Preparing Your Autistic Child for Adulthood with Dr. Haley Masterson and Meaghan O'Dea Johnson

How Much ABA Is Too Much? How Much Is Too Little? The Truth About Dosing ABA for Your Child

In this episode, I'm taking you inside a question that keeps so many parents up at night: how many hours of ABA does my child actually need, and who really decides? I open with a scene from a recent New York Times investigation, a little girl woken from her nap after exactly seven minutes because the clinic couldn't bill insurance while she slept, and I explain why stories like that reveal a system that has, in some places, started making financial decisions in place of clinical ones. I walk you through what the research actually shows about ABA dosage (the studies that found intensive 25 to 40 hour programs help some young children were real and important, but that finding got distorted into the idea that every autistic child needs as many hours as possible, which the science simply doesn't support), and more importantly, how the right number of hours should be determined for your child: their specific developmental needs, the behaviors affecting their safety and learning, and their age. I also share brand new research, an April 2026 study in the Journal of Personalized Medicine from Cortica and NYU, showing that the greatest growth across every developmental domain came from a more integrated, whole child model of care rather than from simply adding hours. And I tell you about Max, a little boy who came to me at three and a half on a required 40 hour per week program: not sleeping, melting down, and losing weight. Once we addressed his sleep, his nutrition, and his sensory needs and rebuilt his schedule around what his nervous system could actually handle, he became a different child, and on fewer hours than before. If you're weighing an ABA prescription right now, I'll give you the exact questions to ask, where the hours happen, the balance of center, home, and community, the ratio of individual to group, and whether there's still room in the week for your child to just be a child.

A Caregivers Guide to Sensory Processing and Autism: Understanding How your Child Sees the World with Christine Adintori

In this episode, I'm taking you inside something that shapes every single moment of your child's experience but is so often overlooked: sensory processing. If your child melts down at toothbrushing, covers their ears at certain sounds, seeks out spinning objects, or seems not to notice when they're hungry or hurt, this episode will give you a whole new way to understand what's actually happening. I'm joined by Christine Adintori, occupational therapist and Senior Manager of Clinical Excellence at Cortica, to walk through what the science says about how autistic children take in and make sense of the world. I walk you through the brain science behind the senses you've heard of and the ones you probably haven't (beyond the familiar five, there are three more, proprioception, vestibular, and interoception, that tell us where our body is in space, whether we're balanced, and what's happening inside us), and more importantly, what that means for how you can support your child every day. We get into why up to 97% of autistic individuals experience sensory differences, how those differences show up at every stage from infancy through adolescence, why sensory processing is now part of the diagnostic criteria for autism, and the single idea I want every parent to hold onto: all behavior is a response to sensory processing. When you ask what your child is experiencing, you get much closer to answering why they're doing what they're doing. Christine also shares real stories from her work, including a child who couldn't tolerate toothbrushing until they found the right kind of input, and a little girl who went from avoiding the whiteboard entirely to writing with confidence, and what those breakthroughs teach us about seeing the whole child.

Autism and Language: What Every Parent Needs to Know with Laura Bierck, SLP-BCBA

In this episode, I'm taking you inside one of the most misunderstood topics in autism: how speech and language actually develop. If your child isn't talking the way you expected, or speaks in scripts and echoes, or can read words but struggles to have a conversation, this episode will give you the framework you've been searching for. I'm joined by Laura Bierck, speech language pathologist, board certified behavior analyst, and our Senior Manager of Clinical Excellence at Cortica, to walk through what the science actually says about autistic communication. I walk you through the brain science that explains why so many autistic children process language differently (many have stronger visual brain networks than auditory ones, which is why some children can read words before they ever speak them), and more importantly, what that means for how you support your child every single day. We break down Gestalt language processing and the 2025 research showing up to 90% of autistic individuals use echolalia at some point, hyperlexia and the surprising power of written words, the simple 9-to-1 language shift that changes everything, and why AAC is never a last resort. This episode is for you if: your child communicates in ways that don't match the typical milestones chart, you've been told to "wait and see" but something in you wants to do more, or you simply want to understand how your child's brain is approaching language so you can meet them there. Throughout, I want you to remember this: communication is something we build with our children. When you shift from trying to pull language out of your child to creating opportunities for connection, everything changes.

Mental Health in Autism: Supporting the Whole Family

In this episode, I'm joined by Aqila Armstrong, licensed marriage and family therapist and Senior Manager of Counseling at Cortica, for a conversation we've been wanting to have for a long time: mental health in autism. For Mental Health Awareness Month, we go beyond the surface to talk about why mental health is so often overlooked in autism care, and why that needs to change. One 2021 study found that nearly 78% of autistic youth also have a mental health condition, most commonly depression, anxiety, ADHD, or behavioral challenges. And those conditions can affect a person's quality of life sometimes even more profoundly than the features of autism itself. I walk you through, alongside Aqila, why anxiety and depression are so common across the autistic lifespan: the biological factors like sleep and rumination, the mismatch with environment, social isolation, bullying, sensory overload, and the quiet exhaustion of masking. We break down how mental health distress can show up differently in autistic children, why irritability is so often misread as a "bad child," and how what gets labeled as noncompliance or PDA (now increasingly understood as a persistent drive for autonomy) often points to underlying anxiety. We also talk about which therapies work, what to look for in a neuro-affirming practitioner, and how to support the whole family, including siblings carrying a silent burden and the caregivers who are often holding more than anyone realizes. (Research shows parents of autistic youth have higher rates of PTSD than the general public.) This episode is for you if: you've ever wondered whether your child's behavior might be more than autism, you're a parent feeling stretched thin and unsure how to add one more thing to the schedule, you want to understand what neuro-affirming mental health support actually looks like, or you're a clinician, educator, or family member who wants to better support an autistic child or adult.

Medical Testing for Children with Autism

In this episode, I'm walking you through the essential medical tests that every parent of an autistic child should know about, and more importantly, how to decide which ones actually matter for your child. I cover five key areas of testing in autism: genetics, metabolic and nutritional health, brain function, gut health, and the immune system. For each one, I break down what the research says, what's clinically recommended, and how to think about whether it applies to your child. We start with genetic testing, including chromosomal microarray and fragile X, the two tests that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends as standard for every child diagnosed with autism, and I explain why genetic testing is not about blame or labeling but about understanding your child's biology. I walk through metabolic and nutritional screening, including why mitochondrial dysfunction, which some estimates suggest may affect a third or more of autistic individuals, deserves attention, and why common nutrient deficiencies like iron, vitamin D, and B12 can quietly affect learning, mood, and energy in ways that are easy to miss. I cover EEG and brain function, including how absence seizures can look like daydreaming and go undetected for years. I explain why gastrointestinal symptoms in autism are massively underdiagnosed, and how a child in chronic gut pain may not be able to tell you about it, showing it instead through irritability, aggression, or disrupted sleep. And I take you into the emerging science of immune involvement in autism, from maternal immune activation to neuroinflammation to folate receptor autoantibodies, a specific and testable mechanism where treatment with leucovorin has shown real promise. This episode is for you if: you've been told your child "has autism" but no one has walked you through the medical workup, you're unsure which tests are worth doing and which are noise, your child has symptoms like low energy, sleep problems, GI issues, or behavioral changes that no one has fully investigated, or you want a clear, science-backed framework for making informed decisions with your care team. Throughout, I want you to remember: medical testing on its own is not the goal. Understanding your child is the goal. Supporting their biology is the goal. Creating the conditions where they can feel well, learn, connect, and grow. That is the goal.