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30-40 hours of therapy per week? How is that even possible?
It's the same amount of time as regular full day preschool or day care, but with one on one attention from the therapists.
For ABA, you attend a center like you would school and get one on one therapy with periods of group activities. My grandson went to a center like this. His therapist attended the preK classroom with him in the morning and then he was in one on one therapy in the afternoon.
Putting children with autism (especially nonverbal ones) into daycare or regular preschools does very little for them as they do NOT learn through imitation. Often in regular daycare, they play alone so they are not getting any social practice.
The other way to do this is to have the ABA therapist come to your home. We did that when he was 18 months, but we only did 10 hours per week of ABA and had Speech, Occupational, Physical and Developmental therapy for another 5 hours. Sometimes his therapists worked at the park or we went on outings to the grocery store or other community activities with them. The therapy increased to 30 hours when we moved and he was 3. He was still mostly non-verbal. He learned to speak, to imitate, to play from his ABA therapists.
He is currently mainstreamed in a regular 3rd grade (soon to be 4th grade) classroom with a special education teacher who comes into the classroom for an hour or so each day to help keep him focused.
He gets 20 hours (at special program with the school board) and then the other 20 with a 1:1 assistant in the daycare. He is verbal but with a lot of echoalia and nonsense. We just moved here but this all starts in a few weeks.
It was easier for me when they were younger. I worked until my youngest was going into kindergarten. I had a great babysitter. I dropped them off at her house and they spent the day in a family environment and doing things they would have done with me being home---zoo, swimming, visiting farms, etc. I quit working because I wanted to be involved at school, story time, homeroom mommy, etc. Within a few months, I started working part-time because I was bored while they were in school. The job was flexible and allowed me to still be involved in school and home when they weren't in school. I returned to working full time a couple of years later.
When my youngest was in 4th grade, I quit work to be a SAHM for multiple reasons. The children no longer wanted to go to the neighbor's house after school because they no longer got along with the neighbor girl. We allowed them to come home since it was only 20 minutes until their father was home. He got home around 4:15 and I got home after 6:00. I'd come home and the kid were out playing and no homework was done. That wasn't the reason I quit working though because we could have made changes to the after-school care, rules, etc. The real problem was the youngest was sick constantly and both my husband and I were trading taking off days. One of us had to quit before we both lost our jobs for calling off work so often.
I haven't worked since my youngest was in 4th grade, with the exception of a brief 3 years I returned to work part time when they were in high school. It was really important for someone to be here during the teen years to keep an eye on them. They are now in their 20s, and I started my own business last year because I became accustom to having free time and a flexible schedule. I never want to go back to the corporate world.
Only you and your husband can decide what's best for your family. No decision is set in stone. You can always return to being a SAHM or cut back your hours if it's not working. If you feel you need to build the nest egg, give it a try and see how it goes.
To the OP: It seems like you have resolved your issues for now. I just want to say, the bold was an issue in our family too as the kids got older. I only worked part time, but on the days I did work, I'd get home about 6:15 to kids either outside or inside watching TV and no homework even started; hubby reading the paper or watching TV along with the kids. I remember one night I said something about dinner and he said "I thought we could go out and get something". I lost it with him, pointed out that meant no HW started until at least 8:00, blah, blah. Fortunately school conferences were shortly thereafter and a teacher told us the older one was a procrastinator (she still is, LOL) and wasn't getting stuff done on time, etc. From then on I'd get home and the kids were working and he was making some semblance of a dinner, even if it was to order a pizza. My point is to stay on top of it with the DH.
A final update. I didn't take the job! At the 11th hour I managed to get another job which pays far less (45k not 60k) but is 2 minutes from home and less hours. No commute downtown, no $300 monthly parking, reduced by 2 hour round trip commute daily! Instead of 7am-530 total, it will be 815-415.
With the kids so young and him having a disability, its well worth it. Starts Monday!
A final update. I didn't take the job! At the 11th hour I managed to get another job which pays far less (45k not 60k) but is 2 minutes from home and less hours. No commute downtown, no $300 monthly parking, reduced by 2 hour round trip commute daily! Instead of 7am-530 total, it will be 815-415.
With the kids so young and him having a disability, its well worth it. Starts Monday!
With the income you will be earning you should get a nanny who has responsibilities for doing the laundry, keeping the house picked up, running errands (food, dry cleaners, etc), starting dinner, etc.
A final update. I didn't take the job! At the 11th hour I managed to get another job which pays far less (45k not 60k) but is 2 minutes from home and less hours. No commute downtown, no $300 monthly parking, reduced by 2 hour round trip commute daily! Instead of 7am-530 total, it will be 815-415.
With the kids so young and him having a disability, its well worth it. Starts Monday!
A final update. I didn't take the job! At the 11th hour I managed to get another job which pays far less (45k not 60k) but is 2 minutes from home and less hours. No commute downtown, no $300 monthly parking, reduced by 2 hour round trip commute daily! Instead of 7am-530 total, it will be 815-415.
With the kids so young and him having a disability, its well worth it. Starts Monday!
Congrats! I hope you enjoy your job and that this works out.
Congratulations on the new job. Even with less pay, I think you'll find the lower stress trying to balance everything is well worth the tradeoff.
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