In the beginning.....there was ADHD.....

Ok, so I've never blogged before but I thought I needed a way to share my frustrations in dealing and loving my newly diagnosed Asperger's son. We've had the diagnosis for two whole months now and it has been a total roller coaster.

My number one feeling since diagnosis is guilt. How could I not have realized what was wrong with my son for so long. He is a 16 year old...and has had symptoms since soon after birth, I suppose...we just thought he was a unique kid. He still is a unique kid...but now a unique kid with a diagnosis.

Why, you might ask, did we push to have a kid who is making B's and C's in all honors classes in high school (some parents I am sure are jealous), and otherwise seemingly thriving, to get diagnosed with Aspergers? Because, I was tired of making excuses about his hygiene and other unique characteristics to his father, step-father and friends and step-brother. I guess I felt like I needed to prove that there was something wrong with him...and that I wasn't just a bad mom who couldn't teach her son to shower every day and had to remind him at 16 to use shampoo when he washes his hair. I was looking for a reason why he can't remember that he needs to wear clean clothes every day...but his 13 year old brother understands. I was looking for a reason to prove that I didn't just raise him to be lazy and not do homework...maybe there is a medical reason why he just can't remember things....

He was always special and super bright! Funny, all the cute stories I told about him as a child, now all point to Asperger's. His first word was ball...at 9 months. By 12 months, he could tell you whether it was a baseball, football, basketball or soccer ball. At 15 months...he said his first full sentence, "Da dog got da ball". (Sure enough, the dog was running around the back yard with a ball in his mouth. At 18 months, he noticed there was a ball in the night sky....and when I told him it was the moon...he decided to call it a "Moonball". At 19 months, he could say his entire ABC's. I suppose, looking back, his first "special interest" was balls.

Verbally, he was very advanced....and physically he was a huge 9 1b baby with a great big head (a big brain they assured me). His motor skills were sadly behind. At the time I was doing a residency in pediatrics at a local children's hospital (yep...I am a pediatrician) and curbside consulted a developmental doctor when he still wasn't walking at 15 months. "Don't worry" , she said, "He's just a big baby and it takes a lot of muscle to move all that mass!". He went to a terrific day care here in town, where they advanced him, based on size and verbal ability and intellect, much more quickly than the other kids. I didn't even really pay attention until a few years ago, watching an old movie of my son's birthday at the daycare. You can hear me distinctly telling another child, "No, Alex isn't turning 4 like all of you...he is just now turning 3."

My first warning sign that something wasn't right, actually wasn't until we packed up and moved to South Carolina, when he was 3 1/2. I remember being at my new partner's house (as a brand new fresh out of residency "real doctor") and Alex was running back and forth all over her living room and she asked "Does he ever stop?" She was impressed that he had read the name of the VHS movie that she had hand written though. He was kicked out of his new daycare in a matter of months, because he was a "bad kid" who never listened. WTH? He was at his old daycare from 4 months to 3 1/2 years old and they thought he was a joy and wonderful. (of course...hindsight says he was placed with the 5 year olds). My husband (at the time) and I moved him to an extremely expensive (read public college tuition would have been cheaper) preschool, where with the exception of a few glitches...he did well.

He apparently stabbed a little girl in the neck with a fork one day at lunch. I personally take exception to the stabbed part. I examined the child myself and there was not a mark on her! Can you actually stab without drawing blood? Wouldn't that be more of a poke? Anyway, another time he grabbed the teachers chest and said, "Boobies, boobies". But I blame that on his dad...he taught him that one at 15 months as a joke. Alex was still very precocious...but not obsessed with animals. He had all kinds of animal books, miniature animals, an animal mural in his room...and preferred Animal Planet to cartoons. I took him to meet Jack Hannah and get an autograph when he was 5. (I thought he was so smart...he wanted to be an endangered animal neonatologist....but can we say special interest number 2?) One day at 4 years old at dinner, he asked, "How do pandas mate?". I said, "What?" I wasn't sure I had heard him right. Alex sighed and said, "How do pandas make baby pandas?". Like I didn't know what the term mate meant! I told him to go ask his dad...who nicely explained, "The same way mommies and daddies make baby brothers." Thankfully, that was enough for him...and thankfully we warned his teacher so she was prepared for..."How do koalas mate?" She answered, "The same way pandas do." I later realized that the Discovery Channel was running a special on the giant pandas. I was so proud when he graduated 4 year old preschool with the math and science award. Little did I know that maybe I should have paid attention to the teacher saying proudly, "Alex loves the math center! All he wants to do is add and subtract...so we let him. While the other kids are listening to group story time, Alex is off by himself doing math. We don't worry about it...since he is doing so well with his reading too".

Kindergarten was the beginning of a nightmare. Three weeks into private parochial school in S.C. I was called into conference. I had asked for placement in their "Advanced" Kindergarten...since Alex could read, add and subtract single digit numbers by the age of 5. The teacher accused me of lying to her. She said he didn't even know his vowels. (umm...my fault...when he could read the word zebra, does it really matter if he knows the vowels are A,E,I,O,U?) She said he was sitting under the table, hitting, not following the rules and didn't even know how to count. WTH? Is she really talking about my son?? By now his activity level was extreme...so after visiting with my partner....we decided to start him on Vitamin R....Ritalin. His father was not happy. I guess he thought that was a sign of a bad parent that we needed our son medicated? Oh well...he got over it quickly when he saw how great it worked. Two hours into the very first dose, I got a call from Mrs. Witch the teacher. (Did I mention that she had told me that my son was the worst child she had ever taught in 14 years of teaching? And she had a son with ADHD and she had said that wasn't the issue...he was just a bad child?....and I was paying $ for this?) Anyway, Mrs. Witch says...what did you do to him? I asked what she meant. She said, "I marked him absent because I hadn't had to yell at him all morning so I figured he wasn't here (In Kindergarten?? Again, I am paying $$$ for this??). Oh, and did you know he can read?".

The birds were singing....the sun was shining...we knew what was wrong! Our precious, precocious little boy had ADHD! The next few years go by in a blur. Math was his favorite thing. I taught him to multiply one night between ordering a pizza and getting it...he did math workbooks instead of coloring. He started listening to Harry Potter audio books. His baby brother moved into the animal room and he got a new big boy "Harry Potter" room. He decided that he was going to be President of the United States, and started following politics (in 1st grade). He decided on Undergraduated at Duke, Law School at Harvard, and then home to be Mayor, then State Senator, then US Senator, then President. (also first grade). He was the youngest child at the school to ever learn to cheat on a test....again 1st grade. He could talk anyone into anything. We put him in a special soccer program that didn't keep score...because he wanted to play but running wasn't his thing. He did one year...and we promptly switched to cub scouts as better suited to his lack of motor skills. He and I had great indepth conversations...but occasionally I would have to explain a common word to him (but define it with a much more complex word). I can't point to one special interest at this time...perhaps the ADHD had him jumping from one special interest to another....but I do remember he had a restaurant mint collection. By Third grade...life at that school was unbearable. His evil teacher told him he wasn't as smart as the other kids because he wouldn't do his work, and didn't make straight A's. I asked her what the consequences for not doing work were...she said they weren't allowed to punish them for not getting it done. She didn't like when I laughed and told her that if there was no reason for me to do it....I'd never turn it in either.....

His self esteem in shambles...he move to public school....where he was promptly placed in the gifted program. (Amazingly, they didn't count spelling scores in his gpa because at 4th grade level...he still couldn't spell "CAT" or "GREAT" correctly). His 4th grade teacher...we'll call her Mrs. Wonderful, told me that Alex was "always going to be a C student...it didn't matter if we put him in honors or remedial....he'd never do his homework and always wind up with C's...so we might as well put him in the most advanced classes so he doesn't get bored". Mrs. Wonderful was a brilliant teacher, who assigned the cutest/sweetest girl in class to sit next to Alex. His little guardian angel would make sure he had his assignments written down and all the right books in his back pack (she will make a great teacher or mother someday). Alex was more that willing to accept this assistance, because he had a big crush on her and loved the one on one attention. The next morning, she would help him unpack his bag and turn in his assignments. Mrs. Wonderful recognized his handwriting difficulties (he couldn't print because the school from hell believed in cursive exclusively...and his handwritting was horrible). If she couldn't read a spelling word, she would call him to her desk and ask him to verbally spell it for her and if he got it right she gave him credit. She also suggested that I type for him any assignments that were graded on neatness, and to start teaching him how to type. How I wish I could go back to those days...because at the high school level...it isn't quite that easy! By that point....he was taking the maximum FDA recommended doses of what ever stimulant de jour that his psychiatrist had him on. She was convinced, "He is the worst case of 'non-comorbid' ADHD she had seen in 20 years of practice". Ok...first Mrs. Witch and now the Shrink both think my kid is the worst ever? He's so good and sweet for me and Mrs. Wonderful?

I know this is probably boring to everyone who is reading but hopefully things will get more interesting as we go along....I just need to get some perspective on the background....