Tag: public therapy

  • When Hope Blooms Happy Moments

    A happy moment can bloom more quickly than expected from the seeds of hope. In my gut, I felt like Arrowhead was the place we needed to do our crowd work with Tony on March 31st. I noticed as we were pulling in that the Funbox park was up and functional, and I told Andy…

  • Why Certain Stores Get All the Public Therapy Lovin’

    Because of the nature of what we do when we are working therapeutically with Tony in public, more attention grabbing behaviors from him can and will happen still…even if we are currently on an upward slope of considerable improvement. We are sometimes really pushing the boundaries of what he can tolerate. In stores right now,…

  • Some Thoughts About Why

    Generally, many of the teens who went to my high school came from families that were far better off financially than mine. At some points, I was saving money given to me at Christmas and for my birthday by my grandmother and my Aunt Cile and Uncle Lawson…and I would use it to buy thrift…

  • Our Pandemic Public Therapy Progress Report

    A couple of weekends ago, on our last public therapy trip with Emily as Tony’s hab therapist, he laughed, smiled, and flapped as we walked towards the door of our local Fry’s. When we first started our public therapy programs, I never would have expected to see him looking happy in that context. The best…

  • Navigating The Stress Of Allergies, POTS, And All Things Health & Being Needed On The Therapy Team

    For nearly a year now, I have been bobbing up and down on the waves of life, trying not to get swamped or washed overboard as I navigated managing my health and maintaining the active role I must play in all of Tony’s therapy programs that transpire outside of our house. These programs are essential…

  • Resurrecting Public Therapy

    The cashier at Bashas’ looked at me as she pulled Tony’s bag of suckers across the scanner and said, “I haven’t seen you guys in a while.” Her eyes crinkled around the corners, so I could see that she was smiling even though her mask covered much of her face. A whole year I thought,…

  • Some Things Are More Important

    I am rarely at a loss for words to write or say. Our current local surge of COVID infections has left me wading through a dim bog of uncertainty. Far too many in our communities have lost loved ones, others are still battling for their health, and many people have lost their jobs…so I feel…

  • When a Full Day Off Isn’t One of Your Options…

    So, what happens in families such as ours when one of the parents gets sick? I’m going to quote part of an email I sent out April 23, 2017 to a group of friends: “Hello my sweet friends, I hope all of you are doing well! I’m slowly getting back to feeling normal. My cold…

  • Why Public Therapy?

    About a year ago, Whitney and I were working with Tony in one of our local Target stores shortly before she moved out of state. Another customer approached us and asked me some information about working with an Autistic child in public because she was hoping to encourage her partner to undertake similar outings (her…

  • Your Kid Finger Paints? Mine Too!

    This is a post I wish to write with as much sensitivity as possible. In choosing to touch upon this topic in any manner, I have been basing my decisions on what I can glean from Tony’s public actions and decided that currently he wouldn’t be concerned about us having this conversation. What he would…