I'm Not Weird, I'm Just Gifted

Today we read an article by Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez ( http://alisavaldesrodriguez.com)about parents with an extremely gifted kid who was thought to have autism. When I first got the article, I was so excited to read it because I worked with special needs children in high school and love autistic kids. The little boy in the article was believed to be and diagnosed with autism. He was interested in very complex things like sprinkler systems and referred to himself in the second and third person (like Dustin Hoffman's autistic character in "Rain Man" http://www.dvdmg.com/rainman.shtml). Although Alex did show symptoms of the type of autism he was diagnosed with, there were many symptoms that he did not have. The author took him to yet another doctor who realized that he was super gifted, not autistic. Alex had just seemed that way due to bad parenting. The author and her husband never made Alex do anything; they catered to his every want and need.

The article has two arguments that jumped out at me.
1. Just because someone diagnoses your child with something does not mean that that is what they have, so always double check and get second opinions (doctors do know best, though).
2. Parents should not do everything for their children because then kids will not learn to do things themselves, thus resulting in a possible misdiagnosis like Alex.
I was very entertained by the article and wanted to keep reading (partly because I wanted to see what the parents would do or not to next). The article was very successful and got it's point across. I give it an A+!