El síndrome de Asperger es un trastorno del desarrollo que se incluye dentro del espectro autista y que afecta la interacción social recíproca, la comunicación verbal y no verbal, una resistencia para aceptar el cambio, inflexibilidad del pensamiento así como poseer campos de interés restringidos y absorbentes.
A child with mild symptoms often goes undiagnosed and may seem odd or eccentric. Let’s consider the case of Miguel:
“Today, I am twenty years old. My room is my safe haven, my books are perfectly ordered, by topic, just like the contents of my computer and the rest of my personal belongings, whether they are drawers or a closet. It is important and essential for me that it remains with my organization. It gives me peace of mind, stability, and I am disturbed by any modifications that occur. On my desk, in plain sight, I have a calendar-agenda in which I mark my tasks and schedules, all established.”
It is my known and predictable world. I live with my parents, who know how I am and love and respect me. They have always stood by my side. My mother often comments on my similarity to my father in all aspects.
From a very young age, at four years old, I started collecting fossils, of which I currently have a large number, all of them classified. I have always enjoyed talking about them, and despite my early age at the time, I already showed unusual knowledge.
I didn’t like playing what the other children wanted, and I would withdraw. They would pick on me, say inappropriate words, and hurl insults.
I used to shut up and isolate myself until I started pushing and exploding. My movements were clumsy, I fell and stumbled easily. Group activities were difficult for me. I was quickly distracted from those school tasks that were not of interest to me, and I repeatedly heard reproaches from the teacher.
During elementary school and then high school, my parents had numerous meetings with the various teachers and professors. They were told that I was mentally absent, that I became tedious and loquacious with my monothematic interests, that I didn’t participate with others, that I didn’t understand jokes or irony, remaining perplexed and without an answer when they were made to me, and on other occasions, I would start laughing alone without others understanding why, that I didn’t look others in the eyes, nor did I recognize the meaning of non-verbal language, that I showed no empathy or sensitivity… On the other hand, they told my parents that I was an intelligent boy, with a command of language above the norm in concepts, even pedantic, outstanding in some areas and topics, but that I was “out of place”, that I was “weird”. They expressed to my parents whether they protected me too much, whether they pampered me, that they had to facilitate my autonomy. My classmates didn’t approach me and mostly rejected me.
I wanted to go back, so many days to my house, leave school, or more exactly, I didn’t even want to go to the center, to the classroom. I can’t explain it, but I felt bad.
I was nervous, restless, it was hard for me to stay seated, I had impulses, I lost attention to the explanations, unless it was a subject like mathematics that interested me a lot and my concentration was higher. I made repetitive movements and started reacting with anger. My parents took me to a specialist and they indicated that I had ADHD, I even took medication. I particularly remember how bad I felt without being able to specify how or why. My parents decided that I should abandon the treatment.
One way or another, with more or less difficulty, I managed to pass the academic tests and go through courses, always with the help of my parents.
When I reached the age and as I was explained in a timely manner, I had the normative hormonal change, but I was increasingly isolated from my classmates, I did not understand them, nor they me. I complied with my duties and rules. They went from ignoring me to being an excessive object of their attention. It was a punishment that I did not understand to excessively endure what they “called jokes”. Insults, subtraction of my belongings, offensive disclosure of my person by cell phones… Even today I do not understand their way of acting. There was intervention by the school to stop this persecution. After a season of suffering the situation, one day in the classroom I felt that my heart was failing and that I could not breathe, I thought I was dying. For some time now I had noticed changes in my heartbeat like this suddenly, that my upper muscles hurt more than normal, that my mouth was drying out, that I was still sleeping worse than I always had, that I felt fear, but then it passed and until the next time.
They took me to the doctor and at almost seventeen years old, after the appropriate explorations and the study of my history, the doctor informed my parents and me that I suffer from Asperger’s Syndrome, a disorder of the autism spectrum. I also presented anxious depressive comorbidity.
In the present course, an engineering with topics that interest me highly and with which I concentrate easily. I manage anxiety adequately and have overcome depression. Since my diagnosis, I started psychological and social skills therapy. I am seeing certain progress in terms of social relationships.
I think that if I had had an early detection of the Asperger’s Syndrome that I suffer from, I would have advanced much more quickly and without the numerous problems with which I have encountered.
My mother tells me “not to complain, that I am fortunate and that others would want my luck”. My first thought is to tell her that she expresses absurd things, but I am learning to stop and analyze what they call figurative, not very literal and sincere language.”
Early detection of Asperger’s and other learning and developmental difficulties
