I have been active in the autism field for over more than 30 years now. I diagnosed children and youngsters back in the eighties, I supported families in a home training project, I’ve set up courses for parents and professionals. Always with the mission of improving the quality of life of autistic people and the people around them. But does my work make a difference? … More Making a difference?
Most people still see the brain as a stimulus-response machine: stimuli in the outside world enter via the senses our brain where they are being processed, so we can react to them. However, this is not how it works. It takes around 200 milliseconds for signals hitting your retina to reach your conscious brain. That … More Your current experience is what your brain predicted 80 milliseconds ago
Very frequently, effort is focused on teaching autistic and other neurodivergent people to figure out what other people are thinking and feeling. For instance, we show them pictures of faces and ask them to identify how someone feels. Training their Theory of Mind may have a certain benefit, but shouldn’t we rather start helping them to understand their own mental and … More Theory of Own Mind, interoception and managing your own emotions
Tennis, the predictive mind and autism … More Tennis, the predictive mind and autism
Is autism a disability? I often get this question. In this blog post I give a shirt answer. … More Is autism a disability?
Happiness is something that individuals — both those with and those without autism spectrum disorder — strive to obtain. It is innate for all human beings to want joy and meaning in their lives. Happiness does not mean a life without problems since no life is exempt from challenges and difficulties. Happiness comes from accepting … More Autism and happiness: a new article
The main task of the human brain is to predict what will happen to us, so it can tell the rest of our body what to do to survive. Therefore, our brains crave predictability. The brain hates uncertainty because in moments of uncertainty the brain cannot do its job properly: protecting us and taking care … More Coping with uncertainty in times of Corona
Although many countries are now relaxing the lockdown measures and rolling out a COVID-19 exit strategy, life will not completely go back to normal. Certain measures will remain in place, especially the social distancing measure (I prefer the term physical distancing). Although measures are now more relaxed and less difficult to follow, when we go … More How to Cope with People not Following the COVID-19 Guidelines
I received a questions from one of the Flemisch umbrella organisations for education: why are so many autistic children afraid when they see people wearing a mouth mask? In this short video I explain where the fear comes from and what we can do to help children who are getting anxious when seeing people wearing … More Autistic children afraid of people wearing mouth masks
