As promised, here is an attractive Bathroom Schedule board (so that you can attach velcro then your picture symbols and have it with you and your child ready for going to the toilet, or taking a bath, or washing hands  - whatever you are working on... and few symbols to use with it if required - however, don't forget you can access some other symbols individually by using the link at the top of the page... If you are looing for further information, read the earlier post here. And, click read more to access the links ready for downloading!

While it was not until just before Badger's fifth birthday, we are thankfully no longer having to use nappies with Badger and have got through the whole ordeal of toilet training. Having said that, it is not just as simple as getting them out of nappies - as many parent's will appreciate! We still face many problems with hygiene, not wiping and "going" in inappropriate places... It is, as with everything on the spectrum seems to be, a work in progress, and while I am confident that we will get there in the end, it is still very frustrating to be sending spare undies everywhere, cleaning up wee, repeating "flush the toilet, wash your hands" a billion times a day and my personal favourite: "NOT IN THE GRID!"  So here, is a link to a very informative leaflet about the continence issues that children with autism spectrum conditions can face... It is very helpful and insightful. Followed by some PECS for you to use, and, if you are completely determined and want to give toilet training another shot, I have located a "plan" for training, which you can follow - it is quite heavy reading and I cannot endorse it because I did not use this, but nonetheless it is certainly thorough! Click read more to access the rest of this post and the links.

http://asdvisualresources.weebly.com/autism-early-intervention-games-pdf.html


This may be useful for you if you are trying to form a therapy plan, look for ideas for the summer months, rain or shine, a grandparent looking for activities to do with your grandchild that might help and may alleviate some of the strain from your children - the autism parents...

I do know what it is like to be at the end of your tether sleep wise and I am yet to find any one thing that works. For us, thankfully, Badger's sleep issues come in waves of a few months at a time, so we can and do ride it out just as best as we can. Summer is hard, so we do have problems right now, but hey ho... we will muddle through and there are plenty worse off than us.

Anyway! Here is a link to an insightful and perhaps useful guide on sleep issues in Autistic individuals. 

Badger's Nanna passed away. She had cancer and it was too late to be able to do anything to save her life. It seemed that this took all of our emotions, drained us, especially my partner as it was his mother and he took on the role of almost all hospital appointments and making sure what was left of her life, was enjoyable and comfortable. He was amazing. Truly. I always knew that he was - I wouldn't be with him otherwise! But, having gone through this and watched him, almost from the sidelines, was a strange experience for me. On one hand, everything did still have to carry on. Our lives still needed to be structured, Badger did still need his new school arrangements to be made, we did still need to be a family, we did still have a baby on the way... 

Looking back, it doesn't feel like we managed to do an awful lot, it seems that 2012 was blighted by this disease. Checking the statistics of this site, or looking at posts that I did make, however, apparently for a long while, I did carry on and everyone else still visited and read the pages, so their lives all did too. To me, in my head, it feels that the illness and the passing of my late mother in law to be, was the be all and end all. Of the world. When it actual fact, it was just the changing of mine. This may seem like a very obvious fact, but for me, with this first "real" loss, it is quite a difficult realisation to swallow.

I spent months, not quite knowing how to deal with Badger when the time did come and we lost Irene. He loved her, dearly and he knew that she was poorly - he visited for a while and saw her in bed, we had to remind him to stay away from jumping and so on. He kind of understood, but of course, you get poorly - then you get better. That was his mentality anyway. And when you go to hospital, they make you better. With terminal cancer, that doesn't happen. His only experience of death is Mario or Sonic on a computer game... and of course, you reboot and they come back. How do you explain that to a (then) 5 year old with Autism? With so much already going on...?!

Let me tell you how, you spend months trying to build up the courage to ask your partner, or mother in law what they would like and fail to do so in the fear of upsetting people even more. You bury your head in the sand, praying and praying - right up until you hear the news of her departure - that you wont have to explain death. I don't say this is what you should do, but I do say this is what I did do. I turned to everyone I could think of to ask for help on this, and nothing seemed "right" it didn't quite fit... what little help there was. So I continued to hope that I wouldn't have to explain it, and if I did have to explain her death, that he'd understand, just KNOW, what it meant. I made sure that he had as many memories to cherish, I made sure we always said yes. Her favourite place was Blackpool. Seriously, all over the world and she loved there best. It was convenient, in that we were able to go often, even when she was deteriorating, and I know that Badger will now associate the place with happy memories. And trams. Gotta love the trams. 

In the end, it was a few weeks after her funeral (we decided against taking him) and he was asking questions again. Exhausted with trying to say "the right things" and put it a certain way, I simply phrased it on this occasion, as she was gone. It sank in, he was sad for a while, but he understood and knows now why we have a grave to visit rather than a house.

For children and adults who are on the spectrum, a very common characteristic is little to no eye contact. The extent of this can vary greatly from person to person and from one social situation to another. If you are interested in learning more about this then this link is a good piece to look at.
Below, you'll find a video. It is a free resource aiming to help improve eye contact if used regularly. There is a whole CD-ROM available from Face-Cards to purchase if you find it useful to your child. I've not used this so cannot really review it, though this resource has helped my son. Read More...

Here are a few PDF printables for you to use with your child. They are all based around practising using the muscles in a child's mouth to improve clarity and ease of speech. How effective this kind of therapy really is, is still unknown, however the majority of speech therapists do use these methods.

All links here are from external sites. I highly recommend the first (TeachBookPort) as it is the very elusive "Mr Tongue." 

I wanted to talk a little about another kind of communication system that we have used in the past. Signing. We don't use it now {however the odd sign still comes out of Badger!} but when Badger was non-verbal, we did get into it and it was especially useful while he was at pre-school as a lot of the staff are already trained and the younger children knew quite a few signs too - from programs on TV such as "Something Special" and from Baby Signing that they may have done with their parents before they could speak. Read More...