A clinic for Jacob?

Chris and I met with the clinical supervisor for Jacob's ABA program today to discuss his progress (or lack of) with eating.

A few new things she wants us to do:

- Make sure to use his choice board with each meal. This is a paper with little food icons velcroed to it so we can switch them around. This gives him a say in what he has for each meal (even if we just have two items on it for him to choose from). We have been using this, but not for every meal.

- Make sure he has one "family" meal each day where it's at least one parent plus all three kids eating at the kitchen table. Jacob should get whatever his regular food would be, but also has to tolerate the foods that the rest of us are eating to be on his plate. He doesn't have to touch them or eat them, of course, but he does have to have them there. This is how it's done at school, where we have the best luck with him eating.

- I am going to start doing some of his in-therapy feeding rather than his IAs doing all of it.

Also...EXCITING NEWS! We are blessed to have had an eating clinic open up at the university near us! Jacob's clinical supervisor is familiar with the woman who opened it, and said she is really great and specializes in kids with autism. How wonderful is that? There aren't very many clinics in the US dedicated to eating issues and we can *certainly* use the help.

I am going to call the clinic on Monday and see when we can get Jacob in, and what kind of help they actually can offer us.