September 23, 2023
The Role of Educators in Advocating for Children With Autism - Barbara Vokatis.
Show Notes
Educators play a critical role in advocating for children with autism. Here are some ways educators can fulfill their role:
- Early identification: Educators are often the first ones to notice signs of autism in children. They can use their expertise to identify symptoms and signals of autism and refer the child for an evaluation.
- Inclusive classrooms: Educators can create inclusive classrooms where children with autism are not segregated or isolated. Such classrooms should offer individualized instruction and support to all students, including those with autism.
- Individualized Education Plans (IEPs): IEPs are legal documents that outline a child's educational goals and accommodations. Educators can advocate for IEPs that meet the unique needs of children with autism.
- Family involvement: Educators can work with families to help them understand and advocate for their children. Family involvement is an essential factor in the success of children with autism.
- Access to resources: Educators can connect families to resources and services that can support children with autism, such as speech therapy, occupational therapy, and counseling. In summary, the role of educators in advocating for children with autism is to identify, understand and support their unique needs, provide inclusive educational experiences, and collaborate with families to support the children's growth and development.
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SUMMARY KEYWORDS
children, autism, parent, dog, school, people, therapy, kids, teacher, naked, problem, years, expertise, create, diagnose, helps, autistic children, fix, talk, struggles
SPEAKERS
Barbara, Chad Ratliffe
Barbara 00:00
Our job is to figure out, I mean our job schools and people in work, how to take advantage of these skills. And if we cannot do this, that means that we are the ones who are not doing the job, not autistic people, because artistic people are incredible. They got those talents, they want to function. And the funny thing is, too, they can be so extremely social. There's like those myths about autistic people that antisocial enter into and the and I and my child is extremely social.
00:37
Welcome to the daily naked parent podcast brought to you by rocket glue. The first ever brand focused on supporting parents with special needs children. Naked parent nation is a group of parents with special needs children, who are willing to give honorable, stripping all down and take a look at ourselves, our parenting, our family and our plans create a life beyond our wildest dreams.
Chad Ratliffe 01:11
On today's show, we'll be discussing the role of educators in advocating for children with autism. Hello naked parent nation and welcome to today's episode of The Naked parent podcast. My name is Chad ratliffe and I'm your host. Before I introduce you to our guests today, let me start by sharing a message from naked parent nation. Naked parent nations a worldwide community of parents and professionals raising children with all kinds of needs. We come together to share our Naked Truth, support our fellow parents and inspire the inner growth that each of us needs to build the life and family of our dreams. For the parents that are struggling, we want you to know that we will love you until you can love yourself. For your children we pray and send power from our collective group.
Naked parenting is the process of moving from where you are to where you want to be. Naked parenting understands that the mind is responsible for all of our problems. As you shed the layers of your old programming and beliefs, you will return to the deepest truths of your own being. Do what you've always done and receive the life you are living or create the vision you want for your family. Combine it with an elevated emotion and support from our community and you can live the life of your dreams and beyond. We have the power to create any kind of life we want for ourselves and our families. We do this by living in the naked present moment, one day at a time. This is your first time connecting with us. I hope you feel the love that's here for you. Together we walk different paths side by side. So we'll take our moment before we get to our conversation and have some grounding or some peace, relaxation, whatever it may be. It's just something that we recommend once or twice a day if you can, but will allow yourself to close your eyes now and just take a moment for yourself. We're going to contemplate fixing it in our societies society's mentality to fix it. So if you want to sit with your back straight, allow your eyes to fall closed.
Gently lift your gaze to that space between your eyebrows and just feel your body and see if there's any sensations any tingling Is there any discomfort as you concentrate on your breath I want you to see what comes to your mind when I asked you if there's anything in your life that's causing your problem that you're trying to fix when we're discontent the natural habit is to fix it. Her mind goes into fix it mode we get into circular cycles of Thinking, trying to solve our problem. Sometimes people ask if it's, if I'm suggesting that we don't set goals.
And that's not the case I believe setting goals is, is very useful. I just think there's an obsession that goes beyond the goal setting. Yeah. And this exercise is an opportunity to just see how we go into fix it mode to take a few deep breaths begin to tune into your thoughts What's that problem that you're trying to solve? Is there something specific you're trying to figure out try focusing on the problem, rather than searching for the solution. And then notice if there's any discomfort, round just sitting there with the problem. We want to plan something to fix it. So make sure you don't use this moment that's supposed to be a healthy moment and start judging yourself. beating yourself up. Just be with the discomfort feel for any tension in your body is your shoulders tense, are you able to breathe into it and relax. Just notice where you're holding tension in your body. And recognize if your mind tries to jump to the solution some things you can say to yourself as you can say, I see the discomfort we can say to yourself, I can see that my mind wants to fix it you can give yourself permission by saying May I sit with this problem?
And then, before we come out of this contemplation, I want you to ask yourself what can be done? Don't start creating a step by step plan. Just allow your general question to go out to the powers that exist and see how it manifests in your life. And as you allow yourself to open your eyes and come back into the room, we can just take a deep breath and recognize that we have problems and our mind just keeps trying to fix them and the tension and stress and cycle of obsession that comes from that. For some is there's a lot to take on it creates a lot of stress. And so it's good To recognize that that's what you're doing that those are some things that you can become aware of.
But I do want to get to our expert guests today, who I'm very excited to talk to her name is Barbara vote cuts this. Yeah. All right. And you are a college professor and author and an autism mom. Her teen daughter has autism and is extremely talented artistically. Her book about dog therapy in educational settings speaks about the benefits of dog therapy for all children, including autistic children. Awesome, cute cover. And then she has an upcoming book. It's got a children's book that teaches children how to include children with autism. Barbara, thank you for taking the time to be with us today. And welcome.
Barbara 11:00
You're welcome. Thank you so much.
Chad Ratliffe 11:03
Where are you calling in from?
Barbara 11:05
I am calling in from New York.
Chad Ratliffe 11:08
New York.
Barbara 11:10
Upstate New York, not New York City.
Chad Ratliffe 11:14
Upstate New York. Thank you for calling in. So you said you have a teenage daughter? So your autism journey? Did it start? Well, 15 years ago?
Barbara 11:28
Yeah, I think maybe not. As many years ago, I just my dog came over. We did not know from the beginning that my daughter had my child had autism. When she was in like early childhood, maybe like three and a half years old. The teacher in preschool kind of was noticing some things like she's a little like behind other children, not much, but a little. So she was just giving them more help, things like that. And then she went to kindergarten. And then of course, more learning. Curriculum gets a little bit more difficult. So we heard from the teacher again, that something's going on, where we don't know was and all that. And I think that what happens next, first grades. And in first grade, we really thought we have to do something differently. She's not progressing that well in school.
Let's see what's going on. So the question was like, Where do you even go right? And like who's going to help you diagnose something? I had no idea about expertises such as, like, developmental pediatrician, I had no idea it even existed. So we went to doctor of psychology, who was known for the diagnosis of children, right? So I don't even remember like how we found out about her, but that's when we went. And it was kind of funny, because so my daughter was, I think it was like six years old. So this doctor of psychology, she actually met, she actually excluded autism. And she thought it was something else. Yeah, so then we went with his diagnosis to school and then it was just like, I don't know, it just still things didn't work. And then we read I had noticed her maybe after a year or something like that, but I at that time I found on Google whatever, that there is something a specialty called developmental podiatrists.
And that's the specialty that really actually is qualified to look at these types of children's and actually diagnose so we found someone like that these specialties are not very common doctors, there's not so many of them. We did and and he had no he just no doubt he was just Yep. Just we went in the office or does yep, that's what it is. So it's really it's just really something how misdiagnosis or just and this is just not my journey misdiagnosis. Kids were misdiagnosed, I don't know 10 times I would only once
Chad Ratliffe 14:35
crazy between hearing that delay. A lot of people are told oh, it's just everybody grows at different. You know, so so a lot of people are fed that one and then the many different diagnosis. What's your experience as a parent as you're going through this process? Are you on board? Are you in denial? Are you angry? Hurry. Are you scared? Where are you in all of this?
Barbara 15:03
I was in denial. I really wasn't denial, especially hearing from the teacher, because here's the thing. And the reason why we went and started looking for expertise for people who can diagnose is that the teacher told me, I would go and maybe check, because my own child had some difficulties. So we decided to check and now she's receiving help. So because this teacher connected with me on a parental level, that really made a big difference, because I no longer thought, Who are you to talk to me like that? Right? I mean, who are you to tell me that I need to go and have my child diagnosed? I mean, who are you? Yes, you are a teacher. But it's a different sort of level. Another parent might take it in a different way. But I took it basically the way I'm saying, Who are you to tell me that I should have my child diagnosed somewhere for something.
So that was really my idea, a total denial. But it was the breakthrough, the way this teacher told me just like that, as a parent to parent, and that really was helpful. That's how I was, and then well, we really went once diagnosed. And, you know, I was really a big advocate, as far as in school to make sure that my daughter would get all the right kind of instruction as much as possible. And about, I will still to an extent, maybe not in denial, but I wasn't, I was never like, open to talk about it. Only certain people in our circle of friends and family knew that Katina had autism, obviously teachers, right. But I was never quick to admit it or to talk about it openly. Not to mention in public, that was not going to happen. It took a lot of years to actually just start talking about it like this right now.
Chad Ratliffe 17:09
What do you attribute the change from not talking to anybody about it to today, what has to happen, for parents to move through those stages,
Barbara 17:22
sometimes nothing really brake, there is no breakthrough that happens. Sometimes the time is that then that happens. It doesn't have to be anything, any kind of events or anything. But something actually did happen. In addition to time, after a while seeing how difficult it is, for a parent, to advocate for your child. In school, I have background in education. And it's not easy for me to be the advocate. We can only imagine parents who don't know much about education, you know, they went to school. And that said, right, but I am in this field. And I still struggle with this a little bit. So thinking about all these struggles, and also thinking about the struggles that children with autism have to go through in school, some schools might be very open, they might have curriculum that pushes more for diversity, inclusion, diversity of, of different disabilities, and they might do wonderful job with us.
But some schools don't. And in some cases, what happens is children with autism kind of expected to adjust to everybody else. And not much happens as far as helping the so called mainstream children understand the autistic kids, I think a lot of materials, curricula, talk about like acceptance, you know, being tolerant, accepting others. But what does it actually mean to accept another person who is different? What does it really mean? How do you as a teacher, in school, how do you teach about that? So when I thought about my struggles as a parent and struggles of my own child, because I heard all the stories, and other autistic kids, I started getting this idea of writing out of children's book, something that would, you know, way teach about it, but in a certain way, my therapy dog will be the character teaching children because I've noticed from my visit with my dog, that kids learn from dogs, and sometimes maybe even more than teachers, which is sort of funny, but it actually does happen. So it's just this idea of me taking my dog and we've been doing it for five years to the school and helping children including autistic children, because it helps everybody when the dog is in school. Literally everybody changes the whole atmosphere. So it helps kids with disabilities, but also thinking about publishing a children's book. And I started thinking, Hey, okay, um, you we do deal with autism in the family, my child has autism. But I'm thinking something good is coming out of it. Why don't I just talk about it. And I'm like, wait a minute, I am not so traumatized about it anymore. I am actually proud of what we have achieved, the way we came and what my daughter has become, who she is as a person, and she's an incredible person. So all these things I just started, they started telling me, it's like, come on time to sort of come out.
Chad Ratliffe 20:49
I love that. I would love if we could figure out a way to help people shorten that timeframe. Yeah, yes, I do believe that there is an amount of time but I think that, at least for me, I went down a bunch of rabbit holes for longer than would be ideal. I think, you know, even work can get risky. Because if you don't, if you struggle at how to deal with your own emotions, and you reach for something that you can get addicted to, I mean, there's a lot of ways that it can go sideways fast. Can you tell us a little bit about your daughter, and like how her autism makes her unique and special?
Barbara 21:31
I think it's hard to tell exactly. You know, what is actually her personality and what autism brings as a part of the personality because this is kind of fused together. But see, she has an incredible artistic talent drawing. In that regard. She has an incredible interest in music, and she'll just know all those dates where each song came out. I have no idea about any of these things. And she'll just tell you, you know, that song, oh, that one they came out and was released in that particular year. Okay. I think that, so that's, so she's basically teaching me about how we can in the society, how we can just like not only understand autistic people better, the how do we learn to like coexist with them? How do we because I hear stories? Oh, yeah, they have some skills that are kind of weird and random.
And they may be not so useful in I don't know, on the job. But I don't agree with this, I think our job is to figure out, I mean, our job schools and people in work, how to take advantage of these skills. And if we cannot do this, that means that we are the ones who are not doing the job, not at this not autistic people, because artistic people are incredible. They got those talents, they want to function. And the funny thing is, too, they can be so extremely social. There's like those myths about autistic people. They're antisocial, enter, enter, enter, and I, and my child is extremely social. As a matter of fact, when she was younger, she was very upset that not everybody in school was her friend. She wanted to be her friend, that was not going to happen because she had all those interests. And she was talking about all this. Some kids were annoyed. So obviously, she didn't think about friends.
But now, what's fascinating to see is her growing understanding of that, okay, I have autism, having even some humor about it. Because she can joke about it, too. And then she reflects on her past in school, and she will say funny things that are not so funny. Like, oh, I had such a bad reputation, because I was just annoying everyone. And right now she says, You know, it's so much better on the bus. I don't really annoy anyone. It's really cool. And she's got this understanding about her autism. One thing though, I never from the very beginning, almost. I did try to tell her that she has this autism though. But I remember the beginning I say it but it was just like, whatever, just like ignoring this, but I just like go and let it go. Okay, nevermind. After a while again kind of said well, you know, because you have this autism, but it's kind of mild. It's nothing to really worry about it. Just want you to know about it. And just slowly, slowly, slowly. She kind of started to understand it. So it wasn't something she found out from somebody else right? Ain't she found out from me, I think that was very important. I read quite a few books, I think that's really cool. You don't want to overwhelm yourself as far as reading everything of autism, right and going like crazy about it. But it's important to read some things. And then you understand this a little bit more. And there was some advice there, such as tell your child's right that they have autism, you don't want them to like, find out from other people.
Right. But it's better when they find out from you. But I think that just seeing her and how she's developing and everything, I think, honestly, we should take advantage and collaborate with these artistic, incredible people. And they can really teach us a lot, how to help the society, include them, they will tell you what you wouldn't need to do.
Chad Ratliffe 25:57
That's a great point. And I think you make a great point about being the one to tell, yes, your child, I hope the listeners paid attention to that one. And I agree to talk to them, I, my kids, I have five within six years of age and the typical kids, by 10 years old, were so much more evolved emotionally and can empathize with their empathy than I was at a much it took me many, many more years. It's like, how amazing it would be if we could spread that throughout the community and create these kind people to interact and create a better world together,
Barbara 26:39
there is so much more that we have to do a lot than it's happening currently in schools,
Chad Ratliffe 26:45
for sure. How about for you? If it started with denial? Did parenting or parenting an autistic child push you to the limit of your abilities? Like for me, it pushed me to the edge of everything I could handle? I mean, I couldn't handle much more. How's your experience been? Have you been able to deal with it in stride? Or has there been some challenging years?
Barbara 27:15
I know that autism can be because it's the spectrum, right? And you can be on the spectrum somewhere all over the place. And mild child's autism is kind of like mild to moderate. So the most challenges were early education, when let's say she came from school, and there was homework, and there was no way for me to even like help her with the homework. Because she just wouldn't do it. She just wouldn't even want to be helped, was like new way. And that was very frustrating. And, you know, I'm not a special education teacher. So I do have educational expertise and all that. But I'm not a special education teacher, I don't have that expertise. So we eventually, behavioral therapy therapist actually came. And she helped with that a lot.
So another expert who can come and help her that this was very, very useful. And I'm very glad that we did that. But that was very, very frustration or not being able to even help your child with the homework, because she just wouldn't just be ready to do any of this. Forget about asking that. She will be doing homework on her own. That wasn't even like in the picture. But just like even creating the homework sort of routine was impossible. It had to really happen with this help of this therapist. And she came to our house, because everything was done in this natural environment. So that was difficult period, but expert health. And another very difficult thing was always I think dealing with a lack of flexibility. Autistic people, sometimes and again, I don't want to speak about everybody because everybody's different. But lack of flexibility, lack of being able to adapt to a situation. That was a big struggle, and it got better over time, as we talked together and explaining her different things and she understands more understanding how understanding more about the you know, the life and the work and the parents working and what how we deal with issues to she has more like empathy, more understanding. I think so that helps. But that's a long process, but the lack of flexibility, especially at the beginning, when when Kalina was younger. It was very tough to deal with, because I don't always have the super patience. My husband I didn't either. And then you have to do something, you have to make a decision. And he had this kid is just not going to, you can say whatever you want, just not going to not going to be flexible. So that was pretty tough.
Chad Ratliffe 30:15
Yeah, I agree. I asked for a favorite quote, and I believe you sent in, I'm going to take this chance and do things I've never done. Tell us what that means to you.
Barbara 30:28
That means exactly what I've said in this conversation. Autism is kind of like this chance, something that happens to you, you experienced this, it can be something you experienced yourself, or you as a parent, right, you just never know, life is unpredictable. But you need to create your own perspective on the things that happen in life, take it to a different level, try to do something that can help others. So because I am an educator, I'm trying to do something that works with my expertise. So writing, so because it connects to dog therapy, whatever I'm doing. So I connect these two spheres, right, helping kids with autism and other disabilities, by bringing my dog to the school and then writing about it and innovating in this area to create activities even better, where dogs can be used even more creatively than right now. So results in terms of social emotional skills are even better and academics.
And because anxiety, I think even every kid, many kids have so much anxiety now in school, and younger ones too. But with children with autism and other disabilities, anxiety can be even more harmful. I think it can affect them, even at a larger scale than a regular kid, possibly. So and then the children's book. So taking this chance and thinking about it, all right, it happened? Yes. It's not like this super incredible thing that you're excited about, right. And nobody's excited when they hear autism diagnosis. But then you have to really think about it, we're going to do with this. And if you can connect it to your job, we will do it or you can help another parents
. Not everybody will write a book, right? And it's perfectly fine. But maybe, let's help another parent who is not who just doesn't know what to do. I hear stories like a child with severe autism or maybe not severe. And I hear stories about schools denying education and things like that. Some cases parents don't know what to do, or where to go, what rights they have. They think they need some help. So everybody, I think has an expertise or legal or anything else. And that expertise can be used to help those parents and children who need that help. And it's just I just don't know what to do. It's just a matter of connecting people.
Chad Ratliffe 33:16
Part of my creativity is expressed through my entrepreneurial efforts. Right. And so that's exciting to me, because it's a wide open landscape. And there's so much need. To me, I'm grateful to be on the side of being excited about creating, versus years ago when I was just bummed about the situation. So I liked that you bring that up. And also in your dog expertise arena. If you find all of these places that create dogs for kids, they have two year waiting lists. And I actually raised $15,000 for my son and we got a scam. We got scammed by all right, with the dog, and they gave us this. And so it's challenging to get in position. Because my son would thrive with a dog.
Barbara 34:15
So sorry to hear is like these days, everybody gets scammed, if not once multiple times. Yeah, it's just, it's terrible. So yeah, I mean, we have to be so careful. But it's so hard to be careful because it's like it's hard to live without trusting people completely right. That's really tough to do. But then you have to be careful. But yet, whatever. We've noticed that dogs can make such a huge difference in schools for everyone, including children with disability, they change just they can't even make kids work better together. As a team help each other. We've noticed that in the classroom with the teacher I collaborated with so there's so much more that we could do
. And in some cases, those stripy dots may even be available in the area. But people schools, for some reason might be objecting to the idea of, you don't know the results to that you don't know, then you just whatever you don't know you kind of stay away from. Yeah, whatever we can do to kind of like spread awareness about is what I'm doing, to try to spread awareness about Voc therapy as potentially being able to change really education for kids, for all children, because that's what this is about, right? We won't help everybody. But really those kids with disabilities, autistic Dickens benefits so much, because if everybody is better, and learns from dogs, everybody will be also better and will understand better kids who have needs more needs. They can just learn so much from the dog. So do you have now your son, any of your children going to school? Right now?
Chad Ratliffe 35:58
All of them are in school? Right? And
Barbara 36:00
there is any therapy dogs are not?
Chad Ratliffe 36:03
No. If you find an organization who doesn't have a two year waiting list, put my name on the list for my son, I agree with what you're saying. And as with a lot of things that are working for special needs children, the supply is limited, the demand is huge. So if there's good therapy that exists, the supply is limited. The demand is
Barbara 36:29
it isn't that point, it's so tough up there for parents, because you get those rights as a parent. And there are IEP plans, and there is this and there's that the state laws, and then you don't have there is no guarantee you're gonna get everything the child needs. It's all about negotiation. And then often schools forget about this. And then everything starts over again. It's it really is it's like a circle that never ends.
Chad Ratliffe 37:00
I agree. It's already my own therapy company, because I couldn't get the kids the hours. So I figured if I start my own if at the least I get my kids the therapy, I'll make sure that the staff that I do have, but you know, not everybody's interested in trying to figure that out. It took me a year to figure out what the insurance companies and all these things. So there's a lot to it.
Barbara 37:25
A lot of to do. Another thing you can look into is having your own dog as a service dog, and then and then
Chad Ratliffe 37:33
the dog that's the problem.
Barbara 37:35
You cannot get a dog. There's two year waiting lists for a set for train service dog that yes, every organization,
Chad Ratliffe 37:43
most organizations, they won't even take names anymore. It's beyond to your waiting list. And it's $20,000
Barbara 37:51
Unless you train your own dog because service dog does not have to be certified. But of course, when you it's a lot to do though. Yeah, I mean, if you purchase the dog, and then like you want the dog perform the task for your child, you have to still train the dog. And is this possible to train it's some of the steps are difficult depends just on the needs. But we have students at college, she had her own service dog. She trained him himself herself. I don't know exactly what testing is that he was doing. It's possible, but I don't know. It's the waiting lists all that stuff. We have so many needs. I don't know, we should have more. I think we should have like more. Those training organizations that train service dogs are so much more need.
Chad Ratliffe 38:40
Well, I think you know, and I think that's why we're having this conversation. I think that that's what we're doing. That's why I'm starting this therapy company. That's why you're writing these books. If we keep talking about it, if we keep creating, we keep you know our eye on these kids and all kids then we do the best we can right and and that's why this is I believe positive. One of the things we do just to get more of your story and your answers and insights is we do like it's called the lightning round where you give like one sentence one word, two short answers to questions. Are you up for trying it? Yeah, we could do this. So what's the best advice you have received?
Barbara 39:23
Just chill out. Just to relax, and be present and trust that you have an awesome kit and that's kind of really cool when you think about it.
Chad Ratliffe 39:36
I love that. What's the next thing on your list that you want to add for your individual well
Barbara 39:41
being. I really for my individual well being I noticed that anything I do that helps me mentally and physically as related to like exercise. Jan walks with my dog. My daughter too. She is willing to go Oh, that is really important that keeps me balanced work and all these issues and re dealing with school. So physical activity is important.
Chad Ratliffe 40:13
Well, I appreciate you taking time, like I said, and I've kept you for a while. But just in closing, for the listeners that are out there that I think there was a time period where if I watched this interview, I would think that we were too casual about the situation, because if I think back there was so much anxiety I had, and anger and disappointment and frustration that like to watch this conversation, I might feel like there's no way that's going to be me, my life is chaos, and my heart has been broken in a million pieces. What do you say to the people that are in that place?
Barbara 40:55
I think that it's perfectly fine to be in this place. Because I was in this place. At the beginning, I just really had no idea what to do. But if you could get some expertise, that's going to be big help, and just kind of have some little circle of friends. Even if it's just one friend, someone you can talk to these things about. That's for me was always a big, big relief, I think to be able to talk to someone about these issues. That is chaotic, I understand.
And mine was like that. And at times as to because there's new challenges, kids are growing up, there's new challenges, but get some help get some expertise as far as the diagnosis, and that what to do next. And then get to know some other parents who also have autistic children, it doesn't have to be a huge group, because we are overwhelmed in life, right? We don't have the time to interact with everyone, but just a little circle of friends. I remember, even I joined a Facebook group with autistic children, I became friends with one mom who has a child to the girl and the same age as mine. And it was really cool to share our like pains and compare the girls and what they do and what it looks like autism and struggles, schools and all that that helped a lot, really relating to someone who's going through something similar.
It's very helpful. Staying isolated is the worst. And when you're overwhelmed, because there is work, and then there was kids to handle. And then there was school, right? We all know it all comes like this. Still, don't forget to find this one little thing that you're going to do just for yourself. It can be a little walk. It can be Jim, if you live close to Jim, sometimes it's not possible. You have to find something that you will do just for you. And this little thing makes you happy. It's very important.
Chad Ratliffe 43:04
I agree. So Barbara, I want to thank you for taking the time to be with us. I hope you'll keep us high on your list when your children's book is complete, so that we can let you know. We can announce it to the listeners and check it out. And I wish you and your family all the best. And let's create a better world together.
Barbara 43:27
Exactly. Chad, thank you so much. So happy that we finally got a chance to meet this is really cool. And hopefully we get a chance to do something together in the future. Many collaborate, do something cool and something that can help children on the spectrum. We have some work to do.
Chad Ratliffe 43:44
I see it happening. So yeah. Bye for now. But I'll see you. We'll talk soon,
Barbara 43:50
of course. Bye. Bye. Thank you so much. Bye bye. Thank you.
43:56
This concludes our show for today. And I'd like to personally thank you for spending the time with us on a topic near and dear to our hearts. If you'd like to be part of the naked parent nation, and help us reach those parents that are struggling and overwhelmed, there's no better way to help them by subscribing rating and reviewing the show on iTunes. iTunes highlights the shows based on these metrics. And the more the show gets highlighted, the more opportunities people will have to be introduced to the show where they can hear that message of hope, or that tip that can change everything. So follow the link in our show notes. And we hope to have you back here tomorrow where we'll do it again. From the team here at the naked parent podcast we wish you the life you've always dreamed of and then some so long
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