A Sense of Space | Port aux Basques, Newfoundland

A four-person support group, for parents of children with autism, inspires an entire community to become Canada's first Autism-Friendly Town.

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Written, edited, and produced by Josh Hallmark Guests: Joan Chaisson, Cathy Lomond, Cindy Goudie-LaPolla, Wanda Merrigan, Candace Matthews

Featuring "Welcome Home, Son" by Radical Face
Other music by Lee Rosevere, Borrtex, Scott Holmes, Chris Zabriskie / Courtesy of Free Music Archive

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
This is an Our Americana podcast networkproduction sponsored by Podbeam. To learn more
about the stories covered and to findout how you can support this publicly funded
show, go to www dot OurAmericana podcast dot com. In twenty seventeen,

(00:23):
I had a crisis of faith.Not your typical crisis of faith,
not one in God or humankind,a crisis of faith in my country.
I lost sight of everything that mademe fall in love with America. I
lost sight of everything that inspired meto start this podcast, and so this

(00:44):
season of Our Americana became very muchabout finding faith and finding my place in
America again. America can be isolatinglately. It doesn't feel like a place
that I will long I've lost mysense of space here. It's felt divided,

(01:04):
exclusionary, binary, and it feelsnearly impossible to make change. I
am, after all, just oneperson. But in Channel Portabasque, Newfoundland,
one woman proved that you can makechange in the world around you and
redefine your sense of space. Thatall it takes is patience, compassion and

(01:32):
conversations. Tell me about Joan's Joan'sawesome. She's just a driving force,
a one woman driving force, andI would say, Joan proves positive the
power of one. She was aspecial education teacher. I have a sister
with Down syndrome. Joan happened tobe one of the first teachers she had,

(01:52):
actually the only teacher she had.I remember Joan from starting the Sunshine
Books in school, and that wasbasically introducing kids who learned to read at
an early early stage. That's therea lot. I don't think she understands
the meaning of the word no.She approaches everything with people are going to
respond positively to me, and peopledo because of the way she approaches them.

(02:15):
She expects people to respond positively,and people do. She's changed the
attitude here right. My name isJoan Shashan. I was a teacher,
a special education teacher for thirty years. But I taught rates from kindergarten to
grade twelve, and I also didspecial education in between and all the different

(02:39):
types of teaching because in a smalltown you know jack of all trades when
you're teaching. Then I retired intwo thousand and nine from teaching and that
was when. Then in twenty ten, someone asked me in town if I
would work with their child who hadautism. In twenty seventeen, Channel,

(03:00):
Porta Basque was designated Canada's first autismfriendly town. And while this designation is
something locals pride themselves on, itwas merely a product of a community driven
effort to be more inclusive, aneffort led by Joan which began in twenty
twelve as simply a four person supportgroup. You were instrumental in changing Porta

(03:25):
bass Can you tell me how thatall started? Well, really, it
started with the parent of the childthat I was working with. They felt,
you know, that it must beother people who feel the same as
them, as being lonely, asbeing not knowing what's happening, needed support.
So we decided to start our ownlittle group here as a support group,

(03:45):
and we called it AIM Autism InvolvesMe. And we only started with
four people, and then it startedto grow, and then we had more
educators who joined, and we hadneighbors who joined, and people who were
just interested well of course as otherparents, and from there it grew and
then the parents started to say,you know, our children, when they

(04:06):
go to school, they're not readyfor all the physical activity in their physical
education programs. They don't have thegross motor skills and it'd be so nice
that we could have a place thatthey could go and learn those that also
would be coming for them too whenthey have sensory issues. What are some
of the day to day challenges forpeople with autism out in their communities.

(04:30):
A lot of their problems, alot of with autism becomes sensory issues we
have, Like we know we haveour five regular senses, but really we
have seven. We have our priorperceptive sense and our vestibular sense. And
a prior perceptive sense is knowing whereour body is in space. So if

(04:50):
you're driving a car, you knowthat you can move your foot from your
gas to your break. You knowhow much pressure to put on that.
Our children with artism, if they'reoversensory and oversensed uff in that area,
they don't realize how much pressures.They don't realize where their body is in
space, save they're walking behind someoneand they might run into them or they

(05:15):
might push them, and that's becausethey don't realize the pressure, and so
they have to push the one overto feel them. And then another thing
could be that they're undersensed up andthey need to need to have this feeling
of being pressure inside. So likeglad the children will wear a vest a
weight a vest I use that oneas an example because in every one of

(05:35):
our senses, the children can beoversensedive or undersensitive. So if they go
into a grocery store and the lightsare too bright, they're going to want
to escape because it's way too muchfor them. It's like us looking at
lightning all the time. Or ifthe music is I'm in the store is
like thunder to their ears. Soyou have to understand the child and they

(05:59):
go into these store and they goto school, and in school they like
to have routines which are very structured, you know, and it is impossible
to have a structure routine in school. It's always something happening, So they're
always anxious all the time, nomatter where they go. These children are
anxious. What are some ways thatthose challenges can be mitigated? So this

(06:21):
is where we started with our sensorygym. And like we started with the
gym, and we go partnership withdifferent people in town, different organizations.
So to do our sensory fitness gym, we went partnership with our local Recreation
center, which is really run byour town council. So they were one

(06:43):
hundred percent behind us. So everypiece of equipment that we raise money and
put into this into this room hasa sensory need in mind. So there
are things there for visual for theprior perceptive sense to investive sense. So
like, for instance, we havea big squeeze machine there that the children

(07:04):
can get in and can make themroll between three rollers and that way then
they can get the feeling of beinghugged as they go through the rollers and
that calms them. Then we haveyour typical things such as your exercise bikes,
your balance bikes, so they learnto have balance, they learn to
be able to become calm and relax, because if you're like on the ship

(07:27):
all the time and you're if you'relike me and you get seasick. These
children feel seasick all the time becausethe vestibular sense is not acting right for
their body, so they're wobbling backand forth all the time. So we
have big balls there for them thatthey can roll on, and this will
bring back this balance for them sothat they're stable themselves. So why don't

(07:50):
you tell me a little bit aboutthe success of the gym and how that
propelled you to make more changes withinthe community. Success of the gym went
over really well. We were sopleased. And what happens is that our
arena, they also rent it outfor all preschoolers in town can use it,

(08:13):
so they have a time of daythat preschoolers can come in and use
it. Then we have our owntime that we can use it. And
also they rent it out for allpreschool birthday parties, so we don't have
to pay any rent or anything forthat because where we've got in partnership with
them, that is how they gettheir funds back from it, and so

(08:35):
it's a win win for both andthey look after and clean it and that
sort of stuff for us. Sothen since that was a success, parents
were saying about how when they goon holidays they can't stay in hotels.
It's unbelievable the number of our parentsthat have to sleep in their cars with
their children because too much anxiety forthem to go into a hotel that they

(09:00):
don't know about. They don't liketo have to sit into a restaurant.
The smell of the foods and thepeople eating chewing, the sounds are just
too much for them. There wasscared that the children might have a meltdown
into a hotel room and then theywould just you know, destroy something in
the hotel room. So I wentto our local hotel, Hotel Port of
Ask, and I asked them thatKathy Lowman, who was also a friend

(09:24):
of mine, I had taught hersister way back in special education and I
had talked about this problem that theparents were having and we were wondering if
we could work on this and makeit an autism friendly hotel, and she
was on board right away. Myname is Kathy Lohman. I own and
operate Hotel Port of Ask in ourbeautiful community. I think the organization would

(09:48):
probably formed a couple of years beforeshe approached me. And that was basically,
you know, parents and Joe gettingtogether on the kitchen table saying,
how can we bring me awareness ofautis information, be a support group for
other parents. And one of thebiggest concerns that parents did have at that
time was when they traveled, theinsecurity they felt going into a hotel,

(10:13):
the unknown for their child, whodon't like anything that they don't see,
they don't like changes, and somost of them did not travel for those
reasons. Joan came down one dayfor a coffee and she said, you
know how thee a way that wecan approach this, because you know you
own a hotel and sport I've beendoing for forty years. What can we

(10:33):
do to make the comfort level ofa parent traveling with child on the autism
spectrum feel that they can go toa hotel and feel very safe and have
the highest level of comfort while they'rethere. So we first started with a
censory room and Joan really gave methe knowledge out what exactly a sensory room

(10:54):
does. And so this is aroom where it can be a comfort for
a child. They can go thereand blow up and seem if they're agitated,
just I guess somewhere the parents needto go and have a private moment
with a child. And I hadnone utilized staff exercise room. I showed
it to Jones, she said,this is perfect. Let's start some fundraising

(11:16):
to get the equipment we need,get the flooring there. And it started
from there. Maybe that was aboutthree years ago, and sold of this
is history and that's exactly what appened. I've provided the room a gentleman in
town who is Ashal special needs andSolf painted the mural in the room to
make it bright and beautiful butterflies andbeaches, and the equipment was all put

(11:39):
in the fundraising that the AIM Groupdid, which is amazing and I love
that you put so much effort intoa space that included everyone in the community.
Yeah, and it doesn't have tobe just for people in our community
or for people in the AIM group. We were thinking, there are so
many teaful traveling past our doorsteps thatmay need a room to go to.

(12:03):
You don't even have to be stayingat hotel Port of Ask to use this
room. The word is out thereand we have lots of parents that are
traveling across our island. It takesnine to ten hours, so you may
just need to bring your child thereto get it calmed down, or just
order your meal and let them dowhat they need to do before you continue
on the ferry ride, which isyou know, six to eight hours,

(12:26):
and it does get so utilize.So I'm very happy that, you know,
we kind of made that investment andit's seeing utilize And what was it
like to see people experiencing turmoil andthen go into this room that you created
and see them calm down and finda safe space well, in this room,
there's equipment in there. One's calleda crowsiness and I used to call
it the swing. And what happenswhen a child sits in this they get

(12:50):
Connie kacoon. They can swing andthe sides of the enveloped them and there
I'm looking like a kucoon. AndI have seen the transformation of what happens
when a child gets in there that'sreally agitated and having a moment and whatever
it is, it comforts them.And there's also a tea pod and they

(13:11):
lie in that and they can goback and forth, and that really comes.
And there's a bean bag in thatroom that sucks special fibers in it
that kind of squishes them when they'rein there, and they can climb.
There's a little rock climbing wall thatif they really are over energies need to
just wear off some of that.They can clunnel off they want too.
So I've seen the transformation and youalmost have to witness it to see what

(13:35):
it can do. At what pointdid you decide you wanted to keep making
the hotel even more autism friendly.It was May of last year that we
kind of did a little bit ofannouncing on the room and that went viral,
and so we speaking with the Pearanceknowing what we needed to do into
our actual guest bedrooms to make themsafe as well, because then we knew

(13:58):
people would be visiting to use theroom, and we would have guests that
would be traveling with children on theautism spectrum. So I knew then when
I saw what this room could do, I sympathize with parents and their concerns
with traveling. So between Joan myselfwe sat down and we kind of said,
well, let's take four rooms andmake them what we call our autism

(14:22):
friendly rooms. Since then I've adto do my complete wing on the ground
floor because the wooms going to beoccupied you might call a need one.
So we have now a complete groundflour of sixteen rooms that are now what
we deem to be autistic friendly.What I love so much about this is
there's a bit of inequity with theterm enough. You know, you can

(14:45):
do the bare minimum, what isenough? And I think for a town
your size, and I don't knowa lot about the tourism there or the
demographics, but I think it's fairto say that one or two autism friendly
rooms would have been enough, butthat's not necessarily equitable. So I love
that you decided it wasn't just goingto be one or two, it was

(15:05):
going to be an entire wing.And I keep spreading the word because I'm
really involved in the rowers of industrythat this does not cost a whole lot
of money. It takes a bitof time. And what we had to
do to the bedrooms to make themvery safe was really not ingenious. It
was securing pictures to the wall andthe TV. In the event that,

(15:28):
you know, the child becomes distressedand they want to move something or throw
something, they can't do that.And we put a child's safety lock on
one of the drawers in the deskwhere we will put the coffeemaker, the
amenity to sulks and shampoos, anythingto parent deems or they inform us that
they would like that done, wedo that prior to arrival. And the
most important thing we did was weput an additional safety lock on the top

(15:54):
of the door so the child can'treach it, so the parent can go
to sleep knowing that their child cannotget out of the bedroom while they're sleeping.
One incident that really sticks out becauseit's still lets me know how much
we still have to do to educatepeople. We didn't have a lady that

(16:15):
traveled across the artem and so thislittle four year old was just confined to
a vehicle for maybe you know,nine to ten hours, and they came
into the hotel. They weren't stayingthere, but they had heard of better
room, and the child was justscreaming, really really distressed again going into
a foreign building, and the ladyplaced her order and took it down to

(16:37):
our century room. But we haddid have other customers in our dining room.
We said, can't they just shutthat child up? Because they just
started screaming, irritable, a childthat a parent couldn't control. And you
know, but now once our server, you know, explained what was happening,
that the child was autistic and theparent was just placing an order and
then going to calm her down,understood that the average person out there wouldn't

(17:03):
have understood. So we still havea little bit of a battle to go
in trying to educate people to beyou know a little bit of sympathy on
you know, a parent trying toconsole one of these children that's one thing
I've been really impressed by with AimsInitiatives and not just aim but the local
businesses and residents and Protobasque is it'stwo things. It's making changes and investing

(17:29):
in local businesses to make these changes, but it's also educating the community.
And I think that that part is, if not more critical, at least
equally critical to making structural changes.Oh, the buy in from the business
community has been overwhelming. So youknow, if you're in a line up
at the food store and you knowyou have a child on the spectrum,

(17:51):
then you immediately can go to thefront of the line. You know,
we have hairdressers in town that arecatering to them. Most of the restaurants.
Now, we took our mayor youand we did a complete picture me
in you because a lot of themadverorable issues. So they can point to
the dryterials and point to the glassof milk and let us know exactly what
they want. So the businesses havereally just come on board, and I

(18:14):
think it's you know, we're sosensitive to it and we just want,
you know, to make these parentsas comfortable as they can, and they
need to integrate their children into society, so we all want to help them
do that. So after the successof the arena and then the hotel,
how many other local businesses started gettinginvolved. When I went to the town

(18:38):
just see if we could be anartist and friendly town, I truly didn't
realize how other businesses world. Butyou do things and you don't realize that
the business are they're helping you.Even though they are, they're doing different
little things, you don't realize it. So the town told me I had
to get enough proof that there wasenough people there having our autism group,

(19:02):
but they could not have children oftheir own who had autism, so there
were more just doing it above andbeyond, And so I started in taking
notes of who was doing what,and it ended up we had seventeen businesses
that were doing things at that timethat were above and beyond to health,
ASP and the autism community. Andso when I went back with it all,

(19:29):
they said, oh, yes,that's definitely compared to our size,
that is definitely enough to say thatwe are autism friendly. Because we really
didn't have a model to go by. We were making our own models,
but we didn't want to make ittoo easy. We're not that tight we
wanted to make it that it wasworthwhile. When these businesses started changing their
models to be autism friendly, hadyou reached out to them or were they

(19:51):
just inspired by what you were doinga lot of them I've reached out to
it. It was different things likeso I'll give you like couple of examples,
Like we had like a piece ofthe light here in town now on
the eastern Canada. There are lotsof Piece of the light restaurants, and
but the nice thing about it isthat they all have much the same decore.
So we went to this Pizza ofthe light first because if we could

(20:15):
teach a child to feel comfortable inthis pizzas a light, then they could
feel comfortable in other piece of lightsin other communities. Because a lot of
our families were eating their lunches allin their cars and their vehicles because a
child couldn't go into a restaurant.So we use this piece of light as
our training center. But then ofcourse we had to train staff of what

(20:36):
to do, so that became placefor us to go. Then our local
post office. Our children didn't knowwhat to do in a local post office,
so we trained the staff there andtalk to the staff there and how
to go in and have for thechildren to go and use it. And
also like they're really good because likeif a child is waiting for something to
come in the post office and theygo every day and it's not there,

(21:00):
then naturally they get upset because theyexpect it to be there and that's not
their structure. So what the postoffice clerks would do would let us know
when it came in and then we'llgo and take the child there because then
the parcel would be there. Andso I would take them que cards to
the clerks for them want to askthe child because if a bab was working

(21:21):
on teaching them how to say theirname, then the clerk would have a
card for this day and they wouldsay, oh, what is your name
today? And they would wait andwait. They may have to wait thirty
seconds for the child to answer.But we would have all this done beforehand.
So it was different places like that, like the post office, the
different convenience stores, the grocery stores. I think it's easy to throw money

(21:45):
at something to say I'm as abusiness going to invest in making a change
financially, But what you have goingon there is an extreme level of personal
participation from people in offices all theway down to people behind the count And
I wonder why you think that iswhy you think this entire town are taking
on that responsibility. I think fora small town, we've always been known

(22:11):
to help each other out. Weknow each other. The children are like
now like superheroes almost where they go, and this town has been educated.
We've had lots of meetings and beentalking about autism. And every year we
have something we have, Like thefireman in town have all been trained and
we have the special baskets for allthe fire equipment. Everyone in town has

(22:33):
sort of clicked together and we're workingtogether. And like we have a lady
in town who owns a pharmacy shopand she pays to have a quote or
an extet rebot autism in our localnewspaper every week, so the people in
town read that every week they knowthere's going to be something there. It's
like, because some people say negativitycan be addicting, but I think positivity

(22:56):
can be addicting also, and we'vegotten the positive way in town and not
donated. Well. My name isCindy Gali Lapoula, and I am a
pharmacy owner of the medicine cabinet herein Porta bas And I guess, you
know, it tugs at my heartstrings because I have a nephew and he

(23:19):
was born with a rare disease whichalso involved him being on the autism spectrum.
So I guess I had some firsthandexperiences with somebody with autism. So
then I guess I really got interestedwhen Jones starts helping and getting involved in
starting an autism movement here. AndI know almost all the businesses in town

(23:41):
started really investing themselves into this invarious ways, but for my understanding,
you were one of the first,and you did it in a way that
didn't really impact your business. Sothey're a lot of people, you know,
really don't understand autism, and alot of people are almost like shy
away from kids and adults with autismthat they don't want to engage in any

(24:03):
type of conversation or almost like notknowing what to say. So if you
know, if a child approaches,or if they see a child or adults
with autisms, they kind of tendto walk away or and maybe that might
have been just with not understanding whatthey're going through, and so for me,
you know, having a nephew withautism, I wanted to put the

(24:26):
understanding out there. I wanted peopleto be educated with autism and not to
be afraid of it, and notto feel that a child is being rude
by you know, their actions orthem not speaking back if you say,
you know, how are you todayand the child don't respond or the child
needs act out in a way thata person might think, oh, that

(24:48):
child is being difficult. So forme, moonsoring the ad in the paper
kind of I'm hoping to educate peopleabout autism and if it's just a little
ad in the newspaper every week thatthey could read and have, as you
know, have a better understanding aboutautism. What was the response? Like?

(25:08):
Good? I you know, I'vehad some responses back saying, you
know that they've read the ads,things that people didn't realize, you know,
things that they're learning through reading stuffin the paper. How did it
make you feel over the last threeyears watching portabask really embrace and adapt to
it. Am so proud, soproud off the altutism involves me movement here

(25:33):
in Porta bask Seriously, it justmakes my heart soul to know that so
much information has gone about autism withinthe town itself, how the whole town
has gotten involved from all everything atthe hotel, the special you know rooms
that they have done up, youknow, the swimming program, the Bruce
To arena, you know programs thatthey have in the gym up there and

(25:57):
everywhere, even even all the stores, all the businesses here that have basically
reached their hand out to help whena child comes in with autism, not
to you know, crowd them,kind of not get in their face,
or basically just let them warm upto coming into the businesses itself, because
that is a big step for them. As the town has changed, have

(26:23):
you seen changes in the residence withautism. Oh? Yes, most definitely.
The residens young and all with autism. They're welcome from town now.
They're not looked at as if there'ssomething wrong with them. There's not a
lot of bullying with them. Thechildren, their peers are getting now much

(26:45):
more educated with them. Everybody ismuch more educated in town. And that's
that's what was lacking before, wasthe education. People didn't understand autism.
And I think that is the bigdifference. I've lived here all my life,
so I'm well known in the town. I taught many of the children,
so you know, I'm not astranger coming in and trying to do

(27:06):
something different. And we do ita little bit by little bit. We
didn't do all this overnight, andwe didn't do it through the media.
You know. The volved personal touch, like I if I'm going to do
something like a little while ago,we had a meeting here for businesses in
town, and I went around toeach business and met the manager or the

(27:27):
owner of the business and gave themthe information and told them what we were
doing. And we had over sixtypeople and over thirty businesses representative that night.
If I had just called them,we probably wouldn't have had that.
I have to wonder when you startedAIM as just a small support group,
did you ever imagine this extraordinary outcome? No, no, not at all.

(27:52):
No, it wasn't even in ourview to do that. We were
just a support group. But throughthe support group, of course, that's
how you learn and the problems.And I'm a person that I feel like
if there's a problem, we shouldbe able to do something to fix it
or help it. We've grown enoughnow that we've become incorporated. So we're
going to have two parts of ourgroup, and we're going to have like

(28:14):
a support group and then our incorporatedgroup. Because we found that everything was
moving so fast, we were kindof losing our support group that we started
with. So I'm going to goI'm with the incorporated group, and then
we will still have the support groupfor the parents. And that was something
that the parents brought up, whichis so true. We went on and

(28:37):
did all these things for them,but then they felt that, you know,
we're losing some of our little supportthat we started within the beginning.
So now we've got a board ofdirectors that will do the things that I'm
doing sort of thing, and I'mon the board of directors, and then
we will also now have our supportgroup that will be just for support only.
Has it been challenging and taking onthe few responsibility is not only an

(29:02):
advocate but an ambassador. Yeah,it is challenging. I've learned how to
have thicker skin than I've ever hadbefore. It doesn't all go over well.
Sometimes, you know, there's parentsthat will get upset things don't work
out the way they wish for itto be sometimes, and then there's sometimes
that, you know, you don'thave one hundred percent people in town who

(29:23):
will always agree with everything that youdo. Yeah, you know, you
have your bad days and your gooddays like anything. But the majority of
town, I would say, youknow, eighty percent of the town or
eighty or ninety percent of the townare behind us. So I only have
one or two parents and one ortwo in the public. So I mean

(29:45):
that's I can't I can't argue withthat. If we had one hundred percent,
there were something wrong. What havebeen some of the most rewarding moments.
One rewarding moment would be the littlefellow when he gave his order at
Piece of Delight. That little boywas non verbal in the beginning, and

(30:08):
he did not know how to orderanything anywhere, and for him to be
able to do that there, thatwas just fantastic. Another thing is when
the hotel tells me stories about peoplecoming in to their hotel, like the
little one who came in from CrossNew for Land, and those parents went

(30:30):
in to use that coming room.No money going to the hotel whatsoever,
but they just went down freely touse that room. That that's outstanding.
That tells about our community, ourfireman asking for help, our fireman wanting
to know more. They asked,they wanted to learn about autism and what

(30:52):
to do. Those are the kindsof things that stand up. And when
I walk downtown. I don't dothis for acknowledgement, but when I go
downtown and someone stops near on thestreet and says, you know, thank
you for what you did for thekids of this town, then I think
it hits me and say, yeah, we did do something here. But

(31:12):
it wasn't just me. I mean, it was the town, you know,
it was the group. But it'snice to know that the other people
see it. Yeah, you know, I guess one person can spark change,
but it takes a community to implementchange. Yes, right, it
certainly does. You cannot do itwithout the community. It's impossible. And

(31:32):
our town council that we had havebeen just phenomenal. We have never gone
to them with a suggestion and theyhave said, no, we can't do
it. It's never happened. Theylike the swimming program, like you know,
like it's a one on one swimminginstruction for our children, and I
mean, like our town gave usa discount for swimming, and like you

(31:53):
would never hear tell of that inmost communities. I mean, you know,
if you want specialized training, youhave to pay more for it.
They gave us a discount so ourchildren could be able to do it.
And this is what the town islike. No matter what we do,
it is not available. Now they'llsay, okay, let's work and see

(32:13):
how we can do it. Myname is Land American. I am the
facility manager at the Boost Sports Centerin town quarterback stoos and then tell me
about how you got involved with AutismInvolves Me well through my works. Joam
and April Bill are the two ladieswho founded the Autism Involves Me group.

(32:35):
They were looking for a way topromote physical activity among some of the children
who are on the autism spectrum,because not all of them have the ability
to participate in your run of themill sports and hockey, if you're skating
a bowling, and for various reasons, they thought if they had some physical
activity equipment that they could use,they could get the kids more active.

(32:55):
I think they raised they probably raisedsix or seven thousand dollars before they even
roached off because they were looking fora place to put this equipment. We
don't have spear space, but wehad space that we couldn't we could use
and it just flew from there.Joan had mentioned, and it's one thing
that comes up over and over andover again is how critical the swim environment

(33:16):
was for kids with autism and howyou guys adapted to really make it inclusive
for them. That's been fascinating forme to watch because it was new to
me. Our community is surrounded bywater on three sides, so anywhere you
are in our community or less thana kilometer from water, many children who
are on the autism spectrum are runnersand they're naturally drawn the water, so

(33:40):
it's imperative the children. I thinkit's imperative for all children to learn swim,
even more so for children who areon the spectrum we stared at with
I think two children who had autismwere in our regular swimming classes. One
was managing perfectly fine, and theother child had been struggling because he had
sensory issues. And you get intoa pool with sixty or seventy kids,

(34:02):
concrete walls and water, it's incrediblyloud, so it wasn't working for him.
And when Jones first approached me,I wasn't sure what we could do
or how we could do it,but we decided we'd try one on one
at a separate time from our regularlessons. So it's very quiet and calm
down there. And we put somethought into picking the instructors because we needed

(34:24):
young adults who were able to,I say, fly by the seat of
their pants, because I give themlesson plans for teaching other swimming lessons,
but for children with autism, everysingle child with autism is different, so
they had to be instructors who wereable to adjust and adapt as they went.
And it's been absolutely amazing to watch. One of the things I've really

(34:45):
been struck by in the town ofPorta Basque and Autism involves me is the
level at which residents are participating.And you know, my understanding is you
have a lot of teenagers working foryou, Yeah, and the fact that
teenage even who are generally considered tobe selfish, yeah, are really investing

(35:05):
themselves in this the pleasure they getfrom watching children who don't normally get to
participate they master a skill. Mostof these children are kids who've never been
necessarily good at basketball, or naturalsat hockey, or we're small town.
Canadian hockey is the end all andbe all here, So you know,
these are kids who haven't found anythingthat they're good at. And when you

(35:30):
see these when you see the sheerjoy on their faces, it carries over
to the instructors and adults around andeducation. I think the difference with Joan
is that she educates as she's going, you know, people fairly unknown.
When you know, when you understand, it's a whole lot easier to be
empathetic and compassionate about things. Yeah, and that's exactly what I love about

(35:53):
Jones methodology is I think, andyou know, we struggle with this in
the States on pretty much every level. Yeah, but I think it's this,
you can't really practice empathy unless youhave an understanding, and very few
people take the time and patience tohelp others understand. Yeah. Yeah,
but you know, I'd say tenyears ago, autism was a how many

(36:16):
people had heard the term, butnobody knew what it meant. If you
went to a local restaurant and youhad a child who was having a meltdown
because of autism, you know,and I was as guilty of it as
others. People assumed, Oh mygod, parents can't control their children,
or children can't behave better than thatthey shouldn't be out and with absolutely no

(36:36):
understanding that the child had no controlover this. Joan has changed changed attitudes
here so much that I don't Idon't know if you could find anybody in
our town who doesn't know what artismmeans, doesn't understand the signs to look
for. And when you change people'swhen you increase their compassion for one specific

(36:58):
group, he carries over to awhole lot of other things before this group
formed. If there were resources inour community, I don't know where they
were. Could I could steer youin a half dozen different directions here now
of where to get help and whatyou can what kind of help is here?
What's available? Speaking of resources,I understand that teaching the kids on

(37:19):
the spectrum to swim is a lotmore challenging and requires a specific set of
circumstances, And so I think itwould be easy to believe that then you
would need to charge a little morefor these lessons. But I understand that
you don't. Yeah, no,we don't know. We don't. We've
charged enough to cover the cost ofour instructors, but we don't charge extra.

(37:42):
You know, people with children whohave special needs incur a whole lot
more expenses than the rest of usdo on a regular basis. If there's
one thing, one way that ourcommunity can help, well that's that's one
way we can help. And swimmingis a life skill when you live in
new Foundland. Another thing that I'vereally taken home is when Aim began,
your autism population wasn't any different percapita than any other town in America,

(38:06):
and yet all these local businesses wereinvesting sweat equity but also money into being
more autism friendly. So I wonderwhy it was important to you to invest
so much of yourself into this.I've always believed that, you know,
we may not be able to changethe world, but I think that if
every single one of us tried tomake a difference for one other person,

(38:27):
we've done something good, haven't I. So you have helped to change this
town and through that the lives ofso many people in this town, and
I wonder how that has changed you. I always say I wish I knew
when I was teaching what I knownow, because, like I say,
I finished teaching in two thousand andnine and I have learned so much about

(38:55):
the parents and also, I meanthe autism has really grown in the knowledge
of autisms, grown in the numbersalso, but has also grown in our
education of it. Since twoy ten. I did not realize what the parents
were going through when I was teachingthe children, and lots of times we

(39:19):
looked at autism too as a behaviorthat we had to try to fix,
which is impossible to do. Weonly really looked at children who were maybe
banging their heads, maybe who werecrying a lot, who had severe autism
as being artistic. We did notlook at the children who had poor eye
contact, who didn't have any attentionspan, who didn't like changes, who

(39:43):
didn't like loud noises. We didnot realize the severity of that for these
children back then. So this hascompletely changed my understanding of children and has
completely change of my understandings of peoplein our community. And I've come to

(40:04):
learn that we are in a greatcommunity. Sometimes we just take it for
granted. I didn't realize how goodour community was. We moved here from
Ottawa or about twelve years ago,but my husband is originally from here.
Our goal was to get back tothe island. We didn't have children yet,
and we decided that we would liketo live ultimately closer to family and

(40:29):
be on the island of Newfoundland.This is Candice Matthews. Her son Isaac
has become an ambassador amongst the PortaBasque children on the spectrum, having appeared
on multiple news segments covering the townwhen we first arrived. It takes a
little bit of getting used to.The climate is certainly very different than elsewhere
in Canada and even elsewhere in Newfoundland, but it's so wonderfully welcoming community.

(40:52):
That was evidence, you know,very early on. It's easy to meet
people, easy to make great friendshere, so it quickly became the place
that we wanted to settle. WhenIsaac was diagnosed at the age of three,
AIM hadn't yet come to be,and it certainly would have been a
very useful resource to have when Isaacwas first diagnosed, as there are a

(41:15):
lot of questions and doubts and insecuritiesand all of the roller coaster of emotions
that come along with learning that yourchild has autism spectrum disorder. Before AIM
really evolved to be what it istoday, what was life like for you
and Isaac um you know what,it's it's hard. It's hard to say
that. I don't want to sayit was any more of a struggle than

(41:37):
any other family that has to gothrough certain things. I think we're really
lucky here in port of ask resourcesfor families with children on the spectrum are
always a challenge. I think thatwe're lucky in terms of we have this
kind of little corner of our provincewhere we have excellent people, our speech

(41:58):
language pathologists that is here. Hewas the first person that mentioned the word
said the word autism to me,and that was pre diagnosis, and I
self referred Isaac to him because Ithought Isaac just had a speech delay.
So, you know, you haveall of these people that work really well
together. You've between speech language andpublic health. It just kind of worked

(42:22):
out that you've got this little cornerof the province where people tend to really
work very well together. And Ithink that that's part of the rural Newfoundland
mentality of you know, you dofor yourself and you do for others,
and it's kind of a rugged history, so we kind of tend to rally
together and help each other as muchas we can. What were some of
the challenges that Isaac faced in hisday to day life. Certainly early on,

(42:49):
he was very challenged in communication.He didn't have much speech until he
was about five, I would sayhe started to speak a lot more.
Many of his early challenges were withemotional regulation. He would have a lot
of meltdowns, a lot of tantrums, but also a lot of meltdowns when
it came to frustrations with being unableto communicate his needs and wants. So

(43:14):
as a parent, or as parentsmyself and my husband, we would have
to do a lot of kind ofguessing and trying to figure out that you
almost have to solve a little mysteryevery time because you can't figure out whether
or not it's a drink he wants, or if he needs to go to
the washroom or all of these things. So that early on, those were
the challenges that I'm sure are typicalof many children on the spectrum and parents.

(43:36):
But as that progressed, and ashe responded so well to therapies,
you know, the challenges became alittle different. They became more social challenges
and still a lot of emotional regulationchallenges, but with better communication, did
that ever feel isolating? Of course, yeah, it's it. The diagnosis
itself was really isolating because there's asignificant amount of especially at that young age.

(44:02):
He was diagnosed just before his thirdbirthday, So you know, you've
get you get some people that theydoubt the path that you've taken to diagnosis.
They they think that maybe you shouldn'thave pursued it, that maybe he's
just a little later developing, orI remember one older person said, you
know, there's nothing wrong with thatchild, and I said no, I

(44:22):
never said there was anything wrong withthem. I said, these are some
of the challenges that he's having,and I'm going to do everything that I
can do to get him the resourcesand help to overcome some of these challenges.
I want to make life easier forhim, not more difficult. So
sometimes it feels like you're you're fightinga singular battle or you know, as

(44:43):
a as a family unit or fightingbattle. But that that very quickly changed.
I think when when people saw theprogress that Isaac made with the various
forms of therapies that we were ableto get for him at an early age,
and I guess that was happening personallyin town. Aim is starting to
grow in both scope and numbers andlocal businesses started making adaptations to become a

(45:07):
little more autism friendly. How didthat feel? Oh my goodness, it's
incredible to think that, you know, as a whole, as a town,
there's this willingness to learn more andto become more aware of some of
the challenges faced by individuals on thespectrum. And you know, we really
see this not just being about helpingchildren on the spectrum, because, as

(45:32):
we all know, these children aregoing to grow into adults that also need
to access services. They're going toneed to access all of the things for
daily life that you or all needto access. They're going to face challenges
with that. So we as asociety and as a community need to think
a little bit more about what canwe do to make a day to day

(45:54):
life a little bit easier and alittle bit more accommodating for some of these
children as they grow into adults.And we have adults in our town that
are on the spectrum, And thetruth is, without even a formal program,
many of our businesses have been supportingthem all through it their lives.
So it's really it's not about puttinguniformalized program. It's more about being willing

(46:17):
to listen and to adapt to theindividual needs of the people who are eventually
going to become your customers. Yeah, and I actually want to just go
over some of the more pronounced changes. And I can't get over the fact
that this started as a support groupthree years ago, and in three years
these are some of the changes.The hotel has become autism friendly. The

(46:39):
newspapers started printing autism awareness pieces everyweek. Most of the restaurants, I
believe, developed picture menus, thefire department developed a kit for people with
autism spectrum disorder to distract them duringemergencies. You had the swim lessons,
become autism friendly, the arena thatwas built. The number of changes that

(47:02):
took place in such a short periodof time is just phenomenal and just really
heartwarming. You know, I livein a city where one governmental change or
one municipal change takes years and yearsand votes and votes and votes, and
usually is driven by money. Andhere you have the small, small community
that's making trastic changes in a shortamount of time just for the sake of

(47:24):
being better. It's really neat,isn't it. And sowhat tipit as Joan,
she is a firecracker. She isabsolutely passionate about what she does,
and she's really good at inspiring otherpeople to do their little bit, their
little parts. So you know,I get, you know, half a
dozen messages sometimes a day from Joan, and then there are other times,

(47:45):
you know, where you don't hearfrom her for a few days. But
she absolutely is passionate about what she'sdoing. She loves these children with all
of her heart, and she's soproud of her community. And I think
that when a community sees proud reflectedin someone else, they respond in kind,

(48:05):
they respond accordingly. So you know, it's really neat to be a
part of something that resonates with somany people, So it kind of it's
snowballs. It makes you want tobe a part of it. And even
if that's just you know, asa citizen, even if that's just maybe
correcting perhaps a negative stereotype or justhaving that conversation. One or one thing

(48:30):
I've learned since Isaac was diagnosed isalmost everyone has a story about someone they
know or someone they know who knowssomeone who is on the spectrum. So
it's just so far reaching. Withthe statistics trending in the way that they're
trending, which is, you know, which is difficult and challenging. When
you think about where the diagnostic numbersare going, it's only going to become

(48:53):
more relevant. It's only going tobecome more important that we tackle some of
this now so that later on oursociety is better equipped to handle, you
know, a population that has verydifferent needs than what a typical and I
do air quotes around that, butwhat a typical population might need. Yeah,

(49:15):
that it's interesting you say that.You know, this season of the
show has been about tackling the binary, how we tend to see things in
black and white or one or theother, and in a lot of cases
normal or different. And I thinkwhat we're starting to realize is there's no
normal. We are all different,and we all have our own set of

(49:35):
special needs, some obviously a lotlarger than others. But I think that's
the beauty of these conversations and reallyseeing the uniqueness and everyone and also seeing
the challenges and everyone for sure.And I tell my kids this all the
time. There is no normal,you know, And sometimes when Isaac gets
you know, he's very self aware, as as you know, most people

(49:59):
are, I guess or most kidsthat struggle with this. I can only
speak for Isaac, but he doeshave his moment. He's a very happy
child, and you know, hehas pure relationships with you know, the
more typical peers. So we're verylucky that he's developed these coping strategies,
and I'm very pleased about that.But when he has his moments of anxiety

(50:21):
and he understands or or maybe someone'smade him feel like he doesn't belong,
you know, he's often had hadthese little breakdowns and we try to talk
to him about that, and wetry to talk him through don't don't focus
on what normal is, because thereis no normal and the truth is and
you know, and I know,you know all of us are wishing to
promise away from needing some of theseservices ourselves. Because that's the cool thing

(50:45):
about some of these modifications that arebeing made or adjustments that are being made,
is you know, they work forpeople with anxiety, they work for
you know, any other number ofsensory processing disorders or physical or emotional or
mental challenges. It's about becoming alittle bit more aware of how you can

(51:06):
help others. And that's it.So if you wake up every day and
say what good can I do today? Even if it's something small, that's
that's the very basis of a communitythat's more welcoming and more friendly. As
Portabas started to change, did younotice changes in Isaac? Yes, well
he's a celebrity. It's a favoritething so for him right now, and

(51:30):
you know, I hope it continues. I mean I have a lot of
misgivings and concerns and worries like anyparent does, about you know, his
social well being as he ages andas his peers age. But right right
now, in this at this pointin time, he actually feels lucky to
have autism. And and I don'tknow that that's not always the case with

(51:52):
a lot of people. And Imade the mistake of venturing into the comment
section on one of the one ofthe postings, I believe it was with
the National the CBC's the national piece. And it's tough because I think a
lot of people are struggling and whenthey watch some of these pieces, they
don't see themselves or their families reflectedin it. And I think that that's
really tough when you feel like aconversation is going on without you. And

(52:15):
I empathize with those people. Butas for right now, he's happy with
the attention that he's getting, andI think he appreciates being understood a little
better. The summer sports program soJoan worked extensively with our municipality for the
summer sports program and Isaac's been ableto join that. But even before Ames

(52:37):
started I join, I put Isaacin that program when his challenges were much
greater, and I remember asking them, you know, if it's okay if
I put him in, and goingup and sitting down and meeting with each
counselor and meeting with the organizers andsaying, you know, here's who he
is. These are his triggers,these are his challenges. Do you think

(53:00):
that we can do this? Andthe truth is right from that first meeting,
it was yes, we're going totry to do this. And for
the first couple of years that heparticipated in that program, there were days
I had had to leave work andgo up there two or three times.
There were days we had to leavethere were then there were the good days
where I didn't get a single phonecall. But the progress that he made

(53:22):
socially by being able to participate ina program like that is incredible. It's
absolutely incredible. And then you knowa few years later when AIME comes on
stream and you start to have theselittle formalized programs and you develop your partnerships
with the new froman on Labrador AutismSociety and all of a sudden they have

(53:45):
a counselor who's an inclusion counselor,you know, they they have a young
woman that's that's her job in theprogram is to make sure that those children
that need the extra supports get it. So they have the common baskets in
the sensory rooms and the people onstaff with the ability to address sensory needs

(54:05):
or meltdowns or you know, tantrumsthat are approaching meltdowns, and these are
these are kids that have this educationof These are teenagers essentially that are you
know, either in or going topost secondary. So they're not specialist by
any way, shape or form,but they have made it their business to
learn more about these kids and howthey can participate in a program as their

(54:30):
typical peers do. And I thinkthat that's something that's incredible And from a
you know, an autism parent perspective, you know yourself in a in a
city especially in most places, toget specialized care like that is cost prohibitive.
It's huge. In our case,the swimming lessons are cheaper than regular

(54:54):
I say regular in air quotes again, regular swimming lessons. The I PA
the exact same fee every single yearthat the other parents did to have Isaac
in that program, as did theother parents who have children on the spectrum
in the program. And that's somethingthat I think is really noteworthy because most
of the time parents who have specialneeds children, those services come at a

(55:17):
premium cost, and it makes themunattainable for a lot of families. You
touched on it briefly, and it'sit's one of the things that really impacted
me the most after watching the videosand reading the stories about Portabasque, which
is when we say community, itis quite literally the entire community. You

(55:38):
know. When I was a teenager, showing up at the job was about
the most that I was willing todo. And you have teenagers, you
know, working at the pizza place, at swimming instructors who are really taking
this on with a level of careand responsibility that is astounding to me.
I think it's I really think itis. It's very special it's a it's

(56:01):
almost a perfect storm situation here whereyou know, it's built on itself to
the point where people are starting toget it. But I think, you
know what, in this in today'sworld, maybe we don't give teenagers as
much credit as they deserve. Becausethey've come through school and the conversation,

(56:22):
the national conversation around even mental healthand self care. They're they're in this
environment where more than ever, Ithink it's okay to talk about your challenges.
So I think that they're they're realizingthis, they're realizing that they have
a role to play, and Ithink that they're very proud to play that

(56:43):
role. You know, I'm speakingspeaking for them a little bit, but
you know, the ones that I'vespoken to, they're so proud to be
a part of it. But alsothey're learning so much from these children.
They learn about perseverance, and theylearn about determine nation, and they learn
about the character that builds when inthe you know, in the face of

(57:05):
adversarial conditions. And I think thatthis is something that they're going to take.
They're so lucky because they get totake this into their post secondary education.
They get to take this into youknow as as they finished or as
they as they navigate through their ownlives. It's very character building, I
think for for some of these kids, and they're starting to realize that,
you know, and I think itmakes yourself, makes them feel less less

(57:30):
isolated for having some of the someof the feelings that they have, doubts
and insecurities and all that stuff.I think it's absolutely wonderful. I've spoken
to a few of them who Igot a message from the inclusion counselor at
the summer sports program and they saidthat they had one counselor up there one
day who was really having a toughtime. She was having a rough day

(57:52):
and she was a bit upset,and and they said they tried their best
amongst their peers to cheer her up, and finally they just and Isaac,
and Isaac was able to cheer herup because you know, they do have
this innocence about them. I thinkthat's really the crux of it is we
all thrive when we have a purposethat is greater than ourselves. I hope

(58:12):
that that's something that you know,everyone in this community takes away from it,
and I think that they will.I think it's something that we can
we can teach others too, youknow, we can lead by example and
continue doing that. But community isI'm a bit of a loss for words,
but it's so important to me toinstill that in my own children,
and I try to live that inmy own life. Whatever you can do

(58:36):
to give even just a little bit, to give of your own talents or
to give of your own time,that's what makes something like this successful.
And so many people in this communityseem to get that. So and we
talked about this earlier, but Isaachas kind of become the face of Porta
Basque. Could you have imagined fouror five years ago that he would be

(58:58):
where he is today? Now?I don't think so, But you know
what I didn't. I never reallythought about it like that. We kind
of just try to give him thespace to be who he is, and
you know, you try to guidehim through making good choices, and you
try to give him the space tofigure out, you know, solutions to

(59:19):
his particular challenges. But it's reallysurprised me how much he has embraced,
say, being in front of acamera or speaking about, you know,
his experience of being on the spectrumman and I think that people like hearing
from Isaac because he can articulate it. He can articulate it a little better
than than some kids who have morecommunication challenges. But also, you know,

(59:44):
it's important to remember that he's onlyarticulating his own experience, and he's
certainly not a spokesperson for the wholespectrum. But he really has embraced it,
and it's it's a lot of fun. It's nerve wracking as a parent.
I'm sure any parent whose child goeson camera in a even in a
live situation and starts to speak youryou kind of, oh my goodness,

(01:00:05):
you crush your fingers and you hopethey don't say something that you don't want
them to. But I can onlyimagine what the teachers here sometimes at the
school, because he tends to bevery direct and really literal. So you
know, I've had a couple ofteachers that have have said things that Isaac,
you know, talks about how muchmommy really just loves wine and it's

(01:00:30):
great, mommy, you just haveyour one and you become okay, yeah,
but you know, it's it's wonderfulfor him to feel accepted, and
I think it's it's it's done wonderusfor his self confidence, and he really
appreciates that. I'm sure he wouldget on here and talk to you just

(01:00:50):
without without prompting, without even prepwhich is pretty incredible for a spectrum kid.
Yeah, you know, I wastalking with Joe the other day and
she said one of the fundamentals ofautism is not having a sense of space,
and it seems like Portabaska has reallyhelped Isaac find a sense of space

(01:01:12):
there. Oh, for sure.I can't imagine at this point, you
know, we don't We don't reallyhave family here in town, not a
lot of it anyway. All thegrandparents live, you know, probably four
hours north of here, and atone point my husband and I we would
sit down and we would say,you know, what do we do We
think we would want to move alittle closer, maybe the family. You

(01:01:34):
know, it'd be great to havethe grandparents attend the school of things and
have that closeness there. But whenyou really start to think about it and
think about the community that they havehere and the friendships that they've developed in
a level of acceptance, particularly thatyou know Isaac has here, it quickly
becomes a parent that this is thisis too special to walk away from.

(01:01:58):
So yeah, for sure, hehe's accepted here, and you know,
he's going into grade six this year. And in Portabas it's a small community,
so we have we just have thetwo schools. We have the elementary
school that's from k to six andthen the high school that's from seven to
twelve. So I can't imagine,at this stage in his development, pulling

(01:02:20):
Isaac away from his peers that youknow, he's been around since since his
kindergarten days and sending him to ahigh school environment in a different community.
I can't. I can't even imagine. And I know that the high school,
that the teachers here, that theyembrace this. You know, they
frequently borrow resources from AIM, theyfrequently consult, They're very accessible, and

(01:02:43):
I think that speaks to the communityas well well. And it seems that
your community has really normalized autism.And we talk a lot about normal and
atypical, but it seems a generalsense is that having autism is a normal
thing to come across in the world. And I imagine that will make it
a much easier place for him tobe and develop and grow, I hope.

(01:03:06):
So, you know, I thinkthey all and the challenges are so
different. And I think that that'sone of the greatest things that has come
out of this particular awareness piece inthis particular community is that I think a
lot of people had an idea ofautism in their head. There's that stereotypical

(01:03:27):
you know, and this is whatautism looks like. And it may be
rocking or headbanging or or all ofthose things. And true, for a
lot of people, that is whatautism looks like, but it also looks
like so many other things. AndI think that the biggest success story that's
come out of this particular town andour experience with the community here is that
more people in this community can identifythat autism is a spectrum disorder. And

(01:03:52):
I think even after the most recentround of consultation sessions with the business community,
you know, a lot of thepeople came out, and you know,
I spoke with a lot of themafterwards to get their feedback, and
they were just, you know,there was so much well, I never
realized that this or I didn't realizethat they would need this certain space,
or I didn't realize that this soundmay bother them, or I didn't realize

(01:04:15):
that this texture might be appealing tothem. So there really is a lot
of learning that has been done andthen so much more still to do.
And I think that the coolest partabout that is that people are obviously still
very willing to continue to learn.Yeah, that's what really struck me about
all of this is that it didn'tstop. It wasn't like, Okay,

(01:04:36):
we are autism friendly, We've doneenough. It's that the whole town continues
to grow and improve. For sure, we have a lot of a lot
of big plans still in the stillin the works, and I think Joan
has been inundated with requests for informationfrom so many other places throughout Canada and
you know yourself, even in theUnited States, and they want to know

(01:04:58):
how we're doing it. But thetruth is is that it was so organic
in the way it happened. AndI don't want to detract from the work
that's been done because Joan has reallybeen the driving force here. But it
happens because someone has an idea ora suggestion, and then it comes down
to Joan saying, oh, Ithink we can do that. I think

(01:05:19):
we can build on that. Ithink there's something here let's let's see where
this takes us. So, youknow, we don't have huge numbers.
You know, all of this isdone for in the elementary school. There's
fourteen kids, I think, sowe don't we don't have a giant population
of people that are banging down ourdoors to access these services. These services

(01:05:39):
are so accessible right now in thiscommunity. The swimming is you know,
it might be one or two kidssometimes, the sensory room, you know,
I can I'm fairly confident that Icould probably leave here right now.
And everything in town is about fiveminutes away, pretty small town. I
could leave here right now, takeIsaac onto the hotel, say to one

(01:06:00):
of the ladies on the desk,you know, is the room available,
and she would of course, youknow, she'd probably say, yeah,
go ahead, take Mone down there. And that's how accessible it is.
It's pretty incredible. So why shouldother communities strive to be more inclusive of
people on the autism spectrum? Ifind that why should you strive to be

(01:06:24):
inclusive of anyone? It's because it'sthe right thing to do. It's easier
than you think it is. AndI think that all we have in life
is connection and humanity. And Ithink anytime, any day, that you
can make someone else feel more welcome, feel more inclusive, feel better about

(01:06:45):
themselves, feel better about their familiesor their environments. I just don't see
I don't see a loss here.There's only something to gain for the person
who's who's making life easier and forthe person whose life is about to become
easier. It's it's a it's ano brainer. It feels good, it's
the right thing to do. AndI think that as a whole, our
society needs us to start thinking inthat direction more than we have been.

(01:07:11):
I agree, well, before wego, I just at the beginning,
I asked you to describe porta Basque, and I would love it if you
would now just describe your community.Oh my goodness, it's it's home.
It becomes your home. And Ithink when people embrace you the way that
portabasque As has embraced Isaac and theother children on the spectrum and the other

(01:07:35):
adults on the spectrum, it turnsa town into a home, into a
community, into something that you're investedin. You're willing to give of yourself
to make it better, as you'veseen other people give of themselves to make
your life there. So I thinkthat's the that's the real definition of being

(01:07:57):
home. For more information on Portabasque, aim and the people featured in this
episode, go to Our Americana podcastdot com and to enjoy episode extras and

(01:08:21):
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