Comments on: Is it really a correct diagnosis?

By: Parenting puzzle « Bookworm Room

Parenting puzzle « Bookworm Room — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 17:38:29 +0000

[...] Posted on February 2, 2008 by Bookworm A few months ago, I did a post about out-of-control children who seemed to be the product, not of biological pathology, but of boundary-free parenting. A [...]

By: Another paradigm blown to bits « Bookworm Room

Another paradigm blown to bits « Bookworm Room — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 16:05:29 +0000

[...] based on my real life, real time observations: (1) no matter the child’s objective deficits, structure and discipline (by which I do not mean abuse and insults) make a huge difference in contro…; (2) some kids, especially boys, are slower than their peers in developing impulse control; (3) [...]

By: Bookworm

Bookworm — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 05:57:05 +0000

I had a feeling, Lulu, that you’d recognize the kind of parenting deficit that I’m thinking of. As it is, I don’t doubt that many of the children diagnosed as Aspergers do have something. I just think that their most serious behavior problems are often a result of the parenting, not the syndrome.

By: Lulu

Lulu — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 05:39:23 +0000

I didn’t see this posting until today. Too bad as it is right up my alley- professionally and personally. But I will say that many mental health professionals have no training in parenting and they see the kid alone without seeing the family dynamics that shaped him. So, they miss a lot.
Like Margeurite said, giving in to a kid who gives the middle finger to her parents only encourages the child to continue to take control in this manner. If tantrums get the kids what they want, they will have more of them. Lots of kids are sent to therapists to play and draw, when what these kids really need is competent parents. Very often I have worked with families who have oppositional kids who were in individual therapy for years with no progress. After working with the parents on parenting- limit setting, argument ending, teaching values, creating a warmer relationship, lo and behold, the parent and child are getting along, the child is doing better because he sees parents who actually lead and guide, and the original diagnosis no longer is applicable.

BTW, the “flavor of the month” diagnosis I see most often is bipolar disorder.

By: Mike Devx

Mike Devx — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 00:00:12 +0000

” I’m talking about people I know well, in whose homes I have stayed, and who consistently allow the child to dictate the agenda”

Book has described the REAL 21st century horror movie “Children of the Corny”. Where the parents have voluntarily given up being parents, given up being “The Adult”, because their own inner child is so wanting. Perhaps they cannot trust themselves because they know that they are over 30.

“I want to be my own child’s best friend” is a phrase to strike fear into the hearts of responsible adults everywhere.

By: ymarsakar

ymarsakar — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 17:40:59 +0000

Children gain the strength of their parents. It is natural evolution and survival, for if a set of genes and circumstances favored the parent then it would logically also favor the child if the parent is around to provide it.

In this case, the parents are useless. Better than the UN, but still, useless.

By: Bookworm

Bookworm — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 15:51:16 +0000

Janey: I’m not talking about the mother I see on a bad day in the grocery store. I’m talking about people I know well, in whose homes I have stayed, and who consistently allow the child to dictate the agenda, and to make poor decisions without consequences. It is these children who I believe need more structured parenting and are, instead, given a diagnosis that gives the parents an excuse for even less structure.

By: Janey

Janey — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 01:39:02 +0000

While everyone has witnessed a child totally lose it in public and a parent who does not react according to what you consider is the best parenting tactic, what none of you has considered is what you do not see. What you do not see is a child with completely messed up senses. A child who is so sensitive to sounds and light that the trip to Walmart can be pure torture. A kid you just can’t leave with a sitter.
So when he falls apart in the checkout line and his mother buys a gumball just to get through the trip, don’t be so smug. You have no idea what their day has been like.
So go a little easier on them both.

By: Gringo

Gringo — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 21:08:05 +0000

I do believe Asperger’s exists. There are people whose brains don’t work quite right. But none of it should be an excuse for having no standards of behavior at all.

Agreed.
In Augusten Burroughs’s autobiography ( or fictionalized one, as the case may be),Running With Scissors, he describes his brother’s brilliant but odd behavior. At the end of the book, Augusten says that his brother has Asperger’s . Definitely some affinity w obsessive-compulsive.

By: ymarsakar

ymarsakar — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 18:13:21 +0000

What also characterizes all of these parents is that, when the child has a tantrum, regardless of how awful it is, and what havoc it creates, the parents respond, not with discipline, but with sympathy: “The poor little thing. He couldn’t control himself. He was so upset I didn’t have the heart to punish him.” And in each case, this sympathetic response to the child’s tantrums worsens after the diagnosis. Now the parent is not only sorry for the child, but he’s convinced that the child is “sick” and must be handled with ever greater care.

This, I suspect, is one of those reasons I provided for why you don’t like Peggy Noonan’s writings. While she is far more proactive and in favor of order than the Left, she isn’t quite up to the Jacksonian war party standards.