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Forum -> Children's Health
Therapy question for 15 year old boy
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imasinger




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Oct 25 2016, 6:13 pm
Yup.

PDD means "pervasive development disorder". As in, the kid matures a whole lot slower than peers.

I don't know what kind of therapy you're doing, but a whole array is good.

A good BCBA supervising a good ABA therapist should make a very significant difference with life skills and general functioning. You probably want a behavior plan for mealtimes and shul behavior, among other things.

A good OT should be of help with sensory issues and fine motor skills building.

A good speech therapist should be able to help with communication skills, teaching him about socially appropriate ways to relate to peers, as well as other areas of nonverbal communication.

Social skills training is also of vital importance. And the groups will give him peers who function at a level closer to his.

In addition, I highly recommend that you read some of the books written by people on the spectrum to get a better idea of what life is like inside that brain of his.
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MitzadSheini




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Oct 25 2016, 6:18 pm
amother wrote:
This. Neurological meaning developmental.

Please take this in the spirit in which it is meant. It seems as though you are holding your ds up to your vision of who/what you want/expect him to be and only seeing where he falls short. This will be painful but you need help coming to terms with the fact that he may not be the person you want him to be. An excellent developmental therapist can work with your son and provide parent counseling for you at the same time so that you understand the root and extent of your ds's challenges, where you can expect him to progress and by how much. This is really important so you can begin to see your ds for who he really is and accept him wherever he is at, while he works to improve his functioning.


This. I wanted to write almost exactly this.

It's really really hard. But at some point it's going to have to be about YOUR acceptance of him, whilst simultaneously trying to give him the help to be the best person HE can be.

A key point here is never being embarrassed about what he does. Easier said than done, I know.
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amother
Ivory


 

Post Tue, Oct 25 2016, 6:46 pm
Thanks for all the advice. I probably do need a support group to help me deal with the day to day frustration. Today on simchas torah he was running around collecting candy with all the little kids in shul. He must've eaten some kind of blue candy because his mouth and teeth were all blue the whole afternoon in shul. Dh was embarrassed when ds got an aliyah and he goes up to the torah with a blue candy mouth.
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sourstix




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Oct 25 2016, 7:11 pm
Op please stop dwelling on the negative. All parents have embarrassing moments! Accept him and love him. That is the first thing he needs, he doesn't need judegement. And I echo what the poster said. I didn't say it as well. You need speak with a therapist to help you accept him for what he is.
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Yael3




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Oct 25 2016, 7:40 pm
OP, "executive functioning" is not "a fancy term for life skills". We may be talking frontal lobe issues and a need for psychotropic medication in conjunction with therapy. Maybe it would help if you look into support groups for PATENTS and get some help and psychoeducation yourself about how to best help him and YOU.
As an aside, it sounds like he's getting an awful lot of attention (negative attention, but still attention) from acting the way he does...
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amother
Emerald


 

Post Wed, Oct 26 2016, 1:09 am
amother wrote:
We've spent many thousands of $$$ on therapy for my 15 yr old son with little results. I think I know why and I'd like to hear some feedback. Basically my son is 15 going on 9. He acts like a 8-10 yr old in every way imaginable.
Academics are a disaster.
He has no shame sucking lolly pops in shul.
He fights with his siblings over things like "she's looking at me".
He fights with his siblings on which chair he wants to sit in at the table.
He has no problem going outside with dirty clothing or a dirty face.
He can't hold a conversation that is age appropriate and therefore has no friends.
A hundred other examples.

It's pretty clear that his mind is like a 9 year old. In the same way I couldn't take a 9 yr old to a therapist and say, make him think, act, and behave like a 15 yr old, I cant take my 15 yr old whose mind is like a 9 yr old and have it changed. I'm reluctant to continue throwing money down the drain. Am I making sense?


I am going to disagree with what a lot of posters have said on here. Many have said with absolute certainty that he has a neurological disorder yet none of them have even met the poor boy!

It is also a possibility (and this will be unpopular on here) that your son is just plain immature and will one day (probably) just grow up on his own, later than his peers. In the meantime, it will be frustrating for you. You have done your best with therapy and it hasn't worked.

On here, on Imadoctor, people always diagnose when sometimes people just exhibit less than stellar behavior.

Newsflash people: some husbands cheat without having SA and some kids behave in an immature manner without a neurological disorder.

OP, hatzlacha with your child. I do echo that you need to love him as is, as frustrating as that is (I have a couple of immature ones myself so I empathize greatly). Hugs.
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MitzadSheini




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Oct 26 2016, 1:20 am
The op said her son was diagnosed 5 years ago as being on the autism spectrum. That means he has a neurological disorder (called autism). I certainly didn't try and diagnose him. I was reflecting on the diagnosis which the op provided. I guess emerald you just missed that post from op. An easy mistake to make.
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amother
Emerald


 

Post Wed, Oct 26 2016, 12:29 pm
MitzadSheini wrote:
The op said her son was diagnosed 5 years ago as being on the autism spectrum. That means he has a neurological disorder (called autism). I certainly didn't try and diagnose him. I was reflecting on the diagnosis which the op provided. I guess emerald you just missed that post from op. An easy mistake to make.


I didn't miss that post at all. You can have autism and still not need further evaluation tied to the immaturity. You can have autism and be mature, in fact many people I know with autism are mature, not immature for their ages. Other people with autism are mature but prone to immature outbursts that they learn to control. IMHO (and I am just as qualified as the other imadoctors on here), her son sounds to me simply to be immature, irrespective of his autism diagnosis.
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amother
Babyblue


 

Post Wed, Oct 26 2016, 10:39 pm
amother wrote:
I didn't miss that post at all. You can have autism and still not need further evaluation tied to the immaturity. You can have autism and be mature, in fact many people I know with autism are mature, not immature for their ages. Other people with autism are mature but prone to immature outbursts that they learn to control. IMHO (and I am just as qualified as the other imadoctors on here), her son sounds to me simply to be immature, irrespective of his autism diagnosis.

Posters are recommending a full and proper evaluation because his last one was 5 years ago. That's too long. Posters are recommending an evaluation because according to OP years of therapy have not improved her ds's behavior. Perhaps they have been the wrong therapists, perhaps they have been addressing the wrong issues in the wrong way. Posters are recommending an evaluation because OP doesn't seem to fully understand the nature of her ds's deficits, what is part of his diagnosis and what isn't, she has not been getting professional parental guidance from his therapists and her expectations seem to be unrealistic. A full evaluation with a better professional is absolutely called for under these circumstances.
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