Suzi and Sara.....

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-31-2003
Suzi and Sara.....
1
Fri, 06-17-2005 - 6:09pm

I am glad to see a couple fo other people who are doing it and getting good results. In the 6 months that Ian has been in it, I have seen MAJOR improvements, but I wondered how much of that was going to naturally happen and how much was RDI. Our school district does not provide RDI, but the teachers are familiar with RDI and Floortime- but I do not think they are even close to being well educated on it.

As a result I have had to pay for a private therapist. When I looked into RDI, it was the first program that really made sense to me (I am not knocking doing ABA, but I did not think it was what my son needed). I signed up for 6 months to see how it went. We are now coming to the end of the 6 months and I was waivering on whether to pay for another 6 months, or see how Ian did without it. At $500 per month it is expensive, so I did not want to keep paying for something if it was just luck that it was having such great results. I am glad to hear you are impressed with it too and I think I will have him continue with it for another 6 months. I think after another 6 months I will comfortable enough with it to continue using it with Ian with having to pay the therapist. Maybe I could then just hire her occasionally if we need some specific advice.

Before all of this I had no clue that parents with autistic children were up against some major financial concerns in getting therapy for their children. I am glad there is money being raised to better diagnose autism and to try to find a cure, but I hope I can some day raise money to help people afford therapy beyond just early intervension!

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-03-2004
Sun, 06-19-2005 - 8:18am

Dear Ian's Mom,

Thanks for writing, and I also agree that money needs to be paid to parents. I actually think that we will eventually find out that the government and drug companies are responsible for vaccines increasing the numbers of ASD children. And of course, it will be almost impossible to get compensation and assistance for what they have done. Completely turns my stomach and doesn't make me feel very patriotic.

I am glad to hear that you are continuing the RDI work with your son. My son has made improvements all along since 3 years of age, but the biggest leap in social development and skills has been since introducing the RDI. Since we also started him with an ASD psychotherapist just a few months earlier, I cannot be sure for absolute certain that the RDI was the most important component, also the move to ASD school helped him be happier being with children more like him, but he was also doing well at previous school.

Since Malcolm will be at Day Camp this summer with NT kids (a first), he will not be in school RDI sessions for 3 months. Instead he will be having an opportunity to try out his skills and we will gauge how he is doing. My husband and I plan to up the RDI activities he does with us during the summer.

Good luck,I look forward to hearing more about Ian.

yours,

Sara
ilovemalcolm