A is for Aidan - PART I

The stories have been funny. Boys will be boys after all. The “funny” Aidan stories are never in short supply. What a funny little quirky child – always up to some mischief. He has always had a mind of his own. But in the past six months or so, his funny quirkiness hasn’t seemed quite so cute and funny anymore. More worrisome than anything. Aidan is going on five soon. At what point do you draw the line and realize when a child just isn’t behaving like other children his age should be behaving? What is normal after all?

I be not one to judge that...

In the past five years or so, I’ve never known a parent of a young child who hasn’t had the big "A" worry. Talk of vaccine scares and toxins in our food and enviornment affecting our children are topics of everyday chatter at moms groups. From the time children are 18 months old, we’re all being told to watch for symptoms of... IT. Is the child talking? Is he giving eye contact? Aidan did those things. No hand flapping or tippe-toe walking. See… no need to worry about A. Except…

Aidan never really has played with other children, or participated in “circle time” or other organized activities. Many times I've watched groups of 30 kids all sit down to a puppet show or movie, except Aidan who continues to just do his own thing. He’s been known to pitch complete blow-out tantrums if another child comes into his space. That can be normal for two year olds and even three year olds. Four years? It should be stopping. He should be more interested in other children and joining the crowd. It’s sad when the other children at daycare come running up to him, excited to see him, and he just ignores them and goes straight to his favorite toys. Of course, that alone doesn’t point to anything wrong. At least he talks and communicates, except…

Aidan’s teachers have asked us on different occasions to have his hearing checked. We did, and his hearing is tip-top. He just doesn’t speak normally. It’s one of the first things people notice about him. He speaks very slowly and very loudly. From the time he was two, he has used great big eloquent words, but he can’t seem to spit them out. Where other children are rambling and babbling, Aidan tends to struggle to express his thoughts, slowly and methodically. He over stresses parts of words and becomes frustrated when he can’t get his thoughts out. He becomes irate when we finish his sentences for him, but sometimes I just can’t help it because I know what he’s trying to say, he just can’t get it out! Speech problems in young children are very common, and he will start speech therapy in a couple weeks to see what’s going on with language. Not something to worry about on its own, but again, we have another EXCEPT…

Aidan is also a deeply obsessive child. When he was two and could play with his train set for three hours straight, we found it cute and we were happy he had such a wonderful attention span. You just couldn’t break that boy away from his activities. To this day, he can sit and color a picture for more than an hour. He will obsess over every line and dot of color and completely tune out the rest of the world. He won’t even break away for a snack or treat. He learned how to write the number 4 this week, and he spent 45 minutes drawing 4’s all over a piece of paper. Big ones, small ones, thick ones, thin ones. He just loved that number. Not… normal… behavior.

The worrisome thing is the way he obsesses over toys isn’t really playing with them. He can build tracks and push a train around the set, but he’s not pretending to, say, pick up passengers or role play a story. He’s only interested in the mechanics of toys. It took me a long time to realize this, since he was always busy with his toys. We’ve been proudly watching him and thinking what a great engineer he will be someday since he loves to build, and missing the fact that he’s not really playing.

A couple months ago I got the Dreaded Daycare Director call. As I’ve posted before, we’ve had many daycare issues in the past, and directors never call to tell you what a delightful child you have. She was mostly concerned that our 4 ½ year old is still having potty-training issues, among other things. These are things daycare directors are concerned with, as opposed to a child who obsessively and quietly draws numbers for hours being a problem. After a few minutes of discussion she asked me “have you taken him to see a doctor?”

What kind of question was that? Of course we go to the doctor! He gets his annual Well Child visit each year and he’s fit as a fiddle!

“Not that kind of doctor. One for… behavior issues.”

I knew what she was getting at, but I wanted to hear her say it. I wanted her to tell me exactly what she was thinking. “No? What do you mean? What kind of behavior issues?”

She was silent for a moment, and I could tell she was trying to formulate her words carefully. Maybe she’s afraid I’d turn her in for falsely diagnosing my child, or sue her for insulting him. “He seems to have some autistic tendencies.”

There. She said it. And as much as I knew it was coming, it still hit me like a ton of bricks to hear the dreaded A word being used to describe my child. All these years I’ve been looking for it, and looking away at the same time. I didn’t want to see it and I didn’t want it diagnosed.

My strategies this past two years are starting to unravel. I’ve been waiting for him to outgrow his quirks, yet he seems to only be growing into them more. Every time we solve one behavior issue, two more seem to crop up in its place. Some days he behaves so well that we can overlook the quirkiness. He’s so funny and loving and just darn cute! But kindergarten is looming just 6 months away, and I know it’s irresponsible to just sit and assume everything is fine. It was time to see what’s really going on. Maybe it's nothing, or maybe...

Time to see a developmental pediatrician.

to be continued...