I have a brother who I am responsible for along with my mother. I am have just reached the point of wanting to explode with frustration.....

[Monecor]

He has been an incredibly difficult child all his life and we have described him as 'like pushing a bus up a hill', being 'weird' and being 'a bit of a dope' (although he is very bright); because my family is full of eccentric and odd types we though nothing of it but now that he is taking his GCSE's and on target for straight D's, and cannot seem to mature to the level that he desperately needs to at this point in his life we are getting really desperate! One of his teachers with a son who has ASD has been joking for years that he 'has a touch of it' and my mother has taught many children with the condition and has has her suspicions since he was a baby. His range of behaviors is having a very negative impact on us all. We are all somewhere on these various ability spectrums (I myself know that I am very held back in some areas but excel in others because of it); I think that he is mildly Asperger's. I don't want him diagnosed but I do want to learn how to help him, especially in the areas of organisation, motivation, maturity and understanding other people. I would be very grateful for any advice. Thanks.

[bronzie]

Hi Monecor,

I find it interesting that your mum as a teacher would have come across similar children but you as a family has not taken the step to have him diagnosed. I didn't do that with my son either - extremely bright - and now that he is older, find he has new challenges which I can't easily help with. if he's about to do GCSEs, i would imagine he is not yet 16 so you might still have a small chance to intervene as he is still nominally a child. After that, you get fobbed off, that it's up to him.

i feel for you in terms of frustration - my other children have had to deal with that and it's hard to be the sibling too!

I do hope you get help.

all the best, bronzie.

[Springsong]

Hi Monecor,

I myself have Aspergers & wasn't diagnosed until after my school years (I was subconsciously aware of being 'different' from my peers though).

To help with GCSEs you may want to draw up a 'roster' with allocated time slots for 'study/coursework' along with some for 'TV/Dinner/Hobbies' to help achieve a sense of this is the time to study & in so many minutes/hours we can have a break. General organisation it will also help to note things down - shopping lists when going shopping, important dates/appts noted upon a calendar, homework recorded in a diary the day it is received along with when it is to be submitted (you can ask for teacher support with this), rosters for housework (washing up, tidying bedroom, taking bins out....) will all help bring a bit more focus & memory on what needs doing when.

Understanding other people is a bit more challenging as everybody is unique (there are still times I struggle to understand social interaction & general behaviour). The basic concept you can get across (although again it can require patience) is to look at the person you are talking to, to listen whilst they talk, to think about their volume/tone of voice when they are speaking (I've often been prompted to 'quieten down as we're next to you not in another room' or 'slow down, we can't understand you talking so fast') as sometimes we're not aware we're doing it until someone points it out to us. Teaching/learning what is socially acceptable will largely begin at home (do your family accept shirts hanging out or prefer them tucked in, do you eat with hands or use cutlery, do you sit at the table until everyone has finished eating, do you say 'grace' before eating....) by encouraging/reminding what is acceptable in your home, this should then branch out into other situations (visiting friends/relatives, eating out, school...).

Above all else, it's important to be patient. We all learn differently, sometimes we'll pick things up quickly, others may take us slightly longer & with some reminders. Remember too that it's not all about the negatives (although having a daughter with ASD I know it can be easy to focus on the 'meltdowns') but the positives that come through also (many ASD people have hidden talents - music, art, sports, science....).

Best wishes