ABA & Neurodiversity Affirming Practices, Making the Shift Ep. 75

We Need To Talk About Behavioral Therapy...

You may not know this but when I was in grad school, I was hired as a 1:1 behavioral support therapist for a little girl in a private school.

ABA is a very common intervention that's recommended for Autistic kids. Some from the field say they're shifting to neurodiversity affirming practices.

With extreme views on this controversial subject...and when we feel like everything we say is wrong...where can we go from here?

What are the solutions? How can we support our Autistic kids moving forward?

That's what we're talking about on this week's live show.

Plus, a special announcement! In order to support our mission of spreading ND affirming practices around the world, we're extending Founding Member pricing for our brand new ND Affirming Therapy Academy.

Join now for just $97 for the entire year to receive access to our vault of trainings, monthly calls with our Autistic mentor Chloe Estelle, and access to an incredible group of like-minded professionals:

[pugginspice]

I’m so impressed with you both. Thank you for your content. I’m an SLP and trying to make the change to ND affirming practices.

[reyestrada]

This makes so much sense. I can understand why ABA was really making my unregulated child so much worse. We weren’t ever dealing with the “why..” My child has way too much power to do anything he doesn’t believe in.

[arizonanotcali]

I know that I am watching it later, but thank you Jessie for mentioning OT for praxis issues.

[arizonanotcali]

I recommend the book Autism Matters by Ronit Molko.

[breekimball]

As a mom of two kids on the spectrum, I have definitely seen that. There are good therapists, but as a whole Aba has not worked for our family, we are currently on a break and the fact that my kids would be happy going to Therapy but also we are thrilled to have a break really gave me a different outlook

[angelicadevilliers]

I found that although the movement away from ABA in South Africa is very prominent, the techniques still creep in although it is not labelled as such. From personal experience having my son in schools and seeing various therapists, only one worked on building a solid relationship with him and then we saw progress. He exhibits avoidant behaviour when he's not happy, and the more he avoids the more he is forced to do something. It seems that the visible goals are more important than the process of getting there in a gentle manner. You nailed it on the head when you said therapists are doing what they were trained to do and not focussing on the child in front of them. Thank you for this post, I really enjoyed listening to it.