Cribsheet: Special needs week

Well according to a post I saw on Facebook, it's special needs week. I've been thinking about this issue a lot for the last few years because my son has a complex constellation of odd issues...a little bit Aspergers, a little bit OCD, a little anxiety disorder, a LOT of Sensory Integration Disorder, a heaping dollop of WTF and a smidgen of boogie-woogie flu. He zigs where the world zags. And those are just the deficits...what I mean is, he is also weirdly smart in some ways.

When he was 3 years old and we were driving in the car he said: "Why do some cars have their lights on?" (it was daytime) and I said "There have been a bunch of studies done that show there are fewer car accidents in the daytime if people have their lights on." he instantly responded: "Then why are some people driving with them off?"

Since I've spent so much time around him, and studied his quirks so intently I've realized that I am a big ball of quirks too. As a grownup I've become slightly more adept at hiding them but all my weird processing issues are alive and if this is the right word, well. The other night I was teaching a class and I had a window open ( not many classrooms left where you can do this) and I realized I had the window open because I don't feel like I can think with it closed. I subtly feel oppressed by claustrophobia if the window is shut. And then I had to close the door because people were talking in the hall and I can't think when I hear talking as I am wired to process sound. I am a complicated ball of adaptations to my own system, hoping to appear normal to the world at large.

You may be "special needs" (undefined) yourself if any of the following apply to you:

Uncomfortable clothes ( scratchy, tight collars, weird feeling fabrics, annoying labels) make it hard for you to focus completely on something else. You can't really think clearly or concentrate in a room full of sound or in a place which is visually very busy. You are scared of heights, or speed. If you seem to have to come at things from a direction other than the "official" way. If anxiety floods you when certain issues are raised and you simply feel that you can't process them at all right now.

These are just a few that are near and dear to my own heart but there are many more, from other parts of the spectrum(s) that I am not so familiar with. If it seems to reduce "Special Needs" to just an exaggerated case of the human situation then "By George, I think you've got it!"

AS kind of a friendly shout out to the all the good hearted special needs teachers and helpers out there here's a story about them.

Isaac loves to say things in his own made up language LIKE ALL THE TIME: To answer normal questions and such. Those of us who spend a lot of time around him actually learn what he means and take it in stride. Well today as I was walking him into his school, (with Isaac being most reluctant to go) his special Ed assistant Ms. Currier saw us coming and peeked at him through the staircase banister with a friendly smile.
"Glibble Norf!" She said.
I said, "Isaac, someone speaks your language!"
Isaac couldn't help smiling and he walked of his own will into the classroom.

Thanks Ms. Currier, for understanding my little weirdo.