Tag Archives: autism blog

Autism Haircuts: Top 11 Tips to Ensure Success

January 7, 2022 maggs.hay

With autism goes sensory processing challenges. And haircuts are the ultimate challenge for all things sensory.

People have spoken about physical pain at their hair being snipped, and others have explained the unbearable feeling as their hair is brushed or combed. These challenges are all before even considering the environment, the noises and most importantly communications.

But success can be achieved when you know the steps to tackle. It is about taking on step at a time, ensuring awareness of the process and what to expect.

Let me share the top tips for haircut success.

Speak to the hairdresser about your child’s needs. I have found them to be very accommodating and keen to help. If they aren’t, go to the other hairdresser on the other side of the road, cause it is not like we are in short supply of options.
After explaining the situation, ask the hairdresser if it is possible to come in 5 minutes before they open. I have never found this a problem, as it only takes 5 minutes to cut a child’s hair, and they tend to always be in a bit before opening time to grab a cuppa or get the different tools out.
Arriving before they open and discussing your child’s needs, lets your child have the salon to themselves with no hairdryers, no fresh strange shampoo smells, and even the opportunity to ask for the music to be turned off and lights dimmed.
Book the top hairstylist. This is due to a number of factors. They are experienced and can provide an excellent cut on child’s head no matter what contortion they put themselves in. They are quick, so less time in the stressful situation. They tend to be the manager of the salon, so something simple as turning down the lights does not need anyone’s approval.
Before going to the appointment, visit the hairdresser a couple of times, with your child. Go inside and have a sit down. Take some photos to show before the appointment. This is all about becoming aware of the environment. Do this at the beginning of the day when it is quiet. You may need to do this in stages, firstly just going up to the door, and working up to actually going inside.
On the day of the appointment, explain to your child where they are going. This can be verbally if they understand, pictures if they want to look at them, or my personal favourite, YouTube clips of a child getting their haircut to provide familiarity of the situation ahead.
Brush your child’s hair before you leave the house. This removes one task for the hairdresser and starts a bit of desensitisation on their scalp. The hairdresser can immediately start cutting as soon as you arrive.
Don’t feel your child needs to sit in the hairdressing chair with a cape around them. Let your child sit where they like. Offer to clean up afterwards.
Distraction is key. Take an ipad, book, chocolate, favourite toy or do your signature crazy dance to entertain them while the hairdresser does her job. You have the place to yourself, so who cares what you look like.
Keep to a simple cut. In my opinion, I have always kept Rhys’ hair in a long surfer cut. It allows for easy cutting, zero styling, and if he does miss a haircut, it is not as noticeable.
At the end provide loads of praise.

You may manage to get your child’s hair cut following the above or you may not. It is about progression and taking one step at a time. However if it doesn’t work, there is an alternative option, and this is what we have now done.

Special needs schools have qualified hairdressers that cut the children’s hair. Phone around the special needs schools in your area, and get the name of the hairdresser that visits the school. These hairdressers tend to be freelance and will come to your house.

Follow the same steps as if you were going to a salon, the pictures, hair brushing and distractions. The benefit of a special needs hairdresser is that they know about things like autism. They are not scared about an anxious child, and accommodate and adapt to your child’s needs. They are also supper quick and will cut your child’s hair in the broom cupboard, if that is where your child feels safe.

I would recommend getting a siblings hair cut at the same time, or if you don’t have one, get a friends child or your husband to have their hair cut. This avoids you feeling bad about a hairdresser coming to your house and your child refusing a haircut. At least the hairdresser will be able to do someone else’s hair instead.

At the end of the day, if all fails and your child finds a haircut too distressing, remember, it is only a haircut. There are a lot bigger worries in our lives and our children having hair halfway down their backs is the least of them.

I suggest reading the below in conjunction with the communication strategies on this site as everything we do is better through communication.

Autism Strategy

Getting your Child to Talk: 8 Alterative Autism Communication Strategies

August 19, 2021 maggs.hay

So your child is not talking. They have missed saying their first word, the milestone of speech, or their ability to understand language. Your Google search will come up with many strategies and methods of encouraging engagement, prompting speech and communicating differently with your child, but there are many other ways you can communicate and engage, from using everyday items around your house to some of the latest technology.

There are strategies you will find and learn from speech therapists which are fantastic in developing communication skills, helping your child to understand everyday requests and helping them to tell you what they want.

I am a strong advocate of these methods. They are proven to work and I have seen the results with my own son. If you want more details you can read of these methods here, where I explain step by step in how to implement them and some real life examples.

But what I found when learning about communication and the tried and tested methods by professionals, is that you have the opportunity to adapt and tweet these methods to your environment. Additionally you can also introduce technological developments into the strategies as we move into a more digital age.

Times change. Our world evolves. Things modernise and although the fundamental strategies will always remain, we can adapt them, mold them and use them in different ways.

Six of these strategic adaptions are detailed below.

Photos

A lot of visual communication aids make use of universal symbols. But there is no rule that you have to use these. The objective is to communicate, and this can be easily done with taking photos of items you use most often or your child, for example doing activities or visiting places.

Photos are great, because with today’s technology we all have a camera in our back pockets with the ability to take the photos wherever we go.

When words are not an option for communication due to barriers to understanding and language processing, a photo tells a thousand words.

Leaflets

Leaflets are a great resource and worth collecting when you see them, or even when you are at a location to store for future.

It is dependent on the individual, but leaflets can consume a lot of space and aren’t freely available when you need them at that split second moment.

However they are a great communication options to add to the collection.

Books

An adaption of the Social stories strategy, books are an amazing tool for communication. A lot of stories for children are based around a specific scenario, for example a trip to the dentist, or the supermarket, or when granny came to stay.

Whether the story is centered around our well known Peppa Pig family or a little girl’s first day a school, they all come with a message and a sequence of events.

If a new outing or visit is planned in for the future, reading a book about the experience is a great way to introduce familiarity about the event and a reference point to relate back to when the time arrives.

Even consider taking the book with you to refer back to, is always a good shout.

Cartoons

Our children love a bit of telly, and although we may think the majority is a load of codswallop and cringe as we hear the theme tune emanating through our television speakers for the hundredth time, there is some value in children’s television episodes.

Not all children’s cartoons follow the model but the majority do. They center around a story or theme and message that is being portrayed.

In a familiar fashion to books, episodes of a bunch of paw patrol pups rushing into the fire station or the poor kid from Fireman Sam getting into a pickle once again, we can use the stories to highlight a new event or activity we have planned.

On our last visit to the beach son, we acted out a Peppa Pig episode about Georges sandcastles, which encouraged engagement, imaginative play and family interaction.

Video

There is nothing better than the video of an activity, attraction or location. If YouTube is not giving you the options you need, search videos by Google and watch a visit to the dentist or local attraction.

There is also nothing more powerful than your child watching themselves on video from a previous visit. Record outings and save them in easy-to-find folders on your phone or PC. Then the next time, instead of using words to communicate where you are planning to visit, you can communicate with the aid of a video illustrating your previous experience.

YouTube

YouTube is an amazing catalogue of resources. Take your pick and you are guarenteed to find a video that will be of benefit to your situation.

A few years ago I was determined to introduce a balance bike to my son’s activities, with the hope that a zoom through the park would be on the cards.

I did everything to demonstrate the mechanism of the push vehicle only to be met with blank stares and a pair of painful quad muscles from attempting a ride on a bike too small for my physical build.

YouTube saved us when I found a video of a child pushing himself around a skate park on a balance bike.

It wasn’t a fancy video, just a ten minute clip of a child riding. But with the ability to repeat the clip, I played it on our television, over and over again, allowing my son to become familiar with the activity and gain knowledge of what the two wheeled piece of apparatus in the corner could be used for.

Familiarity of a new activity or experience is always best shown multiple times to gain awareness and comfort. The foundations of what is expected take away the fear when the real life item is presented.

Webcams

Thank goodness for technology and the virtual power of the Internet.

Previously I would spend hours finding pictures of places and items, then printing and laminating them to allow a method of communication for my son. But there was a great tool that gave him the real life experience from the comfort of his home.

Webcams of beaches, local attractions and public venues are great to allow our children to see where you are going and what it actually looks like. The video gives added value compared to a flat two dimensional picture.

Use Google to search the location you plan to visit plus the word “webcam” to see if you can get a live image stream.

Virtual Reality

Often technology and fancy geeky gadgets can put those less techy folk off, but virtual reality is a great tool and with today’s advances it is easily available for anyone to try at a very low cost.

There are many apps that are VR enabled and allow a virtual experience of the outside world from the comfort of your own home.

However, as a communication mechanism, google maps are one of the best tools you can use to communicate where you are going and give a real life experience of the location without actually going there.

With the use of your smart phone, the only additional piece of kit you will need is a VR headset. If you are not sure this is something you want to venture into or just want to have a go without breaking the bank, the purchase of Google Cardboard will get you into the VR world for only a few pounds.

Google cardboard will give you an insight into the virtual world, but if you want to get a more durable headset, there are many on the market, but I would recommend Samsung gear as a good headset to provide you with all the functionality you would need.

For more information on the use of VR with Google click here.

If you are new to finding ways to communicate with your child who is not yet speaking, have a look at the different strategies here.

Also check out all our posts via the different social media channels below.

Benefits

Benefits for special needs

March 18, 2021 maggs.hay

When you enter the world of special needs, it becomes a minefield of information, but also a treasure hunt to work out what you are now entitled to, and finding that information is not easy.

The benefits and support you and your child are entitled to is different all across the country, and you will receive different answers to questions on what you are entitled to and how to apply or get that support.

To take away the pain and struggle at a time when you have enough to worry about, I have detailed below a list of everything I have gathered over the years. The support, benefits and services you and your child are entitled to, some of them are even before you have a diagnosis.

Why am I entitled to support?

You may feel guilty about living a life never accepting or receiving any benefits or you may be use to the system, either way, if you have just entered the world of special needs parenting, or caring for a special needs child, you become eligible for benefits and services that you were not able to apply for before.

Don’t feel bad about taking these benefits. This is the purpose of the benefits system, to provide support to those who need it. As long as you are not abusing the system and taking something you are not legally entitled to, then you must accept that the benefit is there to help you, and helping your child get the best services available ,will help them and you in the long run.

First Things First

In the UK every child is assigned a Health Visitor a few weeks from birth, when the support is moved from the midwife, who supported you during your pregnancy. A health visitor oversees your child’s development and provides support up until your child is around five years of age, then they are transferred into the school system and under the support of the educational nurse.

In the case of a special needs child, they can be assigned a Special Needs Health Visitor. This will provide support and become the main point of contact to ensure you and your child are getting the supported needed, and any referrals to additional assessments or needs. A Special Needs Health Visitor supports you and your child up until the age of twelve.

To be assigned a Special Needs Health Visitor you need to speak to your GP who will arrange this for you. Your child does not need a diagnosis to have a Special Needs Health Visitor, they just need to be demonstrating a delay in two or more areas of development.

Your Special Needs Health Visitor will become your doorway to referrals and support needed, and if lucky, will have a pillar of information.

DLA – Disability Living Allowance

Disability Living Allowance or DLA is paid as a monetary amount on a weekly or monthly basis, and is to pay for the additional care needed for your child. It is not means tested (i.e. no restrictions if you are on a higher income or working full time).

No diagnosis is needed for application and award of payment. The assessment is based on mobility and care elements, with the assessment of these elements on a low, medium or high requirement.

The form for applying is very lengthy and can take a lot of time to complete. There are agencies who can assist with this, and my advice is to complete as if it were an example of your child’s worst day.

For the mobility element, in regards to autism diagnosis’ or anxiety, it is important to remember that becoming immobile is not necessarily a physical impairment, a child can become rooted to the spot unable to move due to a meltdown or anxiety. It is important to detail these scenarios.

To apply for DLA, you can access all the details and application forms at the government website below.
https://www.gov.uk/dla-disability-living-allowance-benefit

When your child is older, they will become eligible for PIP.

Carers Allowance

If you are the sole carer for your child with special needs, you can be eligible for a payment of Carers Allowance. There is a number of criteria to be eligible for this benefit, this is specifically around the care to be given and the number of hours, and existing benefits being claimed.

You cannot claim if you currently earn more than £128 a week from other income.

Carers allowance can be applied for via the government website at the below link.

https://www.gov.uk/carers-allowance/eligibility

Council Tax Reduction

You can apply for a reduction in council tax if you need to have an extra room in your house for your child’s needs. This could be a sensory room due to their needs. The room however cannot be their bedroom and needs to be a specific room set aside for this need.

You will get a visit to your house to check the eligibility and the use of the room to check it meets the reduction criteria.

This benefit is not means tested.

You can check your specific local authority’s criteria at the following link.

https://www.gov.uk/apply-council-tax-reduction

Watersure

If there is a need for your child, or anyone with a disability within your household, to use more that the standard households quantity of water for medical reasons, you can get a reduction on your water bill.

In the case of sensory processing needs, this could be for a swimming pool, hot tub, or additional washing requirements.

More details and application for a reduction can be found at the below link:

https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/consumer/water/water-supply/problems-with-paying-your-water-bill/watersure-scheme-help-with-paying-water-bills/

Family Fund
There are a number of grants available from Family Fund, from vouchers for holidays, to payments for additional equipment or toys and gadgets for specific requirements for your child.

There are qualifying criteria which are clearly stated on their site, which can be found below:

https://www.familyfund.org.uk/blog/received-a-diagnosis-of-autism

Blue badge

In 2020 the blue disability badge was made available for hidden disabilities. There are many advantages of the blue badge, from being able to park directly outside the place you have communicated to your child, which reduces any anxiety or communication difficulties, to the short distance you need to walk for safety reasons.

The blue badge also becomes a great resource for “proof” of a disability when needing to queue jump, or demonstrate to attractions of specific needs.

It is important to clearly state the needs for a blue badge when applying. State the immobility due to your child’s difficulties, whether this is the probability of a meltdown, safety due to flight risk, or to aid in communication.

Application for a blue badge can be made at the link below.

https://www.gov.uk/apply-blue-badge

Radar key

The RADAR key is a universal key to unlock disabled toilets nationwide. These are vital when your child will not “go” in the bush or behind a tree, and you need access to toilets easily. It also means no queues when your child is unable to wait-their-turn.

There is no requirement to prove disability or need, and these keys can be purchase for a few quid from a range of outlets, but would suggest getting one from disability UK, link below:

https://www.disabilityrightsuk.org/shop/official-and-only-genuine-radar-key

Max card

The max card is available to foster families or those with children with special needs. It provides you discounts to many major attractions and days out across the UK.

New discounts and venues are continually being added. Find details at the below link and how to apply.

https://mymaxcard.co.uk/

School transport

Not a benefit you may immediately think about, but you can get school transport if your child’s educational setting is more than two miles from their primary residence.

Being a distance from your catchment is quite common, especially if they have gone out of catchment to attend the school applicable to their needs.

Going to school in a designated school transport or taxi arrangement may sound extremely daunting at first, but it is a great opportunity to allow your child to gain some independence within a controlled, organised process. Transport also gives you support and help with the school run, especially if you have other children in different schools or childcare settings.

Contact your education authority or school to get details on applying for school transport.

Home Amendments Grant

If you need to make changes to your home as a result of a disability, you could get a grant from the council. This may be for example to:

widen doors and install ramps
improve access to rooms and facilities – eg stairlifts or a downstairs bathroom
provide a heating system suitable for your needs
adapt heating or lighting controls to make them easier to use

A Disabled Facilities Grant won’t affect any benefits you get, more details can be found at the below.

https://www.gov.uk/disabled-facilities-grants

Respite

We all need respite to let us parents or carers recharge and give our children the best care we can. Often families do not have the support from grandparents or friends to take their children for a few hours or overnight. To arrange respite from the council you need to have a support worker. A support worker can be assigned through discussion with your Special Needs Health visitor.

Alternatively you can get payment from the council to provide to a person of your choosing to look after your child.

Queue Hopping

With a diagnosis you have the benefit of queue jumping at many major attractions. This is great for the whole family to get on the most popular rides and venues.

Normally you need to provide proof of the disability, which can be a letter from your GP or more easily, the presentation of your Blue Badge.

Young Carers

Having a child with special needs often means that their siblings miss out on some of the “normal” stuff. Across the UK, there are young carer’s programmes where siblings can go on outings they may not be able to do as a family, and also share their worries or questions with other children who are going through the same things.

Speak to your Special Needs Health Visitor for options in your area.

Wrap around care / Holiday clubs

There is funding for 121 support for your child when attending standard wrap around care or holiday clubs. This is a great benefit to allow your child to go to standard care settings, but with the support of a 121 carer who meets their needs.

This differs per council and worth speaking to your Health Visitor or local education authority as to what funding is available.

Mobility/strollers etc

As your child gets older, the standard stroller which allowed you to go places, will become too small for their needs. For many reasons including safety, ability to walk long distances, and your inability to constantly carry your child, you may need a specifically adapted stroller.

There are grants to provide equipment like strollers for approved needs. There are a few methods of applying for these grants, but in general they come after an occupational assessment. A referral to a Occupational Therapist once again will come from your Special Needs Health visitor or GP.

There are many other benefits, whether monetary or not. There are also many different ways you can apply or obtain these, I have only detailed one method, and tried to provide an awareness of what is available.

Please comment below if there is anything I have missed, or documented incorrectly, I will then update and build on this to ensure we can all get what we are entitled to.

Throw Back

We will wait for the light, but until then, I will sit in the dark with you!

March 12, 2021 AMe

The house stank of bleach. A two hour marathon of scrubbing and cleaning. No clutter remained, each piece of rubbish discarded, with papers filed and books returned to their shelves.

But it still wasn’t right.

It was like one of those makeover shows. Looking around my house I could still only see the before shot, the one through the grey filter, no sparkles or brightness surrounded me. I felt defeated, the need to find some control in my life when everything was falling apart, but my world still looked physically dull and uninviting.

A cry came from the other room and with a deep breath, I pushed my feelings down into my stomach, I wiped the tears from my face, smiled a fake smile and walked through to my three year old son who had awoken from a nap on the couch. His cry was the only sound he could make, the only method of asking for attention. There were no words or babbles, unlike my friends children of the same age.

He was non-verbal with a diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder. A diagnosis we had received a few months earlier.

But it was not the diagnosis that had changed my current mental state, it was the lead up to it. It was the constant changes in our lives. The change from the lives we thought we would have, to a life that was spiralling out of control. A new path that we didn’t have the map to. A new set of rules we didn’t know how to follow.

Every day I woke with a fresh positive perspective, with a view that each new day would be better, but it never materialised. Each day grew darker, with feelings and emotions bottled up. The need to not lose strengh or show weakness in a world of comparison at the school gates.

I felt so alone.

No one understood.

My friends led different lives, where their biggest worries were of lost jumpers and water bottles, or what day was PE. Had their child got the right pencil case or whose playdate was next?

My worries were greater. The same things which were routine to everyone else were impossible to me.

I worried about how to leave the house without my son having a meltdown. I worried about whether he would ever speak, whether he would ever understand me, whether he would be able to live an independent life.

I couldnt walk into a shop, an activity centre or a church hall, because they were unfamiliar to my son. I couldn’t bend down to his level and explain, or talk him through it – words were meaningless. They were useless to a boy who didn’t know their meaning. We were foreigners from different worlds.

So as I sat next to him, I cried. The feelings I pushed down had run out of space to hide. My body ached with pain from the overload of emotion, where my world was an entrapment that closed in on me.

The cries of excited children ran past my window, calling after their friends, and it made me feel worse. My son silent next to me, oblivious to what I was feeling.

I felt like I had fallen from a place of control and shattered into a million pieces. But somehow I had held it all together whenever in public. No one who understood, and I had not allowed them in to understand.

As I cried alone in my front room, the front door opened. My husband stood in the doorway and without words approached me and took me in his arms. He didn’t tell me it would be alright. He didn’t tell me we would get through it. All those words had been said before and were being said without even saying them.

But he said he was there with me. We were in it together, and he would sit in the dark with me. And we would make it.

And we have.

We have come out that grey. The world took a while to get its glimmer back. It took time for us to work out that path and find the way.

Parenting the special needs way is hard. I know that because I do it, and will continue to do it.

It starts out dark, but it does get brighter, and as longs as you are willing to invite others in, they will sit in the dark with you.

You don’t need to sit in that dark alone.
There are many of us here to do that with you.

⚫⚫⚫⚫⚫⚫⚫⚫

Throw Back

Milestones Worth Celebrating!

March 7, 2021 AMe 1 Comment

I remember standing in a gymnastic hall. All the equipment surrounded me, the parallel bars, beam, trampolines and other strange equipment that I don’t know the name of.

Others were energetically lunging themselves into the foam pit, or doing fancy somersaults on the trampoline.

Kids ran around us joining in with the toddlers open floor session. Some joined in with the songs and their corresponding actions that were being enacted on the open floor. Others were energetically lunging themselves into the foam pit, or doing fancy somersaults on the trampoline.

As parents followed their children around the different pieces of apparatus, I could overhear a parent next to me. Her little girl was about two, and carefully tackling the well thought out obstacle course that had been setup by one of the instructors. Her mother held her hand as she walked over the soft mat up to the low ground-level beam. “Come on darling” she said “you can do it”.

The little girl was nervous but reluctantly put her first foot forward, the only stability she had was from her arms which she spanned out on either side of herself to distribute her weight. As she took each step, she came closer and closer to the other end of the beam. Her mother slowly walked next to her, judging if she was going to make it, ready to grab her hand if the wobble became a potential slip or fall.

The mother watched her daughter’s every step, but she only watched with one eye, because her other eye was on the rest of the room. She checked to see if anyone else was witnessing this achievement in the making. Her daughter was in her element, she was reaching a milestone worthy of an applause.

As the little girl took her last step and accomplished the great feat, her mother lifted her in the air, and slightly louder than required said “Well done, you are amazing” then swung her around and looked for the next opportunity for success.

I turned away from this celebratory event and stared down at Rhys. He sat on the floor oblivious to all the people, children and noise around him. I followed his line of slight across the wide open space and up the wall about ten meters away from him. Half way up was a white clock, the numbers one to twelve around the edge.

Out of all the activities, entertainment, and gymnastic equipment, he had chosen the item that had the least relevance to the situation, but an item that meant more to him than any of the things that surrounded him.

I had no hope of getting Rhys to walk a beam like that little girl. I had no ability to even get him to engage with the room. The clock on the wall was his only interest, not the ability to display his achievements of somersaults or dismounts off a low beam.

Since this situation about five years ago, I have overheard many milestones being celebrated by parents. They are being celebrated in parks, play centres and all across social media. A video of a child’s first words, or a little boy initiating a pee all by himself behind a tree because he knew he needed to go!

Rhys is accomplishing so many things, but often I feel that I don’t have enough words to describe the mountain we have climbed to achieve them. It is so hard to explain the feeling when Rhys runs down an unknown path for the first time, or he says “drawing”, taking a pen in his hand with no reluctance, or he understands a simple command like “pass me that book!”

… to others it just doesn’t seem to be as bigger deal to them as it is to you.

It is a feeling of wanting to shout it from the roof tops. It is not like the mother in gymnastics who secretly invites you to share in the accomplishment. In contrast, you want to fly a banner through the sky and publish it in a newspaper. But to others it just doesn’t seem to be as bigger deal to them as it is to you. Their children did all these things as part of their ongoing development. They are not milestones they recorded or celebrated. They just happened!

But that doesn’t matter because they are not their child’s achievements. They are Rhys’ achievements. They are the result of hard work, and I have realised that I don’t need the acceptance from others to confirm that they are worthy of a bottle of champagne, because I know what we have gone through to achieve them. He may have taken a bit longer or a lot longer to get there. But it is not a race, we all do it in our own time.

There is no need to look to others for acceptance that something is worthy of celebrating. We all know that feeling inside when something remarkable happens, and when I look at Rhys, I know deep down he is celebrating with me too.

🕝🕑🕧🕣🕞🕜🕟🕢🕥🕙🕦🕚🕠

A&Me