If a child’s brain with autism spectrum disorder were a home, it would be a noisy place in each room, with very complex wiring and walls very sensitive to any stimulus.
This excess synapse or neural connections in a child’s brain with autism spectrum disorder generate very varied and specific changes in each child, so rarely two cases will be the same.
- It doesn’t matter how much science advances.
- We do not need to know more and more data each year about these disorders of neurological development that affect an important part of our population.
- The lack of awareness.
- The stereotypes and misrepresentations we have of this pathology make us lose much of what knowledge could offer us.
Children and adolescents with ASD (autism spectrum disorder) can behave rigidly and hard to cope, there is no doubt, they can also have a privileged mind or have serious intellectual deficits, despite this enigmatic world in which they usually roam. , suspended in time, we are also surprised at various times by their strength, sensitivity, need and affection.
The families are also very admirable. A tireless love always full of energy that not only fights stereotypes, but also tries to create alliances with the rest of social workers: doctors, specialists, teachers, psychologists and other groups totally dedicated to these children.
Therefore, one way to help them is to better understand this internal reality that occurs within the child’s brain with an autism spectrum disorder, in those minds that, at some point in development, were suspended at a certain point without return. see below.
“I hear you better when I’m not looking at you. Eye contact is awkward. Will people never understand the struggle I face to achieve this?-Wendy Lawson, 1998-
In 2014, Columbia University conducted a very revealing study, whose research data were published in the scientific journal Neuron and explained two very interesting and at the same time very encouraging aspects:
However, we cannot ignore that in addition to this synaptic singularity, there are other associated problems, such as changes in communication between different areas of the brain, characteristics that we will analyze in detail below.
From our embryonic stage and up to about 2 years, an amazing process occurs in our brain: synaptogenesis. At this stage, our brain can create up to 40,000 new synapses per second.
Another particularly striking problem is that of the brain of children with autism spectrum disorders, in this case it is a very relevant and significant structure: the callous body.
Studies such as the one conducted at Yonsei Medical University in Seoul indicate that neuroimaging discoveries are very heterogeneous, it is clear that there are structural and functional abnormalities in the brain development of children with ASD and that they are very important, but what also happens, however. , is that we can rarely see two identical brains.
Currently, there is a lot of research on the mTOR protein and, according to various analyses, this protein would be an obstacle to synaptic size if necessary for the brain to specialize and create stronger neural connections.
However, what we know about this issue today does not give us many conclusions, so what we must do is to continue to delve into the subject and limit ourselves to trying to understand the particular needs of each child, responding in the best way to deal with their personal and unique characteristics.
Fortunately, we have more and more professionals specialized in the subject, concerned about 2% of the population suffering from the disorder and committed, in turn, to the rest of society, so that we can better understand the reality of this part of the world.
Because we must remember that they may seem indifferent and not involved, they may not like us to look at them or even touch them, yet they want to make connections. They need and smile willingly from within that spirit in which they live, which is a noisy and very stimulating world for them.