I have a lovely full of life 8 year old son with autism, communication difficulties, and SPD

Bella72

Hi everyone I’m new on here I have a lovely full of life 8 year old son who was diagnosed with Autism and communication difficulties when he was 2 years old he’s also got SPD he attends a special needs school 

Ross_Alumni

Hello @Bella72

Welcome to the community, good to see you join us. 

Thanks for telling us a bit about yourself and your son. How is he getting on at the moment?

Bella72

Thankyou ..He’s doing well it’s been a slow process with his communication but he’s gone from been completely non verbal when he was five to using single words now for his needs along with using a communication app ..the funny thing is he loves hearing a song and repeats it but can’t tell me what he’s done at school ? He has his funny ways but we love them 

Katharine_Alumni

Hi there, welcome! Yes, when I worked in schools or activity camps there were a lot of parents who would ask what happened that day because the children can't retain the information. One school had a pictorial timetable for some of the students and that seemed to work well,

Bella72

Hi yes I’m hoping he will get to that stage we’re he can tell me verbally or through app how he’s feeling and what he’s done when I’m not around ..just pleased he’s got to we’re he’s at now but it does worry me he can’t tell us why he’s sad poorly ect 

Cress

I think most kids when asked asked what they did at school will reply 'nothing'
Mine certainly did 

Ooh and Welcome 

Bella72

Hi yes my other kids would have definitely just said “ nothing really” ? but with youngest we don’t know if he doesn’t understand questions or doesn’t know how to answer or both ? Hopefully he will with time 

Cress

My son used to have a home/school diary where there would be a brief outline of what he'd done that day, also any problems that might have cropped up.

Maybe his school could do this so you would have something  to reference to ask him about?

Bella72

Hi yes we do get a home diary sent home it’s obviously just brief and we do get phone call from his teacher if there’s been any incidents so in that respect school are doing what they can to communicate with me ..he doesn’t understand past present and future so I will tell him 10 minutes before if we’re going somewhere and show him photos ect if it’s somewhere new ..not looking forward to first few days back at school after the long break ?

Cress

Ah yes it will be unsettling at first for him.

I had to jump in to explain that problem to medical people at times.
He'd be asked how long he'd had a particular symptom and would often reply  either a year or a month or a week ago when it was actually a couple of days ago.
I was always having to explain that he hadn't actually been suffering for months...lol

Hope it goes well for your son.

Elysium

Get him an AAC device or teach him sign language.