There are some synchronizations that make you wonder about the magic of the universe — like when two people meet and change one another’s lives. In this case, speech language pathologist (SLP) Rachel Romeo happened to be on a packed flight from London to Boston.
Romeo was on her way back from a conference in Helsinki. She flown into London earlier in the day, and was about to go on the second leg of her trip before going to another conference. She had planned to use the eight-hour flight to work on material for said conference.
But she wasn’t going to get any of that work done. The flight crew warned her that the boy she was seated next to had some behavioral issues, and since the flight was fully booked, she couldn’t switch seats.
Even the boy’s father preemptively apologized.
He told Romeo that his son has nonverbal autism. But Romeo explained that since she is a speech pathologist, she has plenty of experience working with kids with various levels of language functionality.
Romeo and the boy made a connection during the long flight.
And the boy’s father was nearly in tears by the end of the trip.
Get ready to believe in humanity again — and grab a tissue or two.
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Anyone else in Romeo’s shoes wouldn’t have likely made it through this eight-hour flight. Even before the flight officially started, the boy was clearly agitated and started to act out.
The boy was hitting her before the plane even took off.
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And unfortunately, his father wasn’t very well equipped to deal with these behaviors. Although the child’s father certainly tried to stop his child from hitting and grabbing — and was incredibly apologetic — it was clear that the situation was going to be a bit challenging for all involved. After all, planes are a very challenging environment for most people.
So Romeo asked the father how his son preferred to communicate.
The father actually didn’t speak English very well and Rachel wasn’t able to speak his language — and so there was also an additional language barrier at play in this scenario.
The father didn’t quite understand what Rachel was asking.
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Romeo realized that the child probably hadn’t had much experience with therapy or in environments where communication skills were taught to him.
Romeo started tested communication methods.
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First, she said, “I tried to see if he was stimulable for a communication board.”
She was seeing if he would respond in a few manners.
“‘Stimulable’ means that a consonant or vowel can be produced in isolation by a child, in direct imitation of an auditory and visual model with or without instructions, cues, imagery, feedback and encouragement,” according to Speech Pathology Therapy.
She pulled up some simple images onto a screen
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But the child didn’t respond to the images at all. In fact, she thought that the screens sort of bothered him.
Then she started drawing with her “god-awful drawing skills.”
Her goal was to create a communication board for the boy. According to Very Well Health, a communication is a “board with symbols or pictures that is used to facilitate communication for children with limited expressive language ability.”
“Children communicate using the board by pointing and gesturing or gazing at the various symbols and pictures.”
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And for this boy, it worked!
Romeo and the child were able to communicate via symbols.
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The child realized that she was making symbols — for the things he was grabbing, for his stuffed toy, and for his dad! The child responded to the images and Rachel continued to make lots of symbols.
“Hey, how often do we get an 8-hour session?!” she joked.
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By the end of the flight, the child’s behavior improved and he seemed delighted with his newfound ability to communicate in a way that felt right for him.
The child’s father was moved — and nearly cried.
Romeo thought that it was clear that no one had ever worked with the child using a “AAC approach.”
What the heck is an AAC approach?
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Quick lesson: An “AAC approach” refers to “Augmentative and alternative communication,” which describes various methods of communication for people who can’t use verbal speech.
An AAC method can differ person to person.
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This is why Romeo gave the boy’s father her communication board so that he could take it with him. After all, you can’t give someone the gift of communication and then take it away.
The important thing?
That the child was able to communicate and make a human connection.
How beautiful is that?
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As Romeo explained, the child — just like every single other person — simply wanted to make a meaningful human connection with others.
Imagine not being able to verbalize your needs or wants.
As Romeo tweeted, “Communication is a basic human right, and I was overjoyed to help someone find it. What a privilege and a gift.”
Romeo was gratified by her experience because it reminded her of just how important her job is.
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And honestly, we couldn’t agree more.
The experience reminded her why she loved studying language and communication development.
We’re so grateful for people like Romeo, whose generosity of time, spirit, and compassion breaks through the hardship and ugliness of daily life — to impact, heal, and support someone else. In this case, we love to know that a child was given a chance to make a connection with others in a way that worked for him.
Twitter responded with joy and gratitude
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And parents to autistic children were over the moon to hear her story of kindness.
Many thanked her for her service to autistic children.
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Some thought it was fate that led her to sit next to the boy.
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Others knew no one else would be up to the task.
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Many people would have asked for another seat.
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It’s amazing that there are people out there who train to make a difference in the world — and these folks deserve all the kudos!
But you know who else deserves the kudos?
The child who learned and communicated. And all autistic kids who persevere and work hard to grow.
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Some aren’t viewing this as a heartwarming story, though.
Alyssa Hillary, a self-described Autistic graduate student, was glad Romeo was able to help this child. What she didn’t like, however, was that it took a stroke of luck to get this boy help.
“I am appalled and horrified that people are reliant on a chance encounter with an LSP on a plane in order to be introduced to AAC.”
“Communication access is a human right. I’m glad Rachel got seated next to this father/son pair, and I’m glad she introduced AAC. She did the right things in a situation that should never have happened. There should have been communication access years ago,” Hillary wrote in a blog post addressing the viral thread.
Hillary thinks people should be more upset.
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“People are sharing this like it’s a heartwarming story. It’s a terrifying story. Imagine how many doctors and therapists failed this family, that communication access rested on this chance encounter. Imagine how many people still don’t have communication access.”
“This is, in fact, an important story,” she continued.
“It’s an illustration of just how dire the situation is for autistic people and our families trying to access the human right of communication.”
“We are being “served” by people who don’t know to consider communication board, who don’t know to consider AAC.”
“We are being “served” by people who see a non-speaking person who grabs things and assumes the way to go is to try to control the “behavior” rather than to provide other ways to communicate that they want those things. And we are being “served” by people who presume that non-speaking means non-thinking.”
Her frustration is palpable — and completely valid.
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She said that people should go ahead and share the story, but also remember what it actually means. Yes, it is amazing Romeo was able to help this boy. But why hadn’t he gotten the help he needed the first 10 years of his life?
“So, share away.”
“Just remember it’s a story about years of communication denied and systemic problems. It’s a story about a kid who didn’t get to have his communication honored until he was about 10, who had his attempts at communication treated as “challenging behaviors” instead of attempts at communicating sans speech.”
“It’s a story about a chance encounter, and it’s a story about everything that had to go wrong for that chance encounter to matter.”
“This is no better than the high school robotics team making a prosthetic for a kid whose insurance denied it: good for the team, but remember why it was needed.”
As both Romeo and Hillary’s stories show, autism is still highly misunderstood by many.
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If you’re not sure what autism is (or, more technically, autism spectrum disorder (ASD)), it actually refers to a “broad range of conditions that are characterized by challenges with social skills, repetitive behaviors, speech, and nonverbal communication,” according to Autism Speaks.
It affects about one in 59 children in the U.S.
Boys are more likely to have ASD than girls. According to Autism Speaks, 1 in 37 boys is diagnosed with ASD, whereas only 1 in every 151 girls is diagnosed.
There isn’t one kind of autism.
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There are several different ways it can affect an individual. People with autism present differently, and like anyone else, they’ve got their own unique strengths and challenges.
Experts aren’t sure what causes autism.
Scientists know that there are some genetic components to ASD, but aren’t sure of environmental factors. If parents have a child with ASD, there is a 2 to 18 percent chance that their next child will also have ASD.
Rumors about vaccines causing autism have been disproven time and time again.
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Even the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says “there is no link between vaccines and autism.”
To repeat: vaccines do not cause autism.
The CDC has said so. The Mayo Clinic also states autism doesn’t cause vaccines. Even social media platforms like Pinterest has said pins about “this topic [anti-vax] often violate our Community Guidelines, which prohibit harmful medical information.”
In fact, the study that suggested vaccines causes autism has been retracted.
British medical journal The Lancet removed the 1998 paper back in 2010, saying that author Dr. Andrew Wakefield and his coworkers “are incorrect, contrary to the findings of the earlier investigations.”
Now that we’ve cleared that up–what is autism?
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A person with autism thinks, learns, and problem solves differently.
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Sometimes people with autism have extreme difficulties in these areas, while others don’t experience these challenges in quite the same way. According to Autism Speaks, “Some people with ASD may require significant support in their daily lives, while others may need less support and, in some cases, live entirely independently.”
And there are various signs and symptoms.
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ASD doesn’t look the same for everyone. Still, according to the CDC, people on the ASD spectrum have “problems with social, emotional, and communication skills. They might repeat certain behaviors and might not want change in their daily activities.”
There are some other signs as well.
People with ASD may often avoid eye contact, have issues others’ feelings or describing their own, or have obsessive interests. They may have trouble understanding inflection, like with sarcasm, and they themselves may speak in a flatter, monotone voice.
They also might “stim.”
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Autistic stimming is often “rhythmic, repetitive behaviors,” like flapping arms, grunting, or shaking the head. Again, this is not the same for everyone on the ASD spectrum.
People with autism can also experience physical issues.
These can range from the gastrointestinal issues to sleep disorders as well as psychological distress in the form of anxiety or depression.
Each autistic person responds to therapy and methods of communication differently.
This is why it was so amazing that Romeo created an effective communication board for the boy. But if we take anything away from this story, it’s that it’s important to have compassion for others’ needs — and that communication is essential to someone’s happiness–however communication might look for them.
Autistic want to have friends, don’t mean to hurt others, and respond to love just like anyone else.
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The important thing to remember is that autism isn’t a bad thing. Ableism — or the idea that there’s only one acceptable way to be or think — is the issue.
This tweet sums it up perfectly:
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In the end, we’re all different people with different capabilities, limitations, and offerings.
Compassion and patience go a long way — and can even change a life.
Romeo’s story serves as a reminder that one kind gesture can literally change a person’s life. Fortunately, she was a speech language pathologist who was familiar with ASD, but even simply being nice to someone experiencing frustration can be helpful.
Autism rates are on the rise in the U.S.
Researchers started tracking autism diagnoses in 2000, and since then, the rate of autism has climbed dramatically. This perceived rise in autism had some people panicking about an “autism epidemic.” But is there really?
Researchers think growing awareness helped increase diagnoses of autism.
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The main reason many experts believe that autism is on the rise is simply because people are more aware of it, and physicians now know what to look out for.
There is no objective way to test for autism.
Doctors must rely on observing the behaviors of the child in order to determine whether or not they are on the Autism spectrum.
The American Psychiatric Association redefined the condition in 2013.
After a 14-year editing process, the APA released their Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, AKA the DSM-5. Some autism advocates were happy with the decision, while others were worried about what the change meant in terms of receiving social services.
It was in this iteration of the manual that the term “Autism Spectrum Disorder” was born.
Instead of having separate diagnoses for the pervasive developmental disorders, all autism diagnoses fall under the same umbrella–even though the severity of autism can vary.
Autism advocates are split on the decision.
As Spectrum News points out, the changes in the DSM-5 were “intended to ground the definition of autism in clinical research and make the criteria more accurate. But, in our view, the impact of the DSM-5 on the diagnosis of people with autism has been mixed.
They acknowledged has helped educators and parents identify ASD.
But they argue that the “rigid definition of autism is antithetical to the groundswell of research supporting the idea that autism comes in a wide variety of forms.”
This all serves as a reminder to treat others with respect.
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We never know everything a person is going through in a given moment. Someone, like the boy on the plane, might act out because they have never truly been heard.