#supported communication

[nonspeakerlibrary]

How come I need a Communication Partner?

If you have been reading my blog you will connect with what I am saying more easily.  I have a body that does not listen to the commands fro

Jordyn Pallett, a nonspeaking autistic person with apraxia, explains the role of his communication partner.

Doing anything purposeful requires a minor miracle if done independently. I need to build motor patterns for everything, always with an outside register and initiator until pathways are strongly myelinated. Lots of verbal prompting and sometimes even physically being assisted help me really build a strong brain-body connection where one didn’t exist. The end goal is autonomy, but it always starts with being taught. How do you learn a new skill? I bet much the same way, but without your body fighting to flee the whole time. Being dependent on outside initiation, feedback, and support is how we all get good at anything to the point that it becomes automatic and purposeful.

My Communication Partner listens powerfully for what I am saying, without adding or taking away anything. Never interrupting or influencing. Don’t think many people are able to be that powerful a blank listening for another. That power creates a trust and partnership that isn’t easily replicated. Any person holding my board doesn’t work. Each partner must build that trust and capacity to listen powerfully with nothing in the way.

[nonspeakerlibrary]

Independence through Dependence: Why I Need a Communication Facilitator

A non-speaking autistic teen relates how he uses a communication facilitator to express himself in written word.

“Communicating my inner thoughts is a lot of work for me. I have to isolate the thought I want to express from many other distractions. These distractions can be a sensation in the environment or in my body. They might be obsessive thoughts or impulses to do something else. For me to successfully win at communicating, I need an ally to help me not fall off the path my words must travel to exit my mind.

All of this communicating takes a lot of time and energy. Beating the alternative of silence is a monumental effort. Some people may criticize my need for support as not encouraging independence and being too hard.

I ask you to consider how horrible the alternative is.

Many people are still stuck in a silent hell in which they are prisoners inside themselves. Would you want this for yourself? The freedom of people unable to speak is worth every inconvenience of dependency.”