Temple of geeks

The spouse and I had two rare occurrences last night. We got to go out a few hours by ourselves, and we got to be part of a open forum Q&A with Dr. Temple Grandin.

I had no questions for her I just wanted to hear what she had to say. Most of her answers were plain common sense. The sort of answers that make "normal people" stop and say "Well duh! Why didn't I think of that?"

She describes the way she thinks as putting a topic in Google images search engine. She thinks in pictures. She says there are three types of thinking;
"1. Visual thinking - Thinking in Pictures, like mine 2. Music and Math thinking
3. Verbal logic thinking."

Dr. Grandin warns parents to not stomp out the things their children obsess over. Instead she says to use these things to teach. Find books about it to teach them to read. Find clubs for it to help social interactions and use it to teach turn taking. Turn taking she says is key.

On treatments, Dr.Grandin is conservative, she must have at least three families that claim it was successful and they must answer her defense attorney-like questions. So far chelation and Hbot do not meet her standards. Medications, she says must have the "Wow factor" but she says just a tad too much and the person will feel like they drank 10 cups of coffee or worse.

She says to teach kids career skills and start on it at around 10 yrs of age. She describes Google and Microsoft as "Full of Apsies and Auties that were the lucky ones. The ones who had mentors to give them direction. The ones who didn't have their obsession stomped out of them."

Whether she meant to or not, she had us cracking up. The self proclaimed "geek". I loved the twinkle in her eyes when she described friends of hers (most with Aspergers) that were in Silicon Valley.

Dr. Grandin also told us that studies show that some great composers had aspergers, and Dr. Einstein was most likely autistic.

She told a story about being on an airplane in coach and a couple that made out the whole flight. She confesses she does not "get" or understand all that. She likens it to the reaction her autistic friend has to the conversation of server farms. She tilts her head back, eyes closed, and exclaims "Ahhhhh!"

She says she has the emotional status of a 10 year old boy. As example she tells the story of her being on a construction sight where someone kept stealing the lunches. She can barely stop laughing as she tells about the guys putting dog crap on sandwiches and letting the lunch thief steal it.

When asked by families if there child will ever have meaningful relations (I take it she meant marital relations), she has one answer, "I don't know. Maybe if they find someone with the same intense interests. You have to remember your kid is a geek."

So much insightful information I can't possibly remember to get it all down. She talked about sensitivities, colored glasses and paper for visual processing problems, antidepressants, diets, ABA, speech and OT, manners, and potty training.

During the entirety of the session she spoke of her Mother often. The treatments her Mother used and the people she used as a team. I think it's fair to say that her Mother did one hell of a job.

Then when and why

About a year ago when we were first started with the early developmental program in our state, we were assigned a SC (service coordinator). Our SC was a go getter, she made sure all ducks were in a row and that Connor got every service he needed. She got more hours if needed. She pulled in dietitians, psychologist, local playgroups, and instructed me on how to get services once he turned 3 and the program ended.

As you could imagine SC, in order to get all the above accomplished, was a tad overbearing. She has a teen aged son that had some form of developmental delay and had been in this field for a long time. The result being if you had been to the moon, she had been there twice. If you knew of a treatment, well she may have helped event it, and how nice that the information of said treatment had got around to the lay folk who were not as educated.

My husband loathed her with his very core. I didn't mind her, she had helped tremendously and she was no worse than hubby's first stepmother, AKA Mother-in-law from hell. Unfortunately this was the person to first bring up Wilbarder's brushing protocol.

For those who do not know about the brushing protocol the information about it and the creator can be found here.


When she introduced the idea to us I knew immediately she was not giving it a glowing endorsement as far as hubby was concerned. She describe it as being a very bothersome thing that had to be done every 2 hours and something that her son still liked. I could see the pictures popping up in his head of a grown boy rubbing himself raw all day, every day and having no interest in anything else.


That is in fact what he is afraid will happen. He believes the males in his family have addictive personalities and he may very well be right as one brother is an alcoholic, another addicted to pain medication, and he himself spends way too much time on computer games.

However I am told by the "experts" that the amount of brushing is decreased until it is no longer used at all and the gains are maintained. I am wrestling with either building up a good defense to go back and plead my case with hubby, or else waiting awhile before trying to introduce it again.


I don't care for the idea of chucking the treatment all together. I don't know that it would be paramount to Connor's development, but as I saw a positive effect and it can't cause him harm, I am inclined to believe it should be tried. To say the least I have conflicting thoughts. I wont do it and hide from hubby, I haven't hid anything from him in our 15+ years.


I guess the question I have to answer is; do you ask someone who has only asked not to try one thing, because of personal believes, to change their minds, when the results are not proven?