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Webinar: Preparing for Puberty in Children with Autism
In this recorded webinar, Cora Taylor, PhD, discusses puberty in individuals with special developmental needs, including: Helping children understand and prepare for body changes associated with puberty Encouraging good hygiene Understanding public/private behaviors Handling issues...
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Working to Prevent Suicide in Youth with Autism
This article contains information about suicide and suicide prevention. For help 24/7, please call or text the U.S. Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988. After being bullied at school, the preteen boy came to believe that no one would care if he died. His therapist, whom he had been seeing for...
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Autism and the Troubling Risk of Suicide
This article has information about suicide and suicide prevention. For help 24/7, please call or text the U.S. Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988. Few people used to think about the risk of suicide among people on the autism spectrum. Researchers rarely studied it. Primary care doctors did not...
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Intimate Relationship Failures From an Autistic Perspective
The standard narrative positions autism as the cause of relationship trouble when a non-autistic person dates or falls in love with an autistic person. The autistic partner is assumed to be the disruptive or difficult one. Self-help books offer non-autistic partners tips on how to cope with their...
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Autism and Adolescence: For Many, the Most Challenging Time of Life
It is a well-known conventional wisdom that adolescence, or the teenage years, are a difficult time of life for everybody and that this has probably been the case since time immemorial. It is equally well known in the autism community that middle school (or, as it was known in my day, junior high...
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Making Space for Mourning: A Grief Support Session
As the Coordinator of Family and Wellness in the Developmental Disabilities Division at Services for the UnderServed (S:US) and a social worker with extensive experience in providing grief support, I am often requested to administer grief support to people with intellectual/developmental...
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A Brief Guide to Discussing Intimacy and Sex in Neurodiverse Couples Therapy
Intimacy and sex are healthy, natural aspects of human relationships. Yet, this topic is often unaddressed by both therapists and couples seeking support. While differences and challenges related to intimate connections are not unique to neurodiverse couples, there are core areas of neurodiversity...
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Neurodiverse Couples: Making Meaningful Moments of Every Day – Having a Good Morning
Many neurodiverse couples struggle with emotional connection and intimate communication. They yearn for a romantic touch, a knowing glance, a kind gesture to make them feel close. These little things make a big difference in an intimate relationship. And when these small connecting moments do not...
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Rethinking Non-Compliance as a Skill and Promoting Self-Advocacy
Nearly all behavior analysts have come across “non-compliance” within the behavior repertoire of our consumers. Many of us have operationally defined it and targeted it for deceleration. However, how often do we stop to consider the significance of non-compliance? Can non-compliance be...
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Sexual Consent and Communication
Historically, professionals have assumed autistic people are incapable of engaging in partnered sexual activities or are uninterested in intimate relationships. Most services for autistics continue to focus on affected family members with children. Until recently, research on autistic sexual...
