Now, part of the problem was that the educational and mental-health systems—not to mention her parents—viewed Susan as a seven-year-old child. But while she was chronologically seven, she wasn’t developmentally seven. She had the social skills of an infant, the regulatory skills of a two-year-old, the cognitive skills of a three-year-old. Parents, teachers, and therapists kept trying to reason with her. They explained the rules and tried to explore “why” she did all these “naughty” things. They were doing the best they could; they did not understand state-dependent functioning or the
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