Navigating the New Friendship Phase *Need Advice*

[Guest guest]

Hi all- I am new to this group but love the support here. My 6yr old Aspie is a

wonderful boy. He is full of fun and facts and is (like most ASpie's I am sure)

quite intelligent.

He is in K in the LDL or Special Ed class. There are 12 kids in the class. He

is one of the kids taht excels in all he does and the teachers love him. There

are few in the class that have many issues and functioning socially is very

limited. Therefore- he has not really connected with too many of the kids. He

tends to find one kid to latch onto and then follows that kid all around and

does everything that kid does. This year he has sort of latched on to a kid

that is very limited in his social abilities. My son was just dx in July of

2010 so we are still trying to figure things out & get all the help we need. I

need to get more support for me, him & the rest of our family.

Anyway- here's where I need some help:

My son takes the bus to & from school each day. He has made friends slowly with

a boy who lives across the street from us. This boy is about a yr & half

older. He is in 2nd grade & my son is in K but we held him back. The boy

across the street is very sweet. They have had a few play dates here in our

backyard. We have a really big backyard that has an excellent hill on one side

for sledding. So, they have gone sledding in the backyard a few times and had a

great time together.

And here are my concerns:

1. Do I tell the other parent (my neighbor) that he has AS? They may already

know- I am not sure though. We never told them, but others may have.

2. Do I tell them just to protect him and explain things a little bit? For ex-

my son will not go over to anyone else house to play.

3. My son does not understand the basic nuances of having a friend and we have

realized we need to work on our social stories with him. Since he played with

this kid twice now after school, he thinks he will play with him every day after

school. He waits for him by the door and makes me call over to see if he is

coming over. One day I called and he had gone over to another friends house and

so my son was devastated.

4. I worry that this boy is just using my son for his cool backyard sledding.

5. Along with # 3 above- we are working with him to understand some basic

friendship rules. For ex- if his new friend comes over he ignores him. He

doesn't know to ask him to play something. he'll just get on the SmartCycle and

expect the other kid to watch and want to play with that too. I have to whisper

things to him like " Ask him what he wants to play? " and tell him exactly what to

say to a friend when it is time for them to go home.

whew! This is tougher to navigate than I thought!

Any ideas of greatly appreciated. Like I said- I really need to get some

support in place for us. I am just all over the place.