My Mind is Free Verse: Aspergers is Not Easy To Live With

Living with Aspergers Syndrome in the Household is Not Easy

My daughter Erin, 15, was diagnosed with Aspergers a couple of years ago. She'd already been diagnosed ADHD, ODD and Sensory Perception Disorder but not with Aspergers until 2 years ago. Nothing changed except the schools started helping her out a lot more with her IEP. Let me tell you a little about the disorder.

Asperger's syndrome is a form of autism- it is a developmental disorder that impacts on the individual's ability to communicate and socialize, among other things. It begins in childhood and persists through adulthood and affects the way the person reaches "common sense" perceptions, as well as the way they process information related to other individuals. People with Asperger's syndrome find human interaction challenging, and may interpret creative thought and use their imagination in different way from others.

That seems relatively harmless, right? Just a little socially backwards and harder to communicate with others, right? Maybe they are artsy and imaginative, but with quirks. Well, they are. But think about what it really means to be socially backwards as a kid growing up in a cruel teen environment. Think about what it means to be an adolescent, already prone to issues with parents, but add in extra communication problems and what might you have? Explosive situations could occur. Even the artsy and imaginative minded person could get in trouble if they aren't following the rules because their "art" tells them to do something different.

Well, in MY household things can go downhill really fast. My ability to communicate with my daughter at this point is NIL. Our relationship deteriorated while I was away (long story) in 2011 and has never really gotten back to what a mother-daughter relationship should be. So when she visits on weekends (she lives full time with her dad) she's usually pretty moody. I never know how to react to her when I pick her up. Plus she and her brother, 6, constantly irritate each other so there is always an argument over something going on at our house while she's here. Erin is very jealous of her little brother and likes aggravating him for fun when she's bored.

Now she has a boyfriend. More than a year ago she didn't even admit boys existed much less have a boyfriend, then overnight it was like, boom! She started wearing jeans (never would before because of sensory issues) and fixing her hair. Suddenly she was a girl looking for a guy, without saying anything to us of course. So, the boyfriend thing is OK right now, but it gets out of control. For instance, last weekend she wanted to talk to him on my phone so I let her. She stayed on the phone with him for 4 HOURS! and I had to get into a major disagreement with her which almost led to a meltdown in order to get the phone back after that.

Let me explain *meltdowns. That's when Erin gets upset at something, then her emotion takes over and she can't control it so no matter what action occurs it is likely to increase the severity of the meltdown, unless she can get a resolution to whatever it was that triggered her meltdown, or she can get to a place long enough by herself to calm down. Sometimes for her a meltdown can be brought on by a miscommunication or frustration at her situation (lack of control). These meltdowns can get pretty severe and have even escalated up to her throwing things and making holes in walls. Her meltdowns can occur anywhere at anytime but sometimes we can recognize the triggers. Unfortunately we're just too late to stop them. All we can do is try not to escalate the meltdown.

Erin is a beautiful girl with a sense of humor and lots of style. She's loving toward animals and wants to work with them when she gets out of high school. She has a little dog at her dad's house and we have our two Shar-Pei's here. She's always taking one of them for walks around the block. She rode her bike at home, but I believe she spends most of her time on her phone or TV these days. When she's at my house she'll try to get on Facebook or call her boyfriend. Sometimes she'll walk the dogs or keep Gavin company.

Even if it is hard to raise a child with Aspergers, there are rewards. When I see her smile one of her infrequent smiles at me I know I've been handed one right then.

The following blogs have lately helped me figure out how much I need the support of an Aspergers community:

http://life-with-aspergers.blogspot.com/ (*meltdown)
http://confessionsofanaspergersmom.blogspot.com/
http://www.mountainsofmolehills.com/2013/01/meltdowns-rages-and-moving-forward.html
http://www.aspiekid.net/
http://www.thinkingautismguide.com/

Later in the day, January 15th:
I took a test at http://www.okcupid.com/tests/the-broad-autism-phenotype-test to see how I would score as Autistic/Aspergers and it came up with this:

Your result for The Broad Autism Phenotype Test ...

Autistic/BAP
You scored 118 aloof, 114 rigid and 126 pragmatic

You scored above the cutoff on all three scales. Clearly, you are either autistic or on the broader autistic phenotype. You probably are not very social, and when you do interact with others, you come off as strange or rude without meaning to. You probably also like things to be familiar and predictable and don't like changes, especially unexpected ones.