The Teen Years in Autism

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The teenage years of autism are downright hard and challenging when it comes to autistic boys. I think our son is at his highest, in regard to his anxiety level, and thankfully we have been able to get him to talk more about what is bothering him (that doesn't always work) but helping him find his voice and us listening helps him get it out of his system. 

We have found a temporary fix to him navigating all of the news headlines of the day and there are a lot and as we all know NONE of it is good news. It is like once he reads a headline, this invades his entire day, and his homework doesn't get done ***SIGH***. So, we have decided to take away his phone temporarily and only return it to him after he is done with his homework. It seems to be working really well and he is definitely not as preoccupied or distracted by the world around him. 

School is going great, and he is moving along really well. He is now in his second year online and he is able to take breaks when needed, end or start his day (at his own pace) as long as he completes his lessons for the day, he can do whatever else he would like after he is done. Finding the right environment for our autistic son to learn and progress was key in finding what worked. Believe me when I say that we tried it ALL. Once the pandemic hit and schools were shut down for a year this was a gamechanger. He was no longer distracted by the loud hallways, no communication teachers (at least for us parents) and not one teacher, even the special education teachers could tell us how much progress our son was making (sad huh?). Although this was stated in his IEP that we needed to see IEP progress reports often it was like it was acknowledged, but nothing was ever done to address the problem. 

Thank goodness for being strong advocates for our son and moving forward to the now. Puberty is rough at this age, but we are finding ways to keep him continually busy and engaged, especially because of how quickly he can get bored. If you are a parent of an autistic child, do you ever find yourself scrambling for other ways, opportunities, social groups, etc. to keep your autistic son or daughter engaged? 

At the end of the day, keep fighting for your autistic son or daughter, they deserve a fair chance at all that is available to them, and you deserve an opportunity to continue to do that for them. Keeping it Real. 

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