Autism
Toombes
Posts: 4,506 ✭✭✭
Strange topic for a thread, I suppose. Autism is not something most of us deal with on a daily basis, but I do. My 9 y/o son Gabriel was diagnosed with Aspberger's-type Syndrome 3 yrs ago. Commonly misdiagnosed as ADHD, Aspberger's is in all actuality a higher functioning form of Autism. Through countless days and nights of worry and prayer, medication and hours of interaction he is learning to cope it.
Part of Aspberger's is an almost OCD type of compulsion with certain things. My son's compulsion(s) happen to be LEGOs. He also has a near obsession with the techno-electronica group Daft Punk. Last night, before I left for work, he presented me with his vision of a combination of the two. It took him less than 20 minutes to build what you see in the pictures. Just needed to get this off my mind for a little while and to show that not every Autistic person is the character portrayed in Rainman. Thanks for listening, Brothers.
Part of Aspberger's is an almost OCD type of compulsion with certain things. My son's compulsion(s) happen to be LEGOs. He also has a near obsession with the techno-electronica group Daft Punk. Last night, before I left for work, he presented me with his vision of a combination of the two. It took him less than 20 minutes to build what you see in the pictures. Just needed to get this off my mind for a little while and to show that not every Autistic person is the character portrayed in Rainman. Thanks for listening, Brothers.
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on a related note, there is a guy at work that has Aspberger's, and as a manager i wish i could have this guy cloned a few dozen times. i know to little about it to know what causes what, but the dudes work ethic is amazing, he actually cares about his job (and thats saying a lot these days), he is always early or on time, and everyone loves him.
most of the people at work dont know he has Aspberger's, they just think hes a strange dude.
he was two votes shy (employee based voting) of employee of the year.
exactly on topic: that creation is freaken sweet. if i were you i would go out of my way to buy hum as many Legos as i could.
if i was his father i would jump right in and build stuff too with some quality father -son time. i mean, as stated before, Legos rule.
Way to go, catfish! I agree, there is something beautiful about the inner workings of the autistic mind. I truly hope that your path leads you to helping make a difference in the public understanding of Autism.
Yes, LEGO's do rule! Much like your employee, most people don't catch on to the fact that Gabriel has Aspberger's, they just think he doesn't want to participate in a lot of activities. When he brought his concert construction, I cried when he handed it to me. It's the first thing he's ever given, aside from his undying love. As for buying him as many as possible... You don't think $6000 worth is enough? Lol! He and I have spent countless hrs playing with LEGO's, but my creations pale in comparison to his. I build a wall or a tower, he builds spaceships, helicopters and TRON lightcycles...
I wish I had known those episodes aired, would have loved to been able to see them. He "antisocial" behavioris actually a way for people with Aspberger's to maintain a sense of control. Most people are able to block out the background noise around them. People with Aspberger's aren't able to do that as easily and develop and aural sensory overload. That's why they seem to be antisocial and withdrawn. Gabriel's proficiencies are in his profound creativity, a near photographic memory and math skills. I haven't seen many 9 y/o's who can perform geometric calculations.
Thanks! Of course he's cute, he's my child! Lol! He's extremely proud of his construct and actually asked if we could send the pictures to LEGO Magazine to be published. I'm proud, not only of Gabriel, but of all my children.
That's what I've been thinking, too. He looks at the instructions when he gets a new box of LEGO's, throws the instructions away and builds the toy from memory. It's extremely cool, but kinda scary all at the same time. The daft punk concert construct came about after seeing a picture of the band in their costumes six weeks ago.
I'd love to be able to see what goes on in his mind. He's constantly concentrating on what his next build will be and at the same time he's holding a very coherent conversation and doing his homework. It just blows me away...
The kid I was talking about....literally hears a song once an knows it.
I was in a band with a guy I graduated high school with and he could do the same thing. He wasn't autistic, just blessed with a photographic memory.
Some recent digging around that I've done also brings up the possibility of a genetic link between children with autism and their parents. I've never been diagnosed with Aspberger's but this research does explain a lot of my "obsessive and antisocial" ticks. I see a lot of things in Gabe that I did as a child and still do as an adult. Hopefully, science will be able to explain and define these similarities and possibly come up with a means of slowing down these occurances.
I am not a father, but man....it makes me wonder if it is in teh food we eat, teh water we drink, etc.., as this epidemic did not exist a couple decades ago.
I agree and I wish there was a logical explanation. Everything I've researched tells me that Autism has always existed, but is commonly misdiagnosed as OCD, ADHD, dementia or a form of mental incapacity(sorry, I have no love for the term retardation...). John Elder Robinson, who suffers from Aspberger's, wrote a book titled Look me in The Eye. Growing up in the 50's and 60's he was generally regarded as a "strange" kid. It wasn't until he was in his 30's that he finally discovered his true diagnosis. He later went on to build stereophonic sound systems for Pink Floyd, the burning guitars for Ace Frehley and some of the first talking games for Milton Bradley. It's been here all along, it's just that no one knew what it was. It would gladden my heart to finally hear that a cure has been discovered.
And by all means I am not attacking your reference to a cure because I know you want what is best for your child. I just hate that kind of terminology in the world of psychology as it most likely involves putting someone on some sort of neuropsychological drug that is a synaptic bandaid or inhibits neurotrasmitters are opposed to creating new paths in the brain to overcome adversity.
Lol! Strange that you would mention that. He plays it every chance he gets!
Yep, that's the one. After looking through the episode list I see that not all of the ones are about Autism, but a good many are. One was about a guy who had zero musical talent whatsoever, then after a head injury he immediately turned into a piano master. Interesting stuff...