Visual Vednesday: Bob Marley by Zareen, 20, youth with ASD

A Parent's Experience with Play-Based, Naturalistic ABA Therapy

Photo shared by parents and permission given to publish.

When our son was suspected of being on the spectrum, we decided to move to Kuala Lumpur, where better access to therapy was available. Since the move, we have tried different types of therapy for speech and also other skills, and we were happy to see steady improvements.

After about a year in Malaysia, we came to know of Intan and play-based, naturalistic, ABA* therapy. We decided to try ABA  therapy to see how our son would respond to it. It was one of the best decisions we have made regarding his therapy. In just one month, we already started to see amazing results. His conversational skills really improved, and we started to notice how he became more and more aware of his surroundings. He started interacting more with us and his brother. He became more conversational - we started to see more impromptu short conversations between him and his brother. He communicated a lot better his wants, this also helped with the decrease of his tantrums. At school, his teacher also mentioned how he started to join in during the activities at school.

Over the course of the next few months of therapy, we have seen him just take in whatever was being thrown at him. Some things came easily, other things he needed practice. But the good thing was how he started using the skills he learned during therapy in his every day life.

We are forever thankful to Intan, who designed and supervised his programme, and the 2 wonderful therapists who worked with our son. He loved his sessions with his teachers and always looked forward to it.

Asma
Maldives

* Applied Behaviour Analysis