Kathleen Seidel

Kathleen Seidel of neurodiversity.com spoke to our class last weekend. She is the mother of a son who has been diagnosed with Asperger's and has taken on the subject with passion and conviction. I was moved by the candidness with which she spoke about her son, her father and other extended family members, the traits they share and the travesties endured as the cost of misunderstandings. I was also very interested in her views regarding medical "findings" and the lack of scientific method in many research studies. Diagnosis is such an emotionally charged event, and sometimes parents will grasp any new information offerered as "truth" instead of possibility. While one can hardly question why this could occur, professionals would be nothing less than kind, if not ethical, not to foster false hope. Ms. Seidel offers a wealth of information on her website. It's worth spending some time exploring.
Discussion regarding Asperger's and co-morbidity that took place in my Intro to Counseling class at Antioch University New England (Applied Psychology:Autism Spectrum Disorders Certificate Program) this past weekend reinforced the idea that service providers need to be careful not to attribute the features of a secondary disorder to the general characteristics of an ASD itself. Anxiety, depression, obsessive compulsive behaviors, etc...need to be addressed and respected in their own right. It is difficult to find mental health providers who know enough or are willing to treat individuals on the autistic spectrum. I would appreciate any information available on practitioners in the Manchester, NH area who have had success working with ASD adolescents.
I continue in the quest of establishing a middle school level peer support program. Please check out this blog site after January 1, 2007 for summary statements on my research to this point.

Middle School Mayhem

Hello again. I am beginning to think a lot about the pitfalls of adolescence and how they complicate things for students with Asperger's and vice versa, how Asperger's complicates adolescence. Recently I have had the pleasure of knowing a group of 7th grade students who have taken it on themselves to create a safety net around on of our multiply handicapped students. It's gotten me to thinking...what about a social safety net around our AS kids? I know it's done at the college level (see L Welkowitz), but what's been done younger? Nancy Mizelle at Mentalhelp.net has some interesting ideas about transitioning kids to high school and the successful things that can take place in middle school to assure positive outcomes. The Modelmekids Program offers teaching tools for social skills development throughout middle school and high school, as well. Kelly May at New Horizons has written an informative article about teaching strategies and AS kids, but none of these has offered me exactly what I'm looking for: a way to recruit, train, supervise and support neurotypical peers in an attempt to immerse AS students in their real social surroundings. I'll keep looking and would appreciate anybody else's thoughts.