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Autism/Behaviour and giftedness

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Expert: - 10/15/2008


Question
My son will turn 4 in December and has just been "expelled" from school due to his violent outbursts; students expressing fear and therefore parents also concerned for their child's safety.

He is highly intelligent (particularly in the language area) and attends (attended) a school which is predominantly populated by students for whom English is their second language (Thai being first).

We have seen a behavioural psychologist who immediately diagnosed ADHD (without proper consultation) - who also told us we were completely wrong for even suggesting an ASD or Asperger's or similar.


Is it possible his intelligence is affecting his behaviour, or could there be a more serious issue I need to look at?  

Thank you so much for your time.
Brigitte

Answer
Hi Brigitte,

it's impossible to tell from a few lines of text, if your son has an ASD or ADHD or ist "just" gifted.
Some highly intelligent children do indeed have difficulties at school (socially and otherwise) because they are bored, and feel they are somehow "different" and are excluded by their peers.
Did he have his IQ tested ? If not, that's the first thing I'd do if I were you. Then you could probably start to look for schools with classes for gifted children where he might be much happier than in his current class.
If you still feel he might be on the autistic spectrum please go and see another specialist, ideally one your local autism society recommends and who has seen lots of high functioning/Asperger children before.If you feel your son doesn't have ADHD, you should also get a second oppinion on that. However, it's absolutely possible that he is gifted AND has *both* and ASD *AND* ADHD !

Hope this helps.
C.  

Autism

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*DISCLAIMER*

Please note I am not a healthcare professional or a doctor.
I cannot provide a diagnosis or give any medical advice.
Therefore I cannot answer questions like "is my child autistic ?" other than by telling you to go and see a specialist
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Please be aware that if you are in the US it will usually take at least 24 hours until I can answer your question, as I'm in Europe and don't have access to my email during the day. I also cannot answer questions concerning the US educational or law system (other than by looking up things on google, but that's probably not the expertise you need), as I'm not in the US.
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Please also be aware that I'm a person with autism. My answers may sometimes be very blunt and direct and I may tell you things you won't like to hear. Diplomacy is certainly not among my talents. I'm never being rude on purpose, and I always try not to hurt or offend people, but it has happened before and may happen again. It's NEVER on purpose. I just want to help.
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What I *can* do for you is gather information on any aspect of autism and therapy of autism you're interested in and give you my personal oppinion about it (if you want to hear it) or, if it applies, tell you about my personal experience. I can answer all questions about what life is like for an autistic person.

I can also answer questions asked in German or French (but will have to answer in English to questions asked in French as my French is a bit rusty).

Ich beantworte gerne auch Fragen auf Deutsch.

Vous pouvez poser des questions en Francais, si cela ne vous dérange pas que je responds en anglais.

Experience


As I'm not doing well right now and am not in the shape of answering questions well - I recieved a few low ratings lately - I'll take a break from AllExperts for the next few weeks/until I'm doing better

I am an adult diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome/High Functioning Autism and ADD.

In the past years I have also read a lot about autism and its comorbid conditions and related subjects (as I am experiencing symptoms of most of these or know others who do) , so I have accumulated a lot of layman knowledge in this area (AD(H)D, Tourette's Syndrome, OCD, sleep disorders, allergies, sensory integration dysfunction, learning difficulties, left/right-brain, giftedness, Irlen Syndrome, prism glasses, executive dysfunction (aka. "inertia"), "special" diets).

Education/Credentials
None in the field of autism, apart from being autistic myself !

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