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New here - 15yr old - awaiting ASD assessment

Jacqui - posted on 02/22/2010 ( 2 moms have responded )

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15

I'd love to hear from others with teens... esp late diagnosed. We have struggled with Jacob since the beginning. Never slept, totally without caution or common sense, would invite total strangers home, no friends, fine motor skills issues, obsessive behavior...
First it was ADHD, then they added in LDs, then a private assessment indicated NVLD. Continuing problems took us to the hospital's mental health - and after waiting a year to get in, they suggested Aspergers - so now we wait another year to get in for an assessment - maybe this summer we will get answers.
The therapist he sees is looking into whether his 'significant cognitive delays' are actually because of Aspergers or really 'delays'? He said that Jacob's room looks like a 10yr olds rather than a 15yr old - that he seems to be acting more like a 10yr old trapped in a 15 yr old's body.
Jacob is getting harder and harder to deal with - hard to know what is just teen angst and what is his various disorders.

On top of that, I have a typical 10yr old daughter and a 7yr old son - the younger son is copying much of his brother's behavior - we think. Hard to pick out what is imitiation and what might be his own issues. 7yr old was assessed for autism at age 3 due to lack of speech and weird eating patterns (restricted repetitive foods - dry cereal, crackers, brand specific) but seems socially 'normal' at this point.... still with a mild speech delay. They said no to autism but he has 'apraxia of speech' as a 'cause'. We have had no help with feeding issues but did get speech therapy.

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2 Comments

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Marion - posted on 02/23/2010

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9

Hello Jacqui,
I have a daughter who is 16 and she was diagnosed when she was 15. Her real mother did not want to believe my husband long ago that there was something more wrong then just ADHD. In this time the road has been rough. For us we have to undo what her mother messed up and we have to help her deal with Autism. We also have 4 other teenage girls. Teen life for any of us is not easy but it is not easy with our Mandy. She does not want to use the tools she has been given, she feels it is all to hard. We try to find joy in the small things she has been able to change. Our Mandy functions on a level of a 2 to 8 year old as far as anything outside of school. Class work she has been struggling with a little but they do see her ont he higher end of the spectrum.
Remember no matter what your son has you are to love him and cherish the small things. Life for any child is about repeating things. With children who have anything out of the "norm" you just have to repeat more. Some will get it and some wont, but all the way throught their life they will know that they were loved no matter how others saw them. As far as the foods go, something we have learned is that some foods can actually be hurting your child. So if they are doing well health wise let them continue to eat what makes them feel good. Every now and then ask your son to try something new on a cracker and see if he likes it, if he doesn't ask him why? See what he is able to tell you. Another thing i do a lot of is reading. I try to understand my daughters ways as much as I can. Don't get me wrong there are lots of times my husband and I are frustrated, but we vent to one another and pick our selfs up. There are also people out here who have more info that can help as well.
Keep in touch and I hope this has helped some.
Marion

Cheryl - posted on 02/23/2010

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Hi Jacqui

I have an 18yr old daughter very newly 'diagnosed' with semantic pragmatic disorder and ADHD. Her speech was non-existent til she was about 8yrs old but her (lack of) understanding/comprehension was never really taken too seriously by her senior school even though she attended the speech and language 'unit' of the school. She was forever getting into trouble for her 'bad behaviour' and was excluded quite a lot. We had meetings with the school and explained (over and over again) of her problems but they wasn't bothered. It wasn't until she actually spoke to a psychologist for the first time in September 2009 that he told us what he believes she has. We always knew there was something more to her 'problems' but couldn't get anyone to listen to us. To be told at 18 that you have these problems comes as a big shock but she is doing her best to deal with it. As we understand more about her difficulties we can cope better and know that when she 'loses her temper' it's not actually her 'fault'. Trying to explain to people though can be difficult as she wants to be seen to be an 'ordinary 18 yr old', it is tough but at least we know more but to have taken this long to come to this diagnosis has been hard to deal with

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