Healing Thresholds Autism Therapy Topic Feed

Helping Families Find the Best Evidence: CAM Therapies for Autism Spectrum Disorders and Asperger’s Disorder

scottie — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 16:02:31 +0000

Title	Helping Families Find the Best Evidence: CAM Therapies for Autism Spectrum Disorders and Asperger’s Disorder
Publication Type	Journal Article
Authors	Abbey D
Journal Title	J Spec Pediatr Nurs.
Year of Publication	2009
Volume	14
Issue	3
Pages	200-202
URL for Abstract	http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19614829
Teaser	There are several resources on the Web that provide evidence-based autism therapy information, including resources for enrolling in clinical trials.
Full Text	There are several resources on the Web that provide evidence-based autism therapy information, including resources for enrolling in clinical trials. This article lists some places that parents can go online to find evidence-based therapy information. Sites include the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, NIH Autism Research Network, The Cochrane Collaboration, and others. The list also includes resources for signing up to participate in clinical trials.

NO SMALL VICTORIES…

Mon, 01 Jun 2009 01:44:26 +0000

There are times when I find that I cannot see the forest beyond the considerable tree in front of me. As a parent with a son on the ASD spectrum I alternate between days of feeling that I am doing a pretty good job (those rare occasions when I am pretty well rested and relatively centered) and days when I feel totally inadequate in my efforts to support, advocate for, teach my son all while trying to do the only thing I ever wanted to do for him…be a mom. I spent the last several days trying to think of something meaningful that I could contribute to others through this blog. While I am the self published author of an autism awareness children’s book series and self professed autism awareness advocate, I am not a specialist, an educator or therapist. I am basically just a mom trying to make a difference and hoping in some way to help someone else by promoting basic autism awareness in an effort to bridge communication between what has become in my mind us (those living on the spectrum and their families) and the world.

While at a book signing this weekend at a local Walden Books I had the pleasure of having a conversation with a speech therapist. As I described my books to her and the intentions behind their creation I felt compelled to add that I was not a specialist with educational credentials in the form of letters behind my name. I was a mom basically just “trying to stay in my lane and do what I do” which is in essence trying to keep autism in the minds of those in the community in an effort to make my son’s world less an alien place. I struggle daily with my sons’ diet, sleep patterns, education, and delayed development of social skills. I struggle with the thoughts of what lies ahead next week, next month, next year. I struggle with us both trying to find independent identities as for as long as I can remember I was his voice, his conduit to the world. I struggle with the challenges of him growing up with the challenges that ASD presents and the pain that that growth entails. I am, as I said, just a mom. The therapist laughed and remarked that without the moms (and dads) who are the strong voices for our children, where would she and others in the special needs community be. As parents we are our children’s best advocates. That being said, I hope that something I say here will be enlightening, comforting, empowering, and understanding to others and continue to work, in my lane, to add my voice to all the other voices of parents/advocates to make a difference in the lives of children like my Joshua, and all the other Joshua’s on the spectrum. My anthem of empowerment for my son, my family and indeed for everyone touched by ASD is and continues to be there are NO SMALL VICTORIES…Every Accomplishment Should Be Celebrated! Hopefully I will be able to share something that will help another parent see around that tree in our path, if only for a shared glimpse of the forest beyond.

Jacqueline Williams-Hines is the author of the No Small Victories autism awareness children’s book series and recently released her third book, “Joshua, That’s Sooo Slimming!” which can be purchased from her Author House website, www.jacquelinewilliamshinesbooks.com as well as other retail bookstore outlets such as Amazon.com and Barnes&Noble.com.

Signing Babies Gives Language to Children Not Yet Able to Speak

scottie — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 14:48:22 +0000

Teaser:

Based on British Sign Language (BSL), Signing Babies (United Kingdom) uses Signing Sam, a puppet, to teach children to sign before they're able to talk.

Body:

Based on British Sign Language (BSL), Signing Babies (United Kingdom) uses Signing Sam, a puppet, to teach children to sign before they're able to talk. Some of the children are too young to speak, others have autism and/or other developmental delays. At Signing Babies, parents and their children sit in a big circle and sign nursery rhymes. The children and adults also learn signs for simple items like milk and food and then move on to more social signs. Studies have found that babies and non-verbal children who sign may have increased self-esteem and enhanced speech development.

Read original article.

Misconceptions

Tue, 19 Dec 2006 16:24:47 +0000

Speech Therapy: An example of a misconception related to speech therapy would be that some people (parents ask this often) think/question rather communication that involves signing, PECS or AAC has a negative impact on learning to speak. Actually, other communication means actually are correlated with improvements in speech and do not negatively effect speech development.

Misconceptions

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 22:24:21 +0000

I had never been to this web-site and found it very user-friendly, thorough and informative. I thought that a good addition to this site would be a 'misconceptions' section. A misconceptions section could include misconceptions regarding different therapy options, causes of autism or perceived 'cures' of autism, just to mention a few. I am a speech pathologist and spent some time looking through the speech therapy section in particular. Under 'Is it harmful?', there was a sentence stating that no research has found speech therapy to be harmful. An example of a misconception related to speech therapy would be that some people (parents ask this often) think/question rather communication that involves signing, PECS or AAC has a negative impact on learning to speak. The misconceptions section could clarify that other communication means actually are correlated with improvements in speech and do not negatively effect speech development.

The Sound of Mucous

Wed, 22 Nov 2006 04:32:47 +0000

We’re all sick. And I think Thomas has pink-eye.

Even as I sit here typing, I am painfully aware of all of the germs and wee creepy-crawlies that are most likely throwing rowdy parties all over the keyboard. When will all the sickness end? At least the kids won’t get the flu…or at least they won’t get whatever strain of the flu the CDC deems most threatening this season! I’m still sick and Jonathan is sick now, too. Just in time for Thanksgiving! Thomas missed the Halloween parade, and now he can’t go to school tomorrow when the class would surely be making cute little hand-turkeys.

Of course, since Thomas most likely has conjunctivitis, I will have to take him to the doctor tomorrow…all by myself. Even going to the doctor is not what worries me so much – it’s the eye drops we will have to administer if he’s got pink-eye. How in the world am I going to give Thomas eye drops? Even I, a neurologically-typical grown-up adult cannot stand eye drops. The antibiotics around Halloween was one thing…I could mix that into a cup of juice! I am already sweating at the thought of having to hold him down and get drops in his eyes. Would it be considered child abuse to hog-tie him to administer ocular antibiotics? Honestly, I don’t see it (no pun intended) happening any other way. At least, at least he will be okay to go back to school on Monday if we get him on the antibiotics tomorrow. Even twenty-four hours on the meds should make him okay for Thanksgiving. I should probably just have the pediatrician write a prescription for all of us, since I cannot fathom that just Thomas would get pink-eye. I know how contagious it is.

And the hits just keep on comin’.

Okay, enough of my pink-eye rant. Back to Thomas. The potty training is still going well…he usually has one accident every day or every other day. Getting him to listen to his body’s cues continues to be a struggle, but if we’re diligent about taking him to the bathroom, accidents can be avoided. At least we’re only buying diapers for one child now.

Thomas continues to enjoy singing! He was singing “Jingle Bells” today, and I’m not really sure where he picked it up. We haven’t sung it yet this season, but the morning bus driver was playing Christmas music this past week, so maybe that’s where he heard it. He really seems to like singing and even Hayley is picking up on it. She’s started asking Thomas to sing, too.

One of the greatest things he’s doing is answering when we call his name! We find this so encouraging and we know that he’s listening to us. Lots of times now, I’ll say, “Thomas?” and he’ll respond, “Yeah?” Then I ask him what he’s doing. He’ll say, “Oh, I’m um…just jumping on the couch.” He’ll ask me what I’m doing, too. We have these little conversations now! It’s so much fun and it catches me off-guard a lot of the time. Sometimes he’ll ask me a question and it’s so novel and strange to me that Thomas would ask me something that I have to take a minute to process that he’s waiting for a response. And after I respond sometimes, he’ll say, “Oh. Okay.” So cool!

Unfortunately, Thomas has been pretty rough with Hayley lately. Just tonight they were “playing” while I was putting away some laundry. I heard them laughing and carrying-on, when all of a sudden Hayley’s laughter turned to shrieks of pain. I went into Thomas’ room, soothed Hayley who said, “Thomas hurt it,” and went back to my laundry after a stern admonishment about not playing too rough. Five – no, one minute later, the same thing happened again. Thomas came running out of his room looking sheepish and Hayley was laying on the floor weeping. I had had enough. Jonathan was sick on the couch and all I wanted to do was put away some clean clothes, but no! Getting laundry done was just too much to ask. I was seriously thinking about taking the old baby-backpack out of storage and just carrying Hayley around papoose-style until she’s fourteen and better able to defend herself. I try to explain to Thomas that Hayley is too little for playing rough and he’s got to be more careful. The thing is that he knows when he’s hurt Hayley. He does understand that if she’s crying, she’s upset about something and he usually knows that he hurt her. Is this just brother-and-sister stuff, or is it happening because Thomas can’t understand when he crosses the line? I might be better off telling Hayley that when Thomas is playing too rough, she needs to come to me. The thing is that when Hayley is hurt, she just lays there like a lump until somebody comes to save her. A little more initiative on her part would help the matter greatly, I think.

So we’re off to the doctor tomorrow and my mother-in-law’s house on Thanksgiving, if we’re given clearance from the pediatrician. (Even if we’re not, I’m sure we’ll still go and issue the firm edict that nobody is to touch Thomas – or really any of us – without signing a waiver.) I’ll probably bring my antibacterial wipes and Lysol and wear them around my waist in a holster-type apparatus. Nothing says “Thanksgiving” like following your kids around all day, spraying and wiping down everything they touch. I’m banking on a goofy skin condition for Christmas that will have us up to our elbows in lotions and creams.

Happy Thanksgiving!