Progress

Quoth the boy child today:

"Mom, I think the psychologist is working because there's one kind of bug I'm not afraid of anymore - ladybugs!"

I spoke with Mr. C, the boy child's PE teacher, today to see how the boy is handling outdoor PE (which they do more often than not on nice-weather days). He said he's only had to send the boy inside once so far. Most of the time, he's able to distract him with whatever activity they're doing. Yesterday they were doing something called "rubber-band legs" (yeah, I have no idea, and I didn't ask) and Mr. C said that as long as the boy child was allowed to sit on a milk crate rather than on the grass, he did fine.

This news is both positive and critical to the boy child's therapy, because it indicates that his fear of the outdoors/bugs is part of the perseverative thoughts and behaviors that go along with Asperger Syndrome and not an actual phobia. As the psychologist explained it, the boy child's fear has become a habit more than anything. The boy has come up with a set of thoughts/behaviors that in his mind go along with "being outside", and so when he goes outside, he switches on that set of thoughts/behaviors. But if he's thinking about or actively engaged in something that distracts him from "being outside", he's able to shut down those thoughts/behaviors, at least in part. This wouldn't happen if he had a true phobia.

This is very, very good because it means that we're likely dealing with just Asperger's and not a co-morbid anxiety disorder. I am excited about this to what is probably an inappropriate degree, because I do not multitask well and wasn't looking forward to having to attack this thing on a hundred different fronts.

You've heard of the KISS principle? This is the KISSMDHAC principle - Keep It Simple So Mom Doesn't Have A Coronary.