PLC Testimonials

A Father Of 10-months-old Girl With Autism:

I am a father of 4 years and 10 months old girl with autism. I am a Japanese citizen.

My daughter was diagnosed when she was 3 years and 3 months. After diagnosis, the doctor at the time told us that it is best to have fun everyday, and that was the only advice given. Frankly, we felt that she had been thrown out on the street with a diagnosis, and got lost. We could not accept the diagnosis and visited the other child psychiatrist when she was 3 years and 8 months. The diagnosis was the same and we were also told that she was developmentally over one year old.

We had to wait for a few months to start a therapy at a public institution, so we consulted a case-worker to find other private services available, but they could not find any. Her entrance to the kindergarten was suspended because of her problems, so we took her to swimming and music classes. These classes did not help her developmentally; even worse, her problem behaviors became distinctive such as pinching peer’s cheek, so we had to resign.

We consulted a child psychiatrist I had known and he said “that is her personality and you have to accept who she is”, “it is unhappy for both of you and your child to strain to recover” “even though she has a handicap, she can live her life happily if people around her understand her handicap” and so on. We also felt that the public institution’s educational policy is somewhat similar to what he had said.

However, we could not give up hope and believe that she has so many opportunities in her future. We searched all the information and finally we reached ABA programs. We found ABA by reading a cover story of Yomiuri newspaper on January 31, 2007, “Autism, improvement by high-density therapy”. After that, we participated in autism-related lectures and found out about the Pacific Learning Center, and we applied right away.

The standout feature of this program is 1 on 1 therapy of 30 to 40 hours a week, although we had a financial difficulty so started with 20 hours a week. Within a month, she has shown an improvement. Such as:

• She became able to use the toilet which was never successful.
• She was only able to make 2 words sentences but now she can make 4 words sentences.
• She is able to answer ‘Yes’ ‘No’ ’I don’t …’ so we can make mutual communication.
• She is able to answer ‘Which is..?’ ’Which one is…?’
• She is making better eye contact.
• She follows instructions such as ‘come here’ ’sit down’ ‘change cloths’ ‘wash hands’.
• She is able to categorize ‘animal’ ‘vehicle’ ‘food’ ‘furniture’ etc.
• She has learned attributes such as ‘big/small’ ‘long/short’ etc.

We have seen her improvement so much more than we have expected. After a month of service received, we increased the therapy hours from 20 hours to 30 hours a week. It has been only 2 months since she started to receive a therapy. We are hoping that we could increase the hours up to 40.

After she was diagnosed, we worried about our future. We were disappointed that there was no support system in our community, and frustrated with the one-way communication with our daughter. However, after coming to the Pacific Learning Center, for the first time we feel that she has a bright future ahead. We try to raise money and would like to continue to receive this program. We earnestly hope that all children with autism are able to reach this therapy.