- Tim Waltz shared details about his 17-year-old son, Gus, who has been diagnosed with ADHD, anxiety disorder and non-verbal learning disorder.
- The disorder affects how people process non-verbal communication, such as tone of voice and body language. It does not mean that someone with a non-verbal learning disability cannot speak.
- This disorder can be difficult to diagnose because the symptoms are similar to other childhood disorders.
Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz revealed that his 17-year-old son, Gus, has ADHD, anxiety and a nonverbal learning disorder, a diagnosis he called his son's “secret power.”
Because the term is a nonverbal learning disability, “people tend to assume it means not speaking,” says Dr. Vera Feuer, a child and adolescent psychiatrist and vice president of school mental health at Northwell Health.
“That couldn't be further from the truth,” Fehr told People magazine.
According to Feuer, there are two main groups of learning disabilities: language disabilities and non-verbal disabilities.
“These terms refer to the type of skills that are expected. Language skills are reading, writing. Language learning disabilities affect people's ability to read, write and interpret information,” she said, using dyslexia as an example.
These disorders are “recognized sooner” because they have more obvious symptoms, she told People magazine.
But nonverbal learning disabilities “really affect some of your nonverbal skills,” including “reading body language, reading social cues, all the nonverbal areas, the nonverbal aspects of communication: facial expressions, tone, voice, things like that.”
Specifically, “they may have problems with emotional tone and the social interpretation of others' tone and cues, including interpreting sarcasm, humor, and metaphors.”
“It's the pragmatics of the language that's affected, but they're obviously fully linguistic and able to speak. And that doesn't mean non-verbal.”
Feuer also noted that nonverbal learning disorder “is not a subtype of autism,” but that “the two share common characteristics.”
“Many children with autism have non-verbal learning disabilities because communication skills – understanding and interpreting social cues, expressing and interpreting emotions – can also be affected.”
“But there are myriad other symptoms and characteristics of autism that can be used to make a diagnosis.”
With nonverbal learning disorders, “there's not really something specific that's a big red flag, so it's difficult to diagnose because you have to rule out other possibilities,” Fehr tells PEOPLE.
“This can be subtle and nuanced,” she adds. “Children may have trouble understanding math concepts, or space and time. They may have trouble interpreting social cues, nuances in language, or humor. And they may not have other characteristics that kids with autism have, like sustained interests.”
Children with non-verbal learning disabilities “can have trouble finding their way around or orientation because their brains don't understand spatial orientation or the distance of objects very well,” he said.
They may also not get jokes and may tend to “take things very literally because they're only listening to the words and not taking into account facial expressions, body language, and other social contextual cues that we use to interpret what people say.”
She goes on to say there's been a long-standing misunderstanding. all Learning disabilities.
“The common misconception about learning disabilities is that these people are less intelligent, or that if you have a learning disability you can't be smart, which isn't true. Or that if you have ADHD you can't be smart, which is of course not true,” she says.
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Waltz and his wife, Gwen, exclusively told People magazine in August that Gus is “intelligent, incredibly attuned to the little things that many of us overlook, and above all, a wonderful son and brother to his siblings.”
“We love Gus,” Tim and Gwen, who also have daughter Hope, 23, told People magazine. “We're so proud of the man he's growing up to be and so excited to be with him on this journey.”