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| Truman Self Portrait |
Thursday, September 20, 2012
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
interviewed
We've hit the big time, people.
Maeve and I were interviewed for a school project by a middle schooler from Meigs! Her class is talking about people with special needs, and she chose Asperger's to research a little further. What follows are the questions she sent to us and our answers.
Q: What is it like to have a brother with Asperger’s?
Maeve: It's a lot different than having a normal brother, I think. He takes everything literally and seriously. He's very intense and has strong reactions sometimes when you don't expect it. Sometimes I feel angry about him. Sometimes I'm embarrassed by him. Sometimes I feel protective of him. He's my brother, of course I love him, but sometimes he can be really hard to be around.
Q: Can you name a few things that Truman does differently than you do?
Maeve: He can't take no for an answer. He doesn't have as many friends as I do, and he doesn't act the same with his friends. He doesn't understand sarcasm or jokes. He gets very hooked on to something and stays with it very intensely until he finds another thing to get hooked on very intensely. I like people, he doesn't very much, except for my mom and dad and me.
Q: Does he have need to have a daily routine?
Me: Absolutely! Just like we all feel a little nicer when we have a good schedule of things in place to expect, he does, too. But it's different for him in that it makes him feel very secure. Anxiety is something that people with autism deal with all the time because the world is so much more confusing and sensorally overloading to them. I have found that if he DOESN'T have a routine, that it's fun for just a little bit, but then he just melts down. It's like it's just too much to take in at once.
Q: What are the differences between being a parent to a child with Asperger’s and one without?
Me: You know, I've never really thought about it! I don't think that it's probably much different than parenting two very different children. They both have easy areas and more challenging areas. I know that Maeve will get dressed and do everything that she's supposed to do in the morning without a reminder. I know that I can't leave Truman alone for a second or he'll still be sitting in the same spot when I come back. I know that I can send Maeve out in the neighborhood alone to play with friends and that she knows how to navigate the spoken and unspoken social rules that people have, would know how to deal with a stranger, and that she'll keep track of time and come home when told. But the times that Truman has gone out into the neighborhood without us, he always ends up running home in tears because he just doesn't understand how the interaction between kids works. It takes one of us going out with him to kind of show him what to do. On the other hand, I can hand Truman a credit card and he will go to RedBox in the grocery, use it and bring it right back to me. Or I can give it to him to buy Wii points and he'll do precisely the amount we agreed upon and give it right back. He's completely and utterly trustworthy in that sense, where I would never in a million years trust Maeve with a credit card yet! He might dart out into traffic because he doesn't think about cars or danger or think ahead very often. Maeve never would. It's a very mixed bag!
Q: Does Truman have trouble talking to people?
Me: It really just depends on the person and the topic. He's definitely not shy, but he doesn't like to talk about things that aren't completely black and white. Video games, computers... those are simple, concrete subjects. If you asked him why he's upset, you might not get any answerl, and in fact he might not talk to you at all. If he doesn't want to answer your questions (and he doesn't like to answer personal questions because usually people talk about such personal things and that don't make a lot of sense to him) he just says, “I don't know,” which is kind of his way of putting a stop to the conversation. A simple question like “Did you have a good day?” can be emotionally subjective enough that he might not be able to answer. But if you ask him about a video game, he might not STOP talking. He loves to go to Game Stop because he can talk to the adults there like he is their age, and they talk back to him like he's one of them.
Q: Can you tell us a few ways Truman may act different around people?
Me: The one thing that I find that sets him very much apart is that as I see you all getting older, you get more self-aware and aware of how others perceive you. He doesn't seem to care at all how he is perceived or even aware that he's being perceived. If he's upset, he might stop talking and just go sit in a closet, even if he has friends over. He might completely have a meltdown in the middle of a public place and not be aware that others don't do that kind of thing. He might say really inappropriate things at the wrong time. When he's upset, he flaps his hands and pulls at his hair (it's called “stimming” or “stimulating” - it's a way that autistic people deal with stress to help calm themselves). He doesn't understand the rules of give and take in conversation, so he might not care at all what you have to say but will talk at you like you are just some inanimate object. But he also is very affectionate, and where as you guys get older, I see you not as huggy and touchy as you used to be with the grownups, he'll still snuggle and hug and love as much as he can without being embarrassed. :)
Q: How do his teachers help him learn the best?
Me: That is a FABULOUS question. He can be a tough guy to understand since he is so smart (one of the hallmarks of Asperger's) and looks very “normal” but can completely fall apart the next second without much warning. He has trouble with fine motor skills, so his teachers let him type or dictate his homework. He has lots of focus and attention problems, so sometimes he requires one-on-one help to get his work completed. His intelligence makes him move quickly through topics and get bored easily, which makes him not want to complete things a lot of times, so we put reward systems in place to teach him to take things a step at a time. Sequencing his thoughts is difficult so sometimes he needs help getting the thoughts from his head to the paper. One of the biggest things they can do is to include him, or really, not exclude him when he's having difficulties. I think that as he is growing, he's becoming more aware of his differences. I'm glad that he doesn't seem too self-conscious about it yet, but I want to keep him from being singled out as much as possible in the classroom for his Asperger's and ADHD behaviors. This year we are really working on teaching him to interact with a partner and to really feel like he's part of a group or a team. And the best thing they can do is to try to understand him as an individual who thinks and reacts differently to the world than we do rather than seeing him as a bundle of problems or symptoms.
Maeve and I were interviewed for a school project by a middle schooler from Meigs! Her class is talking about people with special needs, and she chose Asperger's to research a little further. What follows are the questions she sent to us and our answers.
Q: What is it like to have a brother with Asperger’s?
Maeve: It's a lot different than having a normal brother, I think. He takes everything literally and seriously. He's very intense and has strong reactions sometimes when you don't expect it. Sometimes I feel angry about him. Sometimes I'm embarrassed by him. Sometimes I feel protective of him. He's my brother, of course I love him, but sometimes he can be really hard to be around.
Q: Can you name a few things that Truman does differently than you do?
Maeve: He can't take no for an answer. He doesn't have as many friends as I do, and he doesn't act the same with his friends. He doesn't understand sarcasm or jokes. He gets very hooked on to something and stays with it very intensely until he finds another thing to get hooked on very intensely. I like people, he doesn't very much, except for my mom and dad and me.
Q: Does he have need to have a daily routine?
Me: Absolutely! Just like we all feel a little nicer when we have a good schedule of things in place to expect, he does, too. But it's different for him in that it makes him feel very secure. Anxiety is something that people with autism deal with all the time because the world is so much more confusing and sensorally overloading to them. I have found that if he DOESN'T have a routine, that it's fun for just a little bit, but then he just melts down. It's like it's just too much to take in at once.
Q: What are the differences between being a parent to a child with Asperger’s and one without?
Me: You know, I've never really thought about it! I don't think that it's probably much different than parenting two very different children. They both have easy areas and more challenging areas. I know that Maeve will get dressed and do everything that she's supposed to do in the morning without a reminder. I know that I can't leave Truman alone for a second or he'll still be sitting in the same spot when I come back. I know that I can send Maeve out in the neighborhood alone to play with friends and that she knows how to navigate the spoken and unspoken social rules that people have, would know how to deal with a stranger, and that she'll keep track of time and come home when told. But the times that Truman has gone out into the neighborhood without us, he always ends up running home in tears because he just doesn't understand how the interaction between kids works. It takes one of us going out with him to kind of show him what to do. On the other hand, I can hand Truman a credit card and he will go to RedBox in the grocery, use it and bring it right back to me. Or I can give it to him to buy Wii points and he'll do precisely the amount we agreed upon and give it right back. He's completely and utterly trustworthy in that sense, where I would never in a million years trust Maeve with a credit card yet! He might dart out into traffic because he doesn't think about cars or danger or think ahead very often. Maeve never would. It's a very mixed bag!
Q: Does Truman have trouble talking to people?
Me: It really just depends on the person and the topic. He's definitely not shy, but he doesn't like to talk about things that aren't completely black and white. Video games, computers... those are simple, concrete subjects. If you asked him why he's upset, you might not get any answerl, and in fact he might not talk to you at all. If he doesn't want to answer your questions (and he doesn't like to answer personal questions because usually people talk about such personal things and that don't make a lot of sense to him) he just says, “I don't know,” which is kind of his way of putting a stop to the conversation. A simple question like “Did you have a good day?” can be emotionally subjective enough that he might not be able to answer. But if you ask him about a video game, he might not STOP talking. He loves to go to Game Stop because he can talk to the adults there like he is their age, and they talk back to him like he's one of them.
Q: Can you tell us a few ways Truman may act different around people?
Me: The one thing that I find that sets him very much apart is that as I see you all getting older, you get more self-aware and aware of how others perceive you. He doesn't seem to care at all how he is perceived or even aware that he's being perceived. If he's upset, he might stop talking and just go sit in a closet, even if he has friends over. He might completely have a meltdown in the middle of a public place and not be aware that others don't do that kind of thing. He might say really inappropriate things at the wrong time. When he's upset, he flaps his hands and pulls at his hair (it's called “stimming” or “stimulating” - it's a way that autistic people deal with stress to help calm themselves). He doesn't understand the rules of give and take in conversation, so he might not care at all what you have to say but will talk at you like you are just some inanimate object. But he also is very affectionate, and where as you guys get older, I see you not as huggy and touchy as you used to be with the grownups, he'll still snuggle and hug and love as much as he can without being embarrassed. :)
Q: How do his teachers help him learn the best?
Me: That is a FABULOUS question. He can be a tough guy to understand since he is so smart (one of the hallmarks of Asperger's) and looks very “normal” but can completely fall apart the next second without much warning. He has trouble with fine motor skills, so his teachers let him type or dictate his homework. He has lots of focus and attention problems, so sometimes he requires one-on-one help to get his work completed. His intelligence makes him move quickly through topics and get bored easily, which makes him not want to complete things a lot of times, so we put reward systems in place to teach him to take things a step at a time. Sequencing his thoughts is difficult so sometimes he needs help getting the thoughts from his head to the paper. One of the biggest things they can do is to include him, or really, not exclude him when he's having difficulties. I think that as he is growing, he's becoming more aware of his differences. I'm glad that he doesn't seem too self-conscious about it yet, but I want to keep him from being singled out as much as possible in the classroom for his Asperger's and ADHD behaviors. This year we are really working on teaching him to interact with a partner and to really feel like he's part of a group or a team. And the best thing they can do is to try to understand him as an individual who thinks and reacts differently to the world than we do rather than seeing him as a bundle of problems or symptoms.
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