Maybe it's time

Recently, Abby's therapist, Earl and I have been thinking about whether it might be time to tell Abby about her diagnosis. This came up because of some self-esteem issues that are surfacing, most likely from Abby's emerging social awareness.

For example, the other day, Abby was upset and announced she wanted to put herself into the recycling. She then proceeded to say that no one at school likes the way she looks, and no one at school likes her. I asked her if anyone had told her so, and she said, "No, I just think it."

She had gone on a similar tirade a few months ago, when she said she wanted to throw herself in the trash, and then proceeded to go into the bathroom and stand in the wastebasket.

All this is very upsetting to me, and so I mentioned it to Abby's wonderful therapist. And her response was that maybe we should think about explaining to Abby why she feels different sometimes.

My first reaction was that she's too young and she'll probably obsess about it. I can just hear her saying now, in that sing-songy voice she sometimes uses, "I do that because I have autism!"

But after a conversation I had with her yesterday, I'm not so sure. I was bringing her home from OT, and she started singing a song -- something about a silent e. I asked her about it, and she said it was from the Starfall website. She then said she wasn't stimming, because if you sing songs from a computer it's not stimming.

I told her that stimming wasn't about where a song was from, and that if she was just singing a song because it was in her head and she liked it, it wasn't stimming, anyway. And she said, "It's OK as long as I don't stim on it."

So we talked a little about that. And then, I asked her, "Do you ever get stimmy at school?"

And she said, with shock and a silly Mommy! tone to her voice, "No, of course not! Because stimming is boring!"

I know that she's been working on social and conversational skills at school, like staying on topic and not going on and on about a subject (something she doesn't do that much, anyway.) And I see that she's becoming aware of what other people might think is a boring (or strange) behavior, even if her awareness is defined by rules at this point, rather than true theory of mind.

So maybe she is more aware of differences than I thought. Maybe knowledge, in this case, would be power for her, because she could more objectively recognize a behavior and modify it.

We're still thinking about whether, and when, to explain Abby's diagnosis to her, and will discuss it more with her therapist. And in the meantime, I hope we'll have more opportunities to talk like we did yesterday, in the car after OT.