Gadgeteen

The whole process of understanding Gadgeteen has altered my understanding of ‘normal’.

During my earlier blogging days I wrote of a slippery slope that I could see him on and how inadequate I felt to see him on this slope and not to be able to find a way to help him.

He was subsequently expelled from three schools, bad behaviour was blamed, and according to the Exclusion officer for the borough, no other child had ever been excluded from three schools before.

You see, Gadgeteen comes across as any other teen does; in fact he is more articulate and engages better than the average teen. He is intelligent and charming so can impress where needed and it is because he appeared 'normal' that his behaviour in school was apparently deemed the unacceptable behaviour of a 'normal' teen.

After the third school I was desperate to find a way to help Gadgeteen to get through his final year with some GCSE’s and finally decided that a label would help us and those that work with him, to better understand his needs, needs that he didn’t even understand himself.

We are often afraid of labelling people, because of then justifying unacceptable behaviour by using the label, and expecting no more from the labelled person than the label described, but in my son’s case, he was failing without a label so we would be no worse off if he had one.

My Internet research quite quickly and very surprisingly led me to ADHD. My only experience of ADHD was of reading in the media that ADHD was an excuse for poor parenting and didn’t really exist. I was beyond believing that I was responsible for Gadgeteens behaviour or that I could influence it anymore than I already did. I took the findings of Internet tests that we had completed in the family from different perspectives, to my doctor, who agreed to refer us on to a specialist, which would take a couple of months.

In the meantime we had a private assessment which confirmed the ADHD and recommended medication as a means to help calm him down sufficiently to be able to focus in class. He was then assessed by the NHS psychiatrist who confirmed the private assessment and he continued to prescribe Concerta.

Gadgeteen then attended a pupil referral unit and passed five GCSE’s before the summer of 2009. The diagnosis had achieved it’s purpose.

He is now at college studying motorsport engineering on a two-year course and although he still struggles with the course load and his idiosyncrasies, he is still there.

Since his diagnosis at 16, we have continued to learn how to manage his behaviour and needs. He has also been diagnosed with Childhood Autism and has Asberger traits too.

He struggles with changes to routine, for example, getting him back into college after a half term break is a struggle. He talks about quitting because he isn’t learning anything and he talks about refusing to go. We know that we have to just listen actively without getting drawn into any kind of argument about whether or not he is going, because on the day…he will go.

He struggles with remembering what he needs to take and in fact I am going to write a list of everything that he needs to remember to take with him each day before he leaves the house because he often forgets something.

He struggles with appointments, whether it be for the doctor, dentist or other. He gets anxious and agitated about any kind of appointment, even his driving lessons. I give him a countdown over a period of a few weeks so that he has time to mentally prepare.

He struggles with going away for the weekend because it’s yet another change to his daily life that requires additional mental thought. During any journey he becomes agitated about how long the journey will take and why we aren’t arriving at the estimated time. Again…time to prepare helps minimise the anxiety.

He struggles with getting to places on time…..often he will delay departure unnecessarily even though we give a countdown.

He can become fixated on things, for example, needing a new pair of shoes. He will go on and on about needing a new pair of shoes even though his comments might be inappropriate at the time, such as in the middle of a doctor’s appointment.

He’s very volatile and when aggressive, punches walls and doors before thinking about the consequences. He then believes that he has broken a bone in his hand and becomes obsessed with his knuckles, feeling and poking and prodding them to emphasise an injury. If he does fall over or hurt himself elsewhere he becomes adamant that he needs to go to hospital and when we have decided that a trip to the hospital is not necessary or warranted, sometimes he has taken himself.

He still lies in the face of irrefutable evidence to the contrary and still steals from us if he is given an opportunity that he can’t resist.

Many traits are subtle and handled badly can result in huge outbursts of aggression and a lack of cooperation but many can be pre-empted by careful anticipation and preparation.

People will say that all of these traits of those of a ‘normal’ teenager, but we know that throughout all of our years with Gadgeteen, his ‘normal’ is different to ours and we are doing our best to guide him through his life with us, so that he is better able to cope as an adult without us.

I love my son.