Nautilus Award Winner, 2019--Silver in Parenting & Family A comprehensive resource for parents, therapists, caregivers, and educators, packed with lifelong strategies for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) management and support Newly revised and updated, this user-friendly guide addresses autism identification, treatment, and prevention from pre-conception through adulthood. Outsmarting Autism describes more than 50 practical approaches with proven efficacy, including lifestyle modification, dietary considerations, and boosting the immune system. After health improves, focus turns to developing the sensory foundations for communication, social skills, and learning. Patricia Lemer's approach is grounded in research on multifactorial causes, or "Total Load Theory," which explains that developmental delays are caused not by one single factor, but by an overload of environmental stressors on genetically vulnerable individuals. Because every person with autism is unique, this book guides readers to the therapies that may be right for each individual, helping to make the difference between management and healing. New research on topics like stem cells, cannabis, and dentistry is now included.

"Each family's journey with autism is as unique as a fingerprint." Think about autism differently. That's what Vivian M. Lumbard does. She's a mom to teenage twins with high-functioning autism challenges. As a retired air traffic controller, she is familiar with long-term and short-term goals, changing plans on a moment's notice, as well as being able to laugh when stressed. All of which comes in handy when raising a child with autism. Autism awareness is on the rise. But what about autism understanding? Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) manifests differently for each individual. Yet stereotypes hinder understanding and impact our choices as parents and educators. Using examples from her family's life, she reframes common ASD stereotypes and competencies to highlight commonalities with the neurotypical world. Vivian advocates an approach of loving, parenting and supporting the whole, unique child and offers a chapter of helpful tips based on her experiences. See how she applies those tips while staying at home during COVID-19. Frank. Compassionate. Intimate. Sometimes humorous. Join her as she shares her family's journey.

Maritza A. Molis is a wife and mother who has gone through a myriad of issues including raising a child with autistic disorder. She works in health care, is a self-taught researcher on autism and mental health, an autism parent mentor, has graduated from Liberty University with a degree in psychology and from Light University with a master's diploma in biblical counseling. Autism in Our Home inspires you to become a better parent and teaches you skills to help you manage your home better when you have a newly diagnosed child with autism. At the age of eight months, Maritza's son Jaiden begins to have seizures unexpectedly. He was hospitalized and diagnosed with rare form of epilepsy called West syndrome. A little over a year later, Jaiden is diagnosed with nonverbal autism. Maritza fears if she will ever be able to overcome this troublesome situation as having a child with several disabilities is very hard to handle. Maritza stays hopeful and explains the journey into the world of being a special needs mom. Here in this book is the help you need to confront your own fears and an outline of strategies to help you cope through the many trying times that parents will go through when they have a child that is newly diagnosed with autism. Maritza provides an action plan focusing on: How to let God help you in the everyday battles Constructive therapies for your child with autism Accepting the new normal for your new life Resource page with tons of Web sites and helpful info Maritza believes in spite of all the difficulties in life we face when we become our child's best advocate, make small changes daily, and use God to be our guide, we find clarity and peace.

Showcasing conceptually innovative work and cutting-edge methods related to the study of families, this volume presents not just a groundbreaking perspective on disability and family life, but also a new paradigm in disability scholarship.

The last few years have brought increased writings from activists, artists, scholars, and concerned clinicians that cast a critical and constructive eye on psychiatry, mental health care, and the cultural relations of mental difference. With particular focus on accounts of lived experience and readings that cover issues of epistemic and social injustice in mental health discourse, the Mad Studies Reader brings together voices that advance anti-sanist approaches to scholarship, practice, art, and activism in this realm. Beyond offering a theoretical and historical overview of mad studies, this Reader draws on the perspectives, voices, and experiences of artists, mad pride activists, humanities and social science scholars, and critical clinicians to explore the complexity of mental life and mental difference. Voices from these groups confront and challenge standard approaches to mental difference. They advance new structures of meaning and practice that are inclusive of those who have been systematically subjugated and promote anti-sanist approaches to counter inequalities, prejudices, and discrimination. Confronting modes of psychological oppression and the power of a few to interpret and define difference for so many, the Mad Studies Reader asks the critical question of how these approaches may be reconsidered, resisted, and reclaimed. This collection will be of interest to mental health clinicians; students and scholars of the arts, humanities and social sciences; and anyone who has been affected by mental difference, directly or indirectly, who is curious to explore new perspectives.

This handbook provides an authoritative and up-to-date overview of Critical Autism Studies and explores the different kinds of knowledges and their articulations, similarities, and differences across cultural contexts and key tensions within this subdiscipline. Critical Autism Studies is a developing area occupying an exciting space of development within learning and teaching in higher education. It has a strong trajectory within the autistic academic and advocate community in resistance and response to the persistence of autism retaining an identity as a genetic disorder of the brain. Divided into four parts • Conceptualising autism • Autistic identity • Community and culture • Practice and comprising 24 newly commissioned chapters written by academics and activists, it explores areas of education, Critical Race Theory, domestic violence and abuse, sexuality, biopolitics, health, and social care practices. It will be of interest to all scholars and students of disability studies, sociology, anthropology, cultural studies, education, health, social care, and political science.

Disabling Barriers analyzes issues relating to disability at different moments in Canadian and American history. In this volume, legal scholars, historians, and disability-rights activists demonstrate that disabled people can change their social status by transforming the political and legal discourse surrounding disablement. Employing tools from the fields of law and history, this original contribution explores how disabled people have been portrayed and treated in a variety of contexts, including within the labour market, the workers’ compensation system, the immigration process, and the legal system (both as litigants and as lawyers). It deepens our knowledge of the role of people with disabilities within social movements in disability history. The contributors encourage us to rethink our understanding of both the systemic barriers disabled people face and the capacity of disabled people to effect positive societal change.

Ableism is embedded in Canadian criminal justice institutions, policies, and practices, making incarceration and institutionalization dangerous – even deadly – for disabled people. Disability Injustice examines disability in contexts that include policing and surveillance, sentencing and the courts, prisons and alternatives to confinement. The contributors confront challenging topics such as the pathologizing of difference as deviance; eugenics and crime control; criminalization based on biased physical and mental health approaches; and the role of disability justice activism in contesting discrimination. This provocative collection highlights how, with deeper understanding of disability, we can challenge the practices of crime control and the processes of criminalization.

Mobilizing Metaphor illustrates how radical and unconventional forms of activism, including art, are reshaping the rich and vibrant tradition of disability mobilization in Canada – and in the process, challenging perceptions of disability and the politics that surround it. Until now, research on Canadian disability activism has focused on legal and policy spheres and overlooked how disability activism is as varied as the population it represents. Mobilizing Metaphor combines contributions by artists, activists, and academics (including an insightful concluding chapter by renowned disability scholar Tanya Titchkoksy) with rich illustrations and photographs to reveal how disability art is distinctive as both art and social action. As the contributors sketch the shifting contours of disability politics in Canada and show how disability oppression is not isolated from other prejudices, they challenge us to re-examine how we enact social and political change.