Reading-I

This section started out collecting autism information and then, as I did more research, turned into autism spectrum which may or may not be the proper term but refers to all of the autism-LIKE disorders out there. And of course the sensory integration stuff came about because a dear friend's child is struggling with it.

Autism

The number of people I know with autistic children has gotten larger and larger. Some of this information is from those people, and some is just from media.

Overview

This section is called All about Autism from the Autism Society of America's website.

There was an interesting article a few years ago in Wired magazine about autism. The title was: The Geek Syndrome and the premise was: "Autism - and its milder cousin Asperger's syndrome - is surging among the children of Silicon Valley. Are math-and-tech genes to blame?"

Information on Autism is an excellent set of overview links from the folks at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's TEACCH division (Treatment and Education of Autistic and related Communication handicapped Children).

Another interesting website - with more autism links than I've ever seen - is the neurodiversity.com site. Some of the links look pretty "alternative" (e.g. the entire page of books on ... indigo children (?)), but it's a formidable piece of reference work.

The Autism Key website has forums, and also lists the top states in the US for autism support. They are:

Wisconsin

California

New Jersey

Ohio

Missiouri

Diagnosis

Diagnosing Autism is also from the Autism Society's website.

The First Signs Organization seems interesting. They're devoted to the early identification of children with developmental delays and disorders.

The Handle Institute is involved in both diagnosing and treating people with neurodevelopmental disorders. I discovered it while doing a very heavy-duty web search for a friend with autistic twins about two and a half years ago and was blown away by the website. VERY wonderful story. Very interesting stuff. If your child has any type of neurodevelopmental problems, I would suggest that you take a look a them. Handle deals with Add/ADHD, Autism/PDD, dyslexia, learning disabilities, Tourette's Syndrome, and traumatic brain injuries. Their brief look at Handle is very interesting.

In the San Francisco Peninsula area, people are often referred to the Children's Health Council in Palo Alto.

Asperger Syndrome

Here is the OASIS (Online Asperger Syndrome Informaiton and Support) description called What is Asperger's.

TBD

Organizations

This section contains names and contact information for general support organizations for parents of autistic children

Autism Society of America

Bethesda, MD - local chapter in Belmont

The NICHD (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development) has an autism website.

In the San Francisco Bay area, an organization called Parents Helping Parents has a website.

The Autism Research Institute talks about the effort to defeat autism with DAN doctors.

Nancy is a writer and mother to Quinn. She has started a website called Face Autism.

Communities and Blogging

I do not have an austic child so I will have to go out and research the best short pointers to a huge resource: autism communities and autism bloggers (aka mommy bloggers whose children have autism.)

If you are just coming to terms with an autism diagnosis, if you want to hear from other parents of autistic children, I cannot stress the value of the autism blogs. It is a wonderful, warm, sometimes utterly goofy, sometimes terribly sad, always very supportive community of parents who are working their hearts out and loving their children.

Shannon Des Roches Rosa just became the BlogHer contributing editor on special needs. Here is her first post, introcing herself.

Testing

About behavior analysis, from the Cambridge Center.

Outdated generic notes

This is a wonderful essay, called Nonverbal Thinking, Communication, Imitation, and Play Skills From a Developmental Perspective from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's TEACCH division. Here is a list of other educational approaches.

This article, written by Dr. Mythily Chari in India, talks specifically about interventions and training that they did to teach children to get along in the world. She maintains (and I agree with her), that you really need to teach context and social hierarchy when you teach behavior (e.g. about hugging.) Interesting and very useful.

Products

It is my experience (from years of infertility) that there are entire industries set up to prey upon people such as parents of autistic children, who are on never-ending quests to help their children. I saw this with infertility, when it finally cost $25,000 to be introduced to a prospective surrogate mother (with no promises), and I definitely see it in some of the more bogus and ridiculous products aimed at parents of ADHD, dyslexic, and autistic children (not to mention the other acronyms.)

However some products and services are good. When I find them I'll put them here:

Behavior Buddies behavioral tools for positive parenting. Nice. And if you want to, you can make these yourself!

Programs, Theories and Therapies

I am not qualified to talk about the various programs, theories, and therapies for autistic children, other than to tell you that there are about fifty billion. I will try to find a "guest mom" (or several ) who can talk about this.

Autism is NOT caused by:

Cold mothers or poor parenting

RDI

A friend of mine who is smart as a whip inhaled every autism book out there, tried on for size and discarded things left and right, and finally has been using RDI on her child, with great success. RDI stands for Relationship Development Intervention and is an innovative program for autistic children developed by Steven Gutstein, who has written many publications on the subject of autism, Asperger's, the relationship puzzle, activities, etc. My friend says that RDI has done wonders for her child.

See also the ADHD page for an overview of things to check and bases to cover.

Standard Autism Treatment

Standard Autism treatment is available, and from a very young age. I will have to find out how you do this, but I know of people who have three years olds whose treatment and support is paid for by (I believe) the school district. Make sure that you research treatment payment alternatives. Medicine and treatment is outrageously expensive Get Help.

Standard Treatment includes:

Occupational Therapy

Audio therapy

Vision therapy

Behavior modification (ABA)

special teachers, and so forth.

Again, please forgive me here. I do not have an autistic child and have not been through this myself, although I have many friends who have been. I will work to give pointers to the correct places.

Remember: every school district and every area has different and different quality resources for you and your child. Do your homework. Be aware of your rights, and keep talking with other parents of autistic children so that you know what resources are available, what works for them, and so forth.

Nonstandard Autism Treatment: DAN Doctors

DAN stands for Defeat Autism Now and it's a group of doctors who are willing to try "fringe" approaches as they work to help autistic children. Here is a description of DAN doctors from About.com. They commonly look for all types of allergies or sensitivites (including things like heavy metals.). They will often use a special diet, for example, the CFCF diet. Some of them offer mercury detoxification treatments (for example.)

Social Skills

Michelle Garcia Winner is the queen of social skills classes for Autistic and Aspie (Aspberger's) children. She is mentioned in the Social Skills page.

Resources

National

Here is a listing of national resources from the Autism Society's website.

Local (San Francisco area) programs

Achievekids and

Community Association for Rehabilitation

Palo Alto (650) 494-0550

Various services for infants, children and adults who are developmentally disabled.

Developmental Pathways for Kids is an occupational therapy and pediatric services place in the peninsula area south of San Francisco.

Autism Institute on Peer Relations and Play is located in the San Francisco Area. It's based upon Pamela Wolfberg's research. She wrote the book called Play and Imagination in Children with Autism.

Dr. Laurie Leventhal in Palo Alto has something for Aspberger's children called the Friend's Program to teach children how to be friends with people. It comes highly recommended.

Legislation, insurance, and funding

This depends totally on your state, unfortunately.

Book recommendations

A friend of mine recommends DSM-4, which stands for THE definitive research book on diagnostic criteria. She said that you've got to read it, get on top of it, especially if you're trying to track down what's happening with your kid.

The weirdkids.com website has a short list of the most popular/suggested books that they recommend on autism, aspberger's, sensory integration, homeschooling children with special needs, and so forth.

Links

Here are some extremely good link pages:

Links from C.A.R.

Medline links from the National Institute for Health.

Links, especially local to Northern California, from Achievekids.

Room5 is a classroom web page dedicated to helping parents and teachers of students with autistic spectrum disorders.

The Eide blog is fascinating - it's all about neurolearning. This is the Autism archive page for the Eide blog, which summarizes all mention of autism and related topics.

Resources for caregivers

Just found a site named empowering caregivers. Has some good books and references for people who are taking care of others.