Comments on: A depressing shuffle down Memory Lane. http://www.rubenpants.com/?p=141 A chronicle of our son Rubén as he battles his way off the autism spectrum. Sat, 04 Sep 2010 21:43:05 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=1.5 by: carol http://www.rubenpants.com/?p=141#comment-4652 Sun, 13 Mar 2005 16:00:33 +0000 http://www.rubenpants.com/?p=141#comment-4652 i haven't read through your earlier posts...just wondering...what does the SLP do with him? does your area have a preschool specifically for children with autism that he could begin, or, please forgive me, does he already? last question, have you guys tried PECS with him? i haven’t read through your earlier posts…just wondering…what does the SLP do with him? does your area have a preschool specifically for children with autism that he could begin, or, please forgive me, does he already? last question, have you guys tried PECS with him?

]]> by: daniel http://www.rubenpants.com/?p=141#comment-4659 Sun, 13 Mar 2005 20:31:19 +0000 http://www.rubenpants.com/?p=141#comment-4659 Our speechie focuses on total communication, rather than just working at producing speech, although speech is the end goal. We have no desire to try PECS as I believe it to be a crutch. Sign language (which we do use a little) is something of a crutch as well, but at least the centers in the brain for processing sign language are the same as those for speech. And no, we do not have him in a "special needs" preschool, nor have I ever any intention of starting him in one. Some therapists are better than others, but none can match "mom & dad therapy." We're working with him, one-on-one or two-on-one, pretty much all day long, and I just don't see any school or professional having the same kind of dedication as we have. Floortime is easy to learn (though somewhat harder to actually do, especially for creaking thirtysomething bodies), and I refuse to pay someone to do that which we can do better. Also, after having him in various therapies for more than a year, I'm convinced they do very little in terms of aiding recovery. Not that they don't help some, but I find the ROI to be less than optimal. Plus, therapies are expensive. Given the vastly increasing numbers of special needs (i.e. toxic) children, Speech/PT/OT has definitely become a seller's market. You can expect to pay, on average, $80-100 for 40 minutes of someone's time. Floortime has been by far the best therapeutic intervention we've done, but even Greenspan himself puts his patients on a quasi-biomedical regime (implementing diet, epsom salt baths, etc.), and it is my belief that conquering the yeast and heavy metals are the key to his ultimate recovery. Our speechie focuses on total communication, rather than just working at producing speech, although speech is the end goal. We have no desire to try PECS as I believe it to be a crutch. Sign language (which we do use a little) is something of a crutch as well, but at least the centers in the brain for processing sign language are the same as those for speech. And no, we do not have him in a “special needs” preschool, nor have I ever any intention of starting him in one. Some therapists are better than others, but none can match “mom & dad therapy.” We’re working with him, one-on-one or two-on-one, pretty much all day long, and I just don’t see any school or professional having the same kind of dedication as we have. Floortime is easy to learn (though somewhat harder to actually do, especially for creaking thirtysomething bodies), and I refuse to pay someone to do that which we can do better. Also, after having him in various therapies for more than a year, I’m convinced they do very little in terms of aiding recovery. Not that they don’t help some, but I find the ROI to be less than optimal.

Plus, therapies are expensive. Given the vastly increasing numbers of special needs (i.e. toxic) children, Speech/PT/OT has definitely become a seller’s market. You can expect to pay, on average, $80-100 for 40 minutes of someone’s time. Floortime has been by far the best therapeutic intervention we’ve done, but even Greenspan himself puts his patients on a quasi-biomedical regime (implementing diet, epsom salt baths, etc.), and it is my belief that conquering the yeast and heavy metals are the key to his ultimate recovery.

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