Aspies For Freedom

Hi I´m new here, and I have an 8 yr old daughter which I suspect might have aspies or something like that,but I´m not sure. I just feel so alone, because I know she´s different from children her age in behaviour,maturity and learning ability, but it seems like no one believes me when I say something´s definitely wrong and she needs to get diagnoced. People attend to look at me funny like they think I´m hysterical and attention seeking, but I really do have a deep concirn abt my daughter. I have been trying to find videos on the net showing how kids with aspergers and autism act, so that I can find resembliences, but I haven´t found anything usable yet. Have you any suggestions on what I should do? She has just started in first grade for the second time, because the teachers and school nurse meant she was too immature last year. I was told she had trouble concentrating, had motorical difficulties and they put her in SI therapy. But still I haven´t got a name on what´s wrong with her. She is horribly moody, dominant, unwilling to learn new things, lacks the ability to fantasize, bad eye contact, speech disorders and immature to mention a few of the symptoms I think remind me of aspies/ autism. Am I totally wrong or is there something to it???

I have been to my own doctor who referred me to a special educational institution for children with special needs... I´ve had her listed on a waiting list for a psychiatrist to find out what level of development she´s on according to age and to see if there is any psychological explanation for her behaviour. I don´t know what else to do... Besides, when I went to the 5 yr old check up at the doctors she was totally unwiling to cooperate so we blew it off. The doctor didn´t want to force her... The most accurate description of her behaviour must be like a 4 year old spoiled brat! Or that´s how most ppl see her, and that hurts.

Thank you so much. It means a great deal to me to hear what experiences you had with your children, and I can relate to almost everything.
It has made me want to find the answers even more than before.
Some more thing I came to think abt, is that she can´t handle being complimented on anything she´s good at. She usually destroyes what she has done if we say it´s good, and sais " no it´s not, I can´t do anything right, I´m stupid" and so on. She´s very perfectionistic with everything she does, and if she can´t do it as well as she wanted to, she throws a tantrum. Her biggest interest is movies. If we interrupt her while she´s watching one of her favourites it´s asking for trouble. She usually plays out the story of a movie over and over again after seing it, and she´s very good at remembering word by word. When she was 3 she could remember every single word of a story I read to her, just as it was written.
She does not have many friends as she usually bosses them around too much so that they get tired by her. She stutters and has trouble getting her message out without repeating parts of a sentence several times and sometimes forgetting what she was abt to tell. She has bad eye contact, walks on her toes when she´s in a good mood and stomps like 12 elephants when she´s not. People we don´t know that well might defend her behaviour because they think she´s younger than she is. She´s very short for an 8 year old and looks more like a 5-6 year old. Do any of you have any experience with any of the things I´ve just mentioned?
If so I would be happy if you shared it with me.

I fully understand where you´re coming from Louise, and that´s exactly what I expect will happen, but never the less it´s probably a necessity in the progress of getting a diagnoze, isn´t it? Unfortunately people sometimes have to endure unpleasant things in order to get some good results/ answers. That´s just the way life is. It´s not pleasant for me either having to put my child through that, seing how it will affect her, but in order to get her the help she needs I feel like I have to toughen up and do it anyway, you know? For her sake, not mine.

I´ll have that in mind Louise, thank you. It´s always good to know how the children are offected by all the things we have to put them through. But still I´m afraid of how she will develop if I don´t get her some help as soon as possible. That´s just normal parental concirn I guess.

offcourse, I´ll do that. Thnx again Louise!  :grin:

when it gets that far I plan on telling my daughter what is going to happen and why before she has to talk to the psychiatrist. I hope that will help her being more cooporative. I have just been sceduled for a meeting on monday morning with the after school day scenter where they have been asked to observe her behaviour for a while. The leader is a very kind lady who offered to help me get through the system more easily,so I´m both anxious and excited to find out what is going to be on the agenda at the meeting.

No, I don´t think she is intellectually capable of knowing the whole concept of a psychiatrist, but she knows it´s a person who asks a lot of questions :grin:  

But Louise, I have no plan in "curing" my daughter, it is not what this is all about. You see, I can´t just pull her out of school and wait a few years until she understands what a psychiatrist is, before getting her diagnosed. She has a hard time coping with everyday life as it is, and that will just hold her further back intellectually.I don´t want to be the cause of that.
And in order for her to get anything out of going to school she needs to get the right kind of support, or else the school can´t have her there.
She can´t get in to special school without a diagnose either. My daughter is a little young for an 8 yr old in some ways, but then again she understands a lot of complicated grown up stuff in other ways.
you see, I can´t just sit and do nothing. That would be neglect from my point of wiew, and that would make me responsible of holding her back from reaching her full potential, and I don´t want to do that.

Thnx firefoxy. I totally agree.

It most certainly was, thank you.

And that´s exactly what I´m trying to do, to get every aspect of the matter thought trough so we can be prepared for anything, both good or bad. My biggest concirn is my mother, because she is very resistant of the idea that there might be something wrong with her beloved granddaughter. Her opinion seems to be more that my daughter´s being difficult because I can´t find out how to bring her up right, but that´s just my mum. In her eyes I´ve never been able to do anything right, just because I´m so different from her. My mother is not very good at showing her emotions and I am a very emotionally sensitive person myself, so we do have our difficulties.

Louise,
I´m sure that any parents who love their children want the best for them.
At least that´s what I do. If my daughter for instance had a lethal disease I wouldn´t wait for her to be half dead before I get her into treatment, I would get her the treatment right away. What kind of parent would I be to let my child suffer for years on purpose??? Of course you´re in titled to your own opinion, and I´m sorry you had a bad experience with your own diagnosis and everything that followed, but it doesn´t have to be like that for everyone else too. As people we are all individuals, and we all deal with things in different ways. This could end up to be the best thing that ever happened for my daughter, but who´s to know? I can´t tell what the future will bring nor can anyone else. I just want to help her get the best out of her childhood, because I really don´t think I can make the situation worse than it already is. It is obvious to me that my daughter is miserable, and it is my duty as a parent to help her get past that. I´m not even sure yet if she´s got asperger´s or autism or maybe something entirely different, I just know that she´s having some kind of behavioral disorder and some learning disabilities.

Thank you DW_a_mom. You´re absolutely right. You and I seem to have very similar opinions and ways of thinking. :grin:
It actually feels pretty good to be understood, because I don´t experience that very often unfortunately. :?  Maybe because I have a different way of looking at things than the average person,I don´t know... :wink:
If you like to chat with me on msn sometimes you´re welcome to. :grin:

okay, looking forward to it!  :grin:

ERR, no, I'd disagree with you on that one. I'd like a shot at it before I'm written off thanks.

me too