I have the flu, and I've been up most of the night. So forgive some of my incoherent discussion. I do so hope that my general ideas come across well. Last night Primetime did three stories about three special people. One was Temple Grandin. The coolest autistic adult on the face of the earth. Why is she so cool? Because she is fully autistic still (not as mild or emerged like Sean), she is not a savant, is not retarded, etc., ... she is just purely autistic. She went through college and has doctorates in a few things. She revolutionized the cattle industry and how cows are treated and slaughtered. She is the darling of animal rights people in this regard. If livestock, etc., need better treatment, etc., she is the one to see. She is a great author. She has written several books about autism. A few about cattle. One awesome one about genetics. And now about animals in regard to autistics/her. Sean was interested to hear her latest theory that autistic people can think like animals better than normal people. He agrees with this. He says he feels different from other people all the time because of how he relates to animals. He says it's different then say some of use extra sensitive "animal people" who love animals, adore them, and care for them. He says he can feel what they are thinking and see what they are seeing, etc. Remember my story about him being very agitated about people being "rude" to ferrets one day?? To me, they did not mistreat the animals at all. But when I thought about how they might have come across to the animals, like if they are considerate or .... I don't know, it's hard to describe how they were... no they weren't. But when he said this and I scrunched up my face trying to figure out what he meant, I figured out that he was putting himself in the pets place at the time. He was saying that he could imagine that the animals felt the tones and feelings that the humans were directing towards them even if it wasn't overt and even if they could not understand our words. And it made him mad. I had forgotten all about that episode. As well as many others. I always assumed that some of Sean's past behaviors like strongly objecting to people staring at the ferrets, or at his frogs too long to be related to something else. You see while autistic children develop, they have a great deal of trouble with differentiating self with environment. It's a surreal feeling to now know where your body ends and where your coat starts for example. I figured he was meshing with the animals of sorts. Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't. So why don't we see more autistic people working with animals? In fact, some autistic children are downright dangerous around animals. Is it that some of them don't figure out the connection? Is it that only the individuals that emerge, or stratagize around the autism can reach out with this talent or communicate about it? It's interesting to note, that in past studies ... autistic children tend to ignore an animals presence just as they do a humans in general. However ... they do notice animals more than humans. Neurotypical kids acknowledge humans before or more strongly than animals. NT children notice both humans and animals more than autistics as a whole as you would suspect. One study actually watched how children reacted to several species as well as humans. There were obvious patterns. I so wish I could remember them but I can't. In addition one study was done in England, as I remember, and ferrets were in the mix of animals studied with autistic children. They were recognized more than cats, and two other species. I wonder if it's just something they covet for some reason. Sean doesn't annoucnce this phenomenon specifically. When this was brought up, it was like a relief for him to vent it and talk about it. Maybe he just assumed that we couldn't understand. Or maybe it's just one of those things he couldn't put his finger on until someone verbalized it. I often wonder if this is an obstacle many autistic people have (not being able to put their finger on something to communciate it, or work it out in their mind). Wolfy http://wolfysluv.jacksnet.com [Posted in FML issue 4814]