Since our boy was diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) at age two, my wife and I couldn’t accept it initially. We read and learnt vigorously about Autism, which was a domain that we never came across in our path.
We brought our boy to attend numerous different types of therapies, including Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) therapy, Occupational Therapy, Speech Therapy and other unconventional therapies as well. Results? Not significant and unable to sustain the outcome long enough, like a week or two.
One day, we met Jiarou as she was our regular customer that happened to be a therapist that specialised in special education. She introduced us to a methodology named Activity-based Intervention (ABI) and an annual individualised Education Plan, a goal-setting plan for parents and therapists.
Last year, our paediatrician told us that our boy might be a non-verbal autistic child for the rest of his life, and this news was devastating to us. Luckily, our boy suddenly began to talk in June last year after two months that our paediatrician pronounced him to be a non-verbal autistic child. No words could describe our enormous joy that our boy began to talk. Our paediatrician was surprised that our boy could speak when we visited her to request an IQ test for the enrollment of the Special Education (SPED) school. In addition, she advised us that we should put all our efforts into the therapy that worked for our boy and eliminate those therapies that didn’t perform well. We found that Jiarou’s therapy worked significantly well for our boy throughout the years. So, we increased from two to three times per week to six times per week.
From January 2021 till now, our boy has improved remarkably simply by increasing the frequency of the therapy with Jiarou. He was currently able to make simple requests, answer Where/What questions, make better eye contact, have good attention and focus, play the game in a group, and do simple Maths despite being diagnosed with ASD with a Mental Disability (Low IQ). Most surprisingly, our boy was able to come up with his own game and request us to join and play with him. This improvement has never been thought of for us for the past years.
We have no way to show our gratitude to Jiarou for her efforts that helped our boy improve so much in such a short period and past years. Most importantly, Jiarou is a good listener, practical, experienced, creative, hardworking, and always does her best to make the lesson engaging for our boy and ensure we achieve the goals according to our plan. Also, she provides concrete steps for our helper to assist our boy in practising daily. We hope this testimonial may help the parents with ASD child and Jiarou may shine light in your path to help you see your way out of the darkness. Good luck to all of us!