A huge thank you to the Firemen at Fire Station 25! They came by our center today and let us take a tour of their truck and even spray the firehose!









Behavior and Language Opportunities for Communication and Social Skills
A huge thank you to the Firemen at Fire Station 25! They came by our center today and let us take a tour of their truck and even spray the firehose!
We are starting a new virtual learning series at Building BLOCS–Lunch and Learn. Join us on Thursdays as we explore topics that our families consistently ask about–potty training, sleep routines, challenging behaviors, and more. This week we’re starting with an introduction to Special Education and the IEP process.
Continue reading “Special Education and the IEP Process”Building BLOCS knows how important it is to keep our kids active in the community, but finding sensory friendly activities that work for your child is rare. Here is our list of local or virtual sensory friendly events for your family to explore in the Austin area.
Continue reading “Autism Friendly Activities in Austin”What is a support group and is it right for me?
Recently at Building BLOCS we have begun offering a support group for parents of special needs kiddos, specifically for parents of children with ASD. A question that was frequently posed to me was, “what is the purpose of a support group and how would it benefit me?” I thought this was a great topic for our blog.
Support groups offer a group therapy environment where all the members are tackling similar issues in their lives and give the opportunity for members to share their stories and experiences in the hopes of creating a cathartic experience for themselves as well as helping others on a similar path. Support groups may meet anywhere from once to several times a month and can be specified to an ever-increasing array of topics such as depression, anxiety, and survivors of various serious illnesses.
Parents of children with special needs often find they have similar struggles and successes with their journeys despite whatever differences in diagnoses and family life may exist. It is a space where parents can feel validated and heard as well as hear feedback from their group and facilitator. Often parents will discuss and share resources, normalize the experiences of other parents, and share uplifting successes. Support groups are a beautiful opportunity to expand your world view, heal, empower others and be empowered, be a part of a community, and participate in self-care!
While all of this may sound wonderful to some parents, others may not quite be ready for the process and the overall group experience. How will you know if it is right for you? I would recommend contacting the therapist facilitating the group to discuss if group is appropriate for your needs. There can be dozens of factors contributing to why a person isn’t ready for the group experience just yet.
I could look for jokes, quotes, or any cute little platitude to summarize these thoughts, but as a parent of special needs kiddos, you’ve likely heard them all! So, I’ll save you an eye roll at whatever horrible joke I would have come up with by again stating the utmost importance of self-care. Regardless of if you’re even a parent or not, self-care is vital to good mental health and we want to ensure our BLOCS parents (and all other parents) are taking care of themselves in addition to their kiddos. Please feel free to contact me at maggie@blocsaustin.com with any questions regarding our counseling services.
Maggie Hammer, M.A., LPC-Intern, RBT
Supervised by Wanda Montemayor, LPC-S
October is Rett Syndrome Awareness Month. At Building BLOCS, this topic is very close to our hearts. As we spend time researching therapy approaches that will be most successful for children with Rett syndrome, we learn again and again that the research in this field is still very limited. The International Rett Syndrome Foundation is helping lead the charge in this area. Here are some of their resources that can help you learn more about Rett syndrome and ways you can help.