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INDIVIDUALLY-BASED AUTISM INFORMATION: Family-Centered Planning Philosophy
"When will family-centered planning be the approach that provdiership systems use for us?"
That is a very important question that only the providership systems that hold power over us as individuals who must live, work and cope with Autism 24/7/365. This time notation of the life long conditions that people with Autism face and the full time situations our families find ourselves in relation to the mutual impacts of Autism are at the core of this question. We must continue to ask why our community members cannot be more empowered to self-determine which best practice approaches are used on our own children and to be provided with the levels and kinds of training that are well-matched to our family that will be walking this long life path with our child. At Threshold we do believe that providership systems must be response-able to offer best Autism practices and to work to help new parents become response-able to use them up to a reason-able limit of our collective and individual resources. However, we do not believe that any individual provider with agent power, or any agency providership should be able to determine which intervention method is used for any one child or family. Families need to be able to choose their intervention methods and so they may need to have access to professional providers and providerships that offer the full array of best Autism practices described in our green links. Parents are most often the individual that will be involved in family-centered planning, but all family members can be included, since we all are living together in one family system that has been impacted by Autism. This model just acknowledges the unique need for family members to be seen as co-providers within best Autism practices.
"When a family is not ready, able, or willing to participate in family-centered practice how do we proceed?"
The question above assumes that family-centered practice must always begin with a family being immediately ready, able, and willing to participate in best practice plans. In the case of Autism this is rarely true. As a matter of fact, real family-centered planning in Autism practice would start with the opposite assumption, while holding onto the hold that ultimately family members may BECOME fully ready, willing and able to provide just a good enough Autism intervention programs at home. That is right. We need to view excellence as the standard for service providerships and adequacy as the minimum standard for family providers. Excellence is not only impossible, but can become detrimental in a life span of 24/7/365. Whereas mere adequacy service standards that deny the core program needs for full day and full time year round Autism programs and services can be equally disasters and costly over a lifetime. This is just a reality of living and working with Autism for family members that is different than the realities of working with Autism in our jobs as service providers. Of course, we can be very appreciative of parents who show up very ready and willing and who quickly learn best practices and who do an excellent job of early intervention programs intensively. We all need to be mindful that this will be a temporary sprint for most parents, that will need to taper off over time if we are to have a family life and our own work roles back over time. Time, money and other family resources will not endure a life time of round the clock excellence in Autism practices. Therefore, all families will need family-centered planning to help us adjust to the up and down changes in our families and our children and our resources. Family-centered planning gives practitioners an accurate map to help us walk this path together. Family-centered planning means that each individual provider and collective service agency lets go of the power to determine plans that change randomly according to the providers choices and the systems needs. They create a connection between providers and our agencies that require steadfast stewardship of each plan as a part of a life journey. While this may seem constricting at first--it is actually very uplifting and liberating. All reality-based living and working is freeing in its very nature. The reality is that any individual service provider or agency providership is only a temporary companion to each person with Autism and our family members. We need to begin to recognize and respect this truth. Family-centered planning practices give us a model and methods for getting ourselves into this safer providership role.
The reality is that best practices can bring both adequate to expertise levels of family efforts and excellent expertise in service providerships into a kind of synergy that can save a fortune in life long Autism budgets. However, this would require a status quo change in both family and service providers work with each other. We have to stop battling over legal issues and begin to focus on achieving mutual best practices within the resources we currently have available to us. Then we can make the case for needed resources by showing how our collaborations have conserved resources while liberating our true potentials as individuals within our families and across our communities of people with and without Autism.
Understanding Autism Webbook. Copyright © 2000-03 by Sharone Lee. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. All names, concepts, methods, materials, products and publications are protected by trademark and copyright, and no part of this text or this web page may be reproduced or distributed in any manner, for any purpose, including educational purposes, without express written consent from: THRESHOLD • SALEM, OREGON • 503-375-9462 • sharone@understandingautism.org.
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