Chelsea is really smart.
I know; you think that's just the Mom-Me talking. Or you think "So what. Every kid is brilliant. My kid can...[insert thing here]. So what. Stop bragging."
No.
Lots of kids are smart, and yours probably is too. If you don't have kids, then it's probably your niece or nephew; I get it. There are a lot of smart kids.
I'm not talking about that.
Maybe you're thinking, "Oh well, that just means you think your kid is perfect."
No. Chelsea is delayed in many areas, including fine motor ability. She can't write worth shit. She struggles in reading comprehension. She has sensory issues and anxiety and this gets in the way of her abilities. She's not perfect.
But she's damned brilliant, actually. No, she is.
She maxed out her kindergarten tests; they tested her at a first grade level in reading (decoding - not comprehension). She sees words. I was a good reader when I was a kid. This is not the same thing.
She remembers the doctor's name that my parents took her to at the hospital (a doctor she never saw again) in November 2012 when Jon and I were away in Bulgaria. I don't even remember his name, but she does.
She knows how to count to 100, she can count backwards from 100 too. She'll be five in May.
She can spell simple words. She can read words like "objective" and "guide" and "schedule", across multiple settings. She rarely sounds out words...she sight reads them.
She has no imagination. She cannot tell a story. In her class of 22 students, only 2 children will speak to her. The rest walk away. They see her flapping her hands, or they see how she perseverates on the Yo Gabba Gabba characters, and they don't care...they want to play dolls and tea parties. So they walk away and they are not friendly with her.
She's brilliant, but it kinda doesn't matter.
It matters. Look, it's wrong for me to say it DOESN'T matter. Of course it does.
But what do you with a super intelligent child who is socially lost and struggles with hearing people sing Happy Birthday? Who is barely toilet trained? What do you DO with that child?
Put her in Kindergarten? Keep her in preschool, where the letter of the week was R and Chelsea began spelling out long words that began with R and read the one second-grade reader her aide gave her?
Put her in a specialized classroom with peers who are probably not like her?
She's not a savant. She's not Rainman. She can't figure 314 x 29 or something. She's just...
really, really smart. And really lost in other ways. She doesn't fit the mold of autism, she doesn't fit a mold ANYWHERE.
Holy SHIT, she is so my kid. Sorry, sweetie. Bad DNA.
Meanwhile, we wait on assessments..we wait on suggestions. Where can she go to school? If I thought I could successfully homeschool her I'd consider it. But she doesn't respond well to me. She doesn't listen; she melts down when I ask her to complete tasks.
I wish I knew what to do for her.
Loading comments...