Raising Twins In The Special Needs World With Guest Cecily White-Cooper

Episode 30: Raising Twins In The Special Needs World With Guest Cecily White-Cooper In this episode, we discuss raising twins, one neurotypical and one with autism. Cecily White-Cooper's son was diagnosed with autism at age 4. However, she noticed around age 18mo that he was having delays, and he received services through early intervention early on. He was able to receive speech therapy, occupational therapy, and psychotherapy. He tried applied behavioral analysis, but the family was not able to do 10-15 hours of therapy per week outside of school, and doing one hour per week was not useful, so they discontinued ABA. She noted that her son continues to do speech therapy. She makes sure her son gets the therapies that he needs, but she also makes sure she and her family don't "eat, live, and breathe autism." Her son is in the public school system in an autism program. However, both children go to different schools. Cecily noted that she doesn't feel he is getting a stellar education in his current school placement, but that homeschooling is not currently an option. However, she works hard with him at home on his schoolwork to compensate. Her son requires more assistance and routines than his twin sister does. Both twins are helpful around the house, but Cecily has to repeat herself a few times with her son before he helps out. His twin sister initiates play with Cecily's son, as he tends not to initiate play. She stated that he is not overly social currently, but he doesn't appear upset by that. She and her children can go most places together, but he prefers not to go to malls. She does special trips with each child. She noted that her twins act like typically siblings, being sneaky, and fussing at each other at times. They tend to bond over their shared birthday. Her son doesn't have a lot of public meltdowns. However, he does like to touch the hair of other people. For her self-care routine, she listens to podcasts, watches youtube, meditates, listens to sermons, goes to spas, gets her nails done, and exercises.   Links: Teacher Ces Website Teacher Ces Podcast ITunes Spotify YouTube Instagram: Twitter: Facebook Yoga With Adriene Email us if you have any questions or ideas! We are now on instagram! Check out updates on our website. Follow Thriving on Twitter. Check us out on Facebook and join our parent group! Please subscribe to our podcast in the iTunes store, or wherever you find your podcasts, Leave us a 5 star review, to help us know what you like and what you don't like, and to make sure other like-minded people find support through this podcast. Show Music: Intro Outro: Intro Outro 2 by Mattias Lahoud under CC-BY 3.0 License (www.freesound.org) Theme Song: 90s rock style by monkeyman535 under CC-BY 3.0 License (www.freesound.org) Self Care Song: Green and Orange No Water by Duncan Alex under CC-BY 3.0 License (www.freesound.org) Hosted by: Jessica Temple and Lewis Temple Disclaimer: Our show is not designed to provide listeners with specific or personal legal, medical, or professional services or advice. Parents of children with health issues should always consult their health care provider for medical advice, medication, or treatment. Copyright 2020 Jessica and Lewis Temple