With friends, we've found that our Aspie kids tended to either have friends who were Aspie, friends who were much younger, friends who were exceptionally bright or a comination of the lot.
As difficult child 3 got older we found he was increasingly ostracised by kids his own age. He did have kids who he called his friends, but they had increasingly less "meeting point" and when these kids wanted a conversation, they had to go elsewhere for it. They increasingly treated difficult child 3 as a slightly nuisance little brother. The bullies in the class, on the other hand, were just downright horrible and would take full advantage of the teachers being a little afraid of difficult child 3 as well as simply not wanting to take the trouble to understand; if a group of boys all said that difficult child 3 had caused the problem, the teacher would beleive the group of boys even though that same group had a repuation of being a gang and of bullying other kids. We even had a case where difficult child 3 had a witness who backed him up, but later got intimidated. difficult child 3 was told that he must have been mistaken about what happened because kids with autism sometimes misunderstand. I was so angry, because we knew that he was getting bullied but the teacher was taking the soft option. The parents of the bullies were never called about any problems, because the school was afraid of the parents. Much easier to reinvent the truth.
As far as friends now - difficult child 3 is 15, but his friends who seek him out and come knocking at the door to play (now - this didn't happen for years) are all about 10 years old. We found similar things with difficult child 1 - he was a loner for years while kids ostracised him, then it was younger kids or other Aspie kids who sought him out. His best friend is another Aspie. difficult child 3's current best friend is also high-functioning autistic (not as autistic as difficult child 3) plus ADHD, and 10 years old.
At school - difficult child 3 is acorrespondence studnet but does have occasional days at school (we're going in tomorrow and the next day for study days). He has a couple of friends there, two classmates who are boyfriend/girlfriend, and the boy used to be very aggressive and was a bit of a bully. Then the boy's mother explained to him that difficult child 3 was NOT behaving oddly to get attention or cause trouble, but really couldn't help being a bit different. After that, this boy will activedly seek out difficult child 3 to greet him and hi-five him each study day, will look aftger him like a little brother. The girl has also learned about difficult child 3 through her boyfriend. Last study day (last week) difficult child 3 & this girl were partnered in a computer class and both worked well together. I'm a little concerned that the girl slipped difficult child 3 a note saying, "I think I have acrush on you," because
1) difficult child 3 is NOT ready for a girlfriend, he couldn't sustain such a relationship yet; and
2) she is very much the girlfriend of difficult child 3's friend, it could cause trouble again between the two.
I suspect she was trying to say how much she valued his help in class. And he IS cute! Just a bit thick when it comes to relationships...
difficult child 3 grinned, blushed and wasn't sure how to take it. He hasn't talked to me about it, I think I need to talk to him on the way in to school tomorrow, about expectations and also about not poaching your friend's girlfriend.
The ADHD/Asperger's combo is not uncommon. It just adds to the problems.
You should be able to get an IEP for your difficult child, it should help a lot. A strong recommendation to include in the IEP, is use of the communication book (I described that previously). Keep the book as informal as you can and try to not react if the teacher has a bad day and vents - it's still best to know if the teacher is finding him frustrating, than for the teacher to hold back in any way on the communication. Sometimes I would write, "He didn't sleep well last night, he could be a bit more tired or inattentive in class today," or the teacher might write, "he did well this morning but after recess he just couldn't settle back to work, I think the construction work two blocks away was distracting him, he said he could feel the vibration of the pile driver, through the floor."
I did get a teacher at times writing, "I could have cheerfully throttled him today and laughed through the entire process." As long as the teacher also explained why, even that was OK too because I sure know how that feels!
Mind you, difficult child 3's current placement - the teachers are just perfect. If I could set one up on a pedestal and say, "This is how a teacher should be," then it would send a message around the world that it IS possible, that teachers can be kind, helpful, supportive, tranquil, stimulating, loving and most of all - produce wonderful educational outcomes.
We also had a lousy school district. They insisted that difficult child 3 HAD to stay in full-time mainstream placement even though it was increasingly obvious that he had all the prerequisites for correspondence - school phobia, school avoidance, and eventually physical illness. It was the physical illlness that finally allowed us to bypass the school district and get the correspondence enrolment happening, because it was the only reason that didn't mean the application had to pass via the district, who had right of veto of the application.
When difficult child 3 was transferring to high school correspondence the application again had to go past the district, and because his anxiety had now reduced to the point where he was no longer vomiting every day at the mention of school, the district tried to veto the application. I had to get REALLY heavy and threaten them with legal action under the Anti-Discrimination Act (denying difficult child 3 the access to education in a form he could utilise). It wasn't until I began a media campaign to have a Special Education class for high-functioning autistics and Aspies in our district, that they backed down and allowed hie enrolment to go through. They firmly beleived that autistic kids need to be in mainstream in order to learn social skills, but this flies in the face of understanding about autism - these kids DO NOT merely pick up social skills by being around other kids. If they did, then what would be the difference? No, autism has as one of its hallmarks, inappropriate social interaction/difficulty in relating to other people, and this is BECAUSE they don't merely "pick up" these skills. They need to be taught, as you teach a child to knit or to ride a horse.
If you have a difficult school district, then try to make contact with a support network in your geographic area, so you get to know ahead of time who you will be having trouble with. Other important advice I give you in dealing with a difficult district - take GOOD notes of your interactions/communications. Keep minutes of all phone calls. If you can, try to remember exactly what the other person said and put it in quote marks if you are sure of exactly what they said (or what you said).
For example, I had a meeting with a prospective school principal, plus the district Special Education rep, plus me. I took my laptop in with me so I took accurte minutes and would actually transcribe what these people said, where I could. When I look back at my notes of that meting I actually have some of it in dialogue form (like a play script) with the intials of the speaker (faster to type, and I put a 'key' in at the beginning, with my list of who was present). These notes mean that if I choose to, I can directly quote any of the speakers from that meeting. Where I didn't quote directly, but only got the gist of what they said, I use a different code, I put it in square brackets (you don't need to use a shift key to use these).
Here is a sample from my notes (XX was the school principal) -
" XX: Different teachers have different learning styles so there could be confusion and problems with perceived inconsistency.
Marg: difficult child 3 will treat adults and children with same approach. If he perceives a teacher as inappropriate he will talk to them as he would talk to another child [we are working on showing him respect to teach respect, plus constantly explaining and modelling that behaviour varies depending on status of person]."
This is an interesting exercise for me - in trying to find some good examples for you, I have been going through my old notes and feel my hackles rising as I re-hash past problems. We really did have a raw deal with our district, even to the point where the school was told I had to be made to leave, even though I was not causing a scene and was there at the school's invitation. It was surrounding a talk to be given to difficult child 3's class, on what is autism. Sixth Sense program - really good, if it's done right. Trouble is, I found out (and wasn't meant to find out) that in our districtm, it is NOT done right because they carefully don't mention the word "autism" which totally removes any relevance for the class. I strongly suspect that if I had insisted on staying at the school the police would have been called and it would have then played into the district's hands. I chose to leave and to later challenge that request and made a HUGE fuss.
What helped on that occasion and surrounding related events over the previous few months and subsequent year - I took good notes. My phone began ringing hot that afternoon and I took the calls at my computer, so as each official on the other end spoke, saying things like "work with me on this," and "you have to accept, you were there without invitation," I was able to take them down verbatim in quote marks. And because I had the class teacher having previously written in the communication book, "We look forward to having you in the class with us on Thursday 5 March at 10 am", I was able to claim I had WRITTEN invitation to be present. I also had my own full recollection of my own statement to the principal (which the darling man backed up, even though it meant incurring the wrath of his district office) that I had said the talk to the class could not go ahead without my permission and presence.
I hope you never need to use your notes, but if you do, it is such a major confidence booster to have it there to call on.
One last point - this happened about 6 months after I had joined this group. Without this group I might not have had the courage and confidence to stand up to these institutional bullies. It was knowing that our rights were being badly infringed that gavwe me the courage to stand my ground and politely deny that I had been trespassing, or that I had behaved shamefully. I knew I had done nothing wrong whatsoever, but was now fighting a cover-up and a whitewash. The school principal who suddenly found himself in hot water merely for attesting to the truth of a conversation between him and me, was at first shocked and then amazed, and then angry. He had at first been inclined to believe that I was perhaps paranoid. Then he saw first hand what was being thrown at me, and then began receiving these calls himself, urging him to reconsider his story.
This sort of thing, when it happens Occupational Therapist (OT) most parents, has them cowed and running for cover. IF it is someone telling you that your child has lied to you about an incident when you KNOW you questioned your child carefully so as to not prejudice the answer (and autistic kids are not good at lying, they eventually learn to not try) then you either back down for lack of any direction to go, or you drop the whole thing. We so often are isolated as parents, the more we have to chase around after a problem child, the less time we have to compare notes with other parents of difficulot kids and as a result, when we are told something by someone in authority, we tend to accept it. After all, they are the experts.
But if you suspect you have a difficult teacher or district, make quiet independent enquiries. Do not allow yourself to be bullied because you have a right to ask questions and as a parent you are NOT bound by official protocol. If you choose to bypass the class teacher or the principal, they may get angry about it but there can be no disciplinary proceedings as there would be if a staff member did this.
I do get that you are currently running a red queen's race (Alice in Wonderland - "Through the Looking Glass") because as a single parent you have a really full schedule. Don't feel bad about this - you are doing a huge task, it is no wonder if you sometimes feel overwhelmed. You have a right to sometimes feel like you've been run over by a bus. You're not alone.
So stick around, dump on us, read the book when it arrives and take notes to the best of your ability. As and when you get reports, scan them onto your computer so when you see someone who wants a copy, you don't risk losing your originals.
Your son is 10. he has a long way to go.
I like your analogy with the specs. We used computer software as an analogy - the text file that comes off the printer can look exactly the same, whether it was written on a easy child or on a Mac. But the operating instructions to make the software do the job, has to be very different for a easy child than for a Mac.
Some people have mac brains, some have easy child brains. Neither is better than the other, just different. But if you try to use the wrong operating instructions, you will get nowhere.
Marg
I am now putting it all down into a book. I'm thoroughly enjoying the process, it is very cathartic. I'll undoubtedly change names of the guilty (again, enjoying choosing obvious fake names - again, cathartic) but once again, having thorough notes is really helping me with this.
You might never need to use any of it. In which case - all that will happen is maybe your typing speed will improve.
Shopping is always fun 
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