My autistic son is loving his lists

Lists.  We all use them at some point.  They help us organise our thoughts or remind us about tasks.

The A Word so far; my top five explanations

Have you watched any of The A Word yet?  I'd love it if you did. If you don't have autism in your family you may have wondered what's going on at various points in the last two weeks of the show. As tonight we approach the half way point of the series (I think), I thought I'd throw together my top explanations for what Joe's been up to in the series, as identified not by an expert, just by me and my experiences with our autistic and neurotypical kids.

The things I hear during an England game

Some people scream at the TV, some people clap and cheer.  But my son says some strange things when he's watching England play.  It's nothing to worry about, in fact it's a good thing. Read more here.

I'm so happy my son has echolalia

Nearly 75% of verbal autistic people display some kind of echolalia. It is 'echoing' or repeating or words, sounds, sounds made by someone else. It's there because the child doesn't understand what's being said but thinks a response is appropriate.  It was one of the key 'symptoms' that led to our eldest son's Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) diagnosis, so why on earth am I pleased our second son is now showing signs of echolalia?