Stuck in the spin cycle

On the few occasions when my 10 year daughter has asked why her younger sibling is "different" I have tried to give her the somewhat simplistic explanation that the Dancing Queen is just wired a bit differently with some of the wires doing a few extra loops.  I also try to explain it in terms of a computer with her central processing unit being a slightly different model.

And in the lead up to her first school "sleepover" at the end of this week, that extra looping is evident. Particular conversations and the need for reassurance are currently on the repeat cycle with the last (and same) conversation each night being taken up word for word as the first conversation on waking the next morning. 

For some unknown reason, I was lying awake at 5 this morning thinking about those extra loops.  I have learnt at my peril not to underestimate the strength of those loops and while their size and frequency may vary with the occasion on hand, they are very much part of her processing abilities and help define who she is.  While some days I still feel like banging my head against that almost ever present brick wall, because I have yet to fathom how her brain works, I am coming to the realisation that her brain is actually far more advanced than mine. Even if it were not its usual muddled, sleep deprived state, my brain does not have the necessary speed to process all the extra variables she adds into the standard equation. She adds tangents I did not know even existed, let alone would have considered central to the actual answer. And all of these extra variables are then spun around at great speed on that loop cycle until she is ready to process them whether it be later that day, that week or even that month.

Following in my daughter’s footsteps, my mind then did a few loops and sprang back to the days before she was formally diagnosed.  She is the type of child that if you put her in a room with three specialists, you will get five opinions.  The only diagnosis however that I have refused to accept for her is that she is intellectually impaired.  At one point when I was applying for a place for her at a special education development unit on the grounds of severe speech language impairment, I found out that her application had been changed without my knowledge to one on the basis of intellectual impairment.  I think that was one of the few occasions that I did come out of my corner swinging.

Yes, I freely admit to be being a biased and protective mother but I know in my heart of hearts that just because she appears to have a different processing capacity, it does not mean that her capabilities are any less. Even if we do have days when an analogy with a washing machine stuck in the spin cycle appears to be more apt than one with her as a computer.