In So Many Words

Asperger Awareness: A Key To Success For IT And Technical Managers is a great introduction to the benefits and challenges that can arise when managing employees with Asperger’s or Asperger’s traits.

Although directed at those in the IT and technical areas, the information can certainly be applied to varying degrees in other settings (in fact, I think I may pass it on to my boss the next time she is in town!). As one of the reviewers put it, “Diversity once understood and valued can only enhance productivity and knowledge.”

Plowright opens the book with a description of what Asperger’s Syndrome (AS) is and also references the informal Autism Quotient (AQ) test developed by Simon Baron-Cohen to look for AS tendencies. As he points out, many individuals who gravitate to technical areas of work may have high AQ scores, or AS tendencies, even if not diagnosed with Asperger’s.

The labels aren’t as important as recognizing that people who have these tendencies often bring similar strengths and challenges to the working environment and will perform best when those are taken into account. Some of the strengths may be:

• Problem-solving ability
• Perfectionism (yes, this can be a good thing, especially in a technical environment!)
• Persistence
• Intelligence
• Independent thinking and interdisciplinary insights
• Honesty
• Loyalty
• Focus and Attention to Detail

Of course, any of these could also be perceived as a weakness, such as when direct honesty comes across as arrogance. The author provides a number of examples of how AS traits could be aggravated by conditions within an office environment, such as extreme focus making it difficult to deal with too many demands or the sudden addition of new tasks, or with perfectionism causing deadlines to be missed.

He continues with a discussion on how to optimize an employee’s ability to work by reducing the stress caused by his or her innate tendencies. “The keys to reducing work related stress,” he says, “are order, clarity, interest, and autonomy.” I couldn’t agree more!

Many individuals who do quite well as part of a technical team face much greater challenges when given a management role. While acknowledging that this may not be a good move for everyone, Plowright offers some suggestions for how to handle a new supervisory role, including using a mentor to give some guidance during the transition period (and beyond, if needed).

I would highly recommend Asperger Awareness to anyone who is in management, especially those in areas that attract a higher number of individual with Asperger’s or AS traits. It could also be helpful to the individuals with AS themselves to assist in identifying their own strengths and challenges and give them some direction on what types of accommodations could improve their working experience and output.

Thank you to the author for providing a review copy of this book at no charge and with no expectations regarding the content of the review.

Taken from the article “Social Anxiety and Social Skill Competencies” by Michelle Garcia Winner, Autism Asperger’s Digest, www.autismdigest.com

Note: Because this article is fairly long, I have broken it up into two parts. In Part I, Michelle outlines the key strategies she teaches for reducing social anxiety. I so appreciate her outlook on the responsibility of each individual to take ownership for what we need and want to improve in our social lives.

My goal was to find a way to help our clients decrease anxiety while increasing their social competencies. The result was a treatment strategy called the Spirals of Social Success and Social Failure.

I developed this approach for high-level teens and young adults who had first developed social competencies and were now ready to explore social anxiety. We discovered this teaching strategy helped motivate them to challenge their anxiety by giving them alternative strategies to use when stressed by specific social situations. An overview of the social concepts we shared with clients, as well as the description of the spirals, follows.

Social anxiety has deep tentacles; once it disrupts our functioning it likes to keep that power in place! Once it inhabits a person, anxiety will not go away without a fight. This means as our students recognize they have increased social competencies, they have to actively work at reducing their anxiety. This involves learned strategies, as well as their own shift in perception in making a choice in the moment: are you going to default to anxiety or use your strategies?

Some of the key social learning–social anxiety reduction strategies we teach our clients include:

1. Take ownership; be personally accountable for what you need to learn. After many years of working with adolescents, I realized that while I understood they had social learning differences, as long as I prompted them to use their strategies, I was the one taking ownership of their problems. Now I realize that as I teach them these strategies, they have to work at using them, which first means they have to realize these strategies are theirs and not ours (the teachers and parents).
2. Accept that your job is to become more comfortable with social discomfort. The neurotypical teen and adult world is filled with social discomfort. Using strategies does not mean our clients won’t feel discomfort. Their job is to work at learning how to be comfortable with the fact they will be uncomfortable socially at times! The mentor’s job is to encourage the client to use the treatment strategies even when experiencing discomfort.
3. Recognize and celebrate the small steps of progress being made. We need to help our students feel intrinsically proud of themselves for their progress. Avoid using token rewards for progress as these provide extrinsic but not intrinsic motivation.
4. Use your inner coach, rather than your self-defeater voice, inside your head. You and I use an “inner coach” or “private voice” in our heads to encourage and motivate ourselves through difficulties. Our inner coach may say to us: “You can do this!” “Just do it and get it over with!” “Remember last time this wasn’t as bad as you thought it was going to be, so just go do it!”
   Unfortunately, many of our students have a “self-defeater” voice in their heads. This voice discourages rather than encourages: “You’re bad at this.” “You’ve never been able to do this, so you won’t be able to do it now.” Individuals who have a loud self-defeater voice in their heads will default to avoiding the uncomfortable task at hand; those with an inner coach have a far better chance of pushing themselves through the uncomfortable task. We need to help our students be realistic about their strengths and challenges while reinforcing their choice to use their inner coach as much as possible.
5. Stop making excuses for avoiding social encounters. Those with strong self-defeater voices tend to find a lot of benign excuses for avoiding the task at hand. Many of our students don’t recognize that what they are saying is, in fact, an excuse for not pushing themselves through an uncomfortable moment. Instead, they automatically default to their excuses.
   Our strategy is to explore the personal excuses they make as we assign them tasks that provide opportunities to practice social competencies and use their anxiety-reducing strategies. Once students begin to notice and then take ownership of the fact they are making excuses, they further progress.
6. Your brain always learns; whether it learns positive or negative ways to cope, it is always learning! We discuss how our brains are always learning, all the time, that anytime we are awake we are learning from our experiences. If we “default” to what we are accustomed to doing, we constantly teach our brains we can only do it the way we have done it before. If students want to teach their brain a new set of skills, they have to try to do things differently.
   This idea may seem elementary, but it can be difficult for our concrete-thinking, rule-bound students to change the way they do things, especially their thinking patterns. I often ask them a direct question: “Do you want to teach your brain you can’t do something, or do you want to teach your brain you can do something?” Hopefully their answer is a “can-do” response, and we circle back to our other strategies to help them retrain their brain.

Watch for Part II of this guest article tomorrow, where Michelle illustrates her spirals of social success and social failure.

Michelle Garcia Winner is the founder of Social Thinking®. She works in her clinic in San Jose, CA, has written numerous books, and speaks internationally. Visit her website, www.socialthinking.com, for more information.

Excerpt was reprinted with permission. You can get a 15% discount on a subscription to the AADigest when you use this discount code: INTERRUPTED.

Taken from the article “Autism: From Mind Blindness to Context Blindness” by Peter Vermeulen, Nov/Dec 2011 Autism Asperger’s Digest, www.autismdigest.com

Note: You can get a 15% discount on a subscription to the AADigest when you use this discount code: INTERRUPTED.

Remember the scene in the movie, Rainman, where Raymond is trying to cross a street? In Raymond’s mind when the sign displays “Don’t walk,” it means only one thing: “Don’t walk.” We laugh when the sign changes from “Walk” to “Don’t walk” and Raymond stops in the middle of the intersection. Raymond does not understand that “Don’t walk” means many different things, depending on the situation or context. When you’re halfway through the crossing, it means “hurry up” instead!

Here is another example of context blindness: When the doorbell rang, the mother of a seven-year-old boy with autism asked him to open the door. He opened the back door instead of the front. His reaction was logical, but his choice of door was out of context.

Emotion recognition training is immensely popular in the field of autism. Typical materials used in this training are photographs or pictures of facial expressions of emotions. Although these materials can help children with autism learn about different emotions in a rote manner, they do not reflect emotion recognition as it happens in real life.

First, we rarely see faces out of context in real life. When we try to figure out what a person feels, we look at context as much as we do facial expression: the situation, what that person says, body language, our past experiences with similar situations, etc. In fact we don’t even need a facial expression to recognize emotions…. Studies on how people process facial expressions have shown that when we look at faces, our brains always spontaneously encode the context and that in certain instances, context plays an even bigger role in emotion recognition than the facial expression.

The second problem with traditional emotion recognition training is the underlying assumption that there is a direct relationship between an emotion and its facial expression. This assumption goes back to Darwin’s idea of universal expression of emotions in which each emotion has its own distinct facial expression. Unfortunately for people with autism, facial expressions are not that straightforward and quite often are ambiguous.

Take tears for instance. What do people feel when they have tears on their cheeks? It could mean sadness. But it could also mean happiness or pride. Or it could be an allergic reaction or the result of dicing an onion. How can a brain tell the difference? It uses context.

In recognizing emotions—the same is true for all mental states—the human brain relies on context. When people with autism find it hard to empathize, it is because their brain lacks contextual sensitivity. They are affected by context blindness, rather than mind blindness.

We can teach people with ASD a lot of rules and scripts, but for social understanding and competence to flourish, scripts and rules are insufficient. To effectively teach emotion recognition and social understanding to people with ASD, we must add context to the materials we teach. Even using a term such as “socially appropriate behavior” becomes misleading unless context is specified; behavior that is socially appropriate in one situation might be inappropriate in another context!

Social competence is not about knowing whether a certain behavior is socially appropriate or not, it is the knowledge of when that behavior is appropriate and when it is not.

Research has shown that more able people with ASD know quite a lot of social rules, but they have difficulty adapting these rules to changing contexts or making exceptions to the rules. Most social skill training programs focus on teaching generic social skills (e.g., how to start a conversation). However, having a conversation while waiting in the dentist’s waiting room or visiting someone at the hospital is quite different from the conversation you have hanging out with a group of buddies because the contexts are very different.

Instead of putting our focus on teaching social skills, we should focus on teaching social contexts such as visiting someone at the hospital or hanging out with friends. And then teach all the necessary rules, conversation, and behavior attached to a certain context. When you visit someone who is ill and in the hospital, what kind of present do you take? How long do you stay? What do you talk about? What should you say/not say?

The same logic about context applies to Social Stories™, a powerful tool to help people with autism navigate the social world. Instead of creating stories about certain social skills, we should build them around contexts and introduce sentences that start with if and when. In this manner a story can be adapted to different contexts. For instance, a social story about welcoming guests to your birthday party could contain the following contextual sentences:

• When the person who arrives is a close family member, you kiss them and say “hi.”
• When the person who arrives is not a close family member, you shake hands and say “hi.”

Social competence requires more than social skills; it demands contextual sensitivity— something difficult for people with ASD. Training programs designed to help people with ASD navigate the social world should therefore emphasize social contexts, not just focus on teaching social skills.

Peter Vermeulen, PhD, is a senior lecturer and consultant at Autisme Centraal in Gent, Belgium. He has written 15 books on autism, some of which have been translated into several languages.

Excerpt was reprinted with permission. Added emphasis is mine.

Asperger’s From the Inside Out: A Supportive and Practical Guide for Anyone with Asperger’s Syndrome
by Michael John Carley
Perigee (2008)
250 pages

Asperger’s From the Inside Out was written by Michael John Carley, who was diagnosed with Asperger’s shortly after his son was given a diagnosis. He has since become involved in helping others with AS and is the Executive Director of GRASP, which is the Global and Regional Asperger Syndrome Partnership.

The opening chapters cover some background information on Asperger’s Syndrome, as well as Carley’s own experience being diagnosed and then examining his past through that filter. The book also brings out the issues surrounding disclosure and provides some possible coping strategies, a discussion of special interests and, finally, a fascinating look at what happiness really is.

I really like what he has to say about the diagnosis of AS:

Diagnosis is not intended as a eulogy, but almost instead as a starting point, a context, or a filter through which to discover the person’s individuality–far quicker that without it.

He makes another great point in the chapter about coping strategies, talking about how strategies that are offered in books like this are theoretical and are not going to work the same for every person. He stresses that they are not foolproof but are worth trying – in quantity – in order to find the ones that make a difference.

All in all, I think this would be a great book for anyone who either has Asperger’s Syndrome or is close to someone who does. Carley provides a tremendous amount of helpful information while emphasizing the individuality of every person on the spectrum.

Note: This is Book #108 of my 2011 Reads (master list here).

Starting Sensory Therapy: Fun Activities for the Home and Classroom! by Bonnie Arnwine

This is a great little book that I had the pleasure of receiving a review copy to read. I will be finishing up my full review soon, but wanted to list it here just for keeping track of all my books.

The Uncharted Path: My Journey with Late-Diagnosed Autism by Rachel B. Cohen-Rottenberg

You may already be familiar with Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg as the blog author of Journeys with Autism. Even if you aren’t, I would highly recommend reading this compelling memoir of her life. I was deeply touched by much of what she shared, probably more than you can imagine, and I found her observations on her own coping strategies and on the nature of autism itself to be extremely insightful.

The Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism by Dr. Temple Grandin and Sean Barron, Edited by Veronica Zysk

I have had this book on my wish list for quite a while and am so glad that I finally read it. Although the way the text switches back and forth between the two authors and the editor was a bit disconcerting at times, I did appreciate having the perspectives of these two very different people brought together in one discussion on this important topic. The book is aimed primarily at parents and educators of children with autism, but I believe it could be very helpful to teenagers or adults with autism who are reading it for themselves.

There are ten unwritten rules shared in this book, although the first four words of the first rule (“Rules are not absolute”) give you a hint that this is anything but a black-and-white manual. The most helpful part for me was actually in the beginning of the book, where Temple talks about the difference between social skills and emotional relatedness and encourages adults to focus on teaching their child appropriate social behaviors while recognizing and accepting that he or she may not relate to others emotionally in the same way they do.

Daughters-in-Law by Joanna Trollope

I have long been a fan of Joanna Trollope, and this recent novel is no exception. When I saw it being reviewed by Elizabeth at 5 Minutes for Books, I immediately added it to my library list and was lucky enough to get it very quickly!

At its center are Anthony and Rachel Brinkley and how they cope with the changes that come as their youngest son follows in his two older brothers’ footsteps by getting married and starting his own life separate from theirs. Although the road is a bit bumpy, in the end the growth in each character brings them to a stronger and truer place in their lives.

The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie by Wendy McClure

I must admit that I, like Wendy, fell in love with Laura Ingalls and her adventures as a young girl. I have read the entire series of Little House books more times than I can count, as well as many related books. Although I am aware that they are not autobiographical, but were rather written to give future generations a sense of what it was like then, I have never pursued that line of thought very far. I simply enjoy being taken away to another time and place.

It was with a bit of trepidation, therefore, that I began reading this account of Ms. McClure’s own exploration of the life of Laura Ingalls Wilder and her family. In a few cases, my feelings were justified; for example, I had not liked Rose Wilder much before this, and I like her even less now. In terms of the book itself, however, I found it to be extremely enjoyable and fascinating. I greatly appreciated the writing style as much as the content and laughed out loud at least a dozen times during the course of the book. I would definitely recommend this book to any and all Little House book fans.

You can see all the books I’ve finished so far this year on the bookshelf on my Books page or read all of my mini reviews by clicking on the 2011 Reads tag. I am also joining in on the Spring Reading Thing hosted by Callapidder Days, and you can see my list of what I plan to read this spring at my SRT11 post.

Compliments of Autism Asperger’s Digest March/April 2011 issue

“Autism & Asperger’s: The Way I See It,” by Temple Grandin, Ph.D., is an exclusive column in every issue of Autism Asperger’s Digest. This article appears in the March/April 2011 issue and is reprinted by permission of the editor. The Autism Asperger’s Digest is offering a subscription special during April, to celebrate National Autism Awareness Month. Details follow.

As I travel around the country and talk with parents of individuals with ASD, more of them are asking whether they should get a service dog for their child with autism. The use of service, or assistance, dogs with spectrum children is gaining popularity. However, this is a complicated issue. Unlike other autism interventions that can be more easily started and stopped, embarking on the journey to find an appropriate service dog for a child is a long-term commitment on the part of the entire family. A service dog is much more than a well-trained pet.

The first question I ask is, “Does your child like dogs?” If the family does not already own a dog, I suggest they see how their child will react to a friend’s friendly dog first.

There are three kinds of reactions the child can have. The first is an almost magical connection with dogs. The child and the dog are best buddies. They love being together. The second type of reaction is a child who may be initially hesitant but gets to really like dogs. The child should be carefully introduced to a calm, friendly dog.

The third type of reaction is avoidance or fear. Often the child who avoids dogs has a sensory issue. For instance, a child with sensitive hearing may be afraid of the dog’s bark because it hurts his ears. When I was a small child, the sound of the school bell hurt my ears like a dentist drill hitting a nerve. To a child with severe sound sensitivity, a dog may be perceived as a dangerous unpredictable thing that can make a hurtful sound at any moment. For some individuals, the smell of a dog may be overpowering, although keeping the dog clean may alleviate this issue.

I also ask parents if they are willing and able to make the time, financial, and emotional commitment of having a service dog. This is a family affair, with everyone in the family involved. Waiting lists can be two years or more, and fees for the trained dog can run $10,000 or more initially, and several thousand dollars each year thereafter.

Types of Service Dogs
There are three basic types of service dogs that are most likely to be used with individuals with autism. They are therapy dogs, a companion dog, or a safety dog.

A therapy dog is owned by a teacher or therapist and is used during lessons to facilitate learning. A companion dog lives with the family and spends most of its day interacting with the individual with autism. The dog can assist with social, emotional, behavioral and sensory challenges in the child. These dogs also serve as a “social ice breaker” because other people are often attracted to a dog and will interact more readily with the child. Some individuals with autism really open up and interact with a dog.

Therapy dogs and companion service dogs must have basic obedience training plus training for public access. Companion dogs usually receive additional training that focuses specifically on the needs of the child for whom it has been matched. For more information on training standards, visit the International Association of Assistance Dog Partners’ website, iaadp.org.

The third type of service dog is the safety dog. These are highly trained dogs used with individuals with severe autism who tend to run off. The child is tethered to the dog and the dog becomes a protector of sorts for the child. Safety dogs have to be used carefully to avoid stressing the dog. These animals need time off to play and just be a dog. A dog’s mind has categories of behavior. He is trained that when the service dog vest is on, he is working. When he is not working, the vest is taken off.

Dogs that are chosen to be assistance/service dogs should be calm, friendly, and show absolutely no signs of aggression toward strange people. They have to be trained for good manners in public such as not jumping on or sniffing people, and not barking. This level of basic training is the absolute minimum any therapy or companion service dogs should obtain; advanced training to become familiar with the behaviors of people with ASD is preferable. (See companion article online at autismdigest.com, “Questions to Ask When Selecting a Service Dog Provider.”)

There are many different groups who train companion and service dogs. One of the best ways to find a respectable source is through referrals from satisfied people who have service dogs.

Further Reading
Arsenault, V.P. (2010). Effects of service dogs on salivary cortisol secretion in autistic children, Psychoneuroendrocrinology, 35:1187-1193.
Burrows, K.E., Adams, C.L. and Millman, S.T. (2008). Factors affecting behavior and welfare of service dogs for children with autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science, 11:42-62.
Burrows, K.E., Adams, C.L. and Spiers, J. (2008). Sentinels of safety: Service dogs ensure safety and enhance freedom and well being for families of autistic children. Quality Health Research, 18:1642-1649.
Grandin, T. (2011). The roles animals can play with individuals with autism. In: Peggy McCardle et al. (editors) Animals in our Lives, Brooks Publishing, Baltimore, MD.
Gross, P.D. (2005). The Golden Bridge: A guide to assistance dogs for children challenged by autism and other developmental disorders. Purdue University Press, West Lafayette, Indiana.
Pavlides, M. (2008). Animal Assisted Interactions, Jessica Kingsley, London, UK.

Find More Information
Autism Service Dogs of America
Autismservicedogsofamerica.com

4 Paws 4 Ability
4pawsforability.org/autismdogs.html

Wilderwood Service Dogs for Autism
autism.wilderwood.org

Assistance Dogs for Autism
autismassistancedog.com

Northstar Foundation/Service Dogs for Autism
northstardogs.com/autism.shtml

April Only! Save! Subscribe to the award-winning Autism Asperger’s Digest for one-year (6 information packed issues) at the regular price of $29.95, receive a second year for just $15. That’s a 50% savings off the second year! Offer good April 1 – 30th in U.S. and Canada only. Subscribe online at www.autismdigest.com, or by calling Future Horizons at 1.800.489.0727.

Compliments of Autism Asperger’s Digest March/April 2011 issue

Excerpted from the article, “Going Off to Camp: Information and Encouragement for Parents” that appears in the March/April 2011 issue of Autism Asperger’s Digest magazine. Reprinted with permission. The Autism Asperger’s Digest is offering a subscription special during April, to celebrate National Autism Awareness Month. Details follow.

Spring has yet to arrive, so why are we talking about summer camp for kids with ASD? Because you’ll need plenty of time to find a camp and then prepare your child for this important experience. But also because camps are already accepting applications and time is running out.

Whether you’ve made the decision to send your child with autism or Asperger’s to summer camp, or you’re still unsure – possibly torn between pros, cons, or where to begin – this article will help you through the process. Four camp directors shared their expertise, several parents offered advice from their camp experience, and all that information is combined here to give you tips and information to ensure a successful camp experience.

Before You Begin…

Consider these tips from the parents and camp directors to get you started:

• Know what you want; determine your goals. Many parents use summer camp primarily as an opportunity for their child to be away from home, socialize and build self-confidence. Others have a more specific goal, such as a therapeutic environment, academics, or a camp specializing in sports, arts, computers and other interests.
• Perform an honest assessment. Decide whether you and your child are ready for camp. This step is just as – and sometimes more – difficult for parents.
• Gather information. If you’re having a hard time making a decision, finish reading this article, target a few camps you like and talk to the camp directors. This will give you a sense about whether that camp is a good fit and the directors will help you work through concerns to make a decision.
• Prepare a list of questions. Don’t count on remembering everything you want to ask the camp director. Make a very thorough list covering every concern.

What to Look For in a Camp

You can count on this advice because it comes straight from experienced professionals managing camps for kids on the spectrum.

Sylvia Van Meerton (Dragonfly Forest), Linda Tatsapaugh (Talisman Camps), Debbie Sasson (Camp Akeela), and Elsa Berndt (Camp Lakey Gap) generously offered some great information about what to look for in a summer camp. The parents added 100% agreement with these recommendations:

1. Size of camp. Most camps specializing in ASD have fewer campers at each session, however you may also want to ask about size as it relates to how many campers bunk together or the number of kids in group activities.
2. Ratio of campers to counselors. Special needs camps typically have ratios of 1:1 to 1:4 compared to regular camps that have 1:20+. Is there enough staff to allow individual attention to campers whenever necessary.
3. Accreditation. Is the camp accredited by the American Camp Association? This is a good indicator of overall quality.
4. References. Will they put you in touch with another parent whose spectrum child has attended the camp?
5. Application form. This should be extensive so parents provide comprehensive information. This allows staff to get to know the family and the child – what causes meltdowns, fears, when to give cues or warnings. It also builds parents’ confidence in the camp’s ability to manage their child.
6. Staff training and background. How much autism-specific training is provided? By whom? This is a deal breaker because you must be confident that camp counselors understand autism and how to manage each child’s needs. At Camp Lakey Gap, counselors receive two weeks of training provided by experts from TEACCH and the Autism Society of America, and they interact with local special needs kids for experience.
7. Communication. Are phone calls from parents welcome? Do staff members regularly call home? Can parents talk to their child? Some camps find that conversations between campers and parents seldom help homesickness; other camps leave it to the parents’ discretion. This is another reason why it’s important for parents to trust the camp staff. Also ask if they do anything to facilitate ongoing communication between campers throughout the year. Camp Akeela fosters a sense of community through newsletters containing updates about individual campers all year long.
8. Homesickness. How do they deal with homesickness? At Talisman Camps, they encourage the children to write home, expressing how homesick they are. One mother said she was worried when she received a letter saying, “I hate camp. I’m 100% homesick.” But with each subsequent letter, her child’s rating of how homesick he was improved, creating a great visual tool for both parents and campers to see how well they were adjusting.
9. Medical personnel. Who oversees medication management? Do they have a nurse available 24/7? What are their procedures in case of an emergency?
10. Autism support. What specific supports do they provide? For example, at Dragonfly Forest, counselors use a whiteboard at each activity to prepare the kids by writing down the rules, what will happen, and what to say if they need a break. The counselors also carry a backpack with schedules, timers, paper/pen and a common high interest and/or soothing activity.
11. Behavior management. How do they manage difficult behaviors? What happens when a child has a meltdown? Ask how they’ll deal with specific challenges faced by your child. When do they call parents?
12. Daily schedule. What is a typical daily plan? Is it tailored for the child’s interests and needs? Is it flexible? Look for a structure that allows children to do activities at their own pace rather than being forced to keep up with the group.
13. Breaks and downtime. How do they allow for breaks? Are they built into the schedule? Do they have a quiet place or sensory room? Are procedures in place to allow a child to opt-out of an activity when needed? Do they teach campers how to express the need to opt-out?
14. Activities. Does the camp offer something your child will be interested in? Are there enough choices and different types of activities? In addition to summer activities like swimming and hiking, are there other less typical choices like cooking or wood shop?
15. Special diets. Can the kitchen accommodate your child’s special dietary needs? Who will monitor the child’s diet if he can’t/doesn’t himself?
16. Overall environment. This includes the physical and philosophical environment. Does the camp fit your child’s unique needs? What is their overall approach for dealing with autism?

Note: The article also includes sections on “How to Prepare for Camp” and “Anticipate the Unexpected.” Three additional strategy-packed articles are available to AADigest subscribers, in the Read More Online section of the website:

1. Decisions! Decisions! Questions to Guide You in Making a Camp Choice.
   Many pieces of information must be collected and considered when you’re thinking about sending your child with autism/Asperger’s to camp. Let this printable list guide the process and help keep you organized!
2. Stumbling Blocks: Special Considerations for Special Needs Campers
   Our Decisions! Decisions! list is a great cheat-sheet to print out and use as a guide. But some special considerations are likely to present a bigger stumbling block than others. We discuss distance to camp, dietary accommodations, neurotypical versus a special needs camp (with tips for each), and financial considerations (includes ideas for making camp happen no matter what the family’s financial status).
3. Words of Wisdom: From Parents and a Sibling About the Camp Experience

Copyright © Autism Asperger’s Digest. 2011. All Rights Reserved.
Distribution via print or electronic means prohibited without written permission of publisher.

April Only! Save! Subscribe to the award-winning Autism Asperger’s Digest for one-year (6 information packed issues) at the regular price of $29.95, receive a second year for just $15. That’s a 50% savings off the second year! Offer good April 1 – 30th in U.S. and Canada only. Subscribe online at www.autismdigest.com, or by calling Future Horizons at 1.800.489.0727.

The prompt for this edition of Blog Gems is to “link up a post that tells us about a holiday, any kind of holiday even just a weekend away (or an hour to yourself!).” All you have to do is link up your post and then read and comment on the two posts listed before yours (at least!). Visit Blog Gems – Air Your Archives #8 to link up your post or read some other entries.

As I was reflecting back over what I have written about this topic, I realized that I have just passed the three-year mark of my start in blogging, as my first post was published on January 26, 2008. It has been quite the adventure, and I still love it!

The holiday story that comes to my mind, however, is not one that I wrote about here. Instead, it was one of my very first posts on the site 5 Minutes for Special Needs, written just after it started in July of 2008.

I am reprinting the post here to make it easier. I know this is a pretty broad interpretation of the prompt, but since this is what popped into my head, here it is!

Redeeming Elvis (A Vacation Story)

What a whirlwind the last couple of weeks have been – working on articles and various details for the launch of 5 Minutes for Special Needs between posting on my own blog, going to work, taking care of my husband and son, handling ongoing transportation problems and getting ready for a family vacation that started the day before the site went live! Despite the continual itch to sneak away and visit the wifi hotspot during our vacation, we had a wonderful time with each other and my husband’s family.

One of the highlights of the trip was going to a horse riding place where the younger kids had pony rides while the older kids and some of the adults went for a trail ride. As the guide, Matt, helped my son onto his horse, I mentioned that he has autism and may not always answer when spoken to. Matt’s response was to ask me to join them, so of course my first thought was that he was worried about how my son would behave and didn’t want to be alone with him in case there was a problem. But it turned out that he actually wanted to talk to me.

As we walked along the path, he told me about about a child who has come into his life who has Asperger Syndrome. At the stable they have a horse, named Elvis, who was rescued from an abusive situation, and he wasn’t sure if they would ever be able to use him with guests. This boy has really taken to Elvis, however, and the horse has responded by being very gentle around him. From this experience, Matt has looked into the use of horses as therapy with children and adults who have various disabilities and is now planning to become certified for therapeutic horseback riding.

I never know what the response will be when I tell someone that my son has autism, although I am amazed at the number of times the person will begin sharing their concerns about a niece or nephew, a grandchild, or even their own son or daughter. This encounter, however, was such an encouragement to me. Although we hear stories every day of kids who are ostracized or damaged in some way by the people in their lives, here is a guy who had an experience and has responded by looking for a way that he can make a difference in the lives of others. All I can say is, “Way to go, Matt!”

So what’s the best reaction you have gotten to your child’s disability? Please leave a comment and share it with us.

I haven’t joined in on this fun bloghop for quite a while (since the middle of 2009, to be exact!), so I thought it would be fun to start up again.

For several years, I used to keep a running list of all the books I had read. I stopped doing that at some point, although I sort of wish I hadn’t. Now that I am listing books on Shelfari, I have created a tag called “2011 Reads” and have them linked on my Books page so I can see them all together. (I know, I know, it’s all a bit anal retentive, but I like it.)

So far this year, I have finished five books.

Dragongirl (The Dragonriders of Pern) by Todd McCaffrey (son of the original author of the series)
There are a few books in between the last one I read and this one, and this was written by a different author, but I have to say I was not as engrossed in this one as I was in earlier Pern books.

It may just be that I’m older, but I found the writing to be somewhat cryptic at times, and in a frustrating rather than tantalizing sense.

Foundation: Book One of the Collegium Chronicles by Mercedes Lackey
I was a bit nervous to read this one since I was so unimpressed by Dragongirls, thinking that I had lost all interest in the genre. But I thoroughly enjoyed this book, could hardly stand to put it down, in fact!

Although I am a bit fuzzy on the details of Valdemar after not reading any of the stories for so long, I felt right at home with everything about this one. What a fun start to the new year.

How to Teach Life Skills to Kids with Autism or Asperger’s by Jennifer McIlwee Myers
This was one of the books I reviewed for Future Horizons, and I absolutely loved it! Jennifer’s writing style is so engaging and readable, and the advice and examples she gives are spot on. You can read my full review here.

Aspergirls: Empowering Females With Asperger Syndrome by Rudy Simone
This book was recommended by Tony Attwood when I heard him speak, and I am so glad I decided to give it a look. I would highly recommend this for any girl or woman you know who is on the spectrum (or for her parents or spouse, as well.)

Her Daughter’s Dream (Marta’s Legacy) by Francine Rivers
Although I am a big fan of Francine Rivers in general and really enjoyed the first book in this two-book series, I didn’t find this one quite as enjoyable. I felt that it went on and on at points. It did hold my attention enough to finish it, mainly because I wanted to see if and how the generational issues would be resolved.

And here’s “What’s On the Nightstand” to be read:
Autism & Alleluias by Kathleen Deyer Bolduc
The Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism by Dr. Temple Grandin and Sean Barron
Lost at School: Why Our Kids with Behavioral Challenges are Falling Through the Cracks and How We Can Help Them by Ross W. Greene

To read more posts or join in yourself, visit What’s On Your Nightstand? at 5 Minutes for Books.

You can see all the books I’ve finished so far this year on the bookshelf on my Books page or read all of my mini reviews by clicking on the 2011 Reads tag.

Welcome! This is Part 3 in a series related to the recent Future Horizons conference I attended with Dr. Tony Attwood speaking on Autism & Asperger’s. I know this is a lot of information in a relatively short period of time, but my hope is that you will find something you relate to or that you can bookmark these posts for a later time when it may apply to your situation.

Part 1 covered the topics of Autistic Personality, Prevalence of ASDs and Asperger’s in Girls.
Part 2 included the Reaction to Being Different, How to Explain the Diagnosis and the Social Tree versus the Sensory Tree.

Today we are looking at Exploring Feelings, specifically related to Cognitive Behavior Therapy, the Amygdala and Common Emotions.

Cognitive Behavior Therapy

Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) is a treatment for mood disorders that is logical and therefore suited to individuals with Asperger’s. CBT can help an individual to better manage anxiety, sadness, anger and affection.

Tony shared about two critical areas during this section of his presentation–affective development and cognitive distortion. Affective development relates to three areas:

• Maturity – may have tantrums or show affection in a way that’s much younger than their actual age
• Vocabulary – needs words to describe how they are feeling or may express anger in response to a variety of feelings
• Repair – ability to fix negative feelings may be limited and they may not understand why neurotypicals use emotional restoratives and affection (i.e. hugs and such) to feel better

So much of what I have learned about emotions over the last few years has been related to maturity and vocabulary, that is, identifying and talking about feelings. I really hadn’t thought or read much about the concept of repair.

But when an individual does not have good repair strategies, they will react in whatever way gets them away from the bad feelings. This might be through destruction (using anger as a quick fix), solitude (best way to calm down) or focusing on their special interest (to block the negative thoughts).

Congnitive distortion relates to dysfunctional thinking and incorrect assumptions. For example, a person with Asperger’s may not understand why people are laughing in a situation. They may think the people are laughing at them when they are really laughing with them, or vice versa. There are several types of laughter and distinguishing between them requires social skill.

The Amygdala

As Tony shared with us, difficulty with the perception, expression and regulation of emotions in an inherent characteristic of Asperger’s. This is due in part to the amygdala.

The amygdala is responsible for alerting us to the need for fight or flight. Our breathing and heart rate changes, adrenalin is released to alert the frontal lobe, which is where we control our impulses. If you imagine that the amygdala is like a car dashboard and the frontal lobe is the driver, the amygdala tells us when the engine is going too fast or is overheating, i.e. when we are going to have a personal meltdown.

In people with Asperger’s, the amygdala is 10-15% larger and has less white matter for connections to be made with the frontal lobe. So the dashboard is not being consistent or accurate in notifying the driver of a problem brewing, and that is why meltdowns and explosions often seem to come out of the blue, even to the person with the disorder.

Now, an important point to be made is that all of this is an explanation, not an excuse, for inappropriate behavior. Individuals with Asperger’s need teaching and support regarding how to recognize the signals.

One ingenious device that Tony found at Brookstone (otherwise known as a toy store for men!) is a Heart Rate Ring. To use it, you simply place the ring on your finger and turn it on, and it monitors your heart rate. This could be used to identify when your heart rate is going up and possibly alert you to your level of agitation before a meltdown or explosion occurs. Pretty neat, huh?

Common Emotions

Anxiety
Individuals with Asperger’s are very good at worrying and may also have generalized anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, performance anxiety, social anxiety or even post-traumatic stress disorder from being teased or bullied. Controlling or oppositional behaviors can be based in anxiety, as can anger and aggression.

Depression
One in three adolescents and adults with Asperger’s suffers from depression as a result of low self-esteem, a painful awareness of being different and sometimes an empathic attunement to the suffering of others. As I can attest to personally, depression is a difficult thing to overcome as it often results in extreme loneliness and both physical and mental exhaustion. Just as with anxiety, we can see sadness expressed as anger.

Anger
Two out of three people with Asperger’s have a problem with anger management. However, we need to be aware that anger is a quick fix for feelings of sadness, depression or anxiety. Anger can also be a sign of an externalized depression. Because of this, it is vitally important to do a thorough assessment and figure out what is really going on when a person is exhibiting a lot of anger.

This can be done using tools such as self-report scales, a mood diary and a list of triggers. If you chart a person’s moods over a period of time and take away the extremes, you should see a cycle and be able to even predict when a difficult time is coming so additional supports can be provided during that time.

Assessments should also include a clinical interview, observations in different contexts, family history of mood disorders, unconventional signals of distress and misinterpretations of situations and information. A couple of things to keep in mind when working with a child with Asperger’s:

• Three words that are guaranteed to trigger agitation are no, wait and change.
• Once the atmosphere becomes emotional, the child with Asperger’s amplifies it.

One of the ways that Tony recommends to respond to these needs is what he calls “affective education.” He has even developed a program called the CAT-kit that he has designed to work on this area with individuals. I’ll talk more about this concept of Affective Education in my next conference post.

I would love to hear your thoughts on any of the topics discussed here. Is there anything that sticks out to you as being especially true or even not true in your experience?

For more information on other conferences, please visit the Future Horizons website. They also have a variety of books and other materials by Tony Attwood and a number of other authors in their online store.

Note: I attended this conference for free as a member of the Future Horizons blogger review team. I did not receive any other compensation for this post.