Matty's Mummy
Member
Out son Matthew has some quirky behaviour.
While we (husband and I) had questioned different possibilities, we had reassured ourself that Matt was a lot like his older brother (who has Aspergers?) anyway while quirks are not really a problem, got on with life but kept a eye on things. That was until he broke his arm, then all the little quirky behaviour became a living nightmare. There was more to just a broken arm from a fall on the tramp (landed funny on the Tramp mat) the hospital had sent us home with out cast or strapping as they couldnt find a brake. As well as that he was scared while at the hospital after being taken into a dark room, to be x-rayed. You can imagine a small child in so much pain, dark room foreign thing (x-ray machine) with soft light, coming towards you Matthew rang and tried to scream but couldnt talk, his words wouldnt come out, when they did he said get me out of here . I have never in my life seen anyone so terrified it was flight to survive stuff. He couldnt breath..
Wont go anymore into it but it was really bad.
From then on he had regressed to wetting himself, hyperventilating, doing odd breath holding, breathing into his hands and flicking air away, constant whistling when using the toilet, breathing over shoulder when weeing, as well as a lot of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) (Obsessive compulsive disorder)
The hard thing is many of the quirks were there before as well as him having sensitivities to light, sound, touch and feel.
We have a great Occupational Therapist (OT) and Pead who are looking into all things, tis not an easy diagnosis with so many different things going on.
Many of the things that came about after the trauma are settling down, although someday he still cant use the bathroom as its a small room, hand washing has now been added to the long list of things. And let me just say Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) in a 4year old isnt common. So he differently has some posttraumatic stress going on as well as other tings.
There is a point to my post sorry Im getting there.
We have been trying to find out from Matthew why? He has to breath hold. Its hard trying to understand what makes him do this. He has always said Im getting my breath out or in so I had thought because he couldnt speak (out of fear) when he was in hospital, and he hyperventilated , I thought it was all about that. The Occupational Therapist (OT) thinks its all part of his copying (which I do to) but also she said its about his sensitivity so feeling. So when he wees he is hyper aware of the feeling. To understand this better, he was upset (well distort) because he could feel his heart pumping that is a long one so I wont go there too much.
Well today he shed some new light on this. I havnt asked him in over 2mths about it and I did today. He said mum I have to catch my words, so they dont go down the toilet I said you cant see words though, mummy cant see words I spoke and said see you cant see the word dog and he said yes I can and started to point in the air.
He didnt say the letters he just said the sounds the letters make and kept sounding out words and showing me them in the air., Well of cause I cant see them, but the child is convinced he can see words!
So now Im freaking out I dont understand what is going on.
A few months back a Early intervention teacher visited Aden, we went through some family history stuff about all the kids, and about how the Pead was thinking Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). Anyway while she was here she said to me, that is very autistic what he is doing, sounding out words like that I was shocked cause I thought how clever he was, its the one thing he doesnt that I never thought anything of.
An example is (oh and he isnt as full on with this now, its not every time he talks) he might say to me mum I need a drink then he will follow up with sounding out some of the words in his sentence. I dont know how to type sounding out words though sorry, its a bit like Mmmmuumm iii need a ddddrrriiiinnnk, ddddrrriiiinnnkkkk .
He is reading books now, he has stopped with all the Maths stuff. And is working out how to spell everything. Ke comes running to me a few times a day, Mum I know how to spell .
So anyone know anything about how he sees words?