When do you let your kid be a kid? | Autism PDD

Seriously! With all the therapies, school, PT, ST, OT, in home ABA...when do you let your kid just be a kid?

I think weekends are a great time - go to the park, the pool or even the backyard. Do fun things like have a picnic with whatever your child will eat. Play in the sand - great sensory activity.

It's hard - we are fortunate to have a ds who is more flexible than a lot of kids with autism. He does thrive with structure, but every once in a while we will take part of a day off. One time it was such a BEAUTIFUL day and ds begged me to not go to OT because he wanted to stay outside and play with his sister. I told him we could if he promised to work with me for 10 minutes every day on writing to make up for it and that he would not fuss at going the next week. Well, he worked with me a few days and he put up a little fuss the next week. But, there were consequences for those things as well.

Tough question - I'll be anxious to hear other's responses and I"ll think some more as well.

we let go our early intervention therapist

and now our son can be himself
and he is doing better than before
and got rid of a LOT of stress

forker

I have to disagree as well tzoya. With a spectrum disorder comes a wide range of abilities/skills. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think my ds is perfectly capable of just being a kid. He plots with his younger sister against us (all in good fun - well, MOST of the time!), he jumps out and yells "Boo!" to us (and has succeeded in scaring the living daylights out of me but he thinks it's funny), he plays in the field catching butterflies and also tries to rescue flies out of spider webs. He rides his bike and his scooter outside or practices jumping on his pogo stick - without my urging him to. So, in my opinion when he is initiating these activities on his own - he is just being a kid and, even though a lot of these things are "good for him" I don't consider it being therapy as I'm not initiating/suggesting it. If he asks for help (like with the pogo stick), I give him instruction but then when he wants to "do it myself" I let him. His pogo stick is one of those that is a "Grow to Pro" and has a balancing thing on the bottom. Its' still not easy, but he can do a few on his own. If I just barely hold the stick, he can usually do 10-12.

Anyway, I think there is benefit to downtime for our kids - both for us and for them. I don't feel like I'm trying to justify letting my kid play on his own. My kids play well together and I think he sometimes learns better when I'm not right there looking over his shoulder and trying to get him to interact appropriately all the time. He learns the ebb and flow of conversation from my dd (who although she is only just 3 has the conversational skills of a 4 1/2 year old according to the dev ped). I have actually heard her say, " (Ds), please don't interrput me! I was talking first." To me, this is MUCH better than me saying it. To be frank, kids listen better when it comes from someone who is not a parent or professional. I intervene when they can't resolve issues and it sounds like things are deteriorating quickly.

Again, this is my kid, who is on the mild end of the spectrum and has had made huge gains this year conversationally. Although part of me is scared of a very unstructured summer - so far we only have horseback riding lessons scheduled, although I am calling about swimming lessons today - part of me thinks it will be good for him. Particularly if the friendship with the twin boys down the street develops. Now, with the twins, I will be more involved in the play but ds did SUPER well on Saturday playing with them with minimal intervention from my dh (according to him). I was out there briefly off and on, but I was also taking care of our dd who had a 103 degree temp, but everything I saw was totally appropriate. I am also planning on doing a visual schedule very soon to schedule in SOME learning time so that we don't lose the accomplishments made this year - but I hope to do it in fun, creative ways.

Just my honest thoughts here...

No legal stuff here!! He attends a FABULOUS school that gives us MORE THAN MOST during the school year! I have no complaints at all! :)

Every Sunday. We say Sunday is FUNday! No errands, no school, no
classes, no babysitters, no schoolwork, no work! We do something
different every weekend--A project at home or the park, an afternoon
outing to some kid-oriented place, it is OUR day. And it is wonderful.

A sad situation (my divorce) gave me the opportunity to really plan and
look at my schedule in a new way. I had to really buckle down and think
hard about the best custody situation for me and my son. I came up with
ritual of Funday. I worked out everything around that special day. I
highly reccomend NOT having to get a divorce to implement something
similar in your life!

I too pulled Mason from summer school this year...he was having such a rough year behavior wise and I knew that a new teacher and schedule was going to be too hard for him to adjust to properly and by the time he would finally get adjusted school would be over.

I was worried about regression too, but I will work on small things with him at the house and I still need to take him for his speech and OT...but I thought the same thing...he just needs a chance to be a kid...we signed him up for a special needs baseball team, so that should be a lot of fun...plus work on social skills at the same time!

---Great idea, Mamakat!! I bet your son loves all of the mommy time he gets with you!!

I guess I think all kids need some kind of break during the summer and it's not as if you're doing NOTHING - it sounds like he's got a lot going on!

I would maybe see if the school will provide a part-time one-on-one tutor since summer school is apparently not an appropriate setting in which they can guarantee your child's safety. And I'm SURE the school doesn't want a lawsuit on their hands if they lost your child - right? That might light a fire under them if you subtly hint to that (maybe not actually say lawsuit, but dance around it by saying something like "legal implications".

You are right that our kids need free time. They need lots of time

to just take in their day, explore the world, play in their own way.

Constantly engaging them is too much stress - for them and for us -

and counterproductive. ASD kids need free time, too.

Gotta disagree with you here, tzoya. First off, I doubt that any parent is just leaves his kid to his own devices, without any intervention, direction, therapies, etc. I have never encountered a parent who does nothing.

There is a school of thought that argues that stimming or "in their own world" appearing behavior is actually very important and productive for kids/people with ASD. (I know you know this school of thought, but for those who may not...) Many people say that stimming and seemingly inward behavior is not wasted time, but very important calming time, processing time. IMO, it is not wise to quell this behavior at all times and at all costs. There is a lot of discussion all over the Internet about this subject (to stim or not to stim - to zone out or not to zone out - when and if to intervene.) I encourage parents to learn about the various schools of thought before they take action with their child. It's not an either/or thing. Learn more about stimming and zoning.

I disagree that ASD kids need to be kept engaged as much as possible. Certainly, some efforts to engage them (guided by the therapy/approach of your choice) are right and good, but keeping ASD kids constantly busy so that they do not "waste time" by stimming and zoning isn't right. We need to understand how they process the world and be respectful of their experience before we jump all over them with our uneducated ideas of what they "should" be doing. IMO.

Anthony does ABA 10 hrs per week and ST will start again next week for 1 hour per week. He is going to play camp at the local park district which is 3 hours, 2 day a week. And it is just that - PLAY. They play at the park, in the sprinklers and do lots of arts and crafts which Anthony loves. My oldest LOVED this program and was mad when he aged out. It's only for 4 & 5 year olds. Two of the neighbors are also going and we'll be car pooling together, etc. It's part of my master plan on solidifying his friendships with the kids who live closest to us.

Anthony is not one to go into his own little world. He actually seeks an appropriate amount of social interaction (it's just that the interaction itself may not be totally appropriate). He plays appropriately on his own too using his imagination with his action figures etc. Yesterday, he and Frankie were with their friends ALL day. They were swimming at our house and the neighbors. There were 5 kids all together. They had ice cream at my house and lunch at the neighbors. My neighbor and DH said they had a blast all day. Running around, squirting each other with water guns, playing hide and seek. All the typical summer stuff. He was sound asleep when I arrived home from work - he was zonked and sunburned (DH

So even with his schedule he has plenty of time to be a kid. He had ABA yesterday from 9:30 - 11:30 - the rest of the day was his.

Yes, respite!! Does your State offer it? We recieve 30 hours a month! It's nice, you can stay home, do your household stuff, play with your other kids all while you have a trained babysitter working with you ASD child!I decided against summer school this year for several reasons. They went last year, granted it was a different state and school district, but I spent a day observing and i didn't like what I saw. Lots of kids, and lots of teachers. No problem, except the teachers were all sitting around gossiping and I was working with my own children. And the scariest/saddest part I knew what I was doing more than they did. When Andrew wondered over to the puzzle table I said do you want to do a puzzle and the student teacher they had in there said oh he doesn't do the puzzles he just plays with the pieces. ummmmmm you are suppose to try to get him to do the puzzle and NOT just play with the pieces. Plus there was an aggressive little girl in there I saw hitting Andrew and no one paid any attention to it. It was babysitting, it wasn't teaching or therapy or working on things. So this year I never even asked about it. It would have meant another school and another set of teachers, and yet another one come september. Besides they were screaming every morning on the way to school and obviously didn't want to be there. For the first 2 weeks of no school Nikolas gave me a huge smile every morning and a kiss, I think he was saying thank you for not making me go to school. So I am rethinking the 30 hours a week come September. I am still working on setting up OT and ST private for this summer, but I will be with them. My 15 year old neice is coming to visit for a month, we go to the park, the beach, have memberships to the zoo and aquarium. Its been 2 weeks of no school and they are still progressing ALOT! The biggest thing has been 2 way conversations that has just started since school let out, the language is broken and there is still alot of gestures but I am so thrilled that they are attempting to follow and answer and show me things and initiate things. They come to me now. They do get time to do their own thing and just be kids and play outside and get dirty, I don't have a set schedule of we are going to do this now, but I spend alot of making dinner time also talking about frogs and roaring like a lion. LOL! Nikolas follows me around with his animal book. I give them some time and then I put myself in their play for 15 minutes or so, and then I let them do their own thing again. Now they actually come and get me to play with them or want me to watch them go down the slide. THey have come a long way.[QUOTE=John][QUOTE=littlebopeep][QUOTE=John]

It all depends on how high or low functioning a child is. [/QUOTE]

Totally disagree. It's not an either/or question. I encourage you to learn more about stimming and the value of alone time from an autistic person's point of view. Stimming does not = "lights out." Stimming does not = "low functioning."

Again, the question is not whether to go with early intervention. It's pretty much accepted across the board that ASD kids benefit from interventions, etc. But squelching stims and whatever "isolation-type behavior" bugs you, just for the sake of keeping the kid busy and "productive," is not only disrespectful, it is based in mis-information of what stimming is all about.

I really encourage parents who are not familiar with all of this to learn more.

[/QUOTE]

You totally took it out of condense. I was not saying that lower functioning kids stim or zone more then higher. I was saying that lower functioning children need more inter venation and proding. and to totally disagree means that you too are unwilling to accept people opinions. We all have our opinion here and are allowed to have them but I will never just say my way or my opinion is better then someone else�s.

[/QUOTE]

Sorry, didn't mean to come off as saying you're not allowed to have an opinion. I just asked that you (us, all of us parents) learn more about stimming and zoning out from an autistic person's perspective. To judge it as wasted time is perhaps basing your assessment on misinformation. I encouraged you (us, all of us parents) to learn more about it, not that my opinion is better than yours.

Sorry if I came on too strong.

Sarah never had stims but was so ALOOF and not interested in us at all.. She needed structure, and engagement at all hours to get her to respond to her environment and we had to teach her how. All interactions from her had to be reinforced at all times or she would walk off and hide from us.

She had breaks but we redirected her back to us and engaged her to reciprocate communication and play with us, peers and environment... teaching her 100's of steps to get her to understand our world and how to join us..she couldnt do this at all unless we rewarded her and reinforced every attempt to learn these things.

We were told to engage her at all time by the developmental pediatrician and to do ABA.

Just having her around typical kids at park and our home with us or letting her have free time doing what she wanted was not enough for her to learn the many things she needed to learn..she needed to learn that her words & interactions were important and had power in her life..she didnt know this..she needed to learn to want to be with us and the world around her.

I dont think she would of went from nonverbal as she was to talking fully as she does now or all the other million skills she had mastered if it wasnt for the intense ABA therapy she got for over 3 years+...

ABA saved her life from being dependent on others in the future for everything she needed to being independent and able to take care of herself.

Her programs had over 500 sheets of data and at least 15-30 skills on each we taught her every single day....she would of never learned them by osmosis like nt kids. It was always 2 steps forward..one step back..constantly building and reinforcing all the way to get this far...and going over taught skills periodically to keep her from regressing.

This is the first summer in 4 years she will not get any ABA or speech...and it's because she has learned all there is to learn from it and now she has the mass amount of skills to learn naturally like her peers.... nothing can stand in her way to have a very successful life:)

This was absolutely necessary for us to do for Sarah..she was so passive and withdrawn~acted deaf and nil eye contact...it took heroic measures of the therapists to get her to respond to them for 6 hours a day but totally needed or she would retreat instantly.

Now that she is in mainstream in public school she not only knows how to attend but wants to! She can sit and do academics years ahead of peers, transitions perfectly all day and plays with and models her peers. These had to be taught.

I cant imagine her being where she is without the tremendous amount of therapy she got... I could be wrong for doing what we did..but when I see her happy, talking and engaging us fully in our world..my gut tells me we did the right thing.

ShelleyR39245.4397800926

I couldn't get through all the posts, but I wanted to clarify something. I think it all depends on what you mean by "just let him be a kid." BO, you don't just let Noah "just be a kid" either. You spend tons of money and effort on RDI. You intervene all over the place. Lots of people do. In fact, MOST do. With OT or PT or RDI or something. That was the focus of the first poster's question. My point was that if a child is in a position of not actually knowing HOW to be a kid, than "just letting him be a kid" doesn't mean anything. If, on the other hand, the child HAS developed some social skills (or was born with them -- it's totally true that functioning on a social level differs from ASD child to ASD child), the "letting him be himself" can be useful. Certainly, no human being should be asked to perform 24/7. But there is also the other side. OUR side. The side of the parent who is always having a parade of therapists walk through the house. Or the parent who alway has to focus on whether the child earned a star in the last half hour for good behavior. Or the parent who is just sick and tired of saying "look at me." WE need to "just be moms" (and dads, of course). We all LONG for that.

IMHO, one of the things that is lacking in our society today IS "letting a kid be a kid." I think that THINKING occurs most often when there's a void. So when we fill those voids with GameBoy or computer or cell phone or soccer, we're not giving kids the opportunity to USE their boredom to become thinkers and doers themselves. I am talking about NT kids here. Of course, perhaps some ASD kids fall into the category of kids who NEED boredom in order to learn to think. But, frankly, I think MOST ASD kids who can think DO. They probably need less prompting to have an inner intellectual life than NT kids do. What they DO need prompting in is having a outer SOCIAL life. I am near the end of my son's educational years. I can look back on 14 years in school and say that those kids who were dragged into the NT world and encouraged to stay there are the ones who are doing "best" by most measures. When I say "dragged into the NT world," I'm thinking about things like RDI and other social skills techniques. I'm talking about moms who took their kids to every birthday party, had them join NT sports teams, got them lessons of some sort (music, dance, sport) and had play date after play date. THEN they got the schools to do whatever they could to address socials skills. Yes, these kids were BUSY. They didn't have much time to sit at a computer in the corner of their room or got to a favorite corner to stim. They were out there. This sounds exhausting just typing it. But the proof is in the pudding for me. I've seen kids who were allowed to "be just kids" who, as teens, are isolated and afraid of being with others. Their lives have not been enhanced because they were allowed to do what they were simply comfortable with. Of course, there are plenty of ASD kids who were given every possible intervention, including social interventions, and these kids still can't pass in the "real world." But it was certainly not from lack of trying.

Do I let my own son "just be a kid"? Yes. That's what I tell myself I'm doing when I just can't intervene anymore. I plead guilty to doing that more often than I'd like to say. ASD is exhausting. For us. For them. But leaving them alone needs to be limited. They need to LEARN so much more than NT kids, who simply absorb functional skills. And EVERYTHING has to be directly taught and then taught again so that it's generalized into another environment. This is true for EVERY functioning level. Just ask the moms whose middle-aged Asperger's kids with 130 IQ's can't earn a living to this day. I feel like a broken record since I bring this up over and over again, but if those with younger children pay attention, perhaps there will be fewer extremely bright Asperger's individuals who can't contribute to society and lead independent lives.

tzoya, it has been you and Patty Romanowski (author of the Oasis guide to Asperger's Syndrome) who got me off my bottom and got me working really hard on independent life skills with ds. And, Head Start helped tremendously too because they are ALL about doing things independently. They have (at our old local one at least) breakfast and lunch together and they do it family-style. Which means they pass it around and each child is expected to take some of each. They pour their own milk, and clean up after - including scraping left-overs into the garbage off their plates. I'd already taught ds to do most of the stuff, but seeing other kids really reinforced it in him and it is completely second nature to him to take stuff over to the counter now. He doesn't even think about it and this REALLY impresses family/friends when they see him do that without being reminded. In fact, one of his teachers said he had the best independent skills in the class - in terms of getting himself dressed, taking stuff over, etc. - all without being reminded.

Now, it took a LOT of work to get to that point - like you said. And social skills has taken a lot of work as well. But, we are also fortunate that ds has a great desire to be with people and always has. I would never have described him as desiring to always be in his own world. When he was younger, he would enjoy some alone time and needed it (this is pre-diagnosis). Having been an only child, I understood that and let him do that. I'm not sure I would do much different now - although maybe I wouldn't have let him play with the toy vacuum QUITE so often!

Ds' relationship with the twins down the street continues to blossom. Tonight, we had our usual bedtime talk and I told him that the twins were going to be going to kindergarten just like him and maybe one might end up in his class - but there was no guarantee. He turned away, closed his eyes and started hugging one of his animals. Then gave a big smile and said, "Oh, I hope, I hope, I hope!" I honestly thought he had switched subjects on me and was talking about something else (this occasionally still happens!). So, I asked him and he said that he really hoped that one of them was in his class - he'd like both of them, but I know the mom is planning on separating them.

I think all the work we have done up until now is working. Thanks tzoya for all of the advice and encouragement. While I still think that some kids need more intensive social intervention than others I agree that we need to work as hard as we can. I just am a big advocate of having a more relaxed summer and not as much pressure to do everything all at once!

I have to agree that we don't need to do everything all at once. I also agree that it's tough and that WE need to take a break sometimes. And that's OK. I want to let everyone know that I, myself, am not at all on my son 24/7. But when I leave him alone to just veg out, some of that is because EVERYONE needs a break. But I have to admit to myself that the vast majority of the time it's because I need a break. Of course, that's perfectly OK. However, I try not to fool myself into thinking that I'm doing something for my son instead of for myself when it let himveg out. I really should be engaging him. I DO engage him a lot. He has turned out to be one of the most social of the ASD kids I know, no matter what the official dx. His SKILLS leave something to be desired. But his DESIRE is there. And I credit that to our taking him into "normal" society since he was a baby. And KEEPING him there in spite of all the challenges (both from the outside world and from him). So all the time, effort and pain have been worth it. Has he learned "to be a kid?" Not fully. But that has not been for lack of trying on all our parts. He's certainly better at "being a kid" because he's been EXPOSED to being a kid than if we had simply let him be himself. That "self" would have preferred to walk around our property happily gathering sticks and talking to no one. Fortunately, he's comea LONG way since those days.

May you all have courage and stamina because that is what it takes. I hope mine holds out!

Patty Romanowski wow My last name is Romanowsky too close, Only I didn't write anything LOL[QUOTE=littlebopeep][QUOTE=John]

It all depends on how high or low functioning a child is. [/QUOTE]

I really encourage parents who are not familiar with all of this to learn more.

[/QUOTE]

Let me tell you my current problem. Maybe this will guide you on what to do for your son. My son started special ed. in july 26 last year because thats when i register him and they said it would be good he enter school during summer time so he gets adjusted to school setting since he never was in a daycare or anything, it went great! He was there for 3 weeks. Summer recess came in August and in Sept. he started his regular school ,therapies etc... and now ends in june 27. His teacher told me he didnt needed summer school. He has been doing so well and progressed so much that it wasnt necessary and during summer no therapists are there anyways and teachers are substitutes. I planned my vacations to Puerto Rico for 6 weeks.

My son has been lazy , cranky ,pretending to be sick for the past 2 months saying "No school tommorrow mommy?" and gets soooo happy saturdays and sundays because he plays with his trains, goes to the park, we go have dinner out etc... and goes to bed late LOL! So the break , kids do need it from all the restriction they get at school. His teacher and i were talking yesterday on the phone and she totally agree these kids do need summer spent at home. She said some do need to be the full 12 months in school but others dont. So its your choice to see whats better for the family and your son.

Here is a site on stimming! Its part of ASD.

http://www.creative-minds.info/Lorelei/Stimming.htm

fred,

My son and his two NT (I assume) friends spent well OVER an hour in the lot next door with another little neighbor girl looking for bugs this weekend. They found butterflies, ladybugs and all sorts of critters. I am thinking about having ds take the he got from grammy and have him buy a bug vacuum on our trip to Target this afternoon. They have them on sale for .99 this week (I'll kick in the little bit of tax). Of course, that's assuming he still wants one. But, I think it's safe to say that he does.

I think their summer sounds great and the fact that they are writing captions for their pictures - wow! I wish I could get ds to draw or color even! Fine motor skills are really difficult for him and we will be without OT this summer. I think I'm going to try to find my "The Out of Sync Child Has Fun" book and try to get some ideas from there. And just get more creative for things to do to get fine motor skills working.

One advantage is that my dd is starting to be interested in drawing and writing, so I may try to have "lessons" each day in which ds and I work together to try to teach dd how to do things. Ds LOVES doing that - he's working really hard (well, some days that is!) on trying to teach her to potty train - it's so cute! He gives her SUCH encouragement - even when I know he doesn't feel like it. She'll yell to him that she went potty and even if he is in the middle of something he considers important, I'll hear a deep sigh and then a "Good job (dd)! You did it!" I always reward that behavior of course!

Here I go getting side-tracked again. I think summer is a great time to focus on gross-motor skills and socializing at the park, the pool, etc. I think it's important to remember that we are moms and dads and not full-time therapists. That means going to the park for a picnic sometimes or catching lightning bugs at night. Or going out in the middle of the afternoon for an ice cream. Again, for some kids some of those things won't work as it disrupts their routines. But, I'm of the school that encourages disrupting routines occasionally in order that kids learn to become more flexible. When I'm teaching a skill, I think it's very important to maintain a routine for that, but in other areas, I mix things up a lot. We sometimes sit at different chairs at dinner. We sometimes get ready for bed early and then play for a while. We take different ways home (well, not now as I'm trying to get both kids comfortable in our new town - but in our old town I did that all the time).

Okay, I can't seem to stay on track today (could it be that dd woke up3 times in the middle of the night and ds woke and stayed up at 4:20 a.m.? Yup - probably!

I agree, unfortunately.

My life it's al about my son, and my husband's too. We can relax only when he is in therapy. Otherwise he is a full time job. All the time I find the oportunity to teach him something or to correct him or to try and figure out what he thinks. I've tried to just let him play ..... but I cannot help myself notiving the flaws in pretend play, in handling toys, short attention spam. Going along with him helps. The play becomes more constructive and he learns. His constant interaction with us is a continuous social skills lesson. Starting with a sneeze ... there you go "Bless you", prompt for "Thank you" if missing. Sitting at the table for dinner : talk about the day, food, movie that on TV, table manners. Every weekend we go out FOR him : water parks, camping, biking or playground. No need to say .... again more work for us (I'm skinny as a stick and I'm biking kilometers with a trailer on the bike and my son on the trailer). If I just let him be ... nothing happens, bad or good. But I think that's my duty as a mother - keep him going as long as I CAN see that he is not right and, despite all the effort on both sides, he is not.

I know I sound like a freak or weird at least but ..... that's my son and he needs help. I know we are burning out but we cannot stop. Our son keeps us going and trying. We fall asleep by 8-9 and we thank God for inventing the night time. I know there are parents struggling over night too .... been there.

As far as being a kid ..... he is a kid, a ASD kid, happy and lucky for all the attention he gets. His life is not boring and has more kids activities than any normal kid would have ...... Stimulation, engaging, interaction, coaching, therapy that's what he needs until I'll see him (if ever) being able to go to park and actually sustain a play with peers. If he will ever do that then he won't need me anymore .... at least for an hour.

I ask the doctor if I'm doing the right thing or should I do more. He said that the progress talks for itself and he said "Breathe, just stop for a second and breathe, he will need you for a long time, you have to be there". Well, I'm breathing, am I not ? In my son's rythm. If ever that day will come when I can say that he is fine wherever he is without me ..... I'll take a deep breath.

Try not to judge just to understand that ASD didnt' make me a better person ... it just crippled me.

Sorry for my scary post, ignore and consider it a vent ....

Yes, we have a young therapist comming, God bless him .... he is sooo good. That's when I do the housework ....

[QUOTE=emerald_521]

---Great idea, Mamakat!! I bet your son loves all of the mommy time he gets with you!!

[/QUOTE]

That was another reason I opted to pull him. There was going to be a different teacher and aids. I saw how he reacted when there was a substitute one day and I can't imagine throwing him into the same class with all new staff and kids. By the time he got used to it summer school would be over and then back to the old setting! He still has his in-home, ST, PT, and OT outside school, so it's not like we're doing nothing. Plus, I'm trained in PRT. I use that with him constantly!

Thanks everyone for your thoughts!

I don't know if I'd say that you aren't a better person. You sound amazing to me! Again, to me it depends on your child's needs. I think we are all responding to those. That's part of why we are here on this board - we are seeking out how to do better for our kids and ourselves. Nothing wrong with that - it's rather healthy I think!

You are not a freak or a weirdo - you sound like a very dedicated mom. But do make sure you try to get SOME time in for yourself - as your doctor said you have to be there for him. And if you burn out, you won't be. I like fred's suggestion of getting a play sitter, if you can afford one. Do you qualify for MA or TEFRA or any other community support grants? Here in MN, if you qualify for TEFRA, you can also get community support grants and there are many ways you can spend those - one of which is on respite/play therapy. I think this would qualify...

Our boys have always had lots of free time to just play how ever they wanted. We also do things as a family, like camping. (going again this weekend

With our oldest son, we did not do ABA therapy. He's always had lots of time after school to pursue his interrests.

Our youngest son has just started ABA (long wait list). It was actually recommended by his private speech therapist, whom he loves. So far he thinks the VB/ABA is fun! We take him out of school an hour early and the latest they are here is 6:00. Weekends are usually open. So far, so good.

My ds has nothing outside school right now. I have tried a number of
groups but none of them have seemed a good fit. I think ds can self-
initiate many things and he also plays with his younger sisters. I think he
needs more down-time than other kids - if I keep him on the go he just
zones out more. I really still want him to find a social opportunity that is
just the right mixture between social but not overwhelming, challenging
and interesting to him, logistically possible and finacially affordable.
Let's just say moving cross continent was much easier than finding
groups that are a fit for my ds - 'just being a kid' seems to have turned
into rocketscience since his dx.[QUOTE=John]

It all depends on how high or low functioning a child is. [/QUOTE]

I really encourage parents who are not familiar with all of this to learn more.

Our summer schedule includes day camp (KinderCare, all-day), which is LOADED with field trips!!! Qutie varied activities, with some repeats like outdoor water play, bowling and such ... but also art galleries, and outdoor stuff!

On weekends the kids all have a swim lesson, and we try to have some unstructured pool time, too.

Also for summer we have relaxed the no-videos-on-weeknights rule, and guess what she wants to see? Letter Factory!

As a big introvert I value my play-alone, think-alone time and cannot really bring myself to deprive T of hers. I do keep an eye on how MUCH of the time she playing alone, but I gauge that against how much social stress she is undergoing, too. I also check in with her to see if I might interest her in more sociable activity, but do not push it.

[QUOTE=fred]

Since school let out, their typical day consists of lots of drawing and coloring and lots of roaming around the backyard looking for bugs. In some ways, these things seem to be somewhat age appropriate activities, otoh, I doubt there are many four year olds who spend an hour or more each day collecting bugs (they do chit chat while searching and show each other and us their finds[/QUOTE]

FWIW, I think this is fabulous. Also, FWIW, my NT son used to go on backyard safaris for long periods. Bugs are fascinating and it's great that your girls are sharing that with each other - and coming back to show their spoils.

So, the girls get to be kids most of each day. Even when our 1:2 therapist (and we're between therapists right now) starts, it's all play based "engagement", not direct teaching, so even then they're still being kids. Time will tell.