Mission Statement: This blog was created to provide information on getting help for autism in general while focussing on locally available resources for families with newly diagnosed children in Belleville and Quinte area.

Please browse the blog at your leisure. You are welcome to comment on the posts. If you are a parent, an autism consultant, counselor, teacher with information on autism resources available in our area, please email your information to benziesangma@gmail.com. Your information will be added within 24 hours.

Local Autism Support Groups

Parents Engaging Autism Quinte (PEAQ), an autism parent support group, meets once a month on the first Tuesday of the month (no meetings in January, July and August) at Kerry's Place, 189 Victoria Avenue, Belleville at 6:30 to 8 p.m. If you have questions or suggestions for autism topics that are important to you please go to our FaceBook account and post your suggestions so that we can invite appropriate autism professionals to speak at these meetings.

Autism parent support group meeting hosted by Mental Health Agency, Trenton and Military Family Resource Centre (MFRC) is on every second Thursday of the month (from September to June) from 6 to 7:30 pm. For more info, please contact Bryanna Best, Special Needs Inclusion Coordinator at 613 392 2811 ext 2076 or email at bryanna.b@trentonmfrc.ca

For info on Community Living Prince Edward County Parent Support group, contact Resource Consultants @ 613 476 6038

Central Hastings Autism Support Group meets in Madoc at the Recreation Centre. Contact Renee O’Hara, Family Resource & Support, 613-966-7413 or Tammy Kavanagh, Family Resource & Support, 613-332-3227

Parenting your child during Covid-19 pandemic

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

My child is a happy "camper"

My son is off to his first ever gymnastics camp. I wrote a note about him to his teenaged coaches. I noted to them what works best for him and what doesn't. One of his coaches was pleasantly surprised at my note and said not many parents did that. I told her that my action came from years of working it out with different community agencies where my son has been involved in in the past few years. That included school. Each year as the new school year approaches I prepare a short note on all about my son - what he can do and what might set him off - to his teachers. I think it is important to be proactive and help the new agents in your child's life know as much as possible about his/her needs from you, the parent. Instead of waiting around for the teacher/coach to get to know my son, it helps them, too, to know things that work and others that might need tweaking etc. It helps to put the agents in the right frame of mind knowing what to expect from your child and to prepare on how to deal with it ahead of meeting in person. Bottomline is, I want my son to have a good time wherever he goes without having to deal with the torment of not being able to emotionally regulate himself. I know I am doing my part towards his happiness when I am prepared to advocate for him every single time. This time, all it took was a one-page note about him to his coaches and when I picked him up yesterday (his first day being yesterday) I could see that he was indeed a happy camper. He's off to the camp again today and I expect that he'll have a great day.

In it for the long haul...

I created this blog with my sincere wish that those of you reading this will want to share your own stories, both good and bad, what worked for you and what didn't and together, we can make it easier for the next family beginning their own journey of discovery. By posting what you know, where you have recieved certain services, who you have talked to, whose expertise you trust, how you navigated the school education services and by responding to questions in the discussion thread, know that you have helped a family in need. So, parents, experts in the field, counsellors, teachers and everyone who has any information on resources available, please feel free to post on this blog.