When Aspergers Kids Long for Friendship

Saying goodbye to his friends in the special needs classroom.
This was the last time he truly ever felt accepted by his peers.

Some days I think my son's High Functioning Aspergers is my imagination.  That's thing about it.  It's not always super obvious.  There will be really great days where I think "Are people right?  Have I just ruined my son's life by pinning this on him?"  Then there will be really, really bad days where I'm shocked by his immaturity, screaming, tantrums, and his emotional breakdowns.  He's 10 years old and my 9 year old son acts waaaaay older than him.  Even my 7 year old acts older.  Sometimes I wake up to him crying about a video game and pacing.  I will have to take the controllers and put them up till he calms down.  It usually takes about an hour.

I'm in the middle of reading Lonely Girl, Gracious God and it makes me tear up almost every single chapter.  It's about a mother's journey of raising a daughter with Autism but not finding out exactly what was going on till years later.  The feelings fear, doubt, disbelief, loneliness, sadness.  Although what she has went through is 100 times harder than what I've experienced, I guess I've cried so much reading it because on some level I can understand. You JUST want the best for your kid.  A normal life with good possibilities and stability.  Is that too much to ask for?

In one chapter of the book she talks about her daughter's loneliness and wanting friends.  That part made me cry because I know that's how Chaz feels at times.  Thank God he has siblings to play with him and they are all around his age because I had them pretty close together.  Recently Chaz told me that he doesn't want to be in a mainstream classroom anymore.  He wants to be in a special needs classroom. "What??" was my reply.  WHY?  Chaz went on to tell me that he wants friends.  He has NO friends at all.  Every time he passes by the special needs classroom all the kids know him and shout out his name.  Chaz LOVES it.  That's what he longs for is just acceptance and friendship.  I'm going to tell him yes even though I was so happy my son was in a mainstream classroom the last few years.  I guess my heart breaks a little (a lot) because I know that it's one thing to be in special needs when you're in Kindergarten.  It's another in 5th grade.  Kids are more aware of the differences.  

Chaz wants friendship so special needs classroom it'll be.  Thankfully it's with the higher functioning so Chaz won't regress.  He tends to copy behavior so it's important that he's with kids at his level.