4 year old dc diagnosed with hf autism and ADHD. Now what?

amother

Obsidian

Tue, Feb 28 2023, 9:19 pm

amother Chestnut wrote:

And that ABA is not abusive is because it's been so watered down especially for children who are high functioning . But you need a good BCBA, therapist , and agency.

Yeah but it's still built on this awful faulty logic to look at this kid as a blank slate who needs to be fixed of their autism.

Its not a healthy outlook. And even if someone isn't visibly abusive you don't know if they were taught like this and what's running through their head and how they are making the child feel between the lines.

As it is there's many many people if not most that still imply many wrong and bad ideas for these kids to grow up with and ruin their sense of self and natural personality.

And most people don't even know to look this much into it and won't know how damaged their kid is getting until far into treatment. They don't know they should avoid these things when looking for a practitioner.

amother

Dandelion

Tue, Feb 28 2023, 9:28 pm

amother Obsidian wrote:

So along those lines this heal your child with biomedical blah blah should be called out as abusive too. Why are these moms chasing cures for their kids when we all know it’s not a curable disease. I think those anger me more personally.

yachnabobba

Tue, Feb 28 2023, 9:33 pm

amother Obsidian wrote:

ABA is abusive.

Try floor time, regular therapy, OT, PT, Plat therapy, social skills groups. Etc.

I have an 8 year old with an ASD diagnosis and I can not agree more. We wasted time with aABA look into sonrise which takes a middle of the road approach marrying the best of floortime and ABA

yachnabobba

Tue, Feb 28 2023, 9:36 pm

amother Dandelion wrote:

It’s not a disease it is a condition that is often genetic

amother

Chestnut

Tue, Feb 28 2023, 9:45 pm

Nobody is trying to "cure " the autism, and nobody is 'not ' accepting of the child, ABA is working on behaviors one at a time.
What is therapy anyhow? Think about physical therapy after an accident, or speech therapy for a kid who has a bad lisp, it's all about strengthening muscles and helping the child change his speech or physical capabilities.
Same with ABA- it's working on social skills and behaviors so that the child can function in society as "normally" as possible. I'll use that word again.

amother

Obsidian

Tue, Feb 28 2023, 10:01 pm

amother Chestnut wrote:

How does ABA work on behaviors? If a kid has a meltdown when they hear a vaccum - does it build up the child's tolerance to the noise by forcing them to listen to it?

Or does therapist work with the kid to find coping mechniasms that help make things more bearable and learn to ask and take accomadations?

I'm just saying if ABA even has a ten percent chance of being abusive, why risk it? There's other therapies that are successful and proven! So why keep pushing the one that has issues when there's alternatives!?

amother

Tue, Feb 28 2023, 10:01 pm

amother Obsidian wrote:

No, the goal isn't to teach the child there is something inheretly wrong with them, they were born with this horrible autism thing and now we must fix it and make you look as presentable as possible.

Because as much as you try you can't fix autism or cure it or make it ever fully go away.

You should teach kids that they are beautiful as they are, unique and different and at the same time teach them social skills, and what's socially appropriate. Teach them to stim and express their autistic selves in an appropriate public manner and help them learn to do some things in private more, not because they are bad or wrong because our society deems certain things aren't ways we act in public.

Read about how many autistic adults have PTSD, issues masking, and breakdowns due to their ABA therapy.

Look I understand the point you're making I really do. The problem is with my child a lot of the behavior we need to work on is to keep away from danger, which this kid actively seeks out, and reading social cues so dc doesn't get into fights. They don't grasp when someone is getting upset and it's time to stop. They will throw things at adults even thinking it's a joke and that can be really dangerous if the adult or an older child ever retaliates. It's not just acting a certain way in public, it's a safety issue. The other behaviors can be better navigated. So I'm not seeking to fix their autism but I'm hoping, praying, that dc will learn how to keep safe. I don't know if ABA can help with that yet but I'd like to look into it more before writing it off.

amother

Obsidian

Tue, Feb 28 2023, 10:08 pm

amother OP wrote:

I haven't looked into what alternatives work for when someone is dangerous, so in that case I'd reccomend trying to see if there are alternatives. If not doing ABA just on that after looking into a very good therapist might be neccessary.

Someone here did reccomend someone who combines floor time with ABA so perhaps there's other practitioners who use some concepts of ABA for danger but still to other methods to teach other skills.

miami85

Tue, Feb 28 2023, 11:36 pm

amother OP wrote:

I'm looking for guidance on how to deal with this. I expected the ADHD for a while but not the autism. Can anyone share their journey with me and what they've learned? Which methods did you find most helpful?

Look into Hyperfocus ADHD. Seems to be highly similar to ASD --but I think they are 2 different diagnoses--once the medication kicks in, the perseveration goes down, and there is more social/theory of mind.

There are tools to diagnose the two but there are no tools to separate them from one another.

amother

Chestnut

Wed, Mar 01 2023, 9:38 am

amother Obsidian wrote:

It works on building up tolerance slowly and establishing coping mechanism, Both of those are excellent suggestions happens to be so I do not understand your question.
Associating ABA with being abusive only comes up when working with low functioning kids; therapist can sometimes be rigid and compel the child to do certain tasks. But with high functioning kids?
ABA is fantastic.

amother

Steelblue

Wed, Mar 01 2023, 10:07 am

yachnabobba wrote:

That’s balderdash

As a BCBA, I will respectfully disagree. Do your research. There are a lot of recent studies showing that decreased gut health is linked to Autism.
Many individuals with autism do not have the enzymes necessary to break down gluten and dairy.

My clients that have made the most progress did a combined approach of ABA and gut healing treatment.

amother

Steelblue

Wed, Mar 01 2023, 10:12 am

amother Chestnut wrote:

This is misleading, do you work in the field?

ABA, in my practice, focusses on teaching the clients to access the things they want in a safe and healthy manner. Instead of a tantrum for a cookie, we teach the child to request a cookie. Instead of aggression when things don't go her way, we teach her to communicate what is going wrong.
ABA with low functioning kids will look a lot like teaching communication and play and nothing like abuse.

A typical ABA session has lots of laughter, games, reinforcement, outings, and connection.

It is very important for parents to know that a rigid therapist is not a well trained therapist so it might be time to let that provider go and find a new one.