That search for the one thing that might “flip the switch” for a child with autism - or other conditions such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or learning disabilities like dyslexia - drives parents to explore, research, experiment, and buy countless remedies in the hopes that something will cure their child. What if Matthew’s autism was caused by hypersensitivity to sound, and what if this one treatment improved his life forever? And how guilty would we feel if someday, some specialist said, ‘If only he’d had auditory training when he was six,’” Shumaker wrote in her 2008 memoir, A Regular Guy: Growing Up With Autism. “But Peter and I were already carried away by the wave of information we had gathered on auditory training…. Her son’s therapist recommended against the treatment, which had no research to back it. “I thought, ‘Oh, that’s it - he’s just sensitive to sound,’” Shumaker said. Laura Shumaker was struggling with her son’s autism diagnosis back in 1993 when she saw an Oprah episode in which a parent announced that her child had been cured of autism by using a “listening program.”
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