Ben, our second son, is a social butterfly and has been since birth. He repeated his first word at 4 months..."BOO". We didn't realize he was struggling until he was in middle school and had gone from one teacher who knew him well and worked with his short comings to 7 teachers who didn't. It was the same time when he went from A's and B's to D's and F's. It is also when we realized that in our household, APD was a hereditary issue passed down from father to sons. It was the year Ben was diagnosed with APD and we began recognizing symptoms in his then 4 year old brother.
Ben struggles with volume control. In trying to hear his own voice in his head like he should, he raises his voice above the level he should. What stands out in presentations for Ben are associative and output /organization. His short term memory is almost non-existent and always has been. Before we knew what was going on with him, we called him 'squirrel' because it was so easy to get him off task. Ben does not organize his personal space at all, at home at school... anywhere. To me, his space looks like his mind. Information goes in, but it is all over the place-unorganized. His key phrase for me is, "wait... what?" I know now that he says this when he is just not processing what is going on and needs it repeated or more time. My goal with Ben is to create a successful adult... school will be something we get through on the way there.
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