I want to share my story and what led to my being passionate about creating autism awareness. In April 2015 months before my son turned 13, he was diagnosed with ‘Pervasive Development Disorder – Not Otherwise Specified’ (PDD-NOS). This is one of four autism spectrum disorders (ASD).
Background leading to his diagnosis – going through the school system I was told that my son only had speech and language delay. He was under the care of Speech and Language Therapy Service in the area where I live. He had to attend some language programmes to establish lip sounds and sounds at two-word level in structured activities. He also had a few other interventions to help him with his speech. For instance, he had a School Action Plus to help him form letters correctly and to pronounce target sounds / to sequence 2 events in a story. He was also part of a small nurture group – this was to help him with his negotiation skills. This group took place one afternoon a week for 1 ½ hours. This has had a positive effect on his progress as he enjoyed playing cooperative games and one to one teaching activities. His language skills improved, and this led to a real improvement in his general interactions. His speech had become clearer: when he is answering a question in context, people are now able to understand what he is answering. Towards the end of junior school, he began to build up confidence in tackling questions in maths – he demonstrated this by explaining his understanding of strategies. He still struggled in English as he found it difficult to articulate and write down his ideas. The school gave him extra support where the focus was on comprehension skills. I knew he had more than Speech and Language Delay, but I did not know what exactly. If I had known what I know now I would have ensured that he had ALL, the support he was entitled too.
#Acceptance
Diagnosis -I work in the Early Years Sector and in September 2014, I went on an autism awareness training. After the training, some aspects in my boy’s behaviour began to make sense: being a picky eater, repetitive behaviour, stimming, unsocial behaviours, no eye contact. With this knowledge that I have acquired I booked an appointment to see the Special Educational Needs & Disability Coordinator (SENDco) of my boy’s school. He was already in year 9 (third year in secondary school). She did the paperwork and made the referral to the Child and Family Health Centre – the rest is history.
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After diagnosis. I have decided to read what I can on autism; got training on working with children with autism; networking with other parents who have children with autism. This also led me to start blogging about autism.