|
TO HER PARENTS Sharon and Dave, Ashley
was perfect- the second daughter they always wanted.
Sharon says, "She looked
beautiful! She looked perfect! I was elated! I wanted another child so Kacey
could have a playmate -- they were 14 months apart. Kacey
would be a great role model for Ashley."
But Ashley had a different idea. At
16 months, she preferred to be left alone.
"She would tune us out when we'd
call her name - kind of be in her own world. I couldn't imagine
that there'd be something wrong with my child!" says Sharon.
But there was something wrong with
Ashley. After a hearing and speech evaluation, it was determined
that while her hearing was fine, her speaking ability at 19 months
was the equivalent of a 6 month old!
"My heart just sunk!" says
Sharon.
Dr. Chuck Conlon, a neurodevelopmental
pediatrician at Children's Hospital in Bethesda, Maryland examined
Ashley.
"We really look at the hallmark of
her social interaction abilities and her communicative abilities -- it
was autism spectrum disorder." says Dr. Conlon.
"Autism? Ashley's not
autistic," said Sharon.
While devastated, Sharon was also
determined to find help for her little girl. Around her 2nd
birthday, Ashley started speech and occupational therapy. But despite
a 20-hour a week program for almost a year, she made little
progress. So Sharon decided to try a special listening program
developed by a French ear, nose and throat doctor who theorized that
autistic children have under-developed inner ears that can be re-trained
through intensive sound therapy.
Auditory training is really looking to help your ear to
listen better and to perceive sound better, and in doing that to help
start language emerge.
Ashley was exposed to music of Mozart after it had been
filtered to bring out the high frequencies.
Mozart carries higher
frequencies in the music, and the instrumentation carries along very
consistently with the human voice.
Ashley also listened to her mother's
voice after it had been modulated.
The mother's voice
simulates for children what it sounded like to them when they were in
the womb.
It's in the womb that hearing develops.
The fetus picks up only high frequency levels of the mother's voice and
other sounds. Auditory training therapy is designed
to replicate those sounds heard in-utero in order to re-awaken the ear's
natural ability to listen and ultimately stimulate the brain's desire to
communicate.
For some kids, it's
really opening another new door to them in an entirely new
world. For Ashley, the result was nothing short of
miraculous.
Sharon says, "The second day, I
really remember, we got into the car and we were driving home -- all of
the sudden she said, "I want cookie!". She'd never said
anything spontaneously like that before. Dave and I just looked at
each other and go, "what did she just say?"
After more than a year of
listening therapy combined with interactive games, Ashley is now part of
the crowd.
"She learned to talk, she learned to
pretend play, she learned to hug, and she learned to love us.
Auditory training was just that switch!" says Sharon.
But autism experts caution about false
hope. They stress that the auditory training is not a cure, it's not
science, and it's not meant for every autistic child.
"I don't think I could make this a
treatment recommendation from the standpoint of definitely do this, until
there's more evidence to suggest there's good clinical science to say
this works," says Dr. Conlon.
But for Sharon and her husband Dave, this
is all the proof they need:
"I love you Daddy!"
|
