Jackson's evaluation with Bahavior Speacialist

arly1983

New member
Today we drove to Savannah to see the behavior Speacialist, Dr. Greenburg. We were taken back in five mins and stayed for two hours. When we left our heads were spinning even though the our Babies Can't Wait Lady, Miriam, had prepeared us for the visit ( I shudder to think what we would have done without her) We have a diagnosis... Autism Spectrual Disorder.... On a scale from 0 to 60 (0 being no problems, 60 being severe) he is a 43. Dr Greenburg said that we are going to start agressive speech therepy and really push the sign language. She wants everyone to at least learn basic sign language and use it religiously.
We are supposed to see a neurologist and a psycologist in the lext three months to look for underlying causes for the ASD and we will also see Dr Greenburg some more. She is doing this to try to pinpoint exactly what kind of Autistic Spectral Disorder he has so we can better treat him and also have an idea of long term and affects and also of heredity. She also checked out Camille while we were there (she is fine and developing great)..
I really like Dr Greenburg, she is about fifty years old and has ADD (which I do too) She really observed Jackson well and found out (without my help) that the only time he makes eye contact is with the person singing. It jsut seemed like after she observed him, she just picked up on so many things. He has some sensory issues.
I like how she explained the ASD.. That the average person is like a Dell computer..When you hook it up, it has windows already on it and is ready to go..She said the average baby is like that, they understand tone and facial expressions and like to share experiences with other people and seek out company.....People with ASD are computers with DOS (dashes and dots). We have to take extra time to manualy imput everything, but it is doable.
She is expecting with the speech therepy for his score to go down alot in the next three months, if it doesn't then we are not using the right approach and we will try something different.
She said that with him being so young that we could do alot of good and we don't have a day to lose..
It really was great to get some concrete answers but my head is spinning. I have a direction to go in now at least... I went strait to Books A Million and bought The Everything Book of Sign Language... Wish me Luck!
 
ADS

AdventureMom

Senior Community Member
Arly,

I'm sure your head is spinning with all of that info... That's alot to take in. I'm glad you got in to see someone that you really like - she seems great. I agree that he'll improve with the speech therapy. My nephew who has Asperger's seemed much different at 3 yrs old than he does now at 11 yrs old. When he was younger, it was much more apparent that he just wasn't connecting socially - little to no eye contact, etc. Now, you'd have to spend alot of time with him before you picked up on his Aspergers. He went through years of speech therapy and occupational therapy - I think it really helped. Good luck learning sign language, too! Have you thought of taking a class...?
 

broken4u05

New member
It is good to know what you need to do but can be a lot. Good luck with the signing. I do it with the boys i watch and they talk back. I know the basic ones The boys have even taken a baby sign class you might want to look into that. I hope things get better and his number goes down some. HUGS
 

JaRylan

New member
Sounds like you have found someone that will work with you. Good luck and I'll keep all of you in my thoughts.
 

arly1983

New member
Actually, my mom and a friend shared a babysitter who came into their homes and the friends little girl was deaf. So I used to know quite a bit of sign language and I am very rusty. When I was looking at the book last night a lot of things came back to me.
I think a class for both me and Jackson is a great idea. I will have to look into that but I am not sure if I can find anything in this area.
 
Last edited:

broken4u05

New member
This is the class that i took with the boys and i liked it. Our teacher also said to email her any signs we wanted to know and she would tell us in class. Each day had a different theme like bedtime, eating, zoo animals, and so on.
http://www.babysigns.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=aboutus.main

I also love the signing times videos. My godchildren have them and they love them too and sing to the songs. Both my godsons can talk in sign. They do not know how to say everything but you can completly sign to them and they understand here are the videos.
http://www.signingtime.com/
 

arly1983

New member
Oh, we have one signing time DVD and all the kids love it...I love it because the music is somewhat pleasant (and not garishly loud and annoying)
 

musicmaj

New member
I am sorry that your son has that diagnosis. My son is on the spectrum as well. When he was 18 months he was moderate to severe autism and now he is high functioning. Early intervention is GREAT! I can not believe how far my son has come. I am so glad you got the diagnosis early and are going to get him therapy now.
You may want to look into ABA. It has done a lot of good for my son. Also, sign language is wonderful. When we started this journey there was no communication at all.(not even gesturing) Now he is starting to say sentences and we can have conversations - even if they are always about cars or music. lol Sign language helped him so much. I can't say enough about it. I had to teach him the signs by doing a lot of hand over hand because he started out with very poor eye contact. We started out with the signs for more, eat, and drink. We had to sign them with him for several months and then one day he just started to say them. I also sing to him to teach him new words and concepts. I am a music teacher and he loves music! I am using music to teach him the letters and sounds right now. It is working great.

I just thought I would tell you a little bit about my son and how far he has come so that you can see that with the right therapy Jackson can also progress really well. If you want to talk or vent or ask any questions, you can pm me or e-mail me any time.
 

cmm7

New member
http://commtechlab.msu.edu/sites/aslweb/browser.htm is a great site for learning signs. Also, don't freak out if the signing isn't working out. I know quite a few children with autism who just didnt *get* signing, and when their therapists switched to another method, the kids caught right on.

I, too, am a strong believer in ABA when it fits the child. No therapy is one fits all.

My brother has an ASD, so I grew up in this type of environment. Also, I now want to become an ABA therapist. I've been involved with many individuals who had all sorts of treatments/methods and, like I said, no one is for all so find one that you think will work for HIM not what other poeple say.

Best of luck!
 

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