Ten-year old Kevin mixes the colors on his palette, white and blue together make the color of the sky. His art instructor/therapist, Colin, asks him a question. Kevin looks him in the eye and answers – "blue, green, white." "Good eye contact, Kevin" Kevin takes a piece of paper out of his pocket and completes the downstroke on the "K" of his name. Each stroke is for making eye contact. 5 more letters, and 7 more strokes, he gets a gummy bear. He has made good eye contact with Colin today and has many more lines on his sheet of paper than last week. Kevin has worked with Collin for about six months. The bright colors of Kevin’s paintings happily fill one wall in our living room - a still life, an ocean scene, a self portrait, a portrait of Kevin’s favorite artist Gauguin. Kevin has become knowledgeable about painting techniques and can converse about many artists.

Kevin's art instructor, Colin, is not really an art instructor but a therapist for the UCSB autism clinic. Kevin has received between 5 - 10 hours a week of PRT (pivotal response training) from the Koegel autism program since he was 4 years old and was diagnosed with autism. The Koegel autism program has freed him from his four-hour long tantrums and has allowed our family the luxury to take Kevin to events where he has to wait in line. Something "typical" families take for granted. We no longer have screaming outbursts at the grocery store.

Pivotal Response Training is an ABA therapy which is used to change behavior. Two pivotal behaviors, motivation and responsivity to multiple cues, affect a wide range of behaviors in children with autism. PRT has helped Kevin with language skills, social behaviors, and play skills. He has another therapist who has taught him how to play chess. The common interest in chess has helped him to make a chess buddy friend in his classroom. (Kevin attends an open alternative school with an aide).

Regressive autism is where a child develops normally and then around 18 months starts to regress. So slight was Kevin's regression that we did not take much notice, until the time when he was 2 and he was no longer pointing, or speaking, or interacting as a normal two-year old would. His pediatrician reassured us that boys develop slower than girls and told us not to worry. He was enrolled in early intervention services for children who are fifty percent delayed and under 3 years of age when my next door neighbor (who was an early intervention specialist) noticed that he was not talking as well as he should. When he turned 3, he was placed in Special Education services and at age 4 he was diagnosed with autism.

Many children with regressive autism have gastrointestinal problems. Kevin was no exception. At age 5 we put Kevin on the gluten free casein free diet. We immediately saw an increase in responsivity and awareness. Kevin was on the GFCF diet for 5 years and we just recently added small amounts of dairy and wheat back into his diet. We worked with a homeopathic naturopathic doctor who customized Kevin's supplements. We also did chelation which removed some of the heavy metals from Kevin's system.

We were very fortunate at age four to get Kevin into a 3-year grant with the Koegels. This allowed us to also pursue additional types of therapies with our local Regional Center in California. Another ABA therapist introduced us to direct instruction and precision teaching. In the summer we worked on these programs to catch Kevin up to grade level. The SRA Direct Instruction programs Language for Learning and Language for Thinking gave Kevin a schema for thinking and categorizing. Before these programs, his thinking was scattered and he had trouble connecting things or relating objects to each other. We also work with Kevin on direct instruction programs for reading - Reading Mastery which improved Kevin's vocabulary and allowed him to read fluently.

Sensitivity to noise was another hurdle we had to cross.. Kevin would cover his ears when the bus came and he was fascinated with trains and could hear a train coming at least 15 seconds before I heard it. He also refused to go into public bathrooms, even the one at his school, because of the echoing noise in the bathroom. When Kevin was 7 we took him to an auditory integration therapist for auditory integration therapy (AIT). AIT was developed by Dr. Berard in France. It is based on the assumption that processing problems can occur if one hears one frequency of sound better than other frequencies. Some children with autism can hear the wings of butterflies flapping. This hypersensitive hearing can have a huge effect on children. We often noticed that Kevin would tune out and we discovered that he was listening to the humming of the air conditioner or the hummingbird outside the window. Auditory integration therapy was very successful for Kevin and we immediately saw a change for the better. He was able to use the bathroom at school for the first time and loud noises no longer bothered him.

Kevin's autism diagnosis has also allowed me to grow very much as a person. I have met many wonderful people through Kevin's diagnosis - teachers, aides, therapists, etc. I also believe that it is important for parents to network and share information. I moderate a few listserves for parents and teachers including a Special Education listserve and an autism listserve in Santa Barbara. I also moderate the California Autism Coalition listserve and am involved in legislative issues relating to autism and other developmental disabilities in California and on the board of several disability-related nonprofits.

Debbie H.
January 2006