Things you wish you could say

[BigBlueHen53]

That's the thing. His parents have known about his asperger's since he was very young. He is capable of learning habits, but they would let him do nothing but sit around watching TV, YouTube and contribute nothing because it was too much effort to teach him.

Believe me, I spend a lot of time listening to him to understand how he thinks. He does think differently, but he is capable of learning. It's just much harder to do now that he's 23 instead of 3. It has become my job to turn him into a functioning adult. In a lot of ways I'm a lot more patient with him than his parents because I will listen to him, I don't cut off his explanations, and I will explain why he needs to do things and I will patiently wait for him to do the task rather than jump in and do it for him when he's slow because he gets distracted by some aspect of it.

Edit: I do care about the kid, so do his parents. They're just busy trying to make a living like the rest of us. I just come here to vent my frustrations.

Bee, thank you for this. Many a child has been handicapped, not by a condition, but by their parents' low expectations of them, and their failure to find out how to help their child succeed. My GS is on the spectrum and also has ADHD. When he first came to stay with us, I was at a total loss. I had no idea why he behaved as he did. Then the school asked if they could test him. For what? I asked. For autism, they said. Ohhhhhh! The light came on. It was a challenge but at least then I knew what we were dealing with. He's brilliant in some ways and (pardon me ) dumb as a box of rocks in others. Figuring out how to make the world make sense to him .... yeah, it's not always been easy. It's like trying to teach a fish how to live in a world of squirrels. But he just graduated high school and ... I think he's going to be okay.

 

[ShrekDawg]

Ooh, I wanted to say some smart things to the person with the egg-laying rooster, but ... my wisdom got the better of me this time.

Good!!!!!!

 

[HorseGirlAbby]

My friend who’s had cancer for years didn’t just get told it’s terminal.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

My friend who’s had cancer for years didn’t just get told it’s terminal.

So sorry, Abby.

 

[Buckeye Amy]

Not quite, I wish I could say it was 20 and snowing

Although 75 would be a nice improvement over near 100

I keep watching documentaries that were filmed in the Antarctic, wishing I was there!