ReaLife ABA LLC

Baby Steps -

Baby Steps It is tempting to try and rush results. When skills are imperative to every day life such as difficulties with transitions or accepting new experiences or requests, it feels especially urgent to accomplish the desired change. We want to do it all at once.

Picking Your Battles -

Picking Your Battles Handling any kind of behavior can feel overwhelming, particularly when your child is struggling with multiple aspects of their day. It can feel like any step is a step in the wrong direction because it just exacerbates the challenges you’re facing. 

Functionality -

Functionality Academics often take precedence because they are also pushed in the wider world. We have a tendency to go straight for the reading goal or the math goal. Things that are important for school but may not have as much functionality in the real world. Academics absolutely have their place but they shou...

New Year's Resolution -

New Year's Resolution As we approach the new year many people make resolutions to encourage new habits and skills. But it’s also an opportunity to look back on the progress made in the past year.

Break Time -

Break Time Winter break is the time of the year where children rejoice and parents start to look a little bit like deer in the headlights. 

Preparing for the Holidays -

Preparing for the Holidays The holidays are challenging. Everyone has their own idealized version of the way things should go—whether that be taking turns lighting the menorah each night or opening stockings together on Christmas morning—we all have our own “perfect” picture in our heads.

Placing Boundaries -

Placing Boundaries Boundaries can feel overwhelming for parents and often, when a new boundary needs to be established it can create more screaming, more crying, more challenging behaviors. These tantrums can make it feel like it’s easier to just avoid the issue all together by removing the boundary entirely.

Perseveration and Passions -

Perseveration and Passions One of the most widely stereotyped facets of neurodiversity is perseverative behaviors. Perseverative behaviors are repetitive actions or thoughts that persist beyond their rational context. In tv shows and movies these are often seen as repetitive motor movements such as hand flapping or spinning i...

Frightful Feelings -

Frightful Feelings Something that often gets overlooked in the neurodiverse world, and particularly in the autism community, is the language of emotions. We know that neurodiverse kids often struggle with emotional regulation and reading emotions in others. This often means that while other children are learning emoti...

Choices, choices, choices -

Choices, choices, choices Sometimes navigating daily routines with a neurodiverse child can put you on a battlefield. One in which the answer to every request is “no!” and where it takes ten times longer to get those tasks accomplished than you originally thought.

Diagnoses -

Diagnoses Diagnoses are scary. Even when they are expected, or suspected, there is a tremendous amount of power in words. Hearing that your child doesn’t fall into the small box we consider “neurotypical” can be challenging. It doesn’t change who your child is though. At the end of the day your child ...