Getting help for a child with autism. Time is precious.

March 27, 2008

This CNN’s article just hit Digg’s front page. As I’ve mentioned before, my son was recently diagnosed with autism. We first brought our concerns up with his pediatrician when he was 2 years old.

His pediatrician didn’t say he was fine like the one in the article, but at the same time, he didn’t really care that much. Took him almost a month to give us a referral to a neurologist (we have HMO, so we need referrals), and after the neurologist, his pediatrician took another month to send us to what has been our greatest find: The Early Intervention program.

It took almost 6 months after we first brought it up with his doctor for him to be officially diagnosed with autism and start getting his therapies. I really regret not going after this issue more aggressively.

Early Intervention is just that: the sooner your kid gets help, the more effective the therapies will be, and we lost precious 6 months by waiting for doctors to be available.

My suggestion to you: if you have concerns, don’t wait. Even if your pediatrician says there’s nothing wrong. Talk to teachers, talk to other professionals, take your kids to centers that have years of experience with children (eg: YMCA) and ask what they think. Time is precious during these early years.

And while you’re waiting, do your homework. Hit the internet, hit support groups, hit forums and message boards. There are tons of parents out there asking and answering questions. Keep in mind that the people in the forums are NOT professionals (or most of them), so take their advice with a grain of salt. But that doesn’t mean they don’t have tons of useful information that can point you to the right direction.

The key thing is: Time is precious.

I really wish we had known about these Early Intervention Programs before.

Category Posted in Family

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3 Responses to “Getting help for a child with autism. Time is precious.”

Barbara Swafford said:

March 28th, 2008 at 12:46 am

HI J2R,

I pray your son is doing better.

I know Jenny McCarthy feels there is a correlation between diet and autism “symptoms”(?). Do you find this to be true?

And with the controversy over vaccines, would you care to share your thoughts on that issue?
Journey2Retirement said:

March 28th, 2008 at 4:57 am

@B,

We did allergy tests on my son. He’s not allergic to Gluten or any other substances. However, we still try to limit his gluten intake given all the community’s input on the issue. We have also been suplementing his diet with Omega 3 and most recently Zinc. We did notice a huge improvement on my son. My wife swears it’s the Omega 3, but I’m not so sure. It could be his therapies, or any of the other things we have been trying.

I’m a science guy, so before I can affirm anything, I need proof. That’s why I’m not 100% convinced it was the Omega 3 that caused this improvement. The same way with all the vaccines. There are no proof that the vaccines cause autism. However, there’s such a strong correlation given the input of several parents, that they might be related. Like many in the community like to say, the vaccines might not necessarily cause autism, but it might trigger it.

It’s just such a huge topic. Maybe I’ll blog about it someday Thanks for the interest in my son.
John Best said:

April 1st, 2008 at 3:53 pm

All of this early intervention talk is obsolete junk left over from before we knew that thimerosal (mercury) caused the autism. It’s a waste of time. You have to undo the damage from the mercury before the child will improve. Don’t waste time and energy with these useless early intervention therapies. Call A DAN doctor, sign up for the Yahoo group Autism Mercury and you might be able to get rid of the autism.