book & he ripped it up. This all happened before he was due to start secondary school. when he started he was very self consious didnt like the attention when having extra help with the "special needs" teachers, because of this he wasnt statemented , He is now in year 10 & hasnt been to school since october due to extreme anxity.
Maybe what iam saying is its ok when you tell them when they are in primary school, but when they are teenagers its completley different as they do not want to be different and hate labels ask any teenager. He is now more aware of his problems and wants help , but has a complex about the word " special needs" & how it is used within school

I couldn't agree more.
I was that alienated child.

What about parents that are in denial and don't want the kid to be stigmatised, but desperately care about the child's future success and prospects?



I am that confused person.

Imaging receiving help for years and not being told what the heck's going on. Being told that there's something "wrong" with you, and not having it explained properly. Being lied to and "shielded" because they hope that you don't notice. I'm not daft you know.

I'd like to know what's going on, really I would.
That's why I kept saying: "I don't understand."
I really didn't understand the situation at all. I was asking for clear instructions and clarification of the whole situation. All I got was a metaphorical "smoke-screen".

It's kind of ironic that after all those years of "help" I had no idea what I was actually being helped with. I was provided with no positive or helpful information at all. Any explanations provided were very wholly and provided by condescending people who seemed to be, for all intents and purposes, petrified of the condition itself.

Last edited by AmberEyes on 19 Feb 2009, 6:02 pm, edited 5 times in total.

Well yeah, and who can blame him? Even though Special Ed programs have had a major overhaul in the past 15 years, there is still the implication that "special needs"= mentally ret*d. And really, who wants THAT baggage? Even if your son DOES need some different treatment, I wouldn't be alarmed if he didn't want to be associated with the other children that are also labeled "special needs".

My advice would be to not rely on the school for these things, if your son has issues with being singled out and segregated from the "normal, able" kids. This is because there is a growing trend in schools to change accomodations for mildly disabled students from "invisible" to "right out in the open". In the past, it was left up to individual students whether or not they wanted to disclose their disability to their peers. But nowadays, schools are starting to be more "in your face" about it, disclosing disabilities to other students often without the consent of the student in question. Even if they don't come right out and say it, they make the special treatment so obvious that every other student knows about the existance of a disability in that particular student. Your son would probably get very angry if his high school were to start doing stuff like that.

If possible, look into getting him some outside help if it's required. If no professional help is required, then offer to talk about it with him, especially since you said that you suspect AS in yourself as well.

If anything, telling him that you suspect that you have what he has will make him feel a bit better about it.

I was diagnosed when I was 12 so who knows what I would be like now if my parents never got me diagnosed or bothered to try and find out what was wrong with me. I probably would still be worse off and be oblivious about stuff I never knew about thanks to reading about AS and being on here and how people work. Also I saw a shrink who knew about the condition too and he told me things I didn't know about because I was unaware I had that problem. I thought everyone wanted me to read their minds and expected me to know what they were thinking without telling me. I didn't know people communicated through body language. I thought they all used words. My mother taught me to use words and people won't know what I am thinking or feeling if I don't tell anyone.


Thanks to AS, I learned about things I never knew about because I was reading about it and being on the forums and learning more about people and learning from other aspie's experiances. I wouldn't have gotten that if I were never diagnosed. I wouldn't even be reading about AS. I probably would have stumbled upon it by mistake but not think much about it or palce that label on myself since I don't self diagnose. I probably wouldn't be seeing a shrink either who knows about the condition or would he have discovered it himself if I were seeing the same one?

It would probably be a shock if the label were brought up later in my life and got told I have it because I would be thinking of the stereotypes aspies have and I can't possibly have it because I don't have them.