Son diagnosed aspergers today

[di30]

Hi to everyone and what a fantastic website, well done !!

I would like to say, that my son who is 11 years of age (12 in Jan 07) was diagnosed today with aspergers syndrome in which he actually said he feels better now knowing what his problem was as he did not understand before.

We had brought this up to his Junior school towards easter of this year, in which before that we didn't know about aspergers, but learn't about it from a friend who's son was diagnosed approx 2 years ago, as she didn't like to say until i said we could not put our finger on the problem with is due to his lack of social interactions, routines and interests etc etc, and always refused to take part in games/pe activities.

It was noted when he first started the infant school year when he was 4 years old, the staff were concerned then and they sorted it out for him to see a child psychologist then, but when he was seen to, the psychologist put it down to him being immature and he would improve over the years. He was just having the support from us signing the IEP's in order for him to have literacy and numeracy support from the school.

We then moved, so that mean't our son had to change school, the IEP's continued and they pointed out every year about him being quiet, shy etc and did not want any involvement with any other peers, but was happy enough, then the bullying came in.
This was sorted out for a time then it would start up again.

When he joined the junior school, he was still the same and would not get involved, but again was informed by the school, he was just shy.

Things started to get more noticable in the juniors, as he would never get invites to parties, and even xmas not many cards like other kids, this was so upsetting.
Even on school trips, he would never have a partner and sat away from everyone clutching onto his school bag.

This got more and more upsetting, even if someone did come knocking for him, i would let them in and our son would leave them to it in another room.

This was when i had met up with a mate in which I explained to her about this, and she then mentioned this was the same as her son who was diagnosed with aspergers, and she advised us to look into it.

We got in touch by writing to the junior school before easter this year, and raised our concerns, the head of the school got in touch and said if we wanted an assessment then we would have to do this by asking a person from authority first, so i did think of our doctors and my mate suggested asking the school for the community school nurse who is a district school nurse for the area we live in, so i had done this, then was given the contact number.

By June 2006, the nurse made arrangements to have a meeting at the school with us to write a report, this was done, and they requested one from the school, which they had finally done in the end after keeping on.

Our son was then finally assessed by the school, all records of this were sent to the nurse, who forwarded them on to the Child Pyschologist, and by August 2006 we met up with her first before deciding to meet our son. After disclosing all the information she requested to meet our son a few weeks later.

The child psychologist met up with our son, but on this accasion he was asked a number of questions and we were given questionaires to take home to fill and send back when completed.

As he is now in the first year of a mainstream secondary school, the psychologist had asked them to assess our son, in which that was done within a few weeks.

The assessments confirmed the lack of social interactions, learning difficulties etc that are also being dealt with by an educational psychologist and the LEA for a 'special need statement' that can take up to 6mths in total to complete.
Our son's ART is amazing as he loves to draw cartoon characters such as 'The simpsons' etc, but has difficulties in the main of the subjects.

We attended the review appointment today with the Child psychologist and after going through everything, she confirmed the diagnosis of Aspergers Syndrome, but will be passed onto the child specialist dept to confirm this hopefully for January, as this is how they deal with it here.

We now feel relieved that there is finally an answer to these issues, and know there is support out there for our son.

The school have also stated, with a diagnosis, it will help towards getting a 'Special need statement' and he will get the support he needs at school.

Considering it was this year we have been dealing with it, we think the process have worked out well, and very thorough.

There is a light at the other end of the tunnel for our son, and us of course.

Hope everything goes straight forward for anybody going through this process.............so not to worry it will be resolved in the end, so the best of luck.

(sorry if i have gone on a bit) lol:-)

Will be visiting this website daily !!!! Thank you.:bye1::

[Gareth Roberts]

Thanks for an informative post and for the comments regarding the site! Glad things are going well!!!! It does take time getting a diagnosis and a statement, but thats the process.

I know exactly what your talking about when you explain the problems your son has, they are very common. However, I'm sure as he gets older he will get better at socialising.. it just takes much longer than everybody else. Now I have a great group of friends, but in primary school.. I don't remember being popular, and cirtainly not until the final years of high school.. when things did get better. Even better when I left!

Regards,
Gareth

[aspiechick2005]

Yay another one of us. Hopefully we'll be more than the general population soon.

[Aniela]

Hello Di,

forgive me for asking please what is IEP you menton in yuor post...sorry for my bad understand, trying hard for my young son who has,

Thank you for your time,

Ani