And yet, despite all the variation from person to person, there are some basic conventions, and I’ve noticed that many kids on the spectrum consistently pay a lot less attention to hygiene than their typical peers. They’ll often wear the same clothes day after day, shave less frequently than others, bathe less frequently than others, eschew makeup, not bother combing or brushing their hair, and so on. Many college students and young adults on the spectrum tell me that they just like wearing certain comfortable clothes. Whether it’s a hygiene issue or comfort issue, many people won’t go on a third date with someone who wore the same green T-shirt on the last date. This area may need some work if your child’s hygiene habits are not up to par.
An easy way to stick out like a sore thumb, without even having to say anything, is by looking different from the other kids. Children with social delays often aren’t as motivated to be stylish or are even aware that what they’re wearing isn’t what the other kids are wearing. In fact, when a local residential facility for kids with disabilities took the residents for community outings, they were unmistakable with their mismatched socks, odd clothing, no makeup, ruffled hair—you get the picture.
Never forget that your child’s appearance is the first thing people notice. Clothing is one aspect of that, but you also need to pay attention to haircuts and issues of personal hygiene.
Although it seems a bit shallow even to be writing about this, the truth is that our society has created a climate in which looks, hair, clothes, shoes, jewelry, and makeup are important. Just wait in any supermarket line and you’ll see dozens of magazines shouting for your attention and promising to tell you how to get the latest look. For many teenagers, the images on TV, movies, and the newsstand send out a siren call they find irresistible—for better or for worse. Most children plead with their parents for the latest trendy fashion and there’s some justification for their desire to look “right”: there is plenty of research showing that children who are good-looking get more favorable attention.
Dressing Right
You don’t necessarily have to pick out a whole new wardrobe for your child every other month, but you should ensure that your child isn’t isolating herself with clothing that’s out of date or too young.
Look at what the other kids are wearing. It may well be wildly different from what we’d like them to wear, but your kid needs to fit in, so be open to new styles and fashions (obviously, you don’t need to clothe your child in something you find genuinely objectionable—there are always choices, even in fashion). You can recruit a stylish peer, sibling, cousin, or babysitter to help shop.
Here are some clothing-related problems I have seen with individuals on the spectrum.
One junior high student we worked with was always impeccably dressed in polo shirts, socks that matched his polo, and Top-Siders. Unfortunately, at his school, the other kids usually wore skateboarding T-shirts, white sport socks, and sneakers. He looked more like a member of an exclusive club than a student.
Another student we worked with had a rather beat-up old car, the kind of “first car” most of us started off with. The upholstery on her car was falling apart and she came in every day with little pieces of foam all over her clothes. While this could happen to any of us (or to our kids who usually inherit the almost-dead family car), she never quite seemed to realize that foam was becoming a regular part of her daily attire. Even when she took her clothes off at night, she didn’t notice the foam—or just chose to ignore it—until we intervened with some self-management.
At our clinic, we also worked with one girl with Asperger’s syndrome who wore leggings all the time, at an age and time when none of the other girls were wearing them. Her mother loved to shop and was always buying her new leggings with matching tops—she had no idea they weren’t in style. When we pointed out to Mom that none of the other girls were still wearing leggings, she decided to take another child shopping with her daughter. This girlfriend helped them pick out clothing that was stylish, and the next week her daughter was wearing a pair of jeans and fit right in.
Finally, we worked with one adult with Asperger’s syndrome who wore a pair of black sweats with a white T-shirt every day. While he pointed out that he had several of the outfits—exactly the same, so he wasn’t wearing dirty clothes—nevertheless he always looked the same, and the truth is, it doesn’t matter if you have a dozen pairs of the same pants, no one else who sees you knows that.
So again, encourage your child to look at his peers, check over himself in the mirror, and vary his wardrobe. This will help him to fit in and make a good impression.
Some Solutions:
• Shop with a friend. Sometimes kids on the spectrum just don’t know what’s in style. And while it’s a lovely character trait not to be overly concerned with clothes, if the kids look as if they came out of a time warp, people will get a bad first impression. So we’ve found it helpful to have kids on the spectrum shop with someone their own age.If your child doesn’t have many friends, perhaps you can bring along a friend or relative who has a child your kid’s age. Or find a younger, hipper cousin or neighbor who likes going to the local mall. Or you can call your local school and recruit a student who’s into fashion design. Then just give them some spending money and let them loose at the mall. And remember, don’t be judgmental. If they come home from the mall with a slightly different style than you’re used to, remember that this isn’t about your taste, it’s about what kids are wearing, so as long as it isn’t going to get your child sent home from school, be open to the change.
• Look at magazines. Many kids on the spectrum aren’t all that interested in fashion magazines, but they actually provide a great visual aid for improving fashion skills. Areas we’ve worked on using the magazines include how to match colors, how to pick out popular styles, which clothes work together and which don’t (such as not wearing a winter scarf with shorts), and so on.
• Look at your child’s peers. If you aren’t sure that your child is picking out age-appropriate clothes, notice what his peers are wearing. There are always some particular brands and styles that all the kids wear.
• Look online. It’s easy to punch in “fashion” and “style” and come up with the latest shows in Paris and news stories of the latest trends. Browsing these will give you and your child great ideas from the latest fashion trends.
• Watch TV and movies. TV shows and movies often have stylish clothes. When your child is watching, point out what types of clothes the actors are wearing. If your child idolizes an actor—who knows?—he may want to dress like him.
• Go to a fashion mall or restaurant. Go people watching.Look at what everyone’s wearing and discuss the outfits you see. This may help your child in more than one way. Many kids on the spectrum don’t really pay attention to what’s happening around them and therefore don’t imitate what others are doing. Having your child spend some time being aware of others may help with what she’s wearing—and also with what she’s doing.
• Go through the closet. Do the spring cleaning. Talk with your child about which styles are in and which are out. Talk about what goes together and how to match colors. And then have him figure out what matches on his own. It may be fun and will certainly help the tidiness of your house or apartment.
• Sort through your child’s wardrobe regularly. Kids will often continue to put on the tried-and-true clothes that show up on top of the pile after the laundry’s done each week, even if the clothes have become too tight, too unstylish, too babyish, or too torn and stained to look good anymore. I know one mom who noticed that certain items didn’t fit when her son wore them and tried to point it out to him, but he insisted they were fine. So she simply made them “disappear” the next time she did the laundry. At the same time, she put some other items—newer, more stylish ones—at the top of the drawer piles and he was soon wearing those just as regularly.
• Mount a daily checklist to make sure everything matches and is put on properly. See th
e section on hygiene in this chapter for more on this.
Hair
In most ways, hair styling is comparable to the issues of clothing and you should be able to use some of the solutions we’ve just outlined. Just as you don’t want your child to be wearing clothes that are out of date or dirty or unkempt, you don’t want to send your teenager out in the world with a haircut that is clearly a mess or so inappropriate for her age that it’s going to raise eyebrows.
For example, one middle school boy we worked with always wore his hair in an unstylish bowl cut. When our clinician trimmed it a bit and taught him how to gel up his hair he looked adorable—and much more like other boys his age. It was an easy fix, but it made a world of difference in how the other kids viewed him.
Hair is of course an easier thing to deal with than clothing, because you can give your child a simple, classic cut on a regular basis and be done with it. At any age, a girl can go out with clean, brushed long hair or a ponytail and look fine. (For help with the “clean” part, see the hygiene section on page 317.) And as long as you can drag your son to the barbershop once every couple of months, you can probably keep him looking fairly decent. Plenty of teenage boys do have overgrown, slightly wild hair these days, so even that’s OK. What’s not OK is the babyish cut, as the boy had in the example we gave above, or noticeably greasy, flaky hair.
If your child hates having his hair cut, you may want to consider a desensitization program, which we describe how to implement in Section I, Chapter 2.
Makeup
Girls in middle and high school wear a lot of makeup these days—more even than college students or young adults. There are always exceptions, of course—it’s hardly a requirement—but you may want to talk to your daughter about wearing a little for special occasions, like school parties or commencement. We worked with a college student who never wore makeup and didn’t seem to care about it at all. Years later she visited to say hello and had a dozen or so long and unattractive whiskers on her chin and still no makeup. Another high schooler we worked with never wore makeup. One day before a school performance her mom spent hours helping her apply makeup, but when she got to school she immediately ran to the bathroom and washed it all off. When her mother got to school she was horrified to find that her daughter now looked like a raccoon, with dark mascara smeared all around her eyes.
Again, teaching your child to use a little strategically applied makeup can help her fit in and look like her peers.
Putting this into action might be another opportunity for a fun outing or get-together with a peer: invite a potential or current girlfriend to go with you and your daughter to a department store to play makeover at the cosmetics counter. Or you could have the friend come over to your house, where you’ve set up an appointment with one of those women who sell cosmetic products directly to the customer. You can turn either event into a game of makeover and, afterward, buy both your daughter and her friend little gifts of cosmetics—your daughter will then have something you can urge her to use for special occasions. She’ll have a chance to make a connection with a peer and be more prepared for those special events.
Hygiene
We once worked with a college student who refused to shave or wash his hair. Although he was very nice looking, his grubbiness really turned off the college girls. It took us a while to get him to understand how others might view him, but as he became better at socializing (we worked with him using many of the interventions described in Section II), he came to realize the impression his poor hygiene was making on others and began to change his habits.
Unfortunately, this isn’t an uncommon problem for teens and young adults on the spectrum. Their social delays, general absence of self-consciousness, and maybe just a lack of interest lead to a real obliviousness when it comes to the area of hygiene. While they’re still young enough for their parents to dictate and watch over their daily regimens, there’s no problem, but once those same kids are getting up and ready for school by themselves, or eventually, getting ready to go to work, that obliviousness can cause real social problems. No one wants to work in the cubicle next to someone who forgot to use deodorant, and any potential romantic interest will be turned off by someone who shows up for a date ungroomed and poorly dressed.
Fortunately, it doesn’t take a lot of effort to turn things around in this area. Here are some suggestions:
Checklists
Checklists have been a great help for our older kids and adults who have been neglecting their daily hygiene. With checklists, you can target the individual problems. If your child just forgets to wash her hair, but is pretty responsible about other hygiene areas like brushing her teeth and washing her face, you can target just that area by making sure she checks off “wash hair” every morning (or evening, depending upon the routine you want to establish).
If your child is more forgetful and often doesn’t even remember to change clothes on a daily basis, let alone follow through on each morning’s many grooming steps, you can create a much more extensive checklist. For example, you could make the following list and have your son check off each item on a daily basis before going out the door:
❍ Shower
❍ Shave
❍ Put on a new shirt
❍ Put on different, clean pants
❍ Make sure your socks are clean and match
❍ Take one last look in the mirror to make sure there’s nothing on your face and your clothing looks clean
Depending on your child’s level of self-reliance, age, and living conditions, you could either check the list for completion before he leaves in the morning or have him self-manage by checking it himself. If you are checking it on a daily basis, try to fade that support by checking only every other day after a while and then every third day, and so on, until he’s completely self-managing. If it helps the self-management, he could give himself a reward after a certain number of days of remembering to do everything before leaving.
We find it helpful to keep these lists somewhere near where the habits should take place, like a bathroom mirror or on the inside of the front door so our clients can check it on their way out.
We worked with one girl who wore her pants so high that her classmates made fun of her. We wrote out a checklist that reminded her to look in the mirror and orient her pants correctly. We also included other tasks she was likely to forget, like looking in the mirror after breakfast to make sure she didn’t have any remaining food on her face (more than one time she went to school with egg on her face, and I mean that literally). This successfully helped her to pay attention to small neglected hygiene areas on a daily basis. As you can see, using the checklist allowed us to individualize the program to her specific areas of forgetfulness. While you will probably need to help create the initial list, your goal is to have your child ultimately keep track of the things she needs to do before leaving the house, all by herself.
ANDREW
I actually worry a lot about the way I look. I worry about the way I look because I feel that if I look bad, people would make fun of me and not want to hang out with me much. When putting on my clothing, I do not really care about what I wear each day and just choose what I will wear randomly. When I am searching for clothing, I am normally with my parents. I like to search for clothing that other kids my age would wear every day, like ones with skateboard or surfing logos or ones that represent movies I like. I also care about if it fits, because I really feel uncomfortable in small clothing (especially tight pants), but I also do not want my shirt to look like a dress if it’s too big. I really care about looking good every day and want people to like what I am wearing, unless it is just ripped pants.
I also care about how my hair looks every day. I have curly hair and comb it after I shower because I do not want it to look like an Afro (a Jewfro as a nickname). Whenever I am getting a haircut, I really care about how it looks. I do not like to get haircuts that people would think are too dorky. Whenever I want a haircut, I like to search f
or barbershops where workers are nice and let me decide what kind of haircut I want without bossing me around about how it should look. I also absolutely hate it whenever my parents like to jump in and help me decide what haircut I should get, because I want it to be only my decision. Whenever I have to decide what haircut I should get, I always like to look at other people from my school or from Internet pictures to see what kinds of cool haircuts other people have. I tend to like to get haircuts that are slightly long, but that change the way my hair looks (such as a surfer hairdo, or like some guy from a rock band, and so forth). I also like to look at other people’s shirts and admire them and think that I might want to have them.
I am the kind of guy who really wants to look good every day and have good hygiene. I really do not want to get germs from other people and want to stay healthy. I feel that I cannot go about my day unless I shower and shave at least once every day and wash my hands at least ten or fifteen times a day. I almost never wear dirty clothing and hate wearing it, but whenever I do not have enough clean clothes, I have to wear dirty clothing out of my hamper. Not to be rude or anything, but I absolutely do not like to be around other people who smell bad and who do not take showers every day. It really doesn’t bother me when I see that people’s clothing is a bit dirty, but it is much worse when they smell bad. Nobody really judges me on the way that I look, but I am still really obsessive about it. I feel insecure whenever I do not shower and then go to school, so then I shower when I get home later.
Frequently Asked Questions
My daughter is going on a class trip and I’m really worried about her maintaining the right level of hygiene—I’m convinced I’m going to see all her packed clothing come back untouched because she just wore the same dirty clothes over and over again. It’s what she’d do if I weren’t at home to make her stop every morning and go through her checklist. Do you think I could ask a roommate to remind her or would that be stigmatizing?
Growing Up on the Spectrum Page 31