Autism and Empathy

For those working with Declan, I have found there is a certain look one gets when talking about him.

One hand goes to their heart. The eyes go puppy dog “aww” like and occasionally the “aww” will actually come out.

(Honestly, to know Declan is to love him).

Recently, I had his parent teacher conference at school. In those twenty minutes, I saw the heart grab, “aww” look about 10 times from his teacher and his special education teacher. Truth be told, I had a few heart grabs as well.

“Declan is very aware when one of his classmates is emotional,” his teacher told me, “he will come to me with a very serious face and let me know if a classmate is crying. Before I can even get to the student, Declan is there rubbing their back and telling them it is okay. Even if it is a classmate he has a hard time with. He is always there to offer support. It is so adorable!”

Three heart grabs around the table. Puppy dog eyes and two audible “aww’s” were emitted.

What a sweetheart!

Now change venues.

A couple of weeks ago we were at an event where there was a moonbounce. Declan jumped and bounced and began to play a version of tag with two other boys.

One of the boys got a bloody nose. I walked the boy to find his parents while he continued to dab his nose with his finger to see if it was still bleeding. Once I had the boy with his parents, I returned to the moonbounce to hear.

“Hey kid, let’s go check on the boy with the bloody nose.”

Declan continued to bounce, eyes to the sky.

“C’mon, kid! Let’s go see if he is okay!”

“Declan,” I intervened, “Stop bouncing.”

Declan’s eyes look to me, “What?”

“Go see if the boy with the bloody nose is okay.”

“I DON’T WANT TO DO THAT. I WANT TO BOUNCE!” Declan shouted and returned his eyes to the sky for some deep jumping.

Where did my empathetic child, who cared so deeply about crying classmates, disappear to?

I thought about Hans Asperger, the child psychologist who originally defined Asperger Syndrome in 1944. Asperger defined a pattern of behaviors and abilities he called “autistic psychopathy.”

From this article, here, “The pattern included “a lack of empathy, little ability to form friendships, one-sided conversation, intense absorption in a special interest, and clumsy movements.” Asperger called children with AS “little professors” because of their ability to talk about their favorite subject in great detail.”

And although a lot of that is true for Declan, one thing his teachers and I can say for sure. Declan is not lacking empathy.

Right?

I began to read articles like the one found here, about empathy – the ability to understand what another person is thinking or feeling.

I don’t know if Declan can identify what others are thinking, but he can identify when another person is upset. He may not know why they are upset, but he understands “sad.”

Why?

Turns out I did something right.

When I read this article here, I found one of the best ways to teach a child empathy is to use visual cues. If you remember, or want to read it again (here), we lived in a visual world when Declan was younger. We had feeling faces all over our kitchen that we would point to label the emotion we were 1. Seeing or 2. Feeling.

Declan learned! (Found this the other day when Declan was trying to tell us something while we were watching TV and we asked him to wait until commercial).

And even now, in his social skills training, he continues to recognize his feelings – which only helps him identify feelings in others!

So why didn’t Declan care about the boy with the bloody nose?

My guess? The boy wasn’t crying. He was just dealing calmly with a bloody nose.

Declan did get off and check on the boy – in complete annoyance. Had the boy been crying, I think Declan would have been more compassionate or empathetic. At least, that’s my guess.

In short, to say a person with autism lacks empathy would be a false statement. Declan is very aware when there is an emotion around him and will come to aid as needed.

He’s a sweetheart!