Progress Happens

My son has been making huge leaps lately in social understanding, expressing himself, and managing his behavior. What miraculous intervention is responsible? Well... none. The combination of getting older and getting his needs met (to the best of our ability, though that sometimes seems to fall woefully short) seems to be working pretty well.

It's not that I'm against interventions, though that's a terrible word when you stop to think about it. Let's say, it's not that I'm against supports, therapies, medications etc. But we've found quite a few of them to be counter-productive. (I'm looking at you, ABA.) It's particularly stressful when a therapist uses rigid methods on him that don't take his needs and individual personality into account.

It's easy for me to become a superstitious pigeon about what is or isn't helping my son, so it's important for me to remember that sometimes progress just happens.

P.S. Since writing this, I've become aware that a lot of the improvement is connected to work he's doing with a new speech therapist at his school. I'm not sure if she's a particularly excellent speech therapist or that he's just in the right place now to work with her, or perhaps both.