Spectrum Advice

DOES AUTISM EVOLVE WITH AGE?

Have you wondered about how your loved one with Autism may change as they go through the phases of pre-teen, teenager, young adult, etc.? Or is it possible that they can change? What can you expect as they grow through each stage? When should you begin to worry?

These are questions we often get and I think they are certainly worth exploring, so let’s dive right in!

First, I want to state right up front that there is no “cure” for Autism, nor should there be!
People with Autism are wonderful and they have their unique talents and gifts that they can and do offer to the world.

Temple Grandin, a name familiar to many of you, revolutionized the entire cattle industry in a way that no one else could. She completely redesigned cattle runs in a way that totally changed how cattle are treated, washed and how they undergo other procedures. While this was first met with real skepticism and even scorn, the end results simply couldn’t be argued! Using Temple’s cattle runs, accidental deaths of cattle were reduced dramatically, the cattle behaved better and were easier to manage, and on and on. Today, most major cattle producers will not use cattle runs that aren’t designed and approved by Temple Grandin.

So how did she do it?
BY USING HER AUTISM GIFTS to better understand the things cattle were reacting to that put them into a fight or flight mode. She understood these things because she was more attuned to their sensory triggers in a way that a nuerotypical wouldn’t even clue into.

In other words, these Autism gifts can actually be a real blessing and we should look for and embrace the different perspectives and skills that our loved ones with Autism have to offer.

Now with that said, these wonderful kids will eventually grow up and need to learn how to function in an adult world. Temple Grandin, and many others, wouldn’t have made the contributions they made if they had not first learned these functioning and coping skills to live and thrive in the day-to-day world.

So what has research shown about these questions that I posed regarding the different stages of maturation for people with Autism?
While each child is different and while Autism will remain, research has found that symptoms of Autism in many children can be reduced or even eliminated over time IF certain interventions are made.

These symptoms may include........

READ MORE ON OUR BLOG
https://www.spectrumadvice.com/blog/does-autism-evolve-with-age

THE REAL KEY TO UNDERSTANDING AUTISM

A few years ago as I was researching the causes of autism and how to best address it, I came across some amazing research that links autism to the work done by Dr. Stephen Porges called “The Polyvagal Theory.”

In this theory, Dr. Porges gives great insights that help us understand that autism is not just about the outward behavior, where most practitioners have focused, but that the real causes, and therefore the real solutions can be found by learning about what is happening on the inside.

Through this theory we understand that autism is a learned response generated in the body as a result of being in a prolonged state of fight or flight. Some of this is attributed to the fact that a child’s brain is still developing and through recent developments in nuero-plasticity (the capacity of the brain to change throughout life), we have developed very effective tools to help parents and professional strengthen your child’s brain-body connection and lesson the social and emotional impact of autism.

Dr. Porges discovered that we have a sixth sense that didn’t even have a name, so her termed it “Neuroception.” To help you understand this term, let me ask you a question:

Have you ever felt that pit in your stomach but you really couldn’t explain why? Yet, you intuitively felt that something just didn’t feel right?

This is Neuroception. It is a sense that is constantly scanning your environment, looking for any signs of threat. Keep in mind that for your autistic child, these threats aren’t necessarily restricted to a threat that we would all identify with. These are threats that stem from your CHILD’S PERCEPTION, whether they are real threats or not.

When your child feels this threat, your child’s brain shuts down and they go into survival mode where their ENTIRE focus is on how to protect themselves usually in one of two ways......

READ MORE ON OUR BLOG
https://www.spectrumadvice.com/blog/the-real-key-to-understanding-autism

Why Does Your Child Often Struggle with Hygiene Issues?

I remember one day I was standing at the sink washing dishes as my son Travis walked past me on the way to the pantry to get something to eat. The moment the odor hit me, it took all of the willpower I could muster just to not wrinkle my nose in disgust! Travis clearly had not showered for days, and the smell was enough to knock you over! “But why?” I thought, “Why won’t he just take 30 minutes and get himself clean?” I mean it’s not like we hadn’t spent countless hours discussing ad nauseam the importance of personal hygiene and the reactions other people can have when they catch a whiff of you.

But it wasn’t just showering, Travis also struggled with brushing his teeth. And getting him to floss? Forget it! At first we thought it was just a phase – that he would eventually outgrow it. Or maybe even that it was just a “boy thing.” It took some real education and research on our part to figure out what was really going on. Many of the therapists we took Travis to were just as clueless as we were.

So Why Did This Happen?

And why do so many others on the spectrum struggle with hygiene? It’s not that they aren’t motivated, and it’s not that they don’t care. Most often it is that they are so deep into what we call their Shielding System (an autonomic survival mechanism designed to keep them safe) that they just don’t have enough energy to care. Their energy is completely spent just getting through all of the other things of the day and defending themselves against sensory issues, social anxiety and the world in general.

Hygiene is on their priority list! It may be that it is priority #27, and they only have enough energy for #1-3. Their energy will be sucked up taking care of the most basic life functions like eating, sleeping, etc, not to mention getting through the day (school or work), and keeping it all together. Unfortunately, often there simply isn’t enough energy left to do anything else.

Think of It This Way.

If you are a neurotypical like me, many of the above mentioned things probably don’t phase you much, but they can be a major ordeal for someone on the spectrum! If you want to think of this in the terms of an emotional gas-tank, you could say that you and I have a 10-gallon tank. Getting up and ready for the day will use maybe a half gallon. Then you spend 3-4 gallons during the work routines of the day. Maybe the commute was extra stressful and you use up another 3 gallons getting home. You spend the remaining two gallons preparing dinner, spending time with the family and maybe even knocking out a project before bed. You fall into bed with a half-gallon in the tank. Maybe other days you collapse just as that last gallon is running out.

Now let’s look at someone on the spectrum that only has a 5-gallon tank, due to their heightened sensory issues, anxiety, increased stressors, etc. They use up a full gallon getting ready for the day, and another 3.5 gallons due to the stresses of school, social anxiety dealing with school peers, etc. Their last half gallon gets used up on their way home due to sensory the sensory overload they encounter on a crowded bus. Now they come home with nothing left but fumes, and you ask them to take a shower! They simply have NOTHING left to give!

So What Can You Do?

Please continue reading on my blog here:

Why Does My Child Often Struggle with Hygiene Issues? I remember one day I was standing at the sink washing dishes as my son Travis walked past me on the way to the pantry to get something to eat. The moment the odor hit me, it took all of the willpower I could muster just to not wrinkle my nose in disgust! Travis clearly had not showered for days, and...

I had the great privilege of raising an incredible son, who happens to have Autism. While I’m very grateful for all that he has taught me as I was raising him, it certainly came with more than our fair share of challenges! You see, my son was very moody – and by “moody” I mean angry, hostile towards us as his parents, or hostile toward his siblings. Or at other times he was very anti-social, locking himself in his bedroom for hours while he played computer games. And then there were other times when it still wasn’t good, but very different. He would often blame us for his challenges, saying as it was “our fault” that he didn’t get up on time so that he could get to school, even though he was certainly old enough to get himself up and ready. Or that it was “our fault” that he lost his video game privileges, even though we clearly explained why he had lost those privileges – failing grades from tons of unfinished homework assignments, refusing to do the chores we asked him to do, etc. This usually led to him retaliating for these things by destroying our property, or destroying his sibling’s property. Why? Because he felt totally justified in all that he did. We were wrong and he was right, and that was that. At other times, he would even try to manipulate us into giving him what he wanted, like the time he held my wife’s car keys hostage, when she gave him a ride to school (because he missed the bus….again). All because she refused to write him a note to make his absence “excused,” which it definitely wasn’t.

Through all of this, my wife and I were absolutely befuddled! What was causing all of this!? This behavior wasn’t part of his diagnosis, or at least that’s what we’d been told – or was it?
None of the therapists we took him to had any answers, so we just thought he was a very rebellious tween and teenager. It was only later, in discovering recent research and groundbreaking realizations, did we find the REAL answer for all of my sons behavioral challenges.

Researchers have found that the brains of people with Autism don’t produce as much dopamine as neurotypicals and this creates a greater sensitivity to perceived threats that trigger a survival response of Fight, Flight or Freeze. At first that solved half of our problem. We knew that this was what was causing my son’s moodiness, but what was causing his always blaming us, justifying his actions, and even manipulating us? Only after doing more research, and working with many other kids with similar issues, did we learn that this survival response (what we have coined the Shielding System) can come from one of two ways.

The first is a survival response that has its roots in FEAR. This comes from feeling a lack of control (“I can’t seem to control my getting up on time!”) to a lack of certainty (“What is going to happen when I get another unexcused absence or tardy!?”), which then leads to FEAR. It is this FEAR that puts them in their Shielding System and makes them respond in Fight or Flight.

The second survival responses has its roots in SHAME. My son would feel incredibly challenged with something, such as completing his homework or sleeping in, and feel that because he couldn’t find a solution to fix it, he would conclude that the problem must not be his. He would then blame others for his problems. (“Mom and Dad NEED to wake me up to get to school on time and they’re aren’t doing a very good job of that!”) He would then justify his actions when he would retaliate for what he perceived as our failures. (“Because Mom and Dad won’t excuse my being late to school when it really is THEIR fault, I’m going to make them pay! I know, I’ll smash in my sister’s new toy car! Yeah, that’ll get ‘em and make them realize what they have done.”) This ultimately leads to SHAME for what he has done and how he feels about himself, and could result in depression, excessive sleeping, or other forms of emotionally checking out, known as the Freeze response.

So what do you do? We learned that a FEAR based survival response starts with feeling a lack of control, so we would make sure we involved our son in collaboratively brainstorming how to resolve his problems. We wanted to make sure that he felt that he was part of the solution, and therefore took ownership of it. We would then approach these challenges and all interactions with him with a clear intention of what we were trying to do – help him to grow to be a productive adult, not just solve the immediate issue at hand. We gave him our undivided attention and always had an attitude of love, caring and affection toward him. When he felt that we truly loved him and had his best interests at heart, this developed a feeling of TRUST that overcame the FEAR and brought him out of his Shielding System.

Because a SHAME based survival response starts with blaming others for something out of his control, we learned to create an environment of calm and safety where he truly felt that we were on his side and working for him and not against him. We reinforced these messages with heartfelt appreciation by praising him every time we observed the behaviors we desired and truly meant every word! We spent time with him, took an interest in what he was interested in, and showed our affection – all to create a real EMOTIONAL CONNECTION with him. This strong EMOTIONAL CONNECTION overcame his SHAME and brought him out of his Shielding System.

Through all this, we were able to help my son LIVE IN THE PRESENT, taking joy in the moment rather than reliving the traumatic past or worrying unceasingly about his future.
I’m certainly not saying that this all happened overnight or that putting these principles into action is as easy as 1-2-3. But I AM saying that if you can create an environment of real TRUST and EMOTIONAL CONNECTION, you will see incredible changes in your child! My “rebellious” son will graduate college this month with a 4.0 GPA, is happily married to a wife that adores him, and is running a successful business to boot! It isn’t easy, but it is sooooo worth it!