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Posted By A Son-Rise Message Board Participant on November 28, 1999 at 20:57:20:
: Bram, who are you? Your name comes up so much...what's your story?
Lisa,
I'll try to keep it brief. That may be difficult! My wife went to the Start-up program last December. My son Brenen was diagnosed with PDD by a neurologist and Autistic Spectrum Disorder by our school district. That was about six months before going to Option. We looked into ABA and had been doing (and still do at school) Floor Time (Greenspan). Once we started our Son-Rise program, Brenen's improvements had a sharp increase. It has been almost a year since we started the program and we are so happy we did. I did not go to the program, but my wife taped just about the entire thing which I have listened to twice. I have read and listened to tapes, which have all been very helpful.
In conjuction with doing the Son-Rise program, I began to research into biomedical treatments. Son-Rise was helping, but Brenen is a "gut" kid and his mushy poops, bloated belly, and inability to gain weight all needed attention. I felt it was important to learn all I can about this condition and do whatever needed to be done at any level.
I am a firefighter/paramedic in a suburb of Chicago. I work a 24 hour shift and then get 48 hours off. I have been fortunate this year to be at our towns "slow" station. We have internet access after 5 p.m. or weekends when our work is done and we are not on calls. Therefore, I have been able to spend a lot of time researching autism/responding to this message board.
This past summer my wife decided we should do a fundraiser at her health club and give the money to autism research. I thought it was such a good idea but did not know who to give the money to. I started looking and learned that the three people I wanted to fund were not being funded by any major organizations. Therefore, we decided to start our own Not For Profit Corporation.
Just before our first event in September, The Brenen Hornstein Autism Reseach and Education (BHARE) Foundation was offically a 501 (c) (3) tax exempt Not Profit oragnization. Our first priority is to fund research we feel has the best chance for a cure/treatment. Including our event in September, to date we have raised about $17,000 and have given out 12,500 with another 3,500 going soon. (one researcher told us not to send the money yet.) Also, we have spent a few hundred on educational materials (including option books) that we lend out or give to people in our area.
The "treatment guide" I put together is a minimal cost as most of them are E-mailed. Lastly, we want to educate the pediatricians in our area (then expand hopefully) since so many of them told many of the parents in our area "Your child is fine and will outgrow it". I remeber explaining classic signs and autism never entered our Drs. head. Only about five hundred has gone towards expenses. The researchers we support are Dr. Wakefield, Dr. Singh, and Ellen Bolte working with Dr. Finegold. We would take any help anyone has to offer. Wer are probably going to "team up" with The Autism Society in our area to help with educating. I would like to have a poster in every docs office with the many sings of autism on it. Hopefully they can run with this idea as well as educating parents that there is so much that they can do to help their kids.
In a nutshell, that about sums it up. I hope that answered your question Lisa.
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