New school year

Contrarian and his brother spent 6 weeks in South Africa visiting their real dad and his family. They had a great time. Not always easy and big brother assures me that contrarian behaved more like 'a retard' than usual but I'll put that down to sibling rivalry.

There where a few 'incidents' - one involving contrarian smacking another girl in the face. It was awkward for a while but fortunately some of the adults there were aware of contrarian's intolerance for strangers.

When my ex phoned to voice his distress about the incident I couldn't help but think:"Finally you know what it's like to walk in my shoes'. Instead I said :"I'm sure that if you explain the situation to your friend's they will be understanding - they are after all your friends".

I felt determined that for 6 weeks their real dad should handle anything and everything that came his way. Apparently there were some very chaotic moments but all in all I felt that the boy bonded with his dad and that they had a good time.

The medicine went walk about somewhere in the Drakensberg - 3 weeks into the holiday. We have started the medicine again (one tablet pr day) and things are working out great. I'm still not entirely convinced the medication is the cause of all the positive things in our life. I believe there is a lot to be said for a child's sense of security and acceptance not to mention human connection. Something which we have received a lot of lately.

Contrarian is happy to be home with his friends and it is showing. He has had a wonderful start to the school year.

This week I have spoken to the school inspector, the new teacher and the special education teacher. They assure me that everything is going very well and they have no concerns. The boy himself is very happy.

We received a letter from the school. contrarian has been approved for 228 hours of special education (social education) and 760 hours for a personal assistant - either in a group or alone.

The social education started this week with a trip to the forest to build a lavvo (social dynamics group work). Contrarian refused to go with as he wanted to stay in the classroom with the rest of the class.

The teacher wasn't fazed by it at all as contrarian did the classroom work with no problem. But the special education teacher phoned and asked me to talk to contrarian about going with to build the lavvo.

We have asked contrarian several times if he feels a difference on the tablets but his response is always "No, just stomach ache!".

I have a meeting with BUP (children's psychiatric department) on Tuesday. They want to hear how things are going with contrarian.

Right now - life is everything we have ever wished for!

Nevropsykologisk rapport

Tuesday 22 March

Today I had a meeting with the neuropsychologist.

He strongly feels that contrarian has ADHD in addition to Aspergers. It's difficult to know if the 'impulsive behavior' is a symptom of the Aspergers or ADHD but there's a strong possibility it's the ADHD.

If it is a symptom of ADHD then medication could help in the therapy.

If it's a symptom of Aspergers - well then the medication won't do much good.

I have always been very reluctant to use drugs on a child. Drugs have no place in a child's body. But then there are children like my son who really want to 'fit in'. Like most children - he just wants to be like everybody else. The thing is - he's not like everybody else.

If medication can give him the 'thing' that he needs to be able to behave like other kids in new situations and with strangers - maybe that's a good thing.

Maybe it will open a whole new world for him. The ability to try new things and make new friends.

Everything is going well at the moment. The three musketeers (friends) have found eachother again.

I had a meeting with his teacher yesterday. Things are going well at school - much better than they used to. This last week he has been uncooperative and questioning everything but it is always much better than it was a few months back.

The teacher has put contrarian in charge of a project - teaching the other kids English by presenting them with questions to answer.

He thrives in his role as 'English teacher'.

Below is a diagram. The average is 50. It is clear that contrarians ability to focus and shift focus is way below average.

An appointment has been made with the psychiatrist for 1 June.

Visit to the Neuropsychologist

February 22nd - Contrarian spent the morning with the specialist (neuropsychologist) doing tests.

The doc said that it was a slow start but picked up. Contrarian said that the doc didn't speak to him that much- he just had to do tests on a computer - like push the spacebar when he didn't see a letter that was X.

I'm sure that they did a lot more during the 2 hours but I will find out later when they call me in.

Contrarian is no longer so friendly with two of his friends. Once the 'bleyblade' phase was over the boys didn't seem so eager on each other's company.

He is spending more time with his original friend with the playstation. They have a very dynamic relationship because they are similar in some ways. It turns out this little boy's parents were called in by PPT recently. His parent's have told me so I know what is going on but I don't want to talk about another child on this blog.

Contrarian had a little outburst at school last week but other than that he is very happy at school. The incident happened when a new teacher (stranger) tried to take his ice hockey stick away from him - that would be the ice hockey stick that he sleeps with in bed (he was demonstrating something in the hallway).

She hadn't yet been informed that contrarian is Aspergers so she got annoyed with him when he didn't 'respond' to her. Contrarian was devastated and had a shutdown. Fortunately his assistant heard the commotion and came running. It was resolved once his own teacher and assistant took care of the situation.

We have worked on defining his relationship with the ice hockey stick. He is now able to leave it in the hallway at home so that he doesn't knock things over inside the house.

Observation - BUP

Just realized that I forgot to write about the last observation my boy did!

Observation 7th January 2011 - BUP Asker.

I was allowed to watch through a mirror/window - like the ones in NCIS when they play 'bad cop - good cop'. It was a taped session.

We had explained to contrarian that he was going to 'play' with the psychiatrist. He wasn't happy about it, he couldn't quite understand what the fuss was about. I told him that it was because of the WISC test results. That the doctors wanted to know how he could be so clever when his concentration was age appropriate. He accepted my explanation although reluctantly.

He was very offish to the psychiatrist - very distrusting. She tried to engage him in 'role-play' but he told her that he found it childish so he didn't want to play with her.

She would chose a bag for each task. In the bag there would be various toys - there would always be at least one item that didn't fit in with the rest of the toys. He liked the gadgets, at one point he became completely fascinated with a sort of 'pin pad' thing. The one where you can put your hand or face and push the 'pins' to the other side so that it makes an imprint of your hand or face. He loved the detail. He didn't like the figures at all - called them childish.

The questions went something like :"Is mum/dad/friend/sister happy?What does mum do when she happy/angry/sad?How do you know that mum is happy/angry/sad? What does mum like to do?" etc .

I realized that my son

a) Doesn't see facial expressions

b)Doesn't read body language

c)Doesn't know what anybody in his family or social group likes doing or doesn't like doing (except for beyblades - apparently all his friends are only interested in beyblades just like him).

d)He knows when his little sister is angry/upset because she is vocal - she cries or screams. We have to help her then because she is a baby.

e)He does know and remember everything I tell him verbally-even if he doesn't agree with it.

f)My son doesn't know that I smile when I am happy or that I laugh a lot but he can 'feel' it. He can't explain that I go quiet when I am upset or that I go for a walk when I am sad but he can 'feel' it. And the truth is that he does feel it. I know because he will ask me "mummy what is wrong?".

There was a particular task where she took out a book. She then asked contrarian to tell her the story. The book was about the life cycle of frogs.

Contrarian became very enthused - basically grabbed the book from her hands wile she was still talking - nodding his head and pushing her hands away. I was taken aback by his in depth knowledge and understanding of the detailed process. His intelligence shinned through on all accounts. So did his lack of ability to 'read' other people.

One of the psychologist phoned me a few days later to ask if BUP could use the video in their training sessions. I said 'yes'.

Tomorrow I have an appointment with BUP to hear what the psychiatrist made of the observation and what conclusions she has come to.

Today

One and a half hours with BUP (child and teenage psychiatric dep) answering questions and more questions. We are still not finished.

It's taking longer because there are always two answers to each question. This is how he would respond at home but this is how he responds in front of other people.

The psychiatrist told me that I have made her job difficult for her - which is a good thing. In our home we have built a 'stilas' (scaffolding) around our contrarian which has ensured his relative normal functioning.

It's when he has to face the world outside - by himself without the scaffolding that things go wobbly.

There's another appointment just before Christmas to finish the questions, another appointment to go through his WISC (IQ) test results and a separate appointment in the new year where she wants to observe him personally.

Contrarian came home all excited today. He had been invited to Jip's house. He had come home to tell me that he was going (he remembered that I told him he had to come home). But when we got to Jip's house nobody was home.

My contrarian was devastated! He couldn't understand why they had lied to him. I assured him that there must have been a misunderstanding as Jip's parents are divorced (separate houses) and the gran has picked him up from the bus stop.

Maybe Jip was at his dad's house or gran's house?

Contrarian cried loudly all the way home - it felt like the end of the world for him.

I had to listen to how boring his life was and how terribly fed up he was with watching TV (he hasn't even watched TV the last 3 days).

He recovered a short while later and we had a nice evening at home.

BUP - close to final stage

Yesterday I spent an hour with BUP (child and teenage psychiatric dep). We have reached the stage where the psychiatrist is focusing on Aspergers's - or rather eliminating it. She feels that all other diagnoses can be eliminated.

It was an hour of questions - 'when did he say his first word/sentence?, did he use me as a tool or extension of himself before he could speak, does he point when he wants to direct my attention at something? etc etc etc'.

It was exhausting!

Next week there's another hour of questions.

We reached the question of 'does he play with his sentences -i.e say things in a strange way - can you give me an example of something that he has said?'.

Yes, he does play with words but for the life of me I can't remember a concrete example.

The thing is - it can seem as if he is 'stupid' because the sentence doesn't make sense but if you enquire you will find that there is a thought in his head that he has added. So once he explains what he is thinking - then the sentence makes sense.

His big brother does the same thing - tries to be 'superior' by playing with words. I think it's an attempt at wit.

I'll have to be 'on the look out' this week and write it down when next he does something like that.

The psychiatrist made me realize something though. It was only when we moved to England at the age of five that I started noticing that my boy was 'different'. Specifically I realized that he was not as 'mature' as children his own age. Before that I merely thought of him as being active whilst everybody else was shouting 'ADHD!'.

He wanted to play for the sake of playing not for winning or competition.

He was extremely outgoing and had no problem approaching children until the age of six. That was when he started avoiding direct eye contact with the other children.

He stil doesn't have a problem approaching other children. It's understanding their play without getting offended about something or other that is the problem.

'Does he come across as a little professor?'.

I would say more like a 'prosecuting attorney'. He can destroy your defense so fast your head spins. Sometimes I am left thinking 'what just happened, how did I lose that debate so quickly?'.