Labaoise's Story

My son Charlie received his autism diagnosis when he was 7 years old. Me and my husband David were having a difficult time understanding Charlie’s challenges and behaviours. He struggled to communicate his emotions or how he was feeling, and he was experiencing frequent meltdowns, especially after school. It’s really hard to watch your child experience these struggles and not know how to help. After receiving the diagnosis, we were offered 6 weeks support from Autism NI’s Early Intervention Service with Julie. This service has been invaluable to us as a family, and we cannot thank Julie enough for the care and support she has given us. Over the 6 sessions Julie gave us advice, resources and tools to help us connect with Charlie. We learnt more about autism and how we can help Charlie regulate his emotions and communicate them.Charlie has a neurodiverse brain that is wired differently, so the strategies Julie gave us were essential in helping us support him with his unique challenges. Meeting with Julie really was a turning point for us as a family. We will be forever thankful for the ways that Autism NI helped us. Julie gave us the gift of understanding Charlie better. His meltdowns have reduced, as we now know how to best meet his needs, and we couldn’t have done this without Autism NI.