Asperger s. My grandson has just been diagnosed, he is 3. What is it like, what challenges will he face?

Since he is just 3, the challenges he will face are largely unknown. Every few years the world catches up with how capable people are who live with disabilities. Since his diagnosis is early he will get early intervention services which will hopefully decrease the amount of challenges he faces as he grows older. What he needs most and you can provide is unconditional love and acceptance. Accept him for the person he is, not for the person you wish he would be. When you know you are OK the way you are, you can accomplish so much more than if your selfesteem is tatered by people not accepting you for yneing you. That doesn't meean a child with autism isn't disciplined or told he is wrong, it means that that how he interacts with the world must be evaluated on his terms.

Here's an example I used to give regarding my son who has Down syndrome. He is playing with another child and they are building a structure with blocks. The other child is quite agile. My son is not. My son knowcks over the structure when trying to place a block in a place the other child would know wouldn't work. The structure topples down. The agile child is mad and thinks it is my sons fault. Its not his fault - it is his disability that prevented him from understanding the situation the same. So my son needs reassurance that it is OK. And the agile child needs support for their disappointment.

Google it or go to ask.com and type in Aspergers.

What does this have to do with dating because it's in the singles and dating forum and he is only 3.

I am trying to change it now!!

If you are the traditional age for a grandmother -- anywhere from mid 40s on up -- you know people who have it and never found out. They're a little different than the rest of us. Not in a good way or bad way, but a just-is way.

I believe Bob Dylan has Aspergers. He's a little different from the rest of us, but not because he's famous. (Well, that too, but he was different before he became famous.) His difference is his obsessions. Did you know he has written volumes of songs -- to the point where a set of encyclopedias would take less space then if someone printed all the songs he's ever written? He hasn't recorded most of them, because he doesn't have the time to. One of his friends said everyone would go back to his place for a three day party and Bob would do the same thing all three days -- write out songs at the same table without ever sleeping. And it wasn't enough for him to make it at the Ink Spot. He had to be bigger than that. And it wasn't enough to keep the same music for the songs. He never sings even a recognizable song the same way more than once. Given he's been singing for 50 years now, that's definitely different.

He also borrowed albums from people without asking and couldn't understand why they'd be upset when he never bothered to return their record collection. He simply doesn't get that.

But, that's not the way everyone is who has Aspergers. I believe my older brother has it, except he just turned 60 and never needed to find out, so hasn't found out. He's a bit different though. He had over 200 box turtles he found and kept as pets. He also had roughly 10 snakes at any given time, snapping turtles, paint turtles, saltwater turtles, geckos, horn toads, three-lined salamanders, five-line salamanders, chameleons, gerbil, mice, and rats (to feed his snakes), and a caiman. (Relative to the alligator, but legal to own as pets.) Meanwhile he raised rabbits to sell to pet shops (and feed to his snakes lol), to raise money to feed his menagerie. While the rest of us were playing cowboy and Indians, cops and robbers or Star Trek, he was down at the park minnow fishing (to feed his turtles and snakes. lol) Everything -- absolutely everything revolved around his critters. When he grew up, he lived on his own at the ripe old age of 17, after getting a house to live in from my uncle (who was under the mistaken assumption my brother WOULD keep the house clean to show perspective buyers what a nice A-frame house would look like. BIG mistake. The only people who ever cleaned my brother's house was my grandmother, me, once, and his parade of girlfriends who couldn't take his chandelier was "veiled" in cob webs thicker than fleece.)

Once he had his own place, his menagerie changed. The turtles died out, the snakes went from black snakes and gardener snakes to copperheads and boas. The caiman was free to roam his house. (How to lose a girlfriend in one date. Forget to tell her a caiman might be in the bathroom. lol) And, because now he had to work and feed himself, a pig slightly smaller than a VW Beetle lived in a pen going up to his house. Chickens clucked both on the ground and in trees. (They're too tough if they get to the point of flying in trees. Flying in trees, means they've gone wild. He's still open up his door, point his rifle and shoot one down for dinner, if he had company.) A peacock roamed his land, simply because it flew away from wherever it belonged, and he had good food for it, so it never left. AND three goats wandered away for three days after eating his crop of marijuana, until the second time they did that, and then he ate three goats shortly after that.

Meanwhile, he started a stone mason business, did quite well (to the point of not needing to eat his animals), and he finally got to the point he no longer had to dumpster dive for food. (We didn't know, until he didn't have to either.)

He since bought another piece of ground where he is making his "round house," -- boulder by boulder himself. He's been working on that for 15 years. Last I heard it was shoulder high. He got married, but it was doomed before it started, not because of who he is. (Jehovah Witnesses shouldn't marry agnostics, because you can't change someone's beliefs simply by marry them.)

But notice, he's a bit different, but has also made his way in the world. Think about the people you know -- any a bit different? Sometimes we used words like "a character," or "eccentric," or "odd," but there's always something to love about them and something about them that makes us try to imagine what's going on in their heads. Can you picture that person in your life?

Yeah, that's because "Asperger" wasn't something diagnosed until the last 20 or so years. We just accept them despite them being a bit different. Congratulations. In all likelihood, you're grandson will make you see life in whole new ways. That's a good thing.