Through the Glass Wall
A Therapist's Lifelong Journey to Reach the Children of Autism
-
-
2.0 • 1 Rating
-
-
- $5.99
-
- $5.99
Publisher Description
A remarkable testament of hope and love, these pages recount Howard Buten’s lifelong journey working with autistic children. For three decades his pioneering, often controversial approaches have enabled him to gain access to their strange and
solitary universe—a universe he shares in a book that is unlike any you’ve ever read.
From his first unforgettable encounter with a wild, clawing human hurricane in the form of a little boy named Adam S., clinical psychologist Howard Buten has sought ways into the seemingly closed world of the autistic child. Whether he’s done this by
letting himself be pummeled, scratched, and bitten, or by imitating the child’s behaviors, or by feeling himself into what the child must be feeling, he has often been
rewarded. With extraordinary insight and in ways that are powerfully moving, he brings to life as never before the innermost selves of these children.
Among those you’ll meet in the clinic he founded in Paris are Lise, whose seemingly random movements are as expressive as a dancer’s; Florian, who can instantly tell
you on which day of the week your birthday falls for any year, past or future; Martin, whose nonstop speech echoes the angry voices he has heard all around him, but who is impervious to the emotions they contain; and Hakim, a child so lost and so violent, no other institution will take him.
Writing with a scientist’s clarity and a humanist’s heart, Buten conveys the reality of autism with passion, ruthlessness, humor, wisdom—and love. This is a book both heartbreaking and hopeful, and when he succeeds in breaching the invisible wall of aloneness that seems to separate the autistic from the rest of us, we cheer.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Buten, a part-time clown-mime and author of several novels, founded the Adam Shelton Center in Paris, which treats autistic children. While many autism specialists have degrees in psychiatry or do neurology research, Buten has a doctorate in clinical psychology in addition to years of training and experience in clowning and other performance arts. His approach to autism is eclectic, nondogmatic and practical: if it works, he does it. While the psychiatric establishment has had many theories for the causes of autism, Buten remains somewhat agnostic, focusing on treatment instead. First, the therapist must get the autistic person's attention by figuring out what, specifically, interests them. Utilizing his theatrical skills, Buten found that by closely imitating every gesture of an autistic patient, he could catch their attention the game could even become reciprocal. Imitation also helped him empathize with his patients, and this understanding became a way of getting beyond the "glass wall" of his patients' isolation. Imaginative play, humor and inventiveness sparked unexpected breakthroughs. Sensory stimulation massage, music, etc. has also proven effective. Buten doesn't focus on "extinguishing" his patients' ticks and repetitive gestures; he sees their rituals as either a response to disturbing sensory phenomena or as a means of self-stimulating beta-endorphin production. Unlike parent/practitioners like Florance (Maverick Mind, reviewed below), Buten does not focus on neurological assessments, verbal skills acquisition or mainstreaming. He wants to help his patients connect and communicate better, but he believes the autistic are simply different from "us normopaths" and he'd like us to understand and to accept their differences.
