A dad of a 25 year old adult on the autism spectrum, and a member of the SCAN support group, Chennai shares the challenges faced by his son, the techniques deployed to overcome these and enable him to be an independent young adult. #AutismDad
Today my son is 25 years old, a MBA post graduate with work experience in Human resources from a reputed company.
My son’s childhood days with autism
Looking back it has been a roller coaster ride filled with challenges from the time my wife identified autistic features in my 4 year old in the year 1998. In 1998, as a young Engineer deputed to Sydney, Australia, I was busy with my work, when a routine phone call from my wife indicated the need to have our son assessed for his early symptoms of autism.
To me a cute looking kid who had the ability to repeat a book full of birds and their exotic English names like “Humming Bird”, “Zapata”, etc. by simple picture identification, could not be having anything related to autism. I was in denial for some time and tried not to worry too much. However on my return we had him duly assessed and our neuropsychologist reported him to have ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), some LD (learning disability) with mild features of autism. Those being early days, we were optimistic like many other parents, that he would outgrow the diagnosis with therapy and treatment. Given many famous personalities have been successful with such a diagnosis, we went forward doing the therapies diligently.
Kindergarten slowly brought forth the challenges faced by my kid. Lack of age appropriate social skills, repeating same words / phrases, lack of interest in games played by peers at school and in our colony, learning issues to understand commonly played games like hide and seek, etc. started bothering the Dad in me. I witnessed my son being teased, treated as a mentally challenged and bullied. Sometimes these were deeply hurting. Academics slowly started to be a burden with teachers complaining his inability to complete school work, homework coupled with a bad hand writing. Stress in a normal school environment made my child extremely dejected to the point of harming himself.
Helpful teaching techniques
As a Dad I continuously started to ease his social skills by exposing him to various indoor and outdoor activities. If no one played with him, I started being the bowler or batsman to teach him cricket. When playing with other children, I became one among them to support his weakness in learning rules of any game played, be it “hide and seek”, “police and thief” or cricket. The most important challenge faced being, my son had to be taught two or three times more than his peers to understand something. Luckily once my son picked interest in an activity, understood it and took to his long term memory, he was a master at it. And he enjoyed it.
So, we evolved a pattern of teaching more, training more to overcome many of his deficit life skills due to clinically diagnosed “Learning Disability”, “ADHD” with mild features of autism. As a Dad I was always aware of this fact and made it my routine to go the extra mile in adopting specialized teaching methods, techniques from his kindergarten to class VIII. For e.g. some of Tony Buzan’s Mind-map techniques were taught to the boy from his early days to retain things in memory to the best possible. This to an extent helped him pass his exams. Most of his lessons had to be re-written in a simpler form for him to understand. This became a routine activity for me as a Dad till he completed post-graduation.
Coping with disappointments and rejections
Whenever he felt lonely due to lack of friends, my son used to go behind many of his peers who used to insult or bully and send him back. He was so dejected one day, that I told him to gain the power of a magnet by learning special skills like music, drums, narrating jokes, etc. so that others get attracted to him like iron particles. He listened to me and stopped physically following people who insulted him. He also started focusing more on developing music, learning drums, narrating jokes, etc. This technique partially worked to reduce his dejection and improve his morale. Still the challenge of starting a topic, participating in a topic or sustaining a conversation remains a challenge to this day with marginal improvements as years pass by and he gains additional knowledge. Narrow range of interests like going to the temple, watching & enjoying select regional movies, TV serials, playing a few computer games also limits his conversational abilities, while normal (neurotypical) boys and girls of his age could converse on a range of topics from academics, sports, entertainment, politics, humor, etc.
Support by academic school boards and universities by way of some extra time, use of calculator, ignoring spelling mistakes like using letter “t for “d” (typical in dyslexia) meant my son did gain some of his lost motivation and complete his schooling, graduation and post-graduation. Wonderful teachers to repeat teach him on academics also played a huge part. And my simplified writing of his academic subjects adapting to the way his brain learned helping complete the process. Continuously visiting his school and college, talking to his friends, teachers and , requesting them to adapt, include and understand also helped keep his emotions as a teen ager and an adult in check. This awareness creation process in the boy’s immediate social surroundings like friends, teacher, superior and peers at work has helped in creating a positive inclusive, productive environment for my boy. While in parallel EQ enhancing cognitive therapies are offered to make the boy self-realize himself, his strengths and weakness and adapt to this dynamic world.
Supporting him to be an independent teenager
On the safety front my son was afraid of sound from his childhood. Sounds of a motorbike or scooter being kick started, balloons or plastic bags with air burst for fun, put him at tremendous unease. We never relished a Diwali till he turned into his teens. On Diwali day, he used to close all doors and windows and hide himself in a room. It was so embarrassing at times to explain to relatives and friends to whom he appeared normal outwardly. Lord Ganesha and the festival in my colony played a huge part in the correction process. Slowly I made him to see crackers burst during non Diwali days like Ganesh Chaturthi, when my colony folks used to take Ganesha for immersion in the beach. Slowly, but steadily he overcame the fear of sound and started seeing the fun in celebrations. Today in his adult hood, he enjoys more of his Diwali wanting to burst all crackers and throw some by holding in his hand. The technique having been learnt and fear being overcome. He credits me, the Dad for making this happen to this day.
Learning road rules, crossing in traffic was another fear that bothered and spoiled his fun as a college going teen ager. Our chaotic city traffic where many rules are flouted also confused my straight forward autistic boy who is more comfortable following pedestrian rules. Having grown beyond the bullying age, many of his college friends now supported him and taught him to road cross. Now he does cross reasonably well, the Dad in me is the one who is afraid of the same . Today he also knows bicycling and riding an automatic scooter, though city traffic does bother him creating anxiety at times.
Money handling had its set of challenges. He learnt the verbal difference when someone pronounced Rs 2.50/- and Rs 250/- through a humorous incident. As an 8th standard school boy he learnt it the hard way, running away from a shop because the shop keeper asked him Rs 2.50/- for a phone call and he did not have Rs 250/- (the shop keeper chasing him somewhat)! Paise handling was a challenge when taking back change from someone. So, I had to train him on rounding off methods and deal mostly in Rupees. A method that does help to this day to an extent.
Recently improving his mother tongue Tamil by working with me to read better has been a source of inspiration for him. Especially when he realizes that he can use it on many occasions when he travels in the city. Sometimes I make him read Headlines in daily newspaper to make him feel more confident that he too can fluently read like a professional news reader.
Off late he also likes to play Badminton with me, though age and other physical constraints restrict me from helping him more on this front. He has also slowly begun to understand he is now an adult and has to learn more and take more interests. He likes to volunteer and do social service kind of work be it in a temple or a vocational center. One major challenge though is ensuring he does not get worked up when faced with an insult. This happens when someone misunderstands his social communication which requires correction and tuning for some situations, e.g. when a shop keeper or a bus conductor or an auto driver or a ticket vendor puts him down or teases him outside. These do happen repeatedly in a city life even for the so called normal / neuro typical and they too lose their cool.
Supporting as an adult
After his college days, the last couple of years has been a totally different experience. Some of the ongoing challenges are:-
- Making him realize work environment is not anymore a college like environment to have loads of fun and support from friends and teachers.
- Inculcating the importance of punctuality and productivity at work which a corporate business expects.
- Generating realization as to how social situations like interacting with a common man like a shop keeper, bus conductor, auto driver, ticket vendor, others would vary at times. He has been taught that these need not be always polite conversations. I do coach him that miscommunication is common and he should not get anxious or lose his sense of control.
- Strengthening his emotional quotient to withstand pressure from superiors and peers at work is an ongoing activity.
- In short trying to teach this dynamic world. Not an easy task.
Only thing I wish is how great it would be if awareness and inclusion about autism is taught from childhood and the world is more polite in its attitude and the way it speaks to special citizens with autism. Pray quite often this happens.
To this day, as a Dad I continuously teach my son the importance of looking at the positive attributes in people rather than being put down by insults (real or perceived) at the work place. The journey continues for the Dad in me ably supported by my better half, without whom very little could be achieved.
