for those of you who are doing sensory OT | Autism PDD

Hi, we have FINALLY started occupational therapy (phew!) and already I am having a few doubts.. about this particualr therapist I mean. She is very competent I am sure but she does not seem to have a lot of experience working with ASD children and with sensory issues. I did not specifically ask about this but I did tell her about my son so I guess she should have said something?

For starters, she was using longer sentences with him rather than the short ones that people working with autistic children often use.  She was having problems with him attending and asked how I make him pay attention to me. She was not able to get eye contact, and was not able to engage in much productive work in the first session.. However I will give this a shot, for a few sessions anyway. But I am still wondering if this one is qualified enough to work with my son in particular. He has a sensory integration disorder, fine motor difficulties and has difficulty staying at task. The OT set the basic goals to work on these two issues, to increase his attention span and to calm him down. She will also make a sensory diet for us to follow at home. This all sounds good but I am not too thrilled.

What did your OT do in the earlier sessions? When did you start working on sensory issues? Maybe this OT will be more effective a bit later on. I am paying her 0 AUD an hour, out of pocket so I can afford to wait and see how it goes for a couple of sessions. I am really happy with his speechie, right from the start. She is very good, experienced and makes my son work very hard for the whole session so I guess I wanted a similar OT. Any advice? Thanks.


Mary

Hi Mary,

I understand your concerns. Lachlan has an OT that we see on an intermitent basis. Right from the start we felt comfortable with her and she engaged lachlan fully. She does not work one on one with lachlan, but rather she took a comprehensive questionaire at the start and asked us what issues we would like to address. She then started off by giving us a sensory diet to do - with great results. She keeps in contact via email/mobile and we call her when we feel we need another appointment. It works well for us.

My question would be - how did you find you OT? How experienced are they?

Lachlans OT is quite young, but works with profoundly disabled children 5 days a week, does respite care and seems really knowledgeable about latest techniques etc. She often recommends books for me to read, seminars to attend etc.

My experience with the OT we were 'assigned' through our support service is useless. Ask around - see who other people are using and who they recommend.

Mysh

Hi Mary
Right now my ds has two OTs.  One he sees through EI twice a week for 50 minutes and another one that he sees privately for 1/2 an hour two days a week.  They are both very different in thier approach and the one that he sees privatley really, really works on his sensory stuff. One of the reasons is that she has the equipment to do so and the EI person comes to the house and we use what we have.

Both OTs had us fill out a sensory profile in the beginning and it took a few sessions before they really started working on stuff.  My ds needs lots and lots of movement and back in March could not attend to anything to save his life.  Now after a few months his attention to tasks is a little better.

His private OT is very young and knowledgable.  She is always giving me things to try and ds loves her.  He will do anything for her but it took a little while for both of them to get to know each other and to feel comfortable. He just turned 2 at the end of May. 

He likes his EI OT and will work for her but I feel like I kinda have to push addressing the sensory stuff like starting a brushing protocol.  It took a few weeks of me asking about it for her to show us how to do it. Now I think it is funny every time she sees him she brushes him.  One other thing about her.  A few weeks ago she was on vacation and we missed 3 sessions with her I and during that time ds got sick and we missed 1 session with his private OT.  I didn't think much of it until by then end he was really really hyped up and couldn't focus for two days.  Then he went to see his private OT and his EI OT was back from vacation his ability to focus came back and he was much calmer.  It was amazing and that is when I realized that OT was helping him

Sorry that this is so long but my point is to give it some time and see how it goes.  I would give it about a month and then decide.  It took my ds about that long to warm up and to figure out what was going on now he doesn't want to leave either one of them.

Have a  good weekend and good luck

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