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I have a new client who identifies as having autism, he has expressed that his mindset is very fixed on being pessimistic which I have set him some tasking on. He also mentioned he has issues with picking up social cues, body language etc and finding words to express himself.
Has anyone had any experience working in this area?
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Hey Adriana, I’m assuming it is a medical diagnosis. I’m not sure what form as I wasn’t aware of other forms however he is 34 yo and working full time. He works for a company that provide staff with my services when they are having a tough time personally that’s affecting their work. He has recently had a relationship breakdown and isn’t coping very well with the emotional side of it and is very down on himself. He’s not taking any medication.
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Hi Toni
Adriana asks good questions because recently there has been a debate about people who classify themselves as being high functioning or low functioning. I first came across ‘autism’ as a classroom teacher with ‘special needs’ students in the late 1980s and I struggled with the classification back then because I believed there was a lot more to do with environment, diet etc. I worked a lot with girls who were classified as Aspergers. I also had a client between 2017 and 2019 who classified herself as being autistic (no medical diagnosis) following treatment she had for cancer. When things were simplified for her and she had a rewarding ‘task’ to do after every session that was clearly outlined, achievable, relevant for her etc, that gave her building blocks to success – she was very happy. In the end, she said that there were mountains of events and fears she had internalised that created turmoil in her life and that simple steps had made life easier for her. TLT(R) was certainly very helpful. She believed the combination of change of diet, routine, sleep, sunshine etc made a difference to her.
This link has useful information https://www.verywellhealth.com/high-and-low-functioning-autism-260599
Best wishes
Gina
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Hi Gina,
Thank you I found that link very helpful. Good point about the diet, routine, sunshine etc too.
As far as TLT and using active imagination, do you have any insights for people with autism? From what I can tell he is high functioning but has mentioned he sometimes struggles to communicate his thoughts verbally or will sometimes need questions reframed for him to respond.
I think mostly this will rely a lot on my flexibility of behaviour and paying careful attention to the feedback I receive.
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Hi Toni
I am interested in what you say about this man struggling to communicate verbally.
A couple of approaches I have taken in the past are:
1. Keep any communication simple. Clear out any noise. Remember the NLP Communication Model – the filtering process. Overwhelm may occur because of the ‘noise’. What I have done is provided any ‘therapy’ session in a simple way. one step at a time. I have also used simple visuals and have the person ask me questions in their words. My experience is that people who think they are ‘autistic’ are literal communicators. Sometimes they don’t like to have eye to eye contact and may look away. Questions being reframed could be because of the communication style being used by the speaker – language that is unclear or there are metaphors not expressed in a way that the listener can understand.
2. In reference to TLT(R) think about the word imagination and how you can going to keep the description of TLT(R) simple. What are his predicates, key words etc, does he speak in chunks etc, because all of that is going to help you when you describe TLT(R) to him. With some people who are described as ‘autistic’ they simply prefer a different way to communicate, simple words and simple sentences. Also, I have found that some like numbers, lists – ordinal i.e first this, then…steps in a process helps, short segments of work, calm body language. If the body language is composed with a lot of actions i.e. hands moving a lot, head movement, body movement etc can contribute to overwhelm too… bit like a large orchestra – where do you look and what do you listen to. Keep it simple and give him time to process. It’s a bit like this: they listen, formulate what they think is being said, put it into an order to make sense of it, etc etc. time to process is important.
If he uses repetitive behaviour like foot tapping or body movement etc…this can be a way of him communicating to you. Watch out for a pattern – it may be an expression also of how he is feeling. Positive feedback after completing a task or a technique is important.
Hope this gives you more insight….Gina
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Hi Toni,
First I agree with Adriana – is it a self diagnosis or a medical one? I’m finding lots of people self diagnosing into all sorts of warp tunnels recently.
I’ve worked with several autistic people, and high and low functioning Aspergers too. It has been successful each time doing basically what I’d do anyway. There are a few things to bear in mind in my opinion, but once you get the hang of it it’s easy. One of my best friends is Aspergers, so I’m used to it after 40 years.
Social niceties – basically no need with most of them, you can do it but if they don’t bother then you don’t need to. My friend does do the hello. good bye, thank you thing, but I know lots who don’t bother, and it’s not that they’re being rude, it’s just not necessary as far as they’re concerned. Take your cues from the client. There’s one person that if I answer the phone to him I just say “Yes? or Hi” – he doesn’t say hi back but just knows I’m there because I made a sound, and starts talking! Often he just hangs up when he’s finished, which I think is hilarious.
Literal communication – I have to be clear about literally what I want to know or ask them to do. “Is anytime Wednesday good for you next week?” isn’t specific enough – he has no idea maybe because he’s not there yet. “We will meet 2pm next Wednesday” is probably more along the right lines. I had one funny moment when I told a client I was leaving to be somewhere else and he didn’t move – but when I said “Mate that means this is where you leave too” he just said “oh ok” and got his things together.
As for the potential for a rant on the subject of their personal obsession, get the OK ahead of time to interrupt that without them being offended..
One other thought, just with Aspergers I think, but there tends to be a physiological movement that gives them away, they often have a sort of tick where they touch the tip of their tongue a lot, or the top of the head, and also rocking is common.
Just my random thoughts, if you have specifics fire away and I can let you know if I have any experience with it.
As for techniques, I have had no issues with anchoring, TLT etc. So have fun!
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