Emotional Abilities in a Recovering Child

(Editor's Note : this is a copy of a posting by a parent to one of the autism discussion groups.)

To parents who have fully recovered children.

I would like to hear your experience so that I can be prepared for the work ahead.

Hello,

I have a son who has PDD and is on the way to recovery, I hope. He is 6 years old and we have been doing ABA for the last 3 years and we now have

very loose ABA and lots of Theory of Mind stuff. His expressive language level is anywhere from 4 to 5 years old. All other reading and math stuff are way ahead of his peers.

I've seen a number of recovered kids who are beyond the 2 grade level. However, I've noticed that some of them are not really normal in my eyes. Of course, I have microscopic eyes. Nevertheless, I see their mild awkwardness among peers. What they are lacking is not any functional skills, it is blindness to read the social atmosphere. Parents have told me that although they are fully functional at school and home, some kids don't have close and private intimate relationship with their peers.

I have one NT child. He has a number of buddies that he calls and plays with all the time. He plays and fights with them. AND he gets hurt by them which is the fact of life.

Here is what I see in my son being awkward and not reading the others feeling at this time. For example, when my husband and I have an argument for some reason (yes, it happens once in a while :( ) that the atmosphere of the house is tense, my NT child is very cautious and he would try not to get in the way and do his stuff by himself. I see him worried and he would ask my husband and I later that if everything is okay.

On the other hand, my PDD son has no clue and no worry. The other examples are, although he can list things that can make anyone embarrassed, he does not have a feeling of embarrassment himself. I don't know if he would know if someone teases him. I don't feel that he gets hurt emotionally either. Of course, he gets angry and cries when things are not the way he wants them to be. But I never see him being sort of depressed for something. He is either happy or angry.

What I see with him now is, he likes to state/answer wrong answers on purpose and to see how others react and gets a kick out of it. He shows very very tiny bit of jealousy. He does not (cannot) lie to get away with something. He watches a movie/video that has physical reality, like a sing along or a documentary about animals. He can somewhat follow Author on PBS only if the story line is physically visible. As soon as the story line is about who is liking and who is not, then he walks away from the TV.

I have been teaching my son all the facts of emotions through ABA and theory of mind. It is the biggest focus of all the programs that I do with him now. As I said earlier, he can LIST why someone is feeling in different ways.

Temple Grandin said in her book, she never understood Soap Operas. She did not understand how one can love and hate at the same time. Now I understand what she meant. I can see that my son can be fully functional, yet not fluently functional in social and emotional aspects of life.

Sooooo, what I am asking is

Now that you have done and experienced all these, could you share your knowledge to make my son to FEEL the feeling of himself and others? I find this to be the hardest. Because it is to teach the human nature that we are born with and learn just being with others.

Thank you for reading this long letter and thank you in advance so much for responding to me.

E.C.

You may email this parent with comments and suggestions at EC@newdiets.com.