Anonymous wrote:Not all kids with ASD need or get ABA. ABA has NEVER been recommended for my DS with ASD/ADHD by anyone.

You are right however that speech therapy for a MERLD child will look very different than speech therapy for a child whose deficit is solely pragmatics. DS attends a language immersion school, Mandarin/English, has excellent language skills and gets pragmatic speech therapy and social skills classes. He would not be in a dual language program if he had issues with receptive and expressive language in English.

Also, it is hard to imagine a child who has issues with receptive and expressive language NOT having pragmatic speech issues.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think there is one MERLD parent that is attacking ASD kids as nightmares and permanently severely disabled, while there is one ASD parent who insist's that the term should not be used, and points out that MERLD kids will always have some difficulty. There is a spillover effect from the battle between these two. The rest of us should just ignore it.

I am not a MERLD parent (to my knowledge), but my child is difficult to diagnosis and there is no consensus on what she actually has. I am interested in learning more about MERLD because understanding it may help diagnosis and treat her.

The mother was describing her child as a medicated ADHD/ASD kid who had severe needs. Yes, those needs would be a nightmare and instead of focusing on slamming others and pushing her agenda, she needs to focus on her own child.

Anonymous wrote:I think there is one MERLD parent that is attacking ASD kids as nightmares and permanently severely disabled, while there is one ASD parent who insist's that the term should not be used, and points out that MERLD kids will always have some difficulty. There is a spillover effect from the battle between these two. The rest of us should just ignore it.

I am not a MERLD parent (to my knowledge), but my child is difficult to diagnosis and there is no consensus on what she actually has. I am interested in learning more about MERLD because understanding it may help diagnosis and treat her.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MERLD parents are treated horribly on these boards by a few ASD parents. You cannot even tell success stories without these parents chiming in that they will always have trouble...which is in no way a universal truth. They also put out so much information about MERLD. ..even some of the MERLD parents are doing this. MERLD can be a challenging diagnosis...or it can simply correct itself when a child's receptive language kicks in. I know a child who was labeled autistic and mentally retarded at age 7 because his receptive language was in the bottom 1 percent. He ended up going to college on a scholarship and is successfully employed in a demanding job and has a wife and family.

The treatments for MERLD and ASD are not the same. Many of us have found that out the hard way. And we have every right to tell our stories.

I also know of several women who realize they have married men on the spectrum. (I live in a town full of engineers.) These marriages are now imploding because while these very smart men were able to get through enough social communication to land a wife they can no longer maintain the relationships. So the challenges do not end for those on the spectrum either.

MERLD and ASD choose from the same bag of treatments. Your child didn't respond to certain treatments because of her/his specific needs, not because of the diagnosis. It makes much more sense to contrast something like DYSLEXIA and HYPERLEXIA which are neurological opposites based on MRIs. One requires the emphasis on decoding the other requires the emphasis on reading comprehension. The fact that you leap to saying you know autistic engineers who are divorcing because they cannot communicate well makes me think that if you can convince yourself MERLD is a world away from autism then your child will be fine. Just focus on what your child needs rather than making broad generalizations.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NP here.

The vitriol is completely puzzling.

My MERLD kid is now a young adult and a nightmare. Am willing to do an exchange with a parent of an ASD kid.

Aside from that, agree with pragmatics issue. My MERLD kid did not have this. But I could discuss his upcoming Christmas presents with him playing barely five feet away and know that he wouldn't pick up on anything I was saying. That is a receptive language problem. Once he got the gift, he had no trouble at all with all the proper responses.

Or a hearing problem. My child with HFA has receptive delay and expressive delays that are now considered mild, but from an early age if he heard "birthday" and "present" he could hear and process it from across the room and tell you in detail what you said he was getting. He also had pragmatic issues, but was quite able to naturally express joy and gratitude when opening gifts. Pragmatic issues can be more subtle and they are multifaceted. A child with language receptive issues may or may not read non-verbal social cues well, but processing language and expressing oneself accordingly is a huge part of social interaction. If a child has more than a very mild case mized receptive and expressive delay, then there are going to be some issues.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MERLD parents are treated horribly on these boards by a few ASD parents. You cannot even tell success stories without these parents chiming in that they will always have trouble...which is in no way a universal truth. They also put out so much information about MERLD. ..even some of the MERLD parents are doing this. MERLD can be a challenging diagnosis...or it can simply correct itself when a child's receptive language kicks in. I know a child who was labeled autistic and mentally retarded at age 7 because his receptive language was in the bottom 1 percent. He ended up going to college on a scholarship and is successfully employed in a demanding job and has a wife and family.

The treatments for MERLD and ASD are not the same. Many of us have found that out the hard way. And we have every right to tell our stories.

I also know of several women who realize they have married men on the spectrum. (I live in a town full of engineers.) These marriages are now imploding because while these very smart men were able to get through enough social communication to land a wife they can no longer maintain the relationships. So th

e challenges do not end for those on the spectrum either.

Our ASD kids are being called nightmares by (one?) MERLD parent, and who is treating whom horribly?

One fed up MERLD parent gives you back a dose of your own medicine. And you need to be honest with yourself. No parent wants a child to have an autism diagnosis. It is considered to be one of the most challenging situations to the public at large.

Go fuck yourself. Seriously. Not one person on this thread has made sweeping judgments about kids with MERLD and their inherent worth. But autism -- that seems to be your dumping ground of choice. Get out of the SN forum if that's your attitude toward kids with SNs.

Anonymous wrote:NP here.

The vitriol is completely puzzling.

My MERLD kid is now a young adult and a nightmare. Am willing to do an exchange with a parent of an ASD kid.

Aside from that, agree with pragmatics issue. My MERLD kid did not have this. But I could discuss his upcoming Christmas presents with him playing barely five feet away and know that he wouldn't pick up on anything I was saying. That is a receptive language problem. Once he got the gift, he had no trouble at all with all the proper responses.

Anonymous wrote:MERLD parents are treated horribly on these boards by a few ASD parents. You cannot even tell success stories without these parents chiming in that they will always have trouble...which is in no way a universal truth. They also put out so much information about MERLD. ..even some of the MERLD parents are doing this. MERLD can be a challenging diagnosis...or it can simply correct itself when a child's receptive language kicks in. I know a child who was labeled autistic and mentally retarded at age 7 because his receptive language was in the bottom 1 percent. He ended up going to college on a scholarship and is successfully employed in a demanding job and has a wife and family.

The treatments for MERLD and ASD are not the same. Many of us have found that out the hard way. And we have every right to tell our stories.

I also know of several women who realize they have married men on the spectrum. (I live in a town full of engineers.) These marriages are now imploding because while these very smart men were able to get through enough social communication to land a wife they can no longer maintain the relationships. So the challenges do not end for those on the spectrum either.

Anonymous wrote:MERLD parents are treated horribly on these boards by a few ASD parents. You cannot even tell success stories without these parents chiming in that they will always have trouble...which is in no way a universal truth. They also put out so much information about MERLD. ..even some of the MERLD parents are doing this. MERLD can be a challenging diagnosis...or it can simply correct itself when a child's receptive language kicks in. I know a child who was labeled autistic and mentally retarded at age 7 because his receptive language was in the bottom 1 percent. He ended up going to college on a scholarship and is successfully employed in a demanding job and has a wife and family.

The treatments for MERLD and ASD are not the same. Many of us have found that out the hard way. And we have every right to tell our stories.

I also know of several women who realize they have married men on the spectrum. (I live in a town full of engineers.) These marriages are now imploding because while these very smart men were able to get through enough social communication to land a wife they can no longer maintain the relationships. So the challenges do not end for those on the spectrum either.

Anonymous wrote:I think there is one MERLD parent that is attacking ASD kids as nightmares and permanently severely disabled, while there is one ASD parent who insist's that the term should not be used, and points out that MERLD kids will always have some difficulty. There is a spillover effect from the battle between these two. The rest of us should just ignore it.

I am not a MERLD parent (to my knowledge), but my child is difficult to diagnosis and there is no consensus on what she actually has. I am interested in learning more about MERLD because understanding it may help diagnosis and treat her.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NP with an older MERLD DD here. I'm on a MERLD Facebook group, and everyone is kind and helpful. So sad there is so much vitriol here.

Please share the link with OP so that she goes away and stops strafing this board with her bitterness.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MERLD parents are treated horribly on these boards by a few ASD parents. You cannot even tell success stories without these parents chiming in that they will always have trouble...which is in no way a universal truth. They also put out so much information about MERLD. ..even some of the MERLD parents are doing this. MERLD can be a challenging diagnosis...or it can simply correct itself when a child's receptive language kicks in. I know a child who was labeled autistic and mentally retarded at age 7 because his receptive language was in the bottom 1 percent. He ended up going to college on a scholarship and is successfully employed in a demanding job and has a wife and family.

The treatments for MERLD and ASD are not the same. Many of us have found that out the hard way. And we have every right to tell our stories.

I also know of several women who realize they have married men on the spectrum. (I live in a town full of engineers.) These marriages are now imploding because while these very smart men were able to get through enough social communication to land a wife they can no longer maintain the relationships. So th

e challenges do not end for those on the spectrum either.

Our ASD kids are being called nightmares by (one?) MERLD parent, and who is treating whom horribly?

One fed up MERLD parent gives you back a dose of your own medicine. And you need to be honest with yourself. No parent wants a child to have an autism diagnosis. It is considered to be one of the most challenging situations to the public at large.