Teen Autism

A few weeks ago we enjoyed a visit with some long-time friends who live out of state. Our families have been friends for so long that we joke that our sons were “friends before they were born.” At one point, their NT son Jonathan, who is twelve, was talking with Nigel about how he (Nigel) learned to read when he was three and a half.

Jonathan: That must be your savant skill.

Nigel: My what?

A sort of chill permeated the air, even though it was about 105 degrees around the patio where we sat. Jonathan didn’t respond, his parents didn’t respond; I think everyone was waiting for me to jump in. It had never before occurred to me to talk to Nigel about autistic savants. I had never thought that his hyperlexia qualified as a savant skill. Sure, it was astounding at the time, but the sources I checked do not include it as a sign of Savant Syndrome.

Me: A few autistic people have skills like computing difficult math problems in their heads, playing music very well, painting or drawing something in great detail, and memorizing lots of information. They’re called autistic savants. But not every autistic person is a savant. In fact, most are not.

Nigel: Good. Because I hate math.

So glad that’s settled.

This entry (Permalink) was posted on Tuesday, September 9th, 2008 at 10:47 pm and is filed under Misc. Autism topics, Nigelisms. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response , or trackback from your own site.