(Originally written on 08/14/2011 on other blog)
This past week was our first week with ABA therapy and it was interesting having someone constantly in our home that is for sure. I thought I would be able to juggle it a lot better than I did, but WOW it is quite time consuming and tiresome.
I took Monday off work last week so I could be here to ensure everything went smoothly and as planned, didn't want any funny business going on. For the morning shift they came in and Joseph took so quick to the tutor Misty seen below, she was very sweet but not too sweet that Joseph would run all over her which is a good thing. She reminded me a lot of Jocie, so sweet and nurturing but not too sweet that the kids run amock. Joseph tries to flirt to get his ways some times, it is quite funny to watch just ask Jocie's friends he is always flirting with them. They mainly played with him this whole week to build a rapor with him first, you won't get too far if you come in making demands of a child without first having a relationship which I learned from a great online friend of mine this week, I would be lost without her.
Wednesday was our "hell" night and by far the worst experience we have ever had with Joseph and his tantrum if that is what you want to call it, for me it was just horrible let me explain. Since Joseph is so far behind in speech they don't expect him to learn to speak and understand over night especially since he has been going to speech therapy since May and hasn't learned too many words but has made progress just not over night progress. So they are going to be using a program called "PECS" which stands for Picture Exchange Communication System, Jason and I got the pleasure of going through training for this Wednesday night which included a tutorial type of movie that was from the early 80's that in itself was quite funny. But seriously, we did learn a lot. He will have a picture card of items we use frequently such as cheerios, toy, mom, dad, sissy, outside, juice, milk, pizza, etc. and he will have to hand us a card in exchange for the item he is wanting.
So afterwards, the supervisor and manager from Capitol Autism (they are the ones doing the ABA therapy) wanted to show us how it works and thought an easy one would be to offer Joseph fruit loops. So one lady Erin had him in her lap and the other lady (I can't remember her name too many people to remember) was sitting across from him and Erin did hand over hand with Joseph and picked up the fruit loop card and in exchange he got 2 fruit loops which he gladly ate until he realized they had a whole cup full and really didn't want the 2 fruit loops he wanted the entire cup like he is used to getting from me. (As many of you have seen on facebook my picture I posted a few weeks back of the cheerios everywhere you know I give him more than just 2 cheerios though many suggested that to fix the throwing problem.) This is when the kicking, screaming, gasping for air, snot running everywhere, in a state of paralization of some kind, and then as soon as he made eye contact with me I just about lost it. I just wanted to grab my son and get in my car and never come back, then I came back to reality and my "want" to help my son kicked in and I realized this is for his own good and to help him to communicate what he is wanting and needing and I stuck it out. The outburst went on for 40 minutes before I really couldn't handle it and I walked out to take 1 huge deep breath and wouldn't you know it I came back to see my son happy, eating his fruit loops and doing his favorite thing "drawing". He ended up giving the fruit loop card 2 more times all on his own, just amazing. The one thing that was odd to me in this whole situation is I was sitting on the floor with them just steps away and not once did Joseph get up to get help from me, it was so bizarre to me. Why didn't my son come to me, his Mom or Dad or Sissy for help? We were all right there.
The next few days the tutors that came out were told not to work with Joseph on the eating card until the supervisor has worked out all the outbursts but to work on the card for "toy" which he has caught onto really quickly, he is even doing it with me which is an awesome feeling to know when my son wants to play.
I am hoping the new PECS will help solve our new problem communicating with Joseph. About a month or so ago we first worked on the sign for "more" which was great and really helped alleviate confusion at dinner time when he wanted more vs all done but then he started using "more" for every single thing he wanted or needed or was asking for so we incorporated the sign for "eat" to help distinguish the difference well now he won't sign for "more" and now everything he signs "eat" instead. I am trying to get him to do the "more" sign and now just puts his hands straight out wanting me to do it, he is just being lazy because he is very capable of doing it. It's hard at times because I felt we were making progress with the sign language but instead we are are almost back to square 1.
So that pretty much somes up week 1 of ABA overall I think it went good, overwhelming but good. Hope everyone has an awesome week.
I took Monday off work last week so I could be here to ensure everything went smoothly and as planned, didn't want any funny business going on. For the morning shift they came in and Joseph took so quick to the tutor Misty seen below, she was very sweet but not too sweet that Joseph would run all over her which is a good thing. She reminded me a lot of Jocie, so sweet and nurturing but not too sweet that the kids run amock. Joseph tries to flirt to get his ways some times, it is quite funny to watch just ask Jocie's friends he is always flirting with them. They mainly played with him this whole week to build a rapor with him first, you won't get too far if you come in making demands of a child without first having a relationship which I learned from a great online friend of mine this week, I would be lost without her.
Wednesday was our "hell" night and by far the worst experience we have ever had with Joseph and his tantrum if that is what you want to call it, for me it was just horrible let me explain. Since Joseph is so far behind in speech they don't expect him to learn to speak and understand over night especially since he has been going to speech therapy since May and hasn't learned too many words but has made progress just not over night progress. So they are going to be using a program called "PECS" which stands for Picture Exchange Communication System, Jason and I got the pleasure of going through training for this Wednesday night which included a tutorial type of movie that was from the early 80's that in itself was quite funny. But seriously, we did learn a lot. He will have a picture card of items we use frequently such as cheerios, toy, mom, dad, sissy, outside, juice, milk, pizza, etc. and he will have to hand us a card in exchange for the item he is wanting.
So afterwards, the supervisor and manager from Capitol Autism (they are the ones doing the ABA therapy) wanted to show us how it works and thought an easy one would be to offer Joseph fruit loops. So one lady Erin had him in her lap and the other lady (I can't remember her name too many people to remember) was sitting across from him and Erin did hand over hand with Joseph and picked up the fruit loop card and in exchange he got 2 fruit loops which he gladly ate until he realized they had a whole cup full and really didn't want the 2 fruit loops he wanted the entire cup like he is used to getting from me. (As many of you have seen on facebook my picture I posted a few weeks back of the cheerios everywhere you know I give him more than just 2 cheerios though many suggested that to fix the throwing problem.) This is when the kicking, screaming, gasping for air, snot running everywhere, in a state of paralization of some kind, and then as soon as he made eye contact with me I just about lost it. I just wanted to grab my son and get in my car and never come back, then I came back to reality and my "want" to help my son kicked in and I realized this is for his own good and to help him to communicate what he is wanting and needing and I stuck it out. The outburst went on for 40 minutes before I really couldn't handle it and I walked out to take 1 huge deep breath and wouldn't you know it I came back to see my son happy, eating his fruit loops and doing his favorite thing "drawing". He ended up giving the fruit loop card 2 more times all on his own, just amazing. The one thing that was odd to me in this whole situation is I was sitting on the floor with them just steps away and not once did Joseph get up to get help from me, it was so bizarre to me. Why didn't my son come to me, his Mom or Dad or Sissy for help? We were all right there.
The next few days the tutors that came out were told not to work with Joseph on the eating card until the supervisor has worked out all the outbursts but to work on the card for "toy" which he has caught onto really quickly, he is even doing it with me which is an awesome feeling to know when my son wants to play.
I am hoping the new PECS will help solve our new problem communicating with Joseph. About a month or so ago we first worked on the sign for "more" which was great and really helped alleviate confusion at dinner time when he wanted more vs all done but then he started using "more" for every single thing he wanted or needed or was asking for so we incorporated the sign for "eat" to help distinguish the difference well now he won't sign for "more" and now everything he signs "eat" instead. I am trying to get him to do the "more" sign and now just puts his hands straight out wanting me to do it, he is just being lazy because he is very capable of doing it. It's hard at times because I felt we were making progress with the sign language but instead we are are almost back to square 1.
So that pretty much somes up week 1 of ABA overall I think it went good, overwhelming but good. Hope everyone has an awesome week.
Jenn
Joseph and Daddy
Joseph and Sissy
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