RE: Intro w/contributing note on hyperlexia [1 Attachment]

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welcome, From: jmdollar@...Date: Tue, 1 Jun 2010 08:13:17 -0700Subject: ( ) Intro w/contributing note on hyperlexia [1 Attachment]

[Attachment(s) from Dollar included below]

Hello,My name is and I am new to this community; so I just wanted to introduce myself. I am a SAHM/part-time uni student. My children are , age 6 (ASD) and Coralie, age 2-1/2 (NT, but a HUGE copycat.) was diagnosed about 1-1/2 ago. I missed a lot of the signals. I knew he was a highly sensitive child. Loud noises would upset him greatly. He didn't really talk. He didn't call me mama until he was almost 2. But, he could point to and name all of the letters lowercase and capital letters and identify the sounds they made before then. He would also spell words out on the refrigerator with magnets to let me know what he would like. At 18 months, he would bring me to the refrigerator and I would

see, c-u-p. Or, s-u-p-e-r-m-a-n (a dvd, he enjoyed.) I think I was just uneducated. My husband was in the army and we were far from home and family. We lived in Alaska and the other mother I spend time with had one child that didn't really talk until almost 4. So, I convinced myself there was nothing to be concerned about. And once did start to speak, his speech was very clear. He did have a very big problem with eye contact, but he was very affectionate - a snuggle bug. And though, I knew he showed a little less empathy than his older cousin had, I thought maybe that was boy-girl difference, or maybe a result of him being an only child. I finally had him evaluated by the specialists in the school district when we left the army and settled back at home. I had noticed that would try to approach other children he would get overexcited and didn't seem to pick up on personal

space issues, and other social cues that the other children his age did. He also had a vocalization tic when he couldn't think of what to say, "ning (rhymes with "ring") uh ning uh ning uh...." He still does the vocalizations. As he got older, he replaced the babble with "excuse me" He might repeat it 10-15 times after he obviously has your attention, while he tries to think of how to say what he wants. He would start to get frustrated with himself and bang his head against the floor or hit himself repeatedly. All of this resulted in his isolation, and he had no friends. Children his age would even play alongside him at the park. They would run away. The evaluation process took a long time. And during that time, I started doing some research. And by the time they came back with the diagnosis, I wasn't really surprised. He is very high functioning. And I am very

fortunate that we live in a school district that is very savvy about autism spectrum disorders. was identified as special needs and rides a special needs bus that will pick him up directly in front of our house with an aide. He will be graduating from kindergarten on Friday. His kindergarten class had 8 other high functioning children on the spectrum. And they stayed on the regular kindergarten curriculum with extra focus on the social skills that they all needed. By the end of this year, spends only 40% of the school day with his original class and has transitioned to 60% in a regular classroom with the assistance of an aide. When needs extra help adjusting to something off-routine or just loud, he is able to leave with the aide. He will be in a similar program for first grade next year. The teacher from the regular classroom has also identified as one of her brightest

students. And he has actually been ahead of the class the entire year. That will probably remain the case as he continues to read voraciously and has recently begun memorizing his multiplication tables with no guidance from me. Well, that was kind of a long introduction. But, I look forward to getting to know all of you and participating in this discussion/support group.Thanks for reading!

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