For Christmas, my Mum bought me The reason I jump by Naoki Higashida. There are some books which change us and this is undoubtedly the most life changing book I have ever read.
Higashida wrote this book when he was 13 years old. He is nonverbal and uses an alphabet system to communicate. That he wrote a book at all is inspirational enough but it is his reflections on autism that changed my views entirely.
The book is a series of questions and answers which explain the reasoning behind particular behaviours. I cannot explain what it means to have your suspicions confirmed and to have insight into seemingly random behaviour. To know that your child is in there somewhere even if they can’t yet communicate with you.
This book has taught me that being nonverbal is not the same as not being able to communicate. And being nonverbal does not mean that we should assume low levels of cognition either, though as a society we often do. As a result of Higoshida’s exhortations ‘not to give up on us’ and after a round of speech therapy which gave us a better understanding of why Hector wasn’t talking, we are finally making progress.
Until quite recently, Hector has been in his own world. Therefore, it was not possible for him to pick up language in the normal way. It wasn’t until we started intensive interaction that this started to change. This is a method where you use strategies such as mirroring, exaggeration and general over the top behaviour to encourage interaction. If our therapist in Shanghai had had Hector’s interests at heart, they would have told us we needed to do this before speech therapy could help but unfortunately they didn’t.
We are finally at the point where Hector actively seeks out interaction. When he is in the mood he can make really intense eye contact. We’ve been able to start some alternative forms of communication like a choice board and makaton. His attempts to communicate are getting more insistent, more hand leading, jumping up and down and babbling. A lot more gesturing too. He’s even starting to point to or touch his choice board. Mostly randomly, though sometimes it seems to be the right symbol (including eat and more!).
I guess the point is that we can get hung up on the question ‘Is he talking yet?’ when what is actually important is is he communicating yet. Of course I have dreams where he suddenly starts talking. But actually if he can get across what he wants in a different way this will make a huge difference in his life.
So if you want to understand the nonverbal people in your life please read The reason I jump. It really will change your perspective.
The Hopkins of Hangzhou 