Today, I'm showing you a short clip from podcast 174 with Grandma Tina,
who has really helped her grandson, Wyatt who's two and a half years old. She's been
helping him for over a year with taking my online toddler and preschooler course,
but we talk a lot about helping him with feeding, talking and self care.
So I love this whole episode, but let's watch this clip just to get a preview.
Hi, I'm Dr. Mary Barbera, autism mom, Board Certified Behavior Analyst and bestselling author.
Each week I provide you a video about turning things around in the autism world,
or even for toddlers, just showing signs. In this week's video podcast we have a little boy,
Wyatt, who was originally diagnosed with Global Developmental Delays and then went on to get
a diagnosis of autism at 19 months old. We are presenting a snippet about some of the challenges
that he faces and some of the progress that he has made. The episode 95 with Dr. Keith Williams
is really important because he he's, um, an internationally known researcher in the field of,
uh, picky eating and feeding disorders. And he was on, on 95 and he said like scurvy
and rickets is through the roof now for, you know, first time he's seen it in decades and these kids
are actually, and I don't think that's the case because he's getting baby food. And that probably
has like a lot of the nutrition in there. Um, but so you, we want to link that in the show notes.
Um, has he ever progressed, like he won't eat any like Cheerios or those cracker things that babies
chew on? He doesn't do any of that. Well, in fact, uh, just here recently,
my daughter-in-law has been, has told me that, uh, at his, uh, feeding therapy and speech therapy,
they're able to give him, uh, they're like the little star shaped kind of,
I don't know if they're crackers or whatever, but they break off like the points of the star.
And give him that. Uh, maybe he's barely and he'll accept that a little bit.
Um, as far as with Dr. Williams, that was one of my favorite podcasts. I, I did order his book.
I was actually very fortunate. I emailed him and we were actually able to speak a couple of times,
he was good enough to call me. And he was the person that actually worked with us to help
get him to get the cup, accept the cup, and get the cup to his mouth and, you know, eventually.
And so, uh, he was great. And of course he, and it was just general information also.
He didn't know Wyatt, but, um, you know, he was just kind to talk to, to talk to me and
walk me through a little bit of that. But like you said, It's kind of intimidating, I guess,
for all of us, because of choking or gagging or throwing up, you know, that where I can be
more of a detective and try things with speech and play, you know, not so much with feeding.
Yeah. It's really dangerous. Now, is he gagging or throwing up?
No, not, no. We've been really lucky with that. He has had a gastrointestinal examination,
some feeding evaluations. In fact, he's going to have another one, uh, in a couple of months. Uh,
they haven't found any medical reasons though, because I know how you stress ruling now medical.
And so we're trying to do that. Um, but yeah. Yeah. So, um, the other thing is, you know, if
you might want to investigate, like, I forget what they're called, but they're little hard
cookies that nine month olds just suck on and, and, you know, just see if he'll he'll,
um, take that or, you know, with a feeding therapist there, but there are all kinds
of feeding therapists too. And there's more like sensory oral versus behavioral. And, um,
I would say, you know, Dr. Williams and my approach is really behavioral. I mean,
of course, ruling out the medical issues too. And I'm thinking his height weight is okay.
Yes, his height and weight is okay now. And his weight is a little bit under average,
but it's not at a point of medical
concern. How we he do with foods that have like chunks in them? Will, he accept that?
Um, I don't know that I've tried that,
and that would be a good idea to try something more. Another thing,
especially with kids on the spectrum, they can get very brand specific and container specific.
So if you're out buying jars of baby food with the little baby on it and
feeding him directly out of that, I would really investigate whether you can puree real foods,
puree it down, smooth smooth, then, then stop. You know, I mean, of course this is all assuming
he could swallow and everything, but I, I do have a story that I've told many places.
I'm not sure where I tell it. Uh, if I tell it in my current book, but you know,
I evaluated a six year old who was eating corn chips and, and, uh, French fries in the cafeteria
at school. And then his mom wanted to see me and she came in and, and he was six. And you know,
she's like, I'm losing my mind. Her husband was off fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan.
And you know, I have him and I have a eight year old son and I can't even take him to the,
to the grocery store. He's not potty trained. So it's like money for diapers and he's clearing
shelves. And he didn't seem like that at school. And then I said, well, what about food? And she
said, French fries and corn chips. And then I said, well, what about
proteins and vegetables. And she's like, oh, only in the baby food.
And I was just like baby food, but I was trying not to be like, what, a six year old who could
chew and swallow eating baby food. That sounds weird. And she's, I said, well, how much baby food
are you buying? And she said, 52 jars a week. Um, so, you know Wyatt’s different. He's had
global delays. He's never eaten. He doesn't eat corn chips and French fries, but there
may be listeners out there who do do baby food because of the nutritional facts. And they can
chew and swallow, but like one step towards more normal food is to start doing your own food,
taking away the processed baby food that's in certain containers, even dumping out, you know,
regular applesauce, regular, you know, when, when Lucas did a feeding program, for instance,
um, every time he had a meal, it was in styrofoam cups that were not see-through.
So that he didn't know what was coming. So, you know, it was applesauce, yogurt maybe.
And, um, I know for this. That’s a great idea. Yeah. So, so some of that may, you know,
you may want to play around with, and then you, if you were pureeing your own, you could
change the texture and make it, uh, lumpier, okay. And then the other thing about feeding,
which I would recommend for everybody, um, you didn't do it because he's really
just taking the baby food that you feed him. But in chapter 10 of my book and in the free book
resources, which you can get, uh, which we can link in the show notes, there is a feeding form
where you put down the easy foods, the medium foods and the difficult foods. And as you progress
towards more chunky things, maybe you could make those, or maybe he does have a preference, like
with, uh, he doesn't like orange baby food, or he doesn't like, you know, bananas or whatever,
and that could go in the medium. And so, um, instead of just, okay, he's
two and a half and he's just going to get smooth baby food, non orange, or non banana or non fruit,
you know, start to apply these techniques where it's, it's a slow shaping to get him to eat better
and to eat a variety. Yeah. Well, it's very, uh, exciting that that Dr. Keith Williams did
call you back and like helped you a little bit, which was very nice. Just very kind.
Okay. So, so the, uh, feeding, I think we kind of went over some of the ideas for feeding also.
I will link in the show notes I did a really good podcast interview with Melanie Potock
recently from Munch Bug. Um, and she is as SLP who specializes in feeding. She has a
little mini course, and she also has a lot of good graphics on Instagram about what sippy cups to buy
what not to buy. I would really try to get them off of a pacifier at night and, and, and nap. I
don't know that that's a huge problem. If he was on a bottle, I definitely, you know, I have six
steps to weaning. We can link in the show notes, weaning from anything even weaning from baby food.
Um, you can apply the same techniques in a behavioral way. And then finally, uh, in terms
of the feeding. Um, you already have feeding evaluations and feeding people in place, but
make sure you get behavioral feeding people, um, into the mix because you'll make more progress,
I think. And then also no calories, um, in between meals, but that's not such a problem because he's
fed his, you know, you feed, somebody feeds him. Um, that's another thing is, you know,
if, you know, if anybody works on, you know, you could have adaptive spoons, um, with thicker
stuff like applesauce versus very thin stuff that comes up this food very easily. Um, Uh,
you might want to have him start to, uh, feed himself. And if he could suck on like
cookie kind of things that are made for babies. I hope you enjoyed that short
snippet from podcast number 174 with Grandma Tina, if you did, I would love a comment.
Leave a thumbs up or share the video with somebody else who may benefit
and for more information about joining our online course and community, you're can attend a free
workshop at marybarbera.com/workshop. And I'll see you right here next.