"I wanted to understand how he sees this world." Stories of mothers of children with autism. Autism: A Common Story
The content of the article:
Autism in children is a disease characterized by mental disorders such as speech motor disorder, lack of social skills, and lack of imagination. Currently, there are no special tests that could establish an accurate diagnosis of autism. It is possible to determine the ailment only by observing the child and his attitude towards others.
A story about the treatment of autism in a child by cleansing the body of Olga, 43 years old
My daughter has autism, she did not speak for a long time, she was characterized by aggressive behavior. In addition, she was hyperactive and it was very difficult to get along with her. Bowel problems became an additional "fly in the ointment".
I have spent several years researching information on the causes and treatments for autism. As a result, I was able to form my own system of treating autism in children, which helped my daughter to recover and adapt to life.
I am convinced that vaccinations are one of the reasons for the development of autism, no matter how doctors oppose this idea. My daughter and I took tests, and it turned out that the amount of tin and aluminum, that is, heavy metals, was increased in her blood.
I found studies that prove that measles virus is found in the intestines of many children with autism. It provokes constipation. So I gave my daughter an antiviral drug to drink. As a result, constipation stopped tormenting us. In addition, we made a control test for mercury and aluminum. It turned out that we have an excess in these indicators as well.
We began to carry out systematic cleansing of the body from heavy metals. The daughter's condition began to slowly but surely stabilize. We are finally getting off the ground in treating autism. The child began to develop speech and imagination to work better, attacks of aggression and hyperactivity stopped.
I found an article by an American neurosurgeon in English on the Internet. I am a translator by education, so it was not difficult to translate it. It turned out that, in his opinion, due to the influence of heavy metals that were obtained from vaccinations, complex autoimmune processes are triggered in the brain of children. In some cases, an inflammatory process develops, and this leads to serious consequences such as autism.
Mercury salts are not excreted from the body on their own, so the process becomes chronic. Mercury salts have a detrimental effect on all organs. We began to cleanse the child's blood and organs. In addition, with the help of various food products and drugs, they began to extinguish the autoimmune process, which was confirmed by IgM tests.
Also, an important point in our therapy is the presence in the menu of a large amount of vitamins, minerals, amino acids. Without this, it is very difficult to restore health and the process is delayed for many years.
Multivitamins can be used, but I prefer to give natural products such as honey, royal jelly, figs, pine nuts and walnuts.
After a year of such treatment, my daughter began to change before our eyes. She has emotions, speech is actively developing, interest in other people, life, imagination appears. And before, she was only interested in water and sticks. Now I understand that we are on the right track and the child will have a fulfilling life.
Life story of treating autism with the Alexandra diet, 37 years old
My son Mikhail and I were referred to the first psychologist by a pediatrician. It seemed that he understood little of what the adults were telling him. He developed quite normally up to one and a half years. However, then he stopped speaking aloud the words that were already well known to him: mom, dad, cow, cat and so on. One got the impression that the child was disappearing into himself. He was almost always silent. At first, we thought that the reason for his silence was otitis media, which often tormented him in childhood.
In just a few months, the child stopped reacting altogether to the outside world and had difficulty recognizing loved ones. He stopped looking in the eyes and did not make contact. Other oddities appeared in behavior: he rubbed his head on the floor, walked on tiptoe, made strange gurgling sounds, constantly repeated some action, for example, opening and closing a door or pouring sand from one container to another in a sandbox. The child did not allow himself to be picked up or hugged. This caused a storm of indignation or hysterical tears in him. He also developed chronic diarrhea.
After the first examinations, the psychiatrist finally sounded this terrible word - "autism". As I later learned, Autism Spectrum Disorder is not a mental illness. This is a developmental disorder in a child that is caused by abnormalities in the brain. Although autism affects an average of one in 500 children, it is still the least studied developmental disorder.
We were told that Misha, most likely, will not become a healthy child and a full-fledged person. He will not be able to make friends, have meaningful conversations, study in a comprehensive school, or live independently. We were advised to believe only that the child will be able to instill certain social skills that he himself is not able to acquire.
After my son was finally diagnosed, I began to disappear in libraries and the Internet in search of information on how to treat autism in children. So I found a book that was about an autistic toddler. His mother was convinced that her son's symptoms were triggered by a "cerebral allergy" to regular milk. The thought of allergies stuck in my head, because Misha loved to drink cow's milk and consumed it in large quantities - up to two liters a day.
I also remembered my mother reading a few months ago that many children who suffer from chronic otitis media are allergic to wheat and milk. Even then, she told me to try to exclude these products from Misha's menu. But I insisted that milk, cheese and pasta are all that he likes to eat and if I exclude them from the diet, then he will simply starve.
After that, I also remembered that Misha's first otitis appeared at the age of 11 months. This coincided with the transition from infant formula to cow's milk. I breastfed him for up to three months, but he did not tolerate breast milk, it was poured. Then we were advised to switch to a hypoallergenic infant formula.
In general, there was nothing to lose, and I decided to exclude "suspicious" foods from the child's diet. What happened next was more like a miracle. A few weeks later, Misha stopped screaming and hysterical. He stopped repeating the same actions endlessly. And he knocked me down when he handed me a pen so that I could help him down the stairs. He also allowed his older sister to take himself in the arms and sing him a lullaby.
A month later, we visited a good pediatrician who specialized in developmental disabilities in children. He ran several tests with Misha and asked us a bunch of questions. We talked about improvements in his behavior after we stopped giving him dairy products. However, at the end of the appointment, the doctor said that the child has autism and although the idea of milk intolerance is interesting, it cannot be due to his autism or recent improvements in behavior.
This led us to despair, but the child was getting better every day: he sat in my arms and looked into my eyes, began to pay attention to my sister, slept well, but the diarrhea did not go away.
He was not two years old, and we already sent him to a specialized children's institution and began to undergo intensive language and behavioral therapy. In addition, we decided to test the theory about the influence of milk on the behavior of the son. In the morning they gave Misha a glass of milk to drink, and by the evening he began to walk on tiptoe and rub his head on the floor, demonstrating behavior that we have practically forgotten. A few weeks later, the child's behavior was repeated. It turned out that in the garden he was given a piece of cheese. So we became firmly convinced that Misha had a peculiar allergy to dairy products.
Later, I was able to find information about researchers who collected evidence that milk complicates the course of autism. It turned out that milk protein, being converted into peptides, affects the brain in much the same way as hallucinogenic drugs. In the urine of children suffering from "milk allergy", substances were identified that contained opiates. According to scientists, such children either lack an enzyme that digests peptides, or peptides enter the bloodstream even before they are digested.
Now I began to understand why Misha was developing normally while he ate hypoallergenic soy infant formula, and this also explained why he later required a lot of milk - opiates provoke a strong addiction.
After a lot of "research" together with my husband, we came to the conclusion that it is necessary to transfer the child to a gluten-free diet, on which celiac patients are sitting. After 48 hours, Misha developed his first hard stool in months. His coordination improved, after a couple of months I even began to make out the words he uttered.
Our attending physicians only laughed ironically when we talked about our dietary method for treating autism. They did not see any relationship in this.
By the time Misha was 3 years old, all doctors agreed that the diagnosis of autism should be removed. The child passed all the tests that confirmed that he is mentally healthy and healthy. According to the test results, over time, he entered a regular school.
Now Misha is 7, and he, according to the class teacher, is one of the most active and cheerful children in the class. He has friends, he plays in the school theater, plays imaginary games with his older sister, which autistic children never do. Our worst fears did not materialize, we are all insanely happy.
How did the sensory integration method treat autism in a child Julia, 27 years old
My daughter is now 3.5 years old. Our diagnosis sounds like "CRD with autistic traits." Almost a year ago we began to study with a psychologist. The daughter did not speak, and the speech therapists refused to take her for treatment.
At 2 and 10, they drank a course of nootropic drugs, but their daughter began to sleep poorly, and began to be capricious. I had to give up drug treatment. We were admitted to kindergarten, but the problems began almost immediately: the daughter did not obey, could not take care of herself, observe an elementary toilet.
We searched the internet for stories of autism in children and treatments. Once I went to a conference on autism in Moscow and there I learned about sensory integration. I didn’t think for a long time, my daughter had serious disabilities, and I didn’t manage to adapt her to social life.
At the center, we went through a consultation, I filled out a bunch of documents, some kind of "questionnaires". They tried to examine the daughter, she began to scream and hysteria. Then she focused on a toy, but again got nervous. I had to calm down with food. But we were persuaded to sign up for trial classes.
Of course, at first we didn't succeed, our daughter screamed, refused to do anything, although they tried to skate and play with her. It was all a little like classes. I even had doubts whether we need all this.
I had to sit on a swing with her in order to ride for no more than three minutes. She didn’t agree anymore. In the third lesson, I left her to a specialist and stayed outside the door. The first 15-20 minutes I listened to her whine. But then there was silence. After 45 minutes, the daughter left. This is not to say that she is happy, but she is clearly calmer than she was at the beginning.
We have been walking for four months. Sleeping better, less aggressive, more agile, not afraid of the people around her. And most importantly, I finally began to understand why a pot is needed and began to try to speak. So far, no more than ten words, but if she needs something, she is already able to explain.
And the other day my daughter has a new achievement - she has started herself. Before, I could not put a spoon in her hand, but now I take it myself and eat it. It turns out that she was taught in class - they took out wooden balls from the container with a spoon. In general, even her look became different, more meaningful. In general, I am happy with the results.
How to treat autism in children - watch the video:
You can learn more about them thanks to their parents, close people, who can open the tightly closed curtain behind which the inner world of people with autism is hidden. This is a world, another world with its own special inhabitants.
Not all mothers of children with autism agree to a frank story. More recently, we asked one of the parents to help us look deeper into the world of these special children. To look not just for the sake of interest, but in order to better understand them. We tried to talk about them, looking at the world through their eyes. However, then the story turned out to be far from frank. Because not everyone is ready to be as open as Alexandra Maksimova, the mother of ten-year-old Andryusha, a boy with a severe form of autism.
Photo: courtesy of Alexandra Maximova
The son of Andrey Maksimov - Andrey
She agreed to give an interview to Sputnik Georgia and tell in detail about the world in which her son lives, as well as about the "We are others" foundation, which she, together with her husband Andrei Maksimov, created in Georgia to help children with autism.
- Alexandra, tell your story. How did it all start?
- Before I start my story, I want to say that many in Georgia, Russia and many other countries believe that autism is a mental illness. Autism is not a mental illness, it is a special disorder of the central nervous system, so it is simply incorrect and incorrect to classify these people as mentally unhealthy. Society still refers them to some sick people who need to be afraid.
In fact, you do not need to be afraid of them. We must try to understand them and work more with society so that ordinary people can see the world through the eyes of autists and make sure that there is nothing wrong with them. On the contrary, they are filled with kindness and sincerity.
Sofia Kravchinskaya - student of the resource class of the project of the "We are others" foundation
Our son Andrey has a severe form of autism with pronounced behavioral problems. He does not speak, but his intellectual development is preserved. When he goes into a state of autism, he starts screaming, can hit the floor, and so on.
Look how it usually happens: ordinary healthy children are born, parents are happy, everything is fine, and no one can understand why problems suddenly arise for no reason. Some attribute this to genetic factors, some to vaccinations, but no one knows the exact reason. The only thing that is beyond doubt is that the number of these children is growing exponentially (WHO believes that 1% of the world's child population suffers from autism - this is a huge number).
As for vaccinations, if immunity is weak, vaccination can malfunction in the body and start some kind of irreversible process.
Immediately after the birth of a child, for example, in America and Israel, the level of immunity is checked. I don’t know, maybe this analysis is expensive, and therefore it is not carried out in many countries, including Russia. But, in principle, it can be done in order to understand whether the child has features of the immune system or not, whether it is necessary to approach vaccination issues more carefully or not.
My child looked physically healthy, plump, and the doctor, apparently, thought that we did not need such a test. I also did not even have a thought that something could go wrong. Indeed, at the age of nine months my child began to speak, walk, run, smile, communicate.
But when our child was one year and one month old, a qualified doctor at home gave him a vaccine. Andryusha had a slight runny nose. After 48 hours after that, the child simply began to degrade. The vaccine caused the immune system to malfunction. He fell ill with all the diseases that he had been vaccinated against. Measles, rubella, tuberculosis - he contracted all these infections at the same time!
- Do you blame the vaccine for what happened?
- No! Children need to be vaccinated, but be sure to clearly understand when, at what time it needs to be done. Before doing it, you need to find out in what state the child's immunity is. In our case, the vaccine provoked the disease. Andryusha got a little cold. You shouldn't have done it.
After being vaccinated, he fell asleep, woke up at night and started screaming. For an hour they could not calm him down. Then they barely laid him down, and in the morning, when he opened his eyes, they were already dim eyes, as if covered with turbidity. He did not recognize me, father, jumped up, climbed under the table and shouted incessantly. It was impossible to even touch him, because it caused even more hysteria. He was covered with some kind of spots. He no longer looked like a child, but rather resembled an animal.
At first, I did not understand anything, I began to measure the temperature. The first day I just tried to pull him out from under the table, to calm him down, but on the second day, when he stopped eating, we called a doctor. They started taking tests, which was also stressful for him. He developed lymph nodes, for a year the doctors could not make an accurate diagnosis.
The biggest problem was tuberculosis of the lymph nodes. He lived for a year with this bacterium, which is very toxic to the nervous system. A year later, finally, a doctor was found who said that it was tuberculosis.
Already nothing could be done, they decided to carry out the operation. The bacteria have taken refuge in the lymph nodes. They had to be removed. When he was 2 years and 8 months old, he underwent an operation. Instead of the promised 30 minutes, it lasted a full hour and a half. General anesthesia is very dangerous for these children. When the child opened his eyes, I realized that this was all. I looked into his eyes, and there was only emptiness in them. He could move, but he did not understand anything. And that's all.
In two months, he was completely cured of tuberculosis. During all this time, we did not even suspect that he had autism. Only at the age of three did we find out about it. Unfortunately, it was only in 2012 that behavioral analysis was introduced in Russia, which I consider to be the only methodology today that can help children with autism. When Andrei was three years old, there was nothing like that in Moscow. And with such children, the main thing is to start behavioral therapy as early as possible, and it will definitely bring results. I see this not only in my son, but also in other children.
We took him to different centers, he developed a little, understood the speech addressed to him, but despite this, until the age of five, he scattered everything, slept only 3 hours a day, all the time he ran, jumped, chatted in his own language, lived on reflexes ... He did not react to me at all, that mom, dad, grandfather and grandmother, he did not care. He lived his life, while smiling, was contact only when he wanted to. I thought I had a mentally retarded child.
We took him to Israel, England, USA. All unanimously said: "Severe autism, unlikely to be done." But Andrey is the only child. I fought for him and I will fight.
- What did you decide after the disappointing forecasts of the doctors?
- I started reading, getting acquainted with any information, hired a nanny who helped me. We, according to a certain method, began to learn letters with him in order to somehow order his life. As it turned out, he knows the letters. Here's another thing about the phenomenon of autism, they have some part of the brain developed, some - not. When we started to study with him, we thought that he did not understand anything, did not hear. When we were convinced that Andrey knows the letters, hears us, counts, perceives everything, but cannot show it, he started having terrible headaches. And I realized that I was going down the wrong path again.
I started taking him to the doctors again. I was finished off by a famous professor. He told me that I was still young, I could give birth to a second child, and this one should be sent to a boarding school, since it would only get worse for him. It just killed me, it was impossible to listen to all this, I did not answer him, took the child, slammed the door and left. Well, what to talk about with this doctor?
- You said that the child is screaming. Why do children with autism scream?
- They try to block what is happening in the head in order to disconnect from the outside world. It's just that everyone tries to do it in their own way. Someone is banging his head, someone is trying to hurt himself, someone is screaming ... This is in order to disconnect from sensory overload. They are hypersensitive. Here we are talking seemingly quietly, and if you put a person with autism here, with high sensory sensitivity, he will have the feeling that he is sitting in a disco.
- Alexandra, why did you move to Georgia?
“Young specialists have worked with us for a year in Russia. This is an unrecognized technique, and, in principle, it is not suitable for all children. But in the case of my child, it helped. Before leaving Moscow, young specialists worked with us, who moved to Georgia, to Ureki. And we followed them.
The sea and the positive disposition of people relaxed Andrey, but I did not see progress as such. Two years later, we moved from Ureki to Tbilisi. Found Tinatin Chincharauli. She heads the Institute for Child Development at Ilya State University. We started working with her. I actually see success from their work. She began to study with Andrei behavioral therapy, sensory integration.
- What is behavioral therapy?
- This is a very individual approach and depends on the needs of the child, so I cannot explain it in general terms. But experts use a special technique to try to control the behavior of the child. That is, if he has antisocial behavior, you need to find ways to make his behavior turn into socially acceptable. This technique is based on this principle. Children are taught to behave more or less adequately in society. And this therapy works.
In order to achieve results, you need to work with them 24 hours a day. For children with severe autism, count 40 hours a month as nothing. It is impossible to achieve a result with the help of any center. It should be either a kindergarten or a school. I could not find such institutions here. We could have moved to another country, for example, to Israel, but decided to stay in Georgia forever and create the necessary infrastructure for our child here, and with him for all Georgian children with ASD.
To do this, in 2016 my husband and I founded a charitable foundation "We are Others" in Georgia. So far, we are the only ones who fully finance it. Made a page in Facebook... There we post videos so that everyone can watch and follow how these children are changing.
We have several projects, one of them was on alternative communications, so that non-speaking children, like our son, could communicate. My son doesn't speak, but he communicates with cards. This is a special PECS system (Image Exchange Communication System - ed.). He has a special book where he glues and shows what he wants. We brought from Germany the most famous specialist who implements this system, and then I began to think, good PECS, good center, everything is great, but how to integrate these children. It’s impossible to do this without society?
Personal archive of Alexandra Maximova
Ivan Liparteliani - student of the resource class of the project "We are others"
And since September we have been carrying out an experimental - pilot project in the state school No. 98 in Tbilisi. There, we created a separate, inclusive class on a completely new model aimed at integrating these children into society. This model is built on the basis of the most modern internationally recognized methods with the active support of the ministry and the department of inclusion itself (Eka Dgebuadze). Invaluable support and understanding was provided by the school director Giorgi Momtselidze, who created all the necessary conditions on the territory of his school for the implementation of this pilot project.
We launched this project, it is fully supervised by Ilya University. We have selected personnel, trained them. These are Georgian specialists speaking Russian.
- What is the main goal of the fund?
- Our goal is to train specialists, introduce and disseminate a new model of working with children with autism. This is a very expensive pleasure. All over the world foundations, parents raise funds for such projects. This is an experiment. First of all, we want to do something for our child, but the most important thing is that in a year it is possible to assemble a team of specialists who will then go and teach other colleagues in all schools and kindergartens.
We have only three children in the class so far, including our son. All three have severe autism. On our site you can find a lot of useful information, learn about the symptoms of the disease. Parents should remember that it is important to start therapy as early as possible. If at two or three years old we began to study intensively with our son, he would be in a completely different state than he is now. In autism, the worst thing is the loss of time, that is, this autistic loop drags the child deeper and deeper. It takes a lot of effort to promote it. Much also depends on the reserves of the body.
We create a replicable resource class model. We will hand it over to the Ministry of Education. There will be a ready-made team that will train specialists, a manual will be published. And it is important to do this not only on the scale of Tbilisi, but the whole country. At least we really want it.
- What do you say to mothers of children with autism?
- Do not be afraid if you are told that the child has autism. You just need to immediately start studying with him. For the past year we have been fighting autism so that it does not drag on the child. Either disease wins, then we win. We do not have stability yet. When he enters his state, it is like a depressed person who wants to be locked up and not see anyone. Over the course of this year, we have achieved that there are fewer such conditions.
Now he smiles, approaches the children, wants to contact them, with gestures he tries to tell people what he wants, he rejoices, visits, studies. Previously, this was impossible to achieve. This is a great result for me, at least he learns to enjoy life.
We are also doing the "Friendly Environment" project so that cinemas or restaurants can be adapted for our children. Due to sensory problems, these children cannot go to the movies. Loud sound, bright light, long advertisement - strong sensory - this is an overload for them. If you turn down the sound, turn on dim lights, remove ads, they can sit quietly and watch a movie or cartoon.
There is a stereotype that these children are dangerous and can be harmful. We want to destroy this stereotype. They are just special. If they have aggression, then this means that they are not being properly handled. And if you work on behavior correction, there will be no aggression.
I really like Georgia, I like the people, the climate, I like everything. Actually I want to help. Help, first of all, your child, and then all children. The sooner we begin to adapt them to the social environment, the better. This is such a multi-stage and long work, but since we have already decided to stay here, we will try to help not only our son, but also all children in need of such rehabilitation.
- I am interested in your opinion on the use of stem cells in autism?
- Maybe someday I will think about it, but for now I do not want to experiment any more on the health of my son. It's one thing when it's a behavioral analysis, when you can fix something, and when you are already being introduced into the body ... I am not against stem cells, perhaps they really help. It all depends on immunity. No one can guarantee that stem cells will not start mutating and he will not develop oncology. So far, no one has studied human immunity enough to say with confidence: "That's it, we take an analysis, transplant stem cells, and the child recovers." It's just that I've already seen so much of his physical suffering that I won't allow such experiments to be carried out. At least until the safety of this procedure is proven.
- And at the end I would like to ask this question. After going through such trials, how much have you changed?
- When it happens in your life that your child turns into an animal in 48 hours, and then your life is nothing more than a struggle to get him out, whether you like it or not, you become stronger. I know mothers who couldn't handle it. They sent the children to a boarding school, could not stand it, emotionally did not cope. It is not simple. You need to do a tremendous amount of work. There are periods when you don't want anything at all, you close yourself off from everything, you start blaming the whole world for what happened, you ask the question "why me?", "Why with me?" We must go through this, get together and fight again. In reality, it hardens, values and priorities change, in a sense it becomes even easier to live. Problems such as the word "could not buy a jacket", "had a fight with a friend" become so funny.
You know, because these kids are hypersensitive, they can't lie. They feel people, and try to make us become kinder not only to them, but to each other. True, they achieve this with the help of their methods, which frighten us at first, but they succeed. No one is to blame for what happened to me. No one owes anything to anyone. We just have to fight. We have this way.
Don't give up. Much depends on moms. Never give in to discouragement. We must fight to alleviate the suffering of children caused by autism. I believe, I know that I will still get my son out of the clutches of this disease, and he will be an ordinary child with me. Yes, with special features, but an ordinary person who can easily live, be friends and enjoy life.
Children with autism are different from "ordinary" children. They do not like to communicate with peers and parents, often hardly speak and behave differently. Author Daley Baby spoke with outyat parents and learned their stories - sad in places, but in some ways positive and hopeful.
Yulia Koloskova, son Arseny is 5 years old (Moscow)
- My son has an autistic spectrum. He was born quite large: 4 230 g, although he was almost a month premature in term.
The birth went well, a healthy little boy was born. He developed well up to a year, and after that we began to notice that he did not hear us at all.
At first, they sinned that the kid was interested in the game, then they thought that the child was deaf. I went to the doctors, they said that our boy's hearing is excellent.
Then we turned to a neurologist, and he diagnosed us with mental retardation. But in words it was said that the child has an autism spectrum. They explained to us that a child under three years of age is not legally entitled to be officially diagnosed with autism.
The neurologist began to observe us and prescribe medications - nootropics. What we just didn’t try: different pills, methods, classes. The child became simply uncontrollable. Sometimes he was quiet and calm, for example, when he played with toys he liked. He was always interested in bright figures, numbers, letters. He put all the toys in a row, he was very fond of collecting pyramids, so we have a lot of such toys.
Hearing the diagnosis, I was at first at a loss: I did not even understand what it meant. I didn’t know who the autists were and what awaited me next.
Like many others, I rushed to the Internet, where I read horrible things and burst into tears. Will my son be like this?
For a long time I could not come to my senses, did not accept my son's illness. Later, having calmed down, I began to act: I did and am doing everything in my power. True, there is not always such an opportunity, since I bring up two children alone and work. Fortunately, my parents are helping.
My boy was growing up, and we were transferred to a psychiatrist, as the neurologist was already powerless. We came across a magic doctor, I am very grateful to her for everything that she did for us the day. We picked up psychotropic drugs, worked hard, went to a speech therapy kindergarten. At first it was very difficult, since autists are unsociable, it was not easy to find a common language with my son. But the teachers tried very hard.
We went through various commissions, got a disability. It was very difficult for me emotionally.
It was incredibly difficult and painful to come to terms with the fact that my child is disabled. I cried, I was afraid, I was not at all interested in disability payments. I just didn't believe in his diagnosis.
The psychiatrist convinced me, saying that until the age of 18 there would be no stigma on a child. And there is no help: the pills are insanely expensive, and people with disabilities are given them free of charge.
We started treatment: psychotropic and nootropics plus classes in kindergarten, speech therapist, defectologist, educators. The group in the kindergarten was combined, that is, autistic people, children with cerebral palsy, and children who speak poorly.
After that, I decided to send the child to tomatis therapy - these are headphones with special music that is individually selected for each child.
Another feature of Outyat is food selectivity. Before the tomatis treatment, we ate only pureed food. Oh, how I suffered: wherever I go, everywhere with me is a blender. My child adores dairy products to this day: kefir, yogurt, fermented baked milk, curds, glazed curds. Everything except regular milk.
Our morning begins with porridge, soup is a must in the diet. At about three years old, we ate preferably red soup, red porridge: it was summer, so I mixed berries into it. My child hardly eats vegetables and fruits. We recently started eating cutlets. Once they brought nuggets from McDonald's, he ate half the box. Then I decided to make cutlets myself from different types of meat, but there was a nuance: he only ate them from a box of McDuck nuggets. Eat only long pasta, potatoes - preferably fries. These are the wishes that have to be adhered to, otherwise the child will simply sit hungry.
Since childhood, I have been turning on educational cartoons for my son, I used Doman's technique for early development. Today he counts, reads, distinguishes and names everything that you show him: colors, vegetables, fruits, vehicles, animals. Knows all letters and numbers up to a hundred.
The only problem is speech. Alas, but it is understandable only to me. The son answers the questions I have asked, and consciously.
I plan to send my child to a regular school, since autistic people are very capable children, they sometimes know more than their peers. The main thing is to develop them, to help learn everything.
I would not want to send my son to a correctional school: it is important that the child develops and does not degrade.
In kindergarten he is praised: he helps everyone, he goes to classes with pleasure. But on the street he behaves terribly: he runs away and laughs, as if he mocks and looks at the reaction of adults. He also behaves with me: he runs to the kindergarten and does not obey. He does not understand what danger is. Unfortunately, autistic people are often unaware of the feeling of fear. Arseny has already run into glasses and sharp objects three times.
The little son cleans up his toys and knows what it means to "put things in order." With such children, you need a lot of patience, it is important for them to take time and take care of them. My son is very affectionate: he constantly kisses, hugs and strokes. Can lie with me for hours in the morning. Arseniy sleeps well, falls asleep quickly and without any problems. As for the toilet: up to three and a half years we walked in a diaper, then we got used to the potty. He knows how to dress and undress independently.
I treat him like an ordinary child - I can quarrel and punish if he is offended. True, when I scold him, he comes up, covers my mouth and kisses me.
Autyata are cunning, mischievous, but very cute and affectionate. They rarely take offense and do not harbor any grudge against anyone.
I would like to advise the mothers of such children: do not despair at all. The behavior of such children is corrected. The main thing is to notice the disease in time and not start it. Try to provide them with all the necessary conditions. And my personal advice: be strict, don't feel sorry for your autistic kid. This is not a sick child, he is normal, just with his own characteristics. Autists have a pure soul and a special perception of the world, it is important to remember this.
Olga Agasieva, son Denis 9 years old (Moscow)
- Until the age of two, Denis was developing absolutely normally. As everybody. Then I went to kindergarten, and then it all started. We began to notice something was wrong when our son was 2 years and 4 months old. At that time, we noticed that our boy is a loner. He played alone, loved not to be touched by anyone. It was then that our lifelong struggle began.
Since two and a half years, we have been dealing with a speech therapist-defectologist. At first, the doctors in the polyclinic said: "Wait, this is a boy, he will speak later," none of them saw the diagnosis of "autism". Only later did our defectologist report: "You have autistic traits."
Frankly, we didn't know what it was then. They began to read various literature, watch programs about autism. There was no shock. There were tears. How so? Why? For what?
But then we accepted this information and began to look for methods of treatment - we tried a lot. Now we go to a special school, which, by the way, are very few in Moscow. And how things are with them in the regions - we can only guess.
From the age of 5 we went to a kindergarten, also a special, correctional one. We had wonderful educators who opened a window to a new world for our son and taught him a lot.
Of course, there are still problems in behavior. Due to Denis's stubborn nature, he needs everything to be the way he wants. There are hysterics. But you can get out of this situation.
We study in an excellent school (GKOU 2124 Center for Development and Correction SP 30). We were lucky with the class teacher: she found an approach to all the children in the class, she worries about each as her own.
My son hardly speaks. It must be admitted that it is difficult to communicate with such children. Denis is a pretty independent guy. If he wants something, he will take it himself or by the hand will lead me to the place where it lies and show what he needs.
Difficulties arise when Denis is worried about something, for example, something hurts. He cannot show, does not understand what we want from him. And then both we and he are nervous. Alas, there is no way out of this situation.
With Denis, every day is a certain job. Understand, explain, tell, show. Of course, we are happy about something new, when once - and Denis washed his feet on his own, once - and learned how to brush his teeth. There are a lot of such examples.
What is common and simple for us - blowing, kissing, washing, cleaning - is very difficult for them.
I would like people on the streets of the city to treat the Autyats with understanding, and not sin on bad manners. Unfortunately, autism is a disease and must be reckoned with. It happens, and, alas, it can happen to anyone. We parents want understanding. Not sympathy and regret, but understanding and respect for us and our children.
And I would like to advise the parents of outyat children - do not cry, do not feel sorry for yourself and your child, do not think about what others will say. Pull yourself together and remember: your child is your pride and support, whatever he may be. And it is in your power to improve his condition and make him happy.
Margarita Voronova, son Kirill 2 years and 9 months (city of Kursk)
- My baby was born a healthy and strong boy. Until one year old he developed like all children: at 6 months he began to sit, at 11 - he went, waving his pen goodbye, in a year he said the first word - “mother”.
When he was 1 year and 2 months old, we went with him to the sea in the Crimea. They lived there in a hotel, where at that time several families with children of about the same age were staying. There I began to notice that my child is very hysterical, whiny, absolutely naughty. He was very different from the others. All the time he ran somewhere, while not noticing obstacles, people. He could collide with anyone and anything, as if he simply did not see them.
He stopped smiling, he was sad all the time. But, most importantly, when I looked at other children, I caught myself thinking that they were different from my baby, but I did not immediately understand why.
Then I realized that all children look in the eyes, pay attention to new adults and examine them, and my child avoids looking in the eyes, even me.
Then there was a feeling that he was as if deaf: the son stopped responding to his name.
At first I decided that nothing terrible was happening: we visited neurologists and no one said anything bad. But, having arrived home, I went online with the question: why does the child not respond to the name? It was then that I first came across the topic of autism and was horrified. Before that, I did not know anything about it.
My husband and I quickly ran to the neurologist. The child was 1 year and 4 months old. At the appointment, the doctor confirmed fears about autism and advised to see a psychologist. From that moment on, just hell began.
The husband and close relatives did not take all this seriously. They believed that I was "slandering the child": he is still small, he is a boy, and boys develop more slowly, and so on.
I began to get depressed from the terrible prospects of life that I drew for myself. My husband was annoyed that I was in a bad mood, I didn't want anything all the time, I had no strength for anything. The husband was sure that everything was fine, I just worried too much from scratch. In the meantime, I began to drag the child to various hospitals, to look for specialists who would suggest how to deal with him and how to develop him.
Autistic people are far from ordinary children. Sometimes it is very unpleasant to hear comments from mothers of normo-typical children like “I should have been more engaged with the child, develop him”. The fact is that, for example, my baby simply did not let me near him. You give him a toy, he is interested in it, he tries to start playing, but does not understand what to do. For example, they hold the hammer incorrectly and do not understand that they need to score balls. When you start showing him, explaining how to do it, he just gets angry, hysterical and leaves. Doesn't want to take the toy anymore, or interact with me.
I began to repeat after him: it was advised in one of the books that I read. If he is considering something, I go up and look too, touch metal objects, put a diaper on my head, spin with him. And the son really thawed out. He began to smile!
We bought him a toy turtle that glowed with different colors. He brought it close, close to his eyes and looked. I remember, I came up and began to do so in the same way. He looked away, looked me straight in the eyes and smiled. It seemed that he was laughing at me and thinking: "Well, did you see anything there?"
Over time, everything changes, in some ways he becomes better, and in others - more and more autistic traits are manifested. But we hold on: my son needs my support, and I need him - my unusual, but so beloved baby.
Marina Russ, mother of 17-year-old Savva (city of Tver)
My youngest son Savva has autism. Savvyonok was born on December 27, so I call him my New Year's present. He was a wonderful baby: he hooted, crawled, reached for toys, began to walk at 9 months. He grew up as an average child, but one winter all my children fell ill - a common cold. Savva was then 3 years old.
As is often the case in a large family: the elder brought a cold from school and infected everyone. Everyone got sick usually, easily, but Savvenok's temperature suddenly jumped again after he recovered. I called the paramedic, she said that, most likely, the child was simply not healed and prescribed medications. Savva did not sneeze, did not cough, he only had a high fever. One morning he woke me up by running and laughing merrily. The temperature subsided, but another trouble came: my son became numb. His blue eyes closed on the bridge of his nose.
In shock, we rushed to the hospital, where they told us that, probably, a spasm had occurred from the temperature. We began to treat eyes. But I began to notice that the child had changed: he no longer played with his brothers, began to communicate less, he was no longer interested in anything new. They began to put a delay in speech development, and then mental development.
We were diagnosed with autism in Moscow in a children's psychiatric hospital, where Savva was examined for 4 months. After being discharged from this hospital, my son was issued a disability.
Savva could open the gate and just walk along the road, aimlessly. We looked for him twice. These are the creepiest moments: how do you find the little boy who doesn't speak?
The computer became his best friend. He easily mastered educational games. Savva learned to read at the age of 7, but he wrote poorly. But he typed on the computer very quickly and without errors. We went to school at 9. It was a type VII correctional school. He was sitting at the desk, and I was next to him. But we were able to study like this only for a year, then we were taken to individual training. Savva does not play with children, does not communicate with them, but at the same time he needs them by his side: his son does not like loneliness.
Now Savva is 17. He speaks a little and builds phrases incorrectly. He has a great memory. But he does only what is interesting to him, speaks only of what arouses his curiosity. Can retell the film itself. As a memory, he can print a TV program on a computer in a week.
Savvyonok helps me around the house: washing dishes, peeling potatoes, vacuuming and removing snow. He can heat his own food in the microwave. This is the second year we have been visiting a rehabilitation center for disabled children and adolescents. There they conduct classes with children and adapt them to life. Savva really likes it there.
- Scientists have proven that bilingual children cope with the manifestations of autism more easily
- "ASD needs to be treated, but cannot be cured." Interview with psychiatrist Elisey Osin
- Where to go when you need help? Russian organizations helping children with ASD
Elena Ignatieva is raising two sons. The eldest son, now 16 years old, has autism. It was for his sake that a special kindergarten, Kids' Estate, was created, which today is attended by 70 children of different nationalities.
- Elena, how did it happen that you opened your own kindergarten?
- 13 years ago there were much fewer kindergartens and schools in which a child with disabilities could study and communicate with ordinary children. Even now, there are not so many places where such children are treated with due attention and understanding. To create an environment for my son, I opened a children's center where children learned foreign languages. We started with early development groups, and two years later we already had a real kindergarten, which is developing and functioning to this day. At the moment we have 70 children. Of these, 4 are with autism, and this is a lot.
- Why do many people oppose inclusion?
- In a class with 30 students, one child with disabilities, if approached incorrectly, can destroy the entire educational process. I understand parents who come to school and say: "A child interferes with learning for other children, because the teacher is constantly distracted by him." Therefore, it is very important to create such conditions under which both ordinary children could study calmly, and a child with special needs received what he came for. To do this, you need to understand what exactly its features are and how to cope with them. For example, a child with cerebral palsy needs an accessible physical environment - railings, special stairs, and ramps. But with children who have mental deviations, it is much more difficult. They look healthy on the outside, but many forms of group learning are not available to them. And yet, we set the task of integrating most of these children into society, and this task is achievable.
A source:
- What if the child refuses to contact other children?
- This happens often in children with autism, but it is quite possible to find those types of activities in which the child can be part of the group - first under the supervision of a tutor, and then independently. It is important to follow the interest of the child - for example, he likes sports activities and in order to train with other children, he is able to wait for his turn - this is also communication. The first step is to build trust between the child and the adult and maintain that trust. And then there is constant work in the zone of proximal development of the child. We always rely on the individual capabilities of the child, taking into account his strengths and so-called deficiencies. After all, it happens that a child has no developmental lag, but he cannot withstand the rhythm of group work, noise load, or he has sensory features. Therefore, at the very beginning of work in the kindergarten, we carry out diagnostics of all children in order to determine the resources of each child, his starting conditions. And then we build such a training program so that, based on the strengths, we help the child overcome or compensate for the weaknesses. The well-coordinated work of different specialists is very important here - a psychologist, a defectologist, a speech therapist, a methodologist.
- Does a child always need an accompaniment?
- Not always. But there are children whose behavior contains undesirable elements. It may seem to uninformed people that the child is ill-mannered or spoiled, but this is not so. Nowadays, the theory of mirror neurons is gaining popularity. Mirror neurons in the brain are responsible for a person's ability to imitate, empathize, and in children, for the ability to learn through imitation. In children with autism, these neurons are undeveloped. If for a normo-typical child the most natural thing is to learn by imitating adults, copying their behavior, then for an autistic child such a natural form of learning is not available, he simply does not understand how to behave. Hence, various forms of undesirable behavior arise. For example, a child with autism might walk up and hit another toddler. To some, this action will seem aggression, but in fact it is important to understand what is behind this gesture. This is often an invitation to chat. The task of a teacher or tutor is to replace undesirable forms of behavior with socially acceptable ones, and then the educational process begins.
A source: Photo: Elena Ignatieva's Facebook
It's no secret that children with autism often have an imbalanced sense system, for example, they can be hypersensitive to sounds. Even the usual turning of the page sounds like a wild rattle to them. But visually, such a child can perceive information well. Therefore, we use various methods of visual reinforcement for these children. The most interesting thing is that it works well for the rest of the children!
My son went straight to the second grade, but for the entire first year of study I sat with him at his desk instead of a tutor. He read and wrote well, but in the middle of the lesson, if he got tired, he could get up and go somewhere, take an eraser or felt-tip pen he liked in a pencil case from a classmate. He was looked at as an alien.
- How to explain to ordinary children what autism is, so that they do not offend a special classmate?
- Little children do not need to explain anything at all - they understand everything themselves. For example, we have a girl in our group, let's call her Masha. She is 6 years old, she is just now starting to speak, very quiet, with huge eyes. So we teach other children to communicate with her, take care, pair her during class. Together with our music teacher, she prepares individual performances for the holidays and loves to perform with everyone. Younger children come up on their own, take her hand, say: "Let's go!" The elders take care of. If a child asks questions: “Why does Masha behave this way? Why is she silent or screaming, or does she not play like other children? ”, We try to explain that we are all different. One likes one thing, the other another. This can be explained by the example of different nationalities: here someone speaks English, and someone speaks French, someone has light skin, and someone has dark. It's okay to be different! This is inclusion. In this, by the way, the lessons of social intelligence are very helpful.
- How do you feel about publicity? Now many mothers start blogs where they write about their special children.
- Everything is very individual. While the child is small, this may be justified, but in the case of adolescents, the question is very complex and controversial. Many people observe a girl with Down syndrome who has become a model, they say how brave she is, but few will say that she is beautiful. And there will always be people who will write nasty things in the comments. Will it do her good? Alas, very often parents strive for publicity not for the sake of their children, but for their own sake.
For a long time I did not talk about my son and his problems. It was very difficult at first. And when she accepted the situation, she began to comment very briefly and with restraint. This corresponded to the request of my child, who himself wanted to be better understood and taken into account with his peculiarities. Now the situation has changed again, because his personal request has changed. I recommend that parents be extremely careful when promoting their children with special needs so as not to harm them. Although it is still necessary to share experience. I want to write a book about my son. Perhaps my experience will be useful to other mothers who find themselves in a similar situation.
- What will you write about?
- All the years I kept a detailed diary. I wrote down everything that happens there, even the microscopic achievements of my son. I was his radar, which received information in the world and transformed it into a form accessible to him and transmitted back signals. Each of his achievements was significant, for example, he learned how to put on socks - for a child with autism, this is a victory! This means that we are moving forward. When a child is not able to imitate, the adult's task is to give him knowledge even about elementary things through learning. To teach! This is a very difficult and slow process. When my son was 9 years old, the youngest was born, and I had a completely different experience, I call it the experience of healthy motherhood, so I have something to compare with. I think my book will be about the period of early childhood, before the birth of my brother. I remember once we had dinner with him, and the youngest son was sleeping in the next room. And so the son says: “Mom, how good it is that I am! Now Petya is still small, he does not realize it. And I already know that I am! " Just a biblical truth in the mouth of a child! At such moments, you experience happiness, and the illumination and presence of God is near.
- How not to be discouraged when everything is not going as well as we would like?
- It's hard to say ... To love a child! When you love, you accept him as he is. The moments of happiness that you experience next to a sick child can hardly be overestimated. All mothers know this - and babies with autism, and with Down syndrome, and simply with physical illnesses. There is so much purity, light, vitality in these children ... When you resist with all your might, you think: “I’ll do this, and the child will recover, the disease will disappear somewhere,” then sooner or later bitter disappointment comes. Because nothing is going anywhere. But this does not mean that you will not be able to be happy.
Foreword
This is the story of four years of life of an autistic child in our family. He was born in another house, his parents never refused him, but could not help him. My wife suggested: maybe we can do it? We have three grandchildren, the same age as Andryusha, who live with us. Natasha herself (a professional and experienced biologist) for the last twenty years, in one way or another, has been taking care of children - both her own and her grandchildren, and ran something like a small kindergarten right in our house. I have experience, I could try with Andryusha.
I want to tell you what has been and what has not been (to date) done for him. The fight for Andryusha was not over, but even on the first day of his appearance with us, we did not know if we could help him, did not know for all four years whether the next step in his development would be successful. We do not know now whether he will be able to overcome the difficulties he is facing. Will he ever be able to enter a full-fledged social life? Or is he facing the fate of one of those who have not coped with the problems of becoming? We cannot know the answer to this question.
But before starting a detailed story about Andryusha, I want to tell you about another, earlier case of my contact with seriously ill children. For me, this is like another link in one chain, and what I now learn from communication with Andryusha is a continuation of what I learned before from communication with those sick children. About seven years ago I happened to visit a psychiatric dispensary for children with severe congenital or early acquired pathologies for a year or two. These were children with hydrocephalus, microcephaly, Down's syndrome, cerebral palsy, etc. The overwhelming majority of them were abandoned by their parents. The children were practically incapable of intellectual development, were in a state of deep idiocy, and also had many other organic diseases. With serious care, they could hope for some minimal prospect, more for adaptation than development. In most cases, they were unable to utter a word, and their lives were short.
And now, looking at them, I clearly understood that the soul and intellect are not at all the same. They were living children, they had a living soul. Sometimes she shone directly in their eyes. One girl of 13-14 years old was called Ira, her face and body were disfigured, degenerative, she could utter in a rough voice, like a cry, only “mom” and for some reason “alibaba”, and her eyes were beautiful, you could talk to her eyes. She needed communication, and all these children were in dire need of attention. From human attention, the presence of affection, they began to physically grow, that is, literally in length (the children were recumbent, crawling at best, and were always not small for their age). Ira's soul shone from her eyes, and the lack of intelligence was no longer so important for communication.
Another boy was named Sasha. He was nine years old, but in size he was like three years old. It seems that he had microcephaly, and his arms and legs were completely crooked. They explained to me that his mother wanted to get rid of the child and was tightly tightening her stomach. She did not get rid of the child, but even in the womb she mutilated his arms and legs. Sasha did not know how to say a word, but with his eyes he followed what was happening in the ward, and with him it was possible to play simple games like "sweethearts". He could rejoice, smile, laugh. One of the Orthodox women who looked after him once told me: “I often think about his mother, where is she, what is the matter with her? After all, somewhere she is and probably has long forgotten about Sasha, but he, now, lives ... I often watch him. Sometimes something appears in his face that seems to me - Sasha sees angels ... ”After a pause, she added:“ We, because of our sins, still do not know where we will be, but the Mother of God with people like Sasha… ”. (Two years later, Sasha died of pneumonia).
I made this digression in order to say: there are two measures for a person, a child: one is earthly, the other is God's, and they do not coincide. Intellectual inferiority, inferiority does not mean inferiority of the child in that second, main, sense. I object to those who see only inferiority in a flawed child, thinks: it would be better if he was not born at all. This position is often found even among believers. Reflections after visits to the dispensary strengthened me in the idea that life has other dimensions besides the generally known ones, and we often lack sensitivity to see this hidden life of another person, an adult or a child.
All this has to do with Andryusha.
So it’s wrong to think that parenting is all about a skill competition. But it is also wrong to say that abilities mean little or nothing. This is obvious: in illness, the inner radiance of the soul of a mentally and intellectually deprived person can be manifested. But normally a person, like everything in nature, is called to flowering and fruiting, and to grow himself in this process. A soul that cannot be heard in illness, has not made its way to a meaningful expression of itself, is a misfortune deeper than physical illness, paralysis of the body. Communicating with Andryusha, thinking about questions that I probably would never have thought about without him, I came to the conclusion that a sick child knows more about himself than he can say, knows even when he cannot say anything. He knows how to discern his life, either full of strength, or devastated by illness, and in this latter case, to know that life has remained, as it were, an ungrowned seed.
Wordless children, like the same Ira or Sasha, still somehow know about the vocation of their life and that a catastrophe has occurred. In a sick child, there is enough depth to know about himself that which the parents do not suspect of them and that is practically not projected onto the external life or at least onto his own self-consciousness.
And this also applies to Andryusha. I think a lot of his autism when he came to us was due to a sense of failure. But more on that later.
For four years we have been living and studying with Andryusha, not knowing the future, not knowing whether we will be able to take the next step in its development. Sometimes it seemed that the ceiling was reached, but then the ceiling was overcome, the next step was taken. However, he was always not what we would like (based on the standards of the norm). This means that the problems were never completely resolved, they dragged on and dragged on for Andryusha for months and years. But time passes, a lot of time, and Andryusha's state turns out to be completely different from what it was before. And at the same time, I repeat, not a single problem has been completely resolved. Perhaps this is the “normal” development of the “special” (sick) child? As the monks say about the spiritual life: “between fear and hope” - between success and failure. This is our position now.
At the end of the preface I will add: we could not see much in Andryusha in time due to our unpreparedness. We didn’t know what to look for, we didn’t have any problems with the next step. This is the price to be paid for unprofessionalism.
Andryusha
Andryusha appeared in our house in December 1998. His father and aunt brought him. Andryusha was four years and three months old.
Our grandchildren saw their comrade and ran to meet him. But Andrei did not seem to see them and went through their formation into the room. There was no pathology in his face, on the contrary - a handsome, intelligent boy. Only his gaze was hard to catch. And he walked, slightly tucking his left leg, slightly on tiptoe, and slightly tilting his head forward and to the side.
The children ran up again. He was like the eldest among them. Eagerly they began to say something. And again they failed. Andryusha both “did not see” them, and “did not hear”. He took something out of his coat pocket, not paying attention to the speech addressed to him. Then, when he was undressed, he looked around in an unfamiliar apartment and began to walk around it around the perimeter, carefully examining the walls, almost sniffing: just like an animal does when it finds itself in a new place for the first time. We were anxious to see if Andryusha would do something that would make his presence in our house among small children impossible.
Having finished inspecting the apartment, Andryusha noticed that the children were busy with plastic rugs. The rugs consisted of many multi-colored removable parts, which together formed the figures of animals, birds, etc. These animals and eyes had the form of multi-colored rounds. They also interested Andryusha. He walked past the children who were sitting on the floor around the rugs, went up to the rugs, deftly plucked round eyes from all animals and birds and went with them to the corner of the corridor. He did all this, as if not seeing the children, completely ignoring them, and in silence. The children were outraged, but we said: he is a guest, let him be. Besides, he only seems big, like Zhenya. But in reality he is small, like Katya (she was one and a half at the time.) He does not understand. Therefore, he does not play - he does not know how to play yet. This is how the salutary deception about Andryusha's age was born, which simplified the perception of children. The children understood - small. There were no more complaints against Andryusha.
Andryusha sat down in the corridor, facing the corner, with his back to everyone, and began to play with his prey. The game consisted in taking turns taking rounds, bringing them close to his eyes, examining them and putting them aside. He took another and did the same with it again. So he sat, not moving, for an hour, all the time while the women were preparing dinner.
Meanwhile, the child's aunt instructed us: he does not drink water, does not drink tea, does not drink anything at all, except juices. He categorically does not eat soup, he can eat a cutlet, but in fact he only eats yogurt, and some kind of special, German one, which can be bought in Moscow in such and such a store in the center. The situation with washing is bad. They refused to wash it for a long time. The last time they washed them by force two months ago. He is afraid of washing up to hysterics. But not washing, but simply washing it is difficult. Hands still somehow, but the face is impossible ...
I went to call the children to the table. I also called Andryusha. He didn't budge. I went over and called him again. He could not help but hear and he knew his name, but he continued to go about his business just as quietly. He will look for a long time at one circle taken from a plastic rug, turn it before his eyes and put it aside, take another. Suddenly he got up and went to the kitchen.
They gave soup. Indeed, he refused the soup, that is, shook his head, waved his hands, squealed, jumped off the table, began to jump. Then he said “drink, drink,” and pointed to the bottle. But they poured him not from a bottle, but tea. And again he waved his hands, jumped - refused. I drank the yogurt and ate the cutlet. And again he went to the corner of the corridor to examine the round pieces. He sat with his face against the wall, and did not turn around for a long time.
When the family got ready to leave, got dressed, began to say goodbye (a step away from Andryusha), he did not turn his head. He knew and heard, but it didn’t seem to concern him. The relatives left, - it seemed, did not notice it. And there was a four-year-old child among strangers in a strange house, to which he was brought for the first time three hours ago.
Finally Andryusha got up, again began to examine the apartment, entered the room in which his son was working on the computer, stood for a long time, watched, but aside, not approaching anyone, not mingling with anyone. We quietly looked at him. His face is correct, beautiful, his expression is intelligent, only a little motionless, too calm. He never seemed to remember his parents.
Suddenly I noticed Katya. Precisely before that he had not seen her. She was one and a half, she clumsily walked along the corridor. Before her, he was a giant. He approached Katya from behind, with a blissful smile, he grabbed her with his bent hand under the chin by the throat, by the neck, and thus dragged her by her head along the corridor, face up. At the same time, he himself smiled with his slightly frozen smile, and Katya began to turn blue. Fortunately, we were close, and the captive was released. We did not see any aggression in Andryusha. It was only attention to Katya, she was the first of us to receive it. Natasha and I had to seek his attention for a long time.
Early Childhood Autism (EDA), or Kanner's Syndrome
There is an extensive literature on child autism. We will restrict ourselves to information from several articles.
O.S. Nikolskaya in her article “Problems of Teaching Autistic Children” characterizes children's autism as a special disorder of the child's mental development, in which the possibility of his social interaction with other people and the entire system of communication with them are severely affected. The peculiarity of the violations is such that they are inexplicable by the lack of intellectual development of the child. At the same time, the most striking manifestations of autism are: stereotyped behavior, consisting in the desire to preserve the usual living conditions, in resistance to the slightest attempts to change anything in them, as well as in the stereotypic nature of the child's own interests and actions and in his addiction to the same objects. Violation captures all aspects of the psyche (sensory, perceptual, speech, intellectual, emotional). In this case, the child's mental development is disturbed, delayed, and distorted. The incidence of RDA is about 20 for every 10 thousand children.
In the reference book "Pediatrics", ed. J. Gref describes the criteria for diagnosing RDA as follows: “The diagnosis is made on the basis of the following symptoms:
a) Aloofness, isolation (the child does not look into the eyes of the interlocutor, does not distinguish between people, does not smile, avoids physical contact).
b) Violation of speech (misunderstanding, echolalia, incorrect use of pronouns), difficulty in communication.
c) Rituals, insistence on uniformity.
d) Onset of the disease before the age of 30 months ”.
The severity of signs can vary widely, some of the signs may be absent.
VV Lebedinsky in his article "Distorted mental development" writes that autism manifests itself in the absence or in a significant decrease in the child's contacts with others, in his withdrawal into himself, into his inner world. The content of this inner world depends on the level of the child's intellectual development, on his age, on the characteristics of the disease. The weakening or lack of contact extends to both loved ones and peers. At home and in the children's team, the child behaves as if he is alone or “near the children”. His reactions to the environment, his acting are stingy, and in severe cases are limited to a poor set of stereotyped movements and facial expressions. Emotional resonance even with close people is absent, coldness and indifference to them are not uncommon. And at the same time, such a child is often fearful and vulnerable.
One of the leading places in the formation of autistic behavior is occupied by fears. Ordinary objects and phenomena (toys, household appliances, noise of water, wind) can cause a constant feeling of fear. The world around us is filled with objects that the child is afraid of. There are more complex forms of fears: fear of death and at the same time fear of life. Anything new evokes a feeling of fear and is therefore rejected. There is a desire to preserve the usual status, the invariability of the environment. A change in habit can trigger violent anxiety reactions.
Autistic fears distort the objectivity of the world. Children perceive the surrounding objects not as a whole, but on the basis of individual affective signs.
The intellectual activity of sick children is autistic. Games, fantasies, interests are far from the real situation. For years, children have been playing the same game, drawing the same drawings, performing the same stereotypical actions (turning off or turning on the light or water, stereotypically hitting the ball, etc.). Attempts to interrupt these actions are unsuccessful. And even at the age of 8-10, games are often manipulative. At the same time, autistic children prefer non-play objects in their games: sticks, pieces of paper, etc.
Mental and intellectual development of an autistic child goes with great difficulties. He is hindered by a deficit of mental activity, violations of the instinctive-volitional sphere; sensory impairment; disorders of the motor sphere; speech disorders. The deficit of mental tone is especially characteristic.
The speech of an autistic child develops with great difficulty. Sometimes during the second year of life, the child pronounces from five to ten (or more) single words, uses a short time, then stops using them. This is evidence that in autism it is not speech that is impaired, but the child's ability to grasp the content of speech. The repetition of words over and over again does not lead to progress, the child stops using them, since he cannot understand the purpose of their use. Many children with autism remain non-speaking and unable to understand speech after this stage. About half of people who have ever been diagnosed with autism never master spoken language and remain mute in practice. The other half of the children begin to mechanically repeat what they hear from others. This phenomenon of mechanical repetition of what the child heard is called echolalia. It is also inherent in ordinary children. But they quickly get through this stage. Among autistic children, echolalia persists for months and years.
The difficulties of social development in the third year of life become evident. The child seems uninterested in other people, and especially in other children. He communicates with people only to get what he wants from them. Some children with mild autism may stand in the center of a group of children and still be surrounded by a strange “aura of loneliness”.
The child's gaze is strange, does not change direction, is not directed at things and at the actions taking place. Often an autistic child avoids looking other people in the eye. But even if this does not happen, and he looks into the eyes, his gaze is not as “alive” as in other children.
The nature of autism and its causes are not fully understood. The discoverer of this disease, L. Kanner, saw a special painful condition in the RDA. Another early researcher of autism, G. Asperger, saw in him a pathological structure close to psychopathic. Some RDA researchers bring it closer to diseases of the schizophrenic circle with unexplained mechanisms of hereditary pathology.
Others see its connection with the pathology of pregnancy, with lesions of the child's nervous system during the period of its intrauterine development. A significant role is assigned to the chronic psychological trauma of the child in the first years of life, caused by disturbances in his emotional connection with the mother, her coldness, despotic pressure, and so on.
Previously, it was assumed that children with autism have a “rich inner world” into which they withdraw from the outside world, and have imaginative abilities, sometimes exceeding the level of normal children. Quite often the reason for this assumption was the clever expression on the faces of autistic children. Over the past two decades, researchers in childhood autism have agreed that people with autism are largely limited in their imaginations.
Van Krevelen writes that in relation to people with autism, questions often arise: “Why do they do this or that? Do these strange activities? ”. A weighty answer, in his opinion, is the following: "This is the only thing with which they are very familiar and know how to do it."
"I am deeply convinced that Kanner's autism is associated with organic damage to mental life, with its central disorder, the essence of which is not always known."
The prognosis for children with profound autism is dysfunctional. Most of them, without mastering any language and any activity, remain incapacitated until the end of their lives, replenishing the ranks of those who suffer from oligophrenia.
Two families
Andryusha was born second in the family for both father and mother. From the first marriage, the mother has two children, one of whom has mental problems unknown to me. The father has a healthy daughter from his first marriage. Father is a mathematician, the author of several books. The mother is currently a housewife. Both denominations are Orthodox, married. In addition to Andryusha, the family has two more children from the same marriage, Marina and Tolya, both younger than Andryusha.
Andryusha is the eldest of the children from this marriage. Only after the birth of two more children, Marina and Tolya, it became clear that Andryusha had serious developmental problems. By the age of three, he had not spoken, he stopped acquiring new knowledge and skills, strange behavior, phobias, hyperconservative habits, and stereotypes appeared.
This is how a friend of his father, a professor at the Russian State Humanitarian University, who saw him in the spring of 1998, when the child was 3.5 years old, describes Andryusha.
“It was a terrible, painful sight. Any child, any living creature, an ant knows why it exists. Andryusha did not know, he was burdened with himself, did not understand what to do with himself. Wandered around without a goal from corner to corner, did not play. It was obvious that he was wildly boring to himself. I was scared to see such a child. Andryusha would close and open doors, climb somewhere without a purpose, then go to adults, demand that he be given something tasty (the only purpose of life), constantly whining. The pissed off father spoke; "Do you want spanks?" Andryusha lagged behind for a short time, then everything resumed. This impression of mine was so vivid that I often spoke about it to my students. A child's development consists of many links, the loss of any of them destroys the entire chain. "
In the literature, as seen from the previous chapter, there are three hypotheses about the factors contributing to the development of autism. And all three influenced Andryushin's development.
The first is an unsuccessful heredity, possibly received by Andryusha through the maternal line. This is evidenced by the already mentioned half-brother who has psychological or psychiatric problems and lives separately from the family.
The second is the trauma received by Andryusha at the last stage of intrauterine development. The umbilical cord has wrapped around his neck, and in the past month, according to doctors, his brain has been undernourished. After birth, it seemed to flatten out. But at the age of three Andryusha did not speak.
The third reason, which could not but affect, is the peculiarities of his mother, who did not know how, and it seems, has not yet learned how to communicate with her own children. Those who have visited their home talk about the ideal order, which is maintained by the efforts of the mother. Neatness, cleanliness are elevated to the principle of life. Disruption of order is perceived as a tragedy. The mother also fulfilled the duties of caring for children in an exemplary manner: she fed, washed, changed diapers ... But she did not talk to them, did not communicate! That is, she did not talk and did not communicate in the sense in which only a mother can talk to her child. The mother introduces the child into the world of complicity and empathy, the resonance of souls, on the energy of which all the cognition and teaching of the child by adults is later based. This unity of the mother's soul with the child's soul, which continues even after the umbilical cord was broken, was not in Andryusha's life. It was like this: the mother silently fed, changed diapers, left the room. The child was left alone, they no longer approached him. In the evening, his mother changed his clothes, washed him, sent him to bed - in silence! And so the child lived with his mother - in isolation, in a lack of communication. The mother loved her son in her own way, but did not know what it meant to communicate with him. During my parents' stay in Moscow, I saw myself how she was lost, shy, being left alone with her children. It seems that she herself was raised in a family where there were similar problems, and this, as it were, was inherited.
Thus, Andryusha's genetics, and the problems of intrauterine development, and the lack of communication in his own family - all could contribute to the development of autism in him.
Andryusha was three years old when he was diagnosed with RDA. The reason for going to the doctor was the lack of speech. Andryusha never spoke, except for a few vague words. In addition to the lack of speech, there was also a lack of understanding and an impossibility of communication. At the age of three and a half, Andryusha wrote during the day, did not know how to dress, for example, just put on his pants, and at four, when I saw him for the first time, my father tried in vain from him: “Give me a small spoon! Give me a big one. ”
They have hidden something from us. I got the impression that before the age of two, some kind of development of the child took place, perhaps some words appeared, which later “left”. Perhaps there was some kind of communication with my father. In any case, he once threw down the phrase that he once felt his son, and kept expecting that he was about to speak, and then it would be possible to study with him, as his father understood: to tell, read books ... But the child did not speak and began to lose even the skills that he had. Four years later, at the Department of Child Psychiatry of the Academy of Medical Sciences, I will be told that Andryusha has “failed” all the mental functions of the “lower floor,” the first two years of life.
Everything about Andryusha's life in his family is my guess. But in my head something like this happened.
From three to four Andryusha was undoubtedly treated - but how and what did they give? We do not know. Andryusha understood the word "medicine" and ate it with discipline. He easily swallowed even a large capsule, which an adult cannot always swallow. Obviously, he trained for a long time. They also tried to study with him, develop him, for this purpose they took him to some elderly woman-teacher. But it was all in vain. From the age of three to four, Andryusha not only did not develop, but also lost the skills that he had before.
To the dismay of the father, the younger children also had problems. They lagged behind in development and clearly tried to copy Andryusha, including his actions and antics. True, the doctors did not find any abnormalities in them, maybe some developmental delay. (Indeed, the children later aligned). Finally, my father could not resist and took Andryusha to Moscow to his sister, an icon painter: let him figure it out, he still lives in the capital. And away from younger children, so as not to adopt antics. Aunt took Andryusha, began to study with him, but her daughter, a student at Moscow State University, fell seriously and for a long time. It was then that Natasha, my wife, invited me to take Andryusha to us.
Our family at that time consisted of eight people: my wife and I, two sons, the eldest was married, he had three grandchildren - we all lived together. There was an amazing coincidence with the children (grandchildren): they turned out to be strictly synchronous in age to the three children of Andryusha's parents. Andryusha was born on September 4, 1994, and our grandson Zhenya was born on September 21. Andryushin's sister Marina was born on January 11, 1996, and our Lena was born on January 12. And Katya was born a month apart compared to Tolya, Andryusha's younger brother. So, leaving his family, he ended up with us among children of exactly the same age. And at the same time, which is very important, in a completely different situation, in a different climate, in a different psychological environment. Here he had to make, no longer by his will, one more attempt to be realized.
The story of our family would not be complete without recounting one episode two years earlier.
Episode with Lena
In the life of our granddaughter Lena, two years before Andryusha appeared with us, there was an episode that, perhaps, has a direct bearing on him. In October 1996, when Lena reached 10 months old, was already getting up and actively moving within the room, Natasha anxiously told me that, in her opinion, not everything was all right with Lena. Lena does not communicate. You can call her, she knows her name and can call herself if she needs it. But no contact arises. The adult fails to keep Lenin's attention. “I told my parents about my concern, but they only laughed,” she said.
We went to the nursery, Lena was crawling on the floor among the toys. Sometimes I got up and moved to another corner of the room. Natasha called Lena. She slid her gaze and went back to her business. Natasha, then I tried to draw Lenin's attention to myself. Indeed, Lena's attention was slipping away. We took her in our arms, showed various objects, rocked her, but she somehow pulled away and immediately went to her occupation, to the chosen toy. She stubbornly did not enter into mutual contact.
The next day Natasha's brother joined our classes with Lena. Natasha managed to convince us of the strange nature of Lena's behavior. I don’t remember the details, I didn’t know that two years later it would affect us again. For about two weeks or a month, we, three adults, could not “reveal” Lena, get her attention to us, and not to the objects of her childhood games. Finally, Lena began to “give in”, for seconds coming into contact with us. The seconds turned into minutes, then into hours. The strange condition was overcome.
However, Natasha maintained throughout the next year that traces of Lena's condition regularly made themselves felt. Over time, Lena turned into a sociable and even overly talkative girl, affectionate, but also easy to cry. However, Natasha still claims that no, no, and she notices in Lena the traces of the past crisis, which are difficult to analyze by the mind, but fixed by intuition. They are manifested not by isolation, not by intellectual problems, but by the imbalance of the child. Either by elements of disinhibition or excessive talkativeness, now by tearfulness for no reason, now by awkward movements, now by adherence to small objects that she is touching in her hands. Or - Lena's inability to just sit or stand quietly, the need to constantly twirl her curl in her hands, sort out her dress and do many other similar movements.
What would have happened to Lena if she had not been helped? Would its strangeness dissolve by itself, or would it strengthen and become a permanent quality? Was Lena threatened with the fate of an autistic child? What happened to her at that moment? I cannot answer these questions.
Life consists of steps that we, old or young, are supposed to overcome. This is the condition of the living norm. During the Lenin crisis, the image arose that by her ten months Lena also faced some stage of formation and development and could not master the stage herself. The aid was timely, the barrier was overcome, and normal development resumed. But could it be otherwise? We did not know then how it was called “otherwise”. The word came with Andryusha.
After my experience with him, this image of a “development barrier” or “step” seems to me even more solid.
First observations
(Natasha narrates, audio recording of January 1999).
My first impressions of Andryusha were like some Mowgli. I first saw him in the house of Olya, his aunt, in mid-November 1998. He was 4 years 2 months old. He made a strange impression. A physically normally developed child walked along the corridor somewhat sideways, throwing his head to the left and on tiptoe. He held his hands stiffly, in fists pressed close to his shoulders. Suddenly he made strange jumps and deftly, in one jump, climbed onto the window. The window was open, and Olya was afraid that he might fall out.
I was shown that he is able to distinguish between card suits. He pulled out a card of the right suit.
Then Andryusha was given a sandwich, and when he ate, he bared his teeth and wrinkled his nose, as dogs do when they are angry, but do not want to bite. I noticed that the child does not look into the eyes, his gaze is detached and kind of glassy. The look is somewhere in the depth, but not stupid or insane. The face is calm, undistorted; at a simple glance, it did not give the impression of a sick person. Normal, handsome and even, I would say, intelligent face.
Later, when he was at our house, I noticed many other things. For example, he never cried, and if he didn't like something, he screamed heart-rendingly, opening his mouth wide and showing his teeth. At the same time, he seemed to be dancing, clenching his hands into fists, jerking them and running to the end of the corridor. There he screamed out loud. This was done almost always only because of food, if he was given “the wrong thing”. Everything else was indifferent to him. And it was precisely the Ohr, Andryusha did not know how to cry. A few days later I asked his father: did he ever see Andryusha's tears? He replied: "No, I have not seen."
Olya warned that Andryusha was not put to bed during the day, because he said: "Everything is ready ... Not ready yet ... Not ready yet." Probably, this is not even his phrase, but what he heard and remembered without understanding. But all these were subtle and indistinct sounds.
Initial state
The purpose of this chapter is to give a more consistent and complete description of the initial state of Andryusha than has been done so far.
Mimicry.
Andryusha's face was correct, without any visible pathology. Moreover, there are photographs in which the expression of his face is found by many to be inspirational. However, it was sedentary, it might seem that it is calm. It was difficult to catch his gaze, in the “inspired” photographs he looks into the distance, and not at the object.
At the table Andryusha, indifferent to everything that was happening around, ate his portion, completely absorbed in this. The children were naughty nearby, children's mimicry and eventful scenes took place (someone crawled into someone else's plate with an elbow, dropped a glass, cried, did not share something, laugh). Andryusha did not react to anything, his attention was on his plate. (One and a half-year-old Katya, who could not speak, with her eyes and facial expressions was everywhere and with everyone.)
Sometimes Andryusha's face was distorted - more often for a scream, fear, sometimes for laughter, sometimes for a grin. In the extreme expressions of mental life, there is always a lack of semitones, which alone reveal its balance and wealth. Andryusha's eyes were not lifeless, they had sparks of feelings and thoughts, but always “in themselves”, rather, potential than realization.
Lack of interest.
If Andryusha had interests, they were hidden. It seemed that he had no interests, in any case, nothing meaningful. Six months later, they brought me to the horse - he seemed not to notice the horse, they showed the hedgehog - he barely looked. The tractor, crane, cars were not interested. A year later, I bought him a children's car, he turned it over in his hands, put it on the sidewalk and left: he had nothing to do with it. He was not only indifferent to everything that had content and meaning, but repelled, denied, avoided everything meaningful. Thus, he avoided all explanation and all understanding. Refused to look at the pictures. In general, I avoided everything that focused and collected the personality, that had purpose and energy.
Another feature is connected with this: Andryusha did not have any search activity. Natasha says about it this way: “He did not have the instinct of cognition, which is already in blind kittens. The kitten cannot stand still, but is already crawling from the boob to the edge of the litter. He is interested in what is beyond the edge, at least one more step. He pokes his nose, tries with his paw, and then whines, calls out to his mother - he’s lost. And those kittens that are interested in what is there, outside the litter, develop better. And those that lie on the mother's belly develop more slowly. And so, as I understand Andryushin’s state, “for some reason, children are born without this basic instinct for the life of any living being - without the instinct of cognition.”
As a first approximation, we can say that Andryusha's interest was in avoiding all interest and goal-setting.
But what remained after the deduction of human social life and children's knowledge of the world was peculiar to Andryusha. In moments of joyful excitement, he could run along the corridor with a squeal and laughter, jump. This is how he met me when I first came to them. With a squeal and laughter, he ran past somewhere on the stairs, perhaps so welcoming the guest. I met my aunt in a similar way when she first came to visit him with us.
Food (in general, pleasures related to the body) occupied a key place in Andryusha's interests. When they gave him cookies, juice, candy, he sometimes shook with delight. He did not grab, did not instantly kill what was given, but circled over him, like a kite over prey or in love with the object of his love. He arranged a sacred service out of food and at the same time a game. He "pecked" the pieces from what he was given, starting with the least tasty, and left the most-most at the end. He ate in a peculiar way. The sandwich could be eaten not from the end, but from the plane, eating holes in it. He ate strictly selectively. What he took from food evoked delight and celebration, what he did not accept - screeching, howling, “dancing” of protest, crawling under the table, running away from the table to the end of the corridor or to the bathroom. And until now, food is one of the strongest hobbies. Here, only moderate prohibitions are reasonable (separation from food of the atmosphere of apotheosis and the offer is not selective, but everything in a row). Only the development of other human values can curb this gluttony.
Food cravings, I think, are compensatory. And an adult, if he cannot realize himself in life and in business, often eats excessively, drowning out his dissatisfaction. Gluttony is normally not characteristic of either humans or animals and indicates a deep dissatisfaction with life. But this passion served in Andryusha's life and a good service - it became our instrument of influence on him. Often there was no other way to make it work other than bait with delicious food.
Speech.
Andryusha's vocabulary at the time of his appearance in our country was, probably, 20-30 words: "sugar", "bread", "juice", "drink", "rash", "give", "more", "everything", “Niki” (this is about myself), “moon” - together with the negative blocks already listed earlier (“nothing”, “everything is broken”, “not ready yet”). He could say "dad", but for a long time he did not say "mom". (Dad was more important.) Andryusha could understand a certain number of words, but he did not use it himself.
His speech was almost always narrowly functional, related to food or other unambiguous realities. They were easily replaced by a gesture. With gestures Andryusha demanded food, water, or rejected what was offered. Gestures made speech unnecessary, and he resorted to it only because not everything can be demanded with gestures.
The speech was “directive”. Andryusha understood only direct instructions, and what he himself said were also commands. (For example, “sugar” did not mean sugar, but a demand for sugar). In addition to commands, he used speech cliches as signs of situations: “nothing,” “everything is broken,” “not yet ready” were indivisible speech cliches, sometimes used for no apparent reason. Sometimes he “got stuck” on some word and pronounced it 5-10-50 times in a row.
There were a few words that had neither the meaning of commands, nor the nature of speech cliches. Usually they meant realities that had no practical meaning, but made a great emotional impression on Andryusha. For example, Andryusha could appropriately use the word “moon”. In general, heavenly realities, which can only be contemplated, but with which absolutely nothing can be done, have always had an inexplicable importance for Andryusha.
Andryusha spoke rarely, usually forcedly, functionally, when he wanted to get something from us. There was no speech-communication. He pronounced the words indistinctly, quietly, with a “dying” intonation that faded away by the end of the word, pronounced without energy and in an unnaturally high voice.
But sometimes Andryusha could start saying something by himself or to himself - a whole stream in which it was impossible to understand a word. These were sounds at a level close to the syllabic babble of a baby. Perhaps it was sound for the sake of sound, without any meaning. Andryusha did not address anyone, he told himself. In other cases, he “got stuck” on some stamp or word, repeating it endlessly.
For us, for a long time, the indistinctness of Andryusha's pronunciation of words remained a mystery, when it was about words, and not about “flow”. Finally, they noticed that he spoke, almost without moving his lips and tongue and barely opening his mouth. Only after that was the method of working on the speech found. It consisted in the requirement to soundlessly repeat our silent facial expressions.
Later, when Andryusha began to respond to the question addressed to him, often his “answer” was only echolal repetition after us, and not even the last word, but the syllable of the question addressed to him.
Nevertheless, it cannot be said that Andryusha did not understand the speech addressed to him. If it consisted in a demand to do something simple, for example, sit down at the table, or give the children candy (this is not right away) - he could understand this. It's another matter whether he agreed to do it.
Communication.
Usually Andryusha did not communicate with anyone. In him there was no sharp denial of people, but there were no points of contact, he did not know how to communicate and did not want to. There was indifference. It seemed, except for two or three people, all were literally the same for him. You say (after three months): “pass the candy to Lena” - he gives it to Katya, Natasha, to me, whoever turns up first. Whether someone comes or leaves - he does not care. He turned to us only when necessary and most often to get food. He actively avoided direct and close contact, especially with children. If he was forced (for example, to participate in a round dance), he would run away at least on all fours. If it was not possible to escape, then completely relaxed the body, did it like “wadded”, “falling over”, “spreading”, crawled to the floor and howled, thus falling out of the situation.
But Andryusha liked to be “in the field of children”, on the periphery of their space. They play in the room, and he is there, but on his own and with his back to them.
Sometimes he could suddenly, for a moment, show interest, get in touch, so that he would immediately fall out of contact. Once, for a candy, all the children had to perform some speech tasks. It was Katina's turn, she answered something, but not very well, and Natasha demanded to repeat it. Katya, on the other hand, believed that she had “done everything,” and reached out with her open mouth to the candy in Natasha’s hand. Natasha hesitated. Suddenly Andryusha, who was sitting next to him, grabbed the hand with the candy and sharply tilted it into Katya's mouth.
It was during the first two weeks of his stay with us.
Fears.
Andryusha gave the impression of a calm child, but he had fears, and there were many of them. I can admit that they were latently pressing on him, and this was expressed by the tension of his hands. And yet, apparently, his numerous phobias were of a local nature and did not create a permanent background. The “middle state” seemed calm. It is difficult, however, to say what happened in the depths. Andryusha's psychic world was deeper and more extensive than what was visible from the surface.
Andryusha was terrified of the metro. He felt it for another 100 meters, and hysterics began with him to the point of frenzy. Therefore, his father drove him only by car. Andryusha was afraid of the elevator. You could only walk to any floor. I was afraid of closed spaces, closed doors. Once, after a year of his stay with us, he calmly sat on Natasha's lap in the assembly hall of Zhenya's kindergarten. Children performed, the hall was full of parents. Far along the diagonal of the hall, there was an open front door through which someone always entered and exited. But this remote door was closed, and Andryusha began to scream.
Andryusha was afraid of incomprehensible household noises. Trumpets hummed somewhere. Someone started drilling the wall three stories higher. At the other end of the yard, a trash can lid slammed open. All this was accompanied by a cry. He was afraid of rain, clouds, lightning, just stars. (But he could be spellbound to watch the moon). I was afraid to walk on an unfamiliar road: stereotypes worked - to walk only the old road. A step to the left, a step to the right - hysteria. I was afraid of some color combinations: I didn't want to go on the bus of the “wrong” color. I was afraid of washing, especially washing my face. Was the latter connected with some painful sensation of his “I”, as if projected onto his face? Do not know.
There were two more fears characteristic of Andryusha.
The first was expressed in an involuntary facial gesture, probably associated with the theme of latent fears. This happened completely unexpectedly. With a small, harmless movement of someone nearby, for example, with an outstretched hand to stroke him or just take something from the table next to him, Andryusha suddenly shuddered with fear. Hands instinctively uterinely flew up over the head with a gesture of protection: to block out. This instinctive, convulsively helpless movement of Natasha resembled the gesture with which in the famous documentary film using intrauterine shooting, an aborted infant trying to protect herself from instruments approaching him.
Finally, in some situations, when, from his point of view, there was some dangerous factor near Andryusha (for example, height, river, etc.), he was desperately afraid of any approaching person, especially an adult. Children, in view of the danger, seek protection from adults. Andryusha was strictly the opposite. On the river bank (in 1999, 2000) it was impossible to get close to it. Andryusha started screaming and ran 100 meters to the side.
For him, man was an additional threat, a zone of the unpredictable and uncontrollable. A person is free, that is, free to do as he wants. How can you know what comes into his head? Andryusha's fear was associated with a lack of understanding of a person, with a lack of empathy, empathy, and reciprocity. Andryusha, apparently, did not know that a loving person can be trusted more than the mechanical stability of the world, than an unshakable stereotype of life. Fear showed that in his world his “I” played an absolutely dominant role: there is “I”, and all others are only external factors of the world. None of the people were the inner reality of Andryusha, and their behavior was unpredictable and threatened.
But the “I” that does not know “others” cannot be a person. It remains some kind of faceless subjective element, in which there is nothing stable, there is no content, it lives in an apparent world.
Maybe Andryusha could not perceive the complex world of people, maybe he did not want to perceive it or could not and did not want to together, but it is no coincidence that the first (incorrect, of course, discarded) image that emerged in Natasha: Andryusha has no soul. (Let us remember how indifferently he reacted to the departure of his relatives, who had left him in our, unknown to him, home. And he did not seem to remember them. It was the same with us. would be unreal). A boy without a soul - this was the first image, immediately, however, rejected. The next was the image of Kai from "The Snow Queen", whose heart froze. Andryusha's trouble was somehow connected with the fact that in his world he was an absolute dominant, and the whole human world seemed like a shadow.
Not knowing people, Andryusha was afraid of them, just as some adults and children who had nothing to do with dogs do not know what to expect from dogs in the next moment, and are afraid of them. Andryusha did not know what to expect from us and from his parents. In the water, he began to cautiously trust himself to me only in 2001 and more calmly in 2002. It seems (and God forbid that it be so), this problem is gradually disappearing.
Games.
Andryusha did not know how to play with children. And how to play if you don’t know how to speak, don’t understand social roles, don’t understand the mimic language and don’t have it yourself? And the games of children, their agility, their spirit of competition and the spirit of communication, the spirit of recognition and learning, which are always in children's games, were alien to him. Andryusha played alone, in himself. He could not build from cubes or legos, nor could draw. His play consisted of looking at isolated small parts, non-functional parts of toys or other things. A year before coming to us, as they said, he could line up a chain of Lego parts in one row. I have never been able to build anything else. By the time we appeared, we were in an active process of curtailing skills, degradation, withdrawal into emptiness, speech narrowed, skills dropped out. I have not built Lego chains for a long time, but only looked at the details.
His parents gave him an electric toy. By pressing a button, it began to move, rotated, blinked, music played. This toy required the skill of pressing a button - and that was it.
What else was Andryusha doing? For hours he could open and close the door, turn on and turn off the light. He loved to climb somewhere high, on a closet, a windowsill and sit, contemplating something on the wall. I could look out the window for hours, but I don't know what he saw there. Perhaps a change in the scenery: a man passed, a car passed, a cloud passed, the light and colors of the day changed. And then, and now, he is the first to notice any changes in this distant background. As if he were the closest plan of his world: not the room in which he is, not the people in it, not what is happening here, but clouds outside the walls, the moon, stars, a plane flying in the distance.
Striving for uniformity.
This was the dominant feature of Andryusha, still felt. The father complained that Andryusha was walking in the same place, walking only along the same road. Trying to change the route leads to hysteria. Andryusha also liked to eat the same food, sleep in the same place, on the same bed. The uniformity extended to clothing. He protested if they tried to put on a new shirt or jacket. It extended to games. His games in themselves are sheer monotony (a thousand times to open and close the door!), But the attempt to draw his attention to something outside his chosen circle of occupations met with staunch protest.
In particular, he rejected looking at pictures.
Pictures.
At the time of his arrival and after a long time, Andryusha did not understand the drawings, in any case, he did not understand any images of the living. He understood the color and shape, but not the image. Perhaps, as an exception, he was able to recognize in the drawing the sun, the moon, the month - these amazing realities of being. Perhaps he could recognize several inanimate objects that were important to him: a painted plate of food, a spoon, a chair ... In any case, he was the first to recognize them (after several months of staying with us). But a year and a half later, when it was already possible to ask him: "What is this?" - he could, at random, completely unpredictable, name the depicted animals or people, regardless of the realism or convention of the image. In the fairy tale "Three Little Pigs" about the same figure of a pig, he could say different things in a row: "girl", "mouse", "chicken". (This is exactly what happened after a year of his stay with us). Obviously, words did not in any way go together with images, especially animated ones. And in life, having a good topographic memory and memory for objects, he confused Lena, Katya, Zhenya for a long time.
In the photograph of his family, which Natasha begged from his parents and by which she immediately began to study with him, he could recognize his father, but not his mother, not his sister, not his brother. For many months Natasha taught him to take photographs and the names of his relatives.
Andryusha rejected pictures. There were only a few episodes that fell out of this rule. He leafed through any book willingly and quickly, but did not look at any pictures. The pleasure was provided by the process of thoughtless paging. But as soon as his attention was drawn to some picture, he strove to hastily scroll further. Pointing to an empty space or to the text, he said: “There is nothing!”. If we returned him to the picture, he tried to close it by force, pushed his hand away, in case of failure he ran away from the book with a squeal.
Perhaps this was not only an inability, but also a reluctance to see and recognize the image, to leave the usual state of dispersion and “collect oneself” on something. In the usual state, there was no room for concentration. In order to teach Andryusha something, at least to button up a button, it was necessary to overcome the “absence of presence” in him every time. This “unwillingness to recognize” the image (and not the inability) can explain why, in some exceptional cases, he could still recognize the image. After two weeks of his stay with us, we witnessed a kind of "dispute" between Andryusha and Lena about whether the moon is drawn in a picture or the sun. “The moon,” said one, “the sun,” said the other. In the end, Lena argued, “The Sun,” agreed Andryusha. “That's right, the sun,” Lena confirmed. But this is an exceptional case both in relation to pictures and in relation to communication. The categorical rejection of the drawings was the norm, as well as the categorical non-communication.
Passivity
- one of the dominants that determine the appearance of Andryusha. In a sense, Andryusha was a “comfortable” child, he never demanded anything (except food) from an adult. He froze over any occupation for long hours, showing no displeasure.
If he hadn't been picked up in the morning, he would have stayed in bed until the evening. Also, for hours he could sit on a potty or with one leg dressed (this is when he already learned to put on his pants). Wherever he was left, he almost immediately found some kind of relaxed position, leaned over somewhere and contemplated - a wall, a ceiling, something else.
Lack of purpose, misunderstanding of situations and passivity are interconnected and interdependent, form a vicious circle. What is primary, I do not presume to say. This also includes the lack of search activity. This is a kind of passivity and, at the same time, a kind of fear: fear of life, fear of knowing what is on the edge and beyond.
Household skills.
It is difficult to talk about them, because they are almost continuous “nots”. Andryusha did not know how to dress - no pants, no shoes, no shirt. He knew how to eat with a spoon, holding it in his fist. But if they didn’t follow him, he willingly lapped his face out of the bowl. I couldn't draw. He could not walk, in the sense that he could not play on the street. A few months before his appearance, we taught him to ask for a pot in the afternoon, and that's almost all ...
The described features and in the aggregate do not give a general idea of the child. He is a living person, an integral personality with all painful anomalies and fragmentation, and is not limited to a listing of properties, especially negative ones. He could be annoying, but you could love him ...