If This Isn't Asperger's--What Is It

[Guest guest]

It's the newbie again. I've been reading everything I can about AS and I think

my dd has it because now I'm seeing that she doesn't react properly in social

situations and she imitates me all the time, copying what I do and repeating

what I say, sometimes inappropriately, but she doesn't seem to have a lot of the

other common symptoms. I can't identify an obsession. She likes dinosaurs but

doesn't talk about them all the time or read books about them. In fact, she used

to love to read but now she doesn't like to do it anymore. I have to bribe her

to read. She comprehends what I read to her, though, remarkably so. She can

apply the knowledge across subject areas and even months later, so I don't think

she has a lot of rote memory without meaning. She likes stories and books and

plays pretend alot, but one story doesn't hold her interest for more than a few

weeks and she gets bored with it. Sometimes whatever interests her doesn't last

more than a few days. She does get sort of ritualistic sometimes. If she sets

the table she doesn't want anyone touching the silverware until we eat, but

she's not alphabetizing things every night before we go to bed. She wants to

listen to her radio while she's going to sleep but she usually doesn't care if

it's a story or music as long as it's on. The only thing I can see that she

enjoys doing is playing. She hates anything that interferes with whatever she is

playing. She doesn't have the AS voice I've read about. She doesn't have trouble

maintaining eye contact, and she can have a give and take conversation. She

doesn't have an awkward gait. In fact, she's quite athletic and could be very

good at any number of sports if she got over her frustration with not being the

best in the world at it the minute she began learning it.

She is negative all the time. Whatever activity I plan doesn't meet with her

satisfaction and she refuses to do it, even when it's something fun. Whatever I

cook for dinner, even if it's her favorite, it's not what she wanted. She yells,

" I hate it. I won't do it " whatever it is. Then she threatens and yells at me.

" If you make me do it then I'll... " fill in the blank. Usually she threatens to

throw things. And she'll do it, too. She argues with me all day long. She's

bored. She doesn't want to go anywhere. She's tired of being stuck in the house

all day. She hates playing in the backyard. She doesn't want to play in her

room. If I tell her something or ask her to do something she'll come right back

at me in the rudest way imaginable. I thought kids with AS weren't aggressive or

oppositional. She is both. When I took away her thirty minutes of television for

the day for her behavior she started screaming at the top of her lungs and

thrashing around. She's not on any medication right now to make her that way.

So, does she have AS and an alphabet soup of other disorders also? I know she

has anxiety-separation anxiety, social phobia, anything involving other people.

And what do I do about it? Please somebody tell me this will get better.

Thanks,

in FL