Autism Awareness Tidbit #3: Lets talk emotions (particularly empathy): A lot of times a generalization of kids on the Spectrum is that they lack empathy and emotional response/feelings. This is not really 100% correct. A lot of ASD kids lack SOCIAL EMPATHY. A good bit of this stems from their lack of eye contact and missing social cues. They do have feelings and experience a range of emotions but cant always express this. For example, my son has a wealth of empathy for his twin sister. He worries about her if she is not with him. He protects her from the evil pediatrician wielding a needle and will hug her and comfort her if hes having a good day (more on good/bad days later). On the other hand, if she stubs her toe and he isnt watching, her scrunched up face is missed and he will not comfort her. He experiences sheer joy, abject disappointment, curious anticipation, and raging anger but it is not always expressed in traditional way. He may be anxious about something and instead of appearing outright nervous he goes into a mode where he controls things. ..shuts doors, flips light switches, pushes in chairs. A lot of these kids dont know how to express the emotions in what is a normal way to us and sometimes they stim. Common stims are hand flapping, toe walking, pacing/walking in circles. This is comforting to them. Also...yelling at an ASD kid or spanking them does not solve the problem. And I dont mean in a traditional dont hit and scream at your kids because it sucks to do and abusive douche parenting. They dont always understand why they do what they do and they sure dont know why youre upset. Yelling and physical brutality will NEVER make them look you in the eye more or stop stimming or stop melting down in Target or get them to fall in line to your behavior expectations. Therapy, specially designed curriculums, patience, love, and a few glasses of wine for mom and dad may help tremendously. Just like you learned that its proper etiquette to open a door for someone, the ASD kids can learn that its the right thing to do but may not be driven to do it because a person is walking with a cane. But you can put that tool in their toolbox so they at least know they are supposed to do it.
Posted on: Wed, 02 Apr 2014 17:19:39 +0000
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