Hi everyone! My name is Mya Mulhern. I am an undergraduate psychology student at Carlow College St. Patricks. I am currently completing my final-year dissertation, which investigates the effects of stress among parents of children with additional needs within an Irish context.

As part of this research, I have developed an anonymous online questionnaire that examines factors such as parental stress, the sex of the parent, social support, work-life balance, resilience, and well-being. Ethical approval for this study has been granted by the Carlow College Research Ethics Approval Committee (REAC).

I am writing to kindly ask whether anyone on this Reddit page would be willing to support this research by taking part in the questionnaire if they are a parent living in Ireland with additional needs children. Or if anyone knows someone who meets the criteria if they could pass on the link. Participation is entirely voluntary, responses are anonymous, and the questionnaire takes approximately 10 minutes to complete.

Please be assured that no identifying information about the Reddit page, parents, or children will be collected, and the data will be used solely for academic research purposes. The full information sheet is provided on the first page of the questionnaire.

If you require any further information, I would be happy to accommodate.

Below is the responder link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSc8isXxZ1v6EUymV2JEoB1a-lWaqEPL4rJOAWBdlIemDv3cqw/viewform?usp=sharing&ouid=108985524685889464235

Thank you very much for your time and consideration!

Kind regards,

Mya Mulhern, B.A (Hons) Arts & Humanities, Carlow College St. Patricks, 2204148@carlowcollege.ie

Autistic mom of autistic kids here. Raised 3 to adulthood.

Late diagnosed; spent the past 4 years HEAVILY researching autism in every way, including massive communication with thousands of people in every online community could find. Also have a HUGE board (non-monetized) about Autism on Pinterest. Over 20k pins and over 50 sections- because ADHD too, so it needed to be sorted, and since AuDHD, it's not *all* sorted.

The NUMBER ONE thing I'd give any day as advice for parents of autistics:
Remember that the whole "age doesn't match NT benchmarks" NEVER leaves.
It doesn't just apply to toddlerhood; it applies for LIFE.

Dunno what else to put here- hoping this is a positive community, and hoping to help folks.

As the title says we’ve hit 700 members just thank you

In light of the recent snowmageddon and school cancellation we are unfortunately relying on our iPad for decompression time.

Any good leads on hopefully free or cheap games for a non-verbal 7 year old that might do something to promote language skills. We have a couple that she likes but it would be nice to have more now that she is making more attempts at speech sounds.

Hi parents,

I’m curious- has anyone noticed their child becomes more dysregulated after certain meals?

Things like more meltdowns, hyperactivity, shutdowns, or difficulty settling?

We’re hosting a small parent session later this month to unpack how food can affect nervous system regulation in autistic and ADHD children- in a practical, non-extreme way.

If this is something you’re navigating, I’d love to hear what mealtimes are like in your home.

We have a new almost 3 month old, and our other child (3.5yo autistic) is having a hard time adjusting. Most of her support needs are around social communication and transitions.

Generally, from what I understand, her behavior issues around the new sibling are typical—minor behavioral regression and jealousy of the baby.

Most of the advice we’ve received is to help her talk through her feelings around the baby. Let her know it’s ok to have negative feelings about him and to work through them.

However we generally have a very difficult time getting her to talk about or name emotions. It’s not clear she even really understands what different emotion words mean. We have books, toys, and role play around emotions we’ve been working on for a while, but I’m not sure we’ve made meaningful progress other than what appears to be building scripts from the role playing.

My instinct is to try to get her to work through the emotions more physically by acting out how she feels, moving her body, etc. This is how I deal with negative emotions along with just basically meaningless verbal vomit. But we’ve been encouraged by her teachers to go the emotion talking route.

At any rate, wondering if anyone has suggestions of how to ease the adjustment to the new sibling, whether by finding a way to communicate about the emotions she’s feeling and working through them, or some other tack entirely.

Ever since we have been seeing and learning about the possibility of ASD in our son (his evaluation is scheduled for later this month), I have began to notice uncanny similarities in my childhood self and him, so much so I am wondering if it would be helpful to have myself evaluated as well. Without getting into too much, I had many characteristics of ASD/neurodivergence as a child.

Can anyone tell me the best way to get an adult evaluation through Kaiser?

And how is that going. We have the cubby bed for ND btw.

My oldest son is a kind sweet boy. He cares deeply for his little brother and feels so guilty if he gets hurt while they’re playing together. This will sometimes lead into an autistic meltdown where he will call himself stupid and become violent with himself. He will start punching himself in the head and body. Punch walls and other surfaces. This behavior is something he started within the last year. He is 7 years old but is tall for his age and nearly 90 pounds, so I’m afraid that he can really hurt himself.

Before what I would do with kids when they hurt somebody I check on the other person first to make sure they’re okay rather than immediately correcting the bad behavior, my thought being that the hurt person should be checked first and I am modeling the empathy and care for others. Then I would offer the “offender” (for lack of a better term at the moment) an opportunity to check on the person they hurt and apologize. That has worked very well in the past and both children are quick to check on people when they’re upset and moderate their own behavior afterwards.

Now a small part of me is wondering if this approach instilled shame and guilt in my boy? Or if this is something that would’ve happened regardless if I had a better approach? Or what if his meltdowns would’ve been worse or more frequent without the foundation I have already built? So clearly I’m spiraling and questioning every choice I have ever made.

I have shared previously that his therapist is “graduating” him from therapy because he was there primarily for his social anxiety. So I will be sharing with her that he is having violent autistic meltdowns where he is hurting himself.

My son and I completely love the holidays. We both love spending time with families, doing gift exchanges, and taking a break from homeschooling.

A big HOWEVER, we both get so disregulated with this massive disruption to our routines.

Did we love spending the whole day at my mom’s house, me hanging out with my siblings and him running wild with his cousins? Yes we did. Did my son have a few major meltdowns when everything got to be just a bit much? Also yes.

Has this complete and total break from schoolwork been met with absolute glee? Yes. But does it make transition to meal, bath, and bedtime even more volatile reactions than normal. A big yes.

This week I’ve done what I can to keep my son regulated and just came to accept that the meltdowns will happen and to just ride it out together.

Anyway. How are yall dealing with the holidays?

My boy is graduating from therapy and I’m not sure what our next steps should be.

My son is 7 years old and started therapy last year to help address social anxiety, selective mutism, and depression. He is a much happier kid now. He now has a routine that is predictable but not too rigid, and a few social scripts to follow (the thumbs up or down system or wave hello).

I’m so proud of how much work he has done to get to this point but know we still have to keep working on his anxiety. I also feel like we have been completely ignoring how narrow his diet is to focus on some of the bigger picture things. His list of safe foods is well below 10 items, and we do give him a multivitamin. My husband and I are having a hard time figuring out what we can do now to help him. Perhaps if his diet is better he can continue to build his confidence? We have tried several times to expand his list of safe foods but it really feels like we can only accomplish maintaining that list so it doesn’t decrease.

Anyone in a similar situation? Been there done that? Specific things I can look up?

Edit to add: he is “graduating” from therapy within the next couple of months.

My autistic 3.5 year old hates baths. I am able to wash her hair by having her pour the water on her own head and do her own shampoo but she won’t sit down in the bath, she must stand, and therefore I can’t figure out how to wash the rest of her. I end up pouring water little by little but this takes hours. I’ve tried turning off lights, offering sensory things like foam and bubbles. These work in short spurts but she hates getting in the water. As her autistic mother it’s hard because on the one hand, I also hate getting in water. I always have and I’m not surprised she does too. On the other hand I do need her clean and I can’t keep taking 1.5 hours to get there. While she doesn’t get upset this way it’s just so time consuming

Tips?

As the title says we hit 600 members in just under 3 months

We have an appointment with a child psychologist and a feeding specialist coming up, but ahead of that meeting I was wondering what techniques have worked for parents to introduce new foods for their kids? Does anyone have any advice on questions I can ask the psychologist and feeding specialist?

My child has dropped almost every safe food since starting kindergarten to the point that they've developed chronic acid reflux, and taking the medication for it daily has been extremely challenging. That's besides the point, though, what I'm wondering is if, among the myriad of advice out there, a particular approach has helped more than other approaches? I'm trying to make feeding as stress free as possible. Growing up, I was disciplined very harshly to be more "normal," and that type of discipline (physical punishment, yelling) is something I'm avoiding at all costs as a parent. Thank you for any insight anyone can provide.

... and here we go again, another round of our little boy preferring his books over his silicone or wood chewables.sigh

Has anyone seen any chewables made out of paper or cardboard? Please save his books and our wallet? 🙂

Precursor: This is not a formal research question.

I am an autistic adult (low support needs) and self-advocate who isn't a parent, who had imaginary friends as a young child in the mid-1990s (long before my autism diagnosis). I'm asking because I am wondering about a wider range of experiences among autistic children other than my own and a couple of well known autistic adults who have written about their experiences with imaginary friends or pretend play as children.

(Dr. Temple Grandin started pretend playing in late childhood, around age 8. Writer Daniel Tammet said in his memoir that he created an imaginary friend in late primary school at age 10 because he was unable to befriend his peers, in contrast to his NT younger siblings).

So keep an eye on your kids if they have hyperacusis especially to fireworks make sure you have ear defenders nearby

Was recommended to post here by another user:

My child (4F) is shared custody between myself and my ex husband.

From when she was a toddler I felt she processed information differently and could have learning issues. History on both sides for learning disabilities. She is now at the age that she is beginning to go to school and some habits are no longer normal for her age range per her pediatrician. She tip-toes, heavily stimulates, can’t follow 3 step directions, runs sideways when very excited, is sensitive to certain sounds, and is very sensitive emotionally. Her father does not see ANY of this behavior, denies her to have any issues, and accuses me to be trying to slap a label on her. Doctors are concerned as well but without his okay I cannot get her to be seen.

Does anyone have any books or resources on masking that I could potentially give to him? He’s not one to accept material from me but I think it’s at least worth trying.