Costy

My thoughts entirely. The ed psych put the comment on the statement. His statement has now been withdrawn, so I am told, as he is no longer a pupil at the school where it was issued. When I was at school, there was always a 'different' kid, or a 'loner'. Rightly or wrongly, that kid now has a label, my son is that kid, and I don't want to label him unnecessarily. I should add that we live in a small village in the welsh hills, he was one of only two boys in his school year, and he and the other boy are like chalk and cheese. He was bullied by the older boys in the school, and has no peer group in our community. He is the only 17yo boy in the village. I have also noticed that he behaves differently when not in mine or his father's company. He does voluntary work one day a week in a local animal rescue centre (he wants to work with animals eventually, says he gets on with them better than humans), and when I went to collect him one day, I heard him introducing a rabbit to a young girl and telling her and her family about caring for it, and handling it, he didn't know I was there. He never speaks so much when we are around, but again, this isn't unusual teenage behaviour. He will not let me touch him, and has not since he was around 9 years old. He has no affection for anything but our dogs and cat. I asked him once if he hated me, and he replied 'I don't hate you, but I do dislike you', and he can't understand why I would be hurt by this. Anyway, ramblings over, I have never discussed this with anyone, not even his father. Our younger son is a successful sportsman, very academic, and is a competent and successful actor. This I feel has led to some understandable jealousy, and has given his father (who is in complete denial about any problems whatsoever) a focus for his fathering role! He finds it difficult to be a good dad to someone who doesn't want to do anything or go anywhere, and doesn't care how he smells or looks. Perhaps I am overreacting, but I do appreciate anyone spending the time to read my ramblings.

My son has been slightly 'different' all through school. He was fine in early school, and had friends round, but I didn't really notice any difference in him as he was my first child. When my second came along, it became obvious that something wasn't quite right. He's got slight dyslexia, and has always had a statement for 'specific learning difficulty' which I think is a really woolly, unhelpful term. In around year 9 at school, 'displays Aspergers tendencies' was added, which upset me terribly, but in truth I always knew. Again, this is a very wooly term, does he have Aspergers, or not? He hasn't actually been diagnosed, as our educational psychologist seems fond of not committing herself to anything, and using these wooly terms, so I now have a bit of a problem. He will be 18 in March. He did reasonably well at school, he excelled in chemistry, physics and biology and got B, B and C for these, and was due to go back to sixth form to take A levels in each. However, due to a mix up over his other results (he got E in English and D in Maths) on enrolment day, he was refused entry to sixth form. He enrolled in the local agricultural college and is doing three years in an animal care course (which was what he always wanted to do). Three weeks into this course, his school called and said that there had been a mix up and they wanted him in sixth form, but he didn't want to go as he liked college. Ho hum. All through school, he did details of school trips from me, I only know now that they existed because his younger brother goes on all of them. He has never had any friends, but will tag along sometimes with his brothers local friends. However, they tease him, and he can't cope with it, and it wounds him. Example, he is rubbish at sports, but I encouraged him when his brother and friends went to play tennis the other day. The other boys filmed his attempts on a phone, laughing, and he was upset by this and came home. He behaves inappropriately with his brother, flicking his face, waving hands in his face, saying hurtful things andtrying to embarass him constantly, so he won't invite him anywhere any more. Consequently, he sits on his own in his bedroom, every day, on his Xbox, with the curtains closed, and it's killing me. He says he's happy, but I know he would love to have some friends (he once asked me when he was a lot younger if he would ever have a best friend), but the only people he speaks to are on the xbox. He has a sunday paper round which I organised for him which brings him some money every week. I feel I should tell him why he's in this situation, but don't think I can without breaking down. Also, who am I to make this diagnosis? No one else has, it was just hinted at in his statement, what if he hasn't? Is he actually in this situation because he IS Aspergers? That has never been confirmed either, so if I tell him he is, and he isn't I couldn't live with myself. What difference would it make anyway? We have brought him up exactly the same as his brother, never treated him any differently at all. So if I tell him, what difference would it make? The issue going round in my head is that he could possibly meet up with other aspergers people and have a bit of a social life, but would he? He thinks some of the people in his college are 'odd' but they are people with learning difficulties, and apart from social awkwardness, he really hasn't got any other difficulties. We have never ticked the box on any of his course application forms that says 'do you have an autistic spectrum disorder', because we can't be sure he has. I'm hoping he meets some new people at college in Septemer when he starts the new part of his course. He met one lad at college last year and got on well with him, he came over for my son's birthday, but after an arranged sleepover at this lad's house where there were two girls were invited, he hasn't seen him since. I have no idea what happened, and don't want to. So, do I tell him, or do we carry on as he is. After all, the rest of the world are not going to know he's aspergers (if he is) and he will have to deal with that all his life. Any kind of help, reassurance, or advice would be greatly appreciated.