School and socialization

Today was a dull cold and rainy day here in sunny California. I reluctantly left the house this morning to volunteer in Aditya's classroom.

Going into his classroom, I participated in a few Brain Gym exercises with the teacher and kids. Somewhere in the day, the class had about 20 minutes of free choice inside the classroom. Earlier this year, this kind of unstructured time would really throw off Aditya, and he would just zone out, not knowing what to do. It was worse when I was in class, as he came to me and started talking (isming). Despite reminding him every single time, he invariably came to me and asked me what he could do.

Today, he actually looked around. There was a group of kids drawing/ making cards/ Valentines for their parents. There were a couple kids playing with plastic animals, another group building with legos, a few kids making Tangrams. Then he saw a boy holding a Twister mat. He went up to him, took the mat and both spread it out on the floor together. The boy came up to me, asked if I could be the spinner and off they went to start the game! Another girl joined in for some time and left. After about 15 minutes, Aditya was done. He simply walked off, put on his shoes and went to see what another boy was building. He did not wait for me to ask him if he was done or keep looking at me. I was shocked! I can only remember one such incidence, about 4 months ago. I had asked him why he kept doing something when didn't want to. His response had been: "I didn't know if they would be Okay for me to not play any more. I think they might be mad at me for playing legos." The "they" were his teacher, other aiding parents, other children! I had a hard time understanding why he would be so anxious. Nobody would care less about what he was playing or if he switched activities!

At read aloud, a child sitting next to Aditya found him picking his nose. The boy (Let's call him B) tapped Aditya and told him to wash his hands. Aditya ignored him a couple times and sat listening to the story. When B tapped him again, he walked away to the sink, washed his hands and came back to his seat. He then looked straight into B's eyes and told him "Do not touch me again, I do not like being touched." Talking about the incidence later, I also noticed that Aditya was non- judgemental of B and said "I just told him what I wanted. I was not mad at him."

Aditya gets to eat his lunch at school on Mondays, as I aid till the end of lunchtime. As they had lunch indoors because of the rains, I had the opportunity to closely observe his interaction with peers. Sitting at a table with 3 other boys, all talk was about some character called Captain Underpants. This character was new to me (and I think, also new to Aditya - we do not have a TV and he has not read these books) But he chimed in with everybody, gigling with them over some silly stuff. Then he and another boy (C) made up a character, Captain King, to go with Captain Underpants whose spaceship always landed on different kinds of sandwiches. There was a lot of giggling and silliness going on. Aditya was very proud that he could actually contribute by suggesting PB&J sandwich and what kind of sound it would make. The boys later moved on to play tag, but Aditya had a long day and was done. He put on his backpack and wanted to be home for some Son-Rise time.

This weekend we attended a baby shower, a first for the kids. We had explained what it meant and what to expect. Most of the kids attending were less than 5 year old and all were girls. A year ago, Aditya had a major challenge at a similar house warming party. (Unbelievable, but true .. we hardly ever socialize, so I exactly remember the times when we go out. It is usually a benchmark to see how he does in a social setting. A couple times a year is good enough for that!)
Aditya played tag and some game they came up with where they were all fairies and he was a thief stealing jewels from them. They played in the backyard and I felt completely lost, with both my kids on their own! I have to relearn socializing myself. I was at a loss .. what do people even talk about when they meet up? Definitely not Autism or Son-Rise or any other therapies .. hmm .. I am clueless!
But we did see that he was done in about 2 hours. That seems to be his threshold in an unstructured environment around kids, for now.

Being around so much food he cannot have is still a big stressor. Something for us to think about and work on!

We have been seeing this pretty consistently - a Birthday party a week ago .. a very structured party at a gym. Aditya had a blast! All went great till it was time to have food. Aditya had his own yummy lunch (he chooses what he eats when we go to such events) and his own sweet. But he still has a hard time controlling his emotions around pizza and cake!