How Autism Parents can Set the Course for Success
Kevin wasn’t one to finish up a chore. While gardening, he would frequently stop midway through bagging leaves, or wander off when it was time carry them. This was how it was for years. And years. When his mom Laura started implementing a home-based fitness program, it was to improve Kevin’s general strength and motor skills. Then there was ‘The Carry.’
While doing Fall cleanup around their Northeastern US home, Laura stood yards away watching as Kevin hoisted up a heavy pile of sticks, carrying them from one side of their backyard to the other. He’d never done this before, certainly not on his own and not with the confidence and capability demonstrated here.
Fitness occupies an odd space, as you can ask a dozen people what “fitness” means, and get a dozen answers. The modern gym setup, with myriad machines along with fitness influencers covering social media does not make the conversation any clearer. An underappreciated yet crucial aspect for quality of life, a general misrepresentation has left fitness at a low position for the autism and neurodivergent population.
What Life Skill Fitness Really Is
Physical fitness is preparing and strengthening the body for the challenges of everyday life. Bending/Squatting, pushing, pulling, carrying, and locomotion are all part of daily living. It is easy to take these skill for granted, however, when we consider many of the strength and motor planning challenges for the ASD population we can call into question whether these skills are fully developed.
Fitness is the ability to perform tasks safely and efficiently, and while some individuals with ASD are highly active, moving around often, a functional fitness program requires structure and emphasis on building healthy movement skills. Moving around a lot or “not being overweight” are not indicators that a fitness program is unnecessary.
Fitness is the ability to push, pull, squat, carry, and locomote without inhibition or discomfort. We can look at activities of daily living (ADLs) and notice that they require a fundamental amount of strength and stability. Often, for the autism and neurodivergent populations, challenges moth physical and behavioral/motivational can get in the way of independence with ADLs. It is about feeling good when we move and having the initiative to engage in physical activity.
What Fitness (and Adapted PE) Can Really Do
There are three components of a successful fitness/Adapted PE program. What fitness can do in a general sense is develop strength, stability, endurance, and movement skills that generalize to the real world. Think of carrying groceries, or climbing a steep set of stairs, opening a heavy door, or independence with chores. All of these require both general and specific physical skills. A meaningful fitness program focuses on the individual and builds these abilities based on current abilities.
The first component is individualization or scalability. A program must meet the current physical abilities of each individual. Placing an individual into categories of “high” versus “low” functioning will miss some of the most important aspects of fitness programming. Their skills will vary by exercises. Some individuals with autism may excel at medicine ball throws but require a higher level of support with a squat.
The second component is exercise selection. The foundational movement patterns (squat, push, pull, carry, locomote) are the place to start. We need to find the appropriate point of progression or modification with each exercise for each individual so there is enough challenge without breakdown in technique. In Autism Fitness programming we use the PAC Profile Assessment to determine the current ability for each Autism Fitness athlete and each exercise.
Exercise selection must take into account how much time will be devoted to the fitness or adapted physical education session each week. Having too many exercises does not enable an athlete sufficient time and practice to gain a training effect. The training effect is the physical result of enough sets and repetitions with each exercise. While the total repetitions needed with each exercise can be similar between the autism and neurotypical population, the former often need more repetitions over time to develop neuromuscular connections. This leads us to our third component.
The third component is consistency. Developing movement skills (strength, stability, motor planning) takes time, consideration, and practice. For physical, adaptive, and cognitive reasons, maintaining ongoing fitness programming and progressing at the pace of the individual is a critical component of success. Changing up the exercises or activities too often or too soon denies the process of independent mastery. This can be the difference between a skill generalizing to a life task or being limited.
Consistency in programming for the autism and neurodivergent population not only pertains to exercise selection. It is also having time set each week (usually the same day(s) and times) for exercise. Having this structure in place leads to great lifestyle habits.
The Greatest Fitness Challenges for The ASD Population
You may be aware of the complications that arise from a sedentary lifestyle, and few groups I’ve ever spoken with believe it is perfectly acceptable to let this continue. Yet high quality, meaningful fitness programming is still missing for most children, teens, and adults with autism and related neurodivergent diagnoses. The big obstacles are prioritization and programming. First we need to make exercise a fundamental part of an individual’s life, and develop/implement programs that are fundamentally sound and meet the physical, adaptive, and cognitive needs of each life skill athlete.
Physical
Most of the research on physical and motor deficits among the ASD population focuses on children, however as we all know, children with autism grow up. Most individuals I coach in my private practice are adolescents, teens, and adults. Their physical functioning did not “automatically” improve as they aged, in fact many of the strength and motor dysfunctions seen in childhood continue to persist into adulthood. Much as with speech or positive behavior support, fitness is also an intervention based on building skills where a gap exists.
Over time, gaps in physical ability can show up as pain or discomfort. We know this to be the case for neurotypical adults as well. As we age, this can inhibit performing daily tasks and avoiding physically strenuous activities.
Adaptive
The most common questions I receive around Autism Fitness programming is how to motivate an athlete, often an email starting with “My son/daughter hates to exercise…” The motivational contingency is often an obstacle to implementing a successful fitness program. The appropriate principles and practices can, over time, shift exercise from an aversive activity to the best 45-55 minutes of the day.
When discussing motivation to exercise and the autism population, it is critical to ask specific questions;
- What have you tried already?
- What was the environment?
- How was fitness introduced?
- What was the coaching communication?
It is often the case that exercise was not introduced in a constructive, structured, and individual-focused way. Understanding both appropriate exercises and coaching strategies can make enormous differences in how our autism and neurodivergent individuals respond and their level of participation.
Cognitive
Forget about “high functioning” versus “low functioning,” outdated phrases that just don’t give us an appropriate amount of usable information. For the purposes of a fitness or Adapted PE Program, we want to know about neurological and neuromuscular functioning.
Neurological functioning refers to memory, communication, and auditory processing. Answering questions about these will lead to the highest quality interaction with our emerging athlete.
Neuromuscular functioning refers to kinesthetic awareness, body positioning, and motor planning. Answering questions about these leads us to individualized coaching that simply works best (even in a group or class environment).
The Power of Parents
Is your child, teen, or adult’s fitness or adapted PE program working for them? Does it focus on general qualities of movement? Is it building real world skills? Are the goals in line with building real-world instead of sports-based skills?
Becoming an advocate for your child’s fitness means considering their short- and long-term physical health. What can be incorporated right now that will enhance their physical capabilities and independence into and through adulthood?
While the perception of fitness programming may still be that it is “just for sport-specific athletes” or “people who want to get in shape” the benefits of consistent, progressive, resistance-based programming cannot be ignored. Whether a parent or self-advocate, you can include or improve fitness programming in any environment.
What YOU Can do as a Parent
Imagine a world in which those with ASD were more physically capable and confident to navigate their days and the challenges of daily living. Fitness, done right, can greatly realize this scenario. Fitness “fits” right into this equation.
Generalizing or “carrying over” skills is one of the biggest challenges for the ASD population. A more active lifestyle that promotes greater physical abilities and independence starts with a great adapted PE program, but does not end there.
Introducing a fitness program in the home can promote faster skill acquisition, provide a healthy alternative to “screen time,” and be on opportunity for meaningful connection between parents and children (of any age).
There are 3 ways to get your autism/neurodivergent child, teen, or adult on their way to becoming stronger, healthier, and having life skill fitness that will enhance short and long-term outcomes;
1- Work directly with an Autism Fitness Certified Pro
2- Have Autism Fitness programming incorporated into a school or residential facility with Autism Fitness Site Certification
3- Become an Autism Fitness Certified Parent and bring fitness programming into your home