This is my first time to share, but I have appreciated reading other's experiences and I am learning. My son is 11 yo and received a dx of Autism, Level One in February. He is supposed to start 6th grade in a few days. He is a different kid than he was in May, when the team met to revise his 504 going into middle school. Anxiety and emotional regulation has always been a challenge, mostly at home. At school he performed very well academically and his teachers always complimented his wit and creativity. He cared a lot about knowing the rules and following them. At home, he would struggle to follow directions and become flooded very easy. It was the shaken soda syndrome, almost daily. Fine at school, explode at home. But still, many moments of enjoying his artistic eye, his heart for nature and animals, his sense of humor. Over the summer, following a the end of elementary school, a significant job change for dad, little structure because of a few vacations and I imagine puberty, my son has been becoming more and more isolated and now is in, what I think may be "Autistic Burnout". This hasn't been officially dx, but he has slowly stopped talking and now is mostly mute. He will provide us with some head nods and shoulder shrugs and an occasional word or sentence, but mostly, he is not interacting. He is cooperative. For the most part, he is doing what is asked, unless it is to talk. He will write answers to my questions, when they are written down. He is acting like a kid I have yet to know. Verbal expression was one of his strengths. With school starting in a few days I don't know what to do, how to set him up. On a couple of rare occasions when he spoke more than a word or two, he explained extreme social anxiety. He doesn't feel like he knows what to say, even to people who have been safe to him in the past, his family, his buddies. He is trying to find his "true self" and doesn't feel he knows who is he is. He feels like when he has talked, it is because he has been forced to and when he feels forced, it makes him want to go back into the hole. This is so hard and disorienting. He sees a counselor and has talked to her. I just don't know what to do. Does this happen? Can someone on the spectrum present one way most of their life and suddenly change? Could puberty cause this? Becoming a Vegetarian? He is definitely not getting as much protein. I am just grasping for a reason this is happening and desperately want to help pull him out of the hole.

Posted by BPandSP at 2023-08-10 01:55:49 UTC