In the latest episode of Autism Labs, practical solutions for parents of severely or profoundly autistic individuals are shared. The podcast covers three key areas: bathroom hygiene, temperature control, and door security. For bathroom hygiene, the recommendation is “P Guard” from Amazon, which prevents urine leaks and odors. Temperature control is addressed through programmable thermostats, offering automatic adjustments for comfort. Door security solutions include “Deadbolt Secure” to prevent tampering. Additionally, the podcast explores programmable locks with individualized access codes and smartphone app tracking. These solutions aim to enhance hygiene, comfort, and safety for caregivers and individuals with autism, offering affordable and effective strategies for daily care.
Assistive Tech for Autism Solutions for Parents: Enhancing Safety, Comfort, and Hygiene
Welcome to another episode of Autism Labs. If you’ve been following us, you know this journey of raising a profoundly autistic child can be filled with both challenges and moments of unexpected joy. In our home, where our son is now 34, nonverbal, and living with seizures and pica behaviors, we’ve had to learn to navigate a world that’s not always accommodating of our needs. But over the years, we’ve found ways to make things just a little easier, a little more manageable—and technology has played a big role in that.
So today, I want to take you on a walk through some of the tech tools we’ve found most helpful. From solving bathroom hygiene issues to tackling safety concerns and temperature control, these are the tools that have made our daily routine smoother, safer, and more comfortable for everyone in our home
A Bathroom Battle: Solving the Hygiene Puzzle with the P Guard
Okay, let’s talk about bathroom stuff. I know most of you are nodding along already because, good lord, potty training with our kids? Absolute nightmare. When our son was little, we figured out pretty quickly that standing up to pee wasn’t gonna happen. His aim was… well, let’s just say the bathroom walls have seen things.
So we taught him to sit down. Problem solved, right? Ha! Nope. The pee would just leak out between the seat and the bowl, and holy crap, the smell. I swear we tried every cleaner known to mankind, but that nasty pee smell just wouldn’t quit.
We blew so much money on fancy toilet contraptions that promised to fix everything. Total waste. Then one day, I’m mindlessly scrolling through Amazon and see this stupid-simple plastic thing called a P Guard. It’s literally just a piece of plastic that sits between the toilet and the seat. It cost like ten bucks.
I figured what the hell, can’t make things worse. You guys… it was a freaking miracle. No more pee all over the floor. No more that ammonia smell hitting you in the face when you walk in. My son can do his business, and we don’t have to follow behind with hazmat gear anymore.
Seriously, out of all the specialized autism products we’ve dumped hundreds on, this cheap little piece of plastic from Amazon has been worth its weight in gold. Who knew?
Temperature Control: The Wonder of a Programmable Thermostat
So if your kid struggles with sensory stuff, you know the freaking temperature battles. It’s like, our son can’t tell us when he’s too hot, but oh boy, do we know it when he starts getting all worked up. And trying to keep everyone happy temperature-wise in our house? Nightmare. My husband likes it freezing, I’m always cold, and our son’s comfort is all over the map.
We finally caved and got one of those programmable thermostats. I was totally rolling my eyes at first, like ‘Yeah right, this magical $60 gadget is gonna solve our problems.’ But holy crap, it’s been a total game-changer.
We set that sucker up to cool things down in the morning when our son’s most likely to get overheated, warm it up a bit in the evening, and just let it do its thing overnight. No more of me getting up every five minutes to mess with the damn dial or my husband and I fighting about whether 68 or 72 is the ‘right’ temperature.
The best part? I installed it myself! Like me—the person who once called a plumber to change a showerhead. Took me maybe 30 minutes with YouTube. If you’ve got a kid who loses their mind when the temperature’s off, seriously, just do it. Sixty bucks to not have to think about this anymore? Total no-brainer.
Door Security: The Ever-Evolving Need for Safety
So, safety. Man, this has been a whole new headache as our kid’s gotten older. He’s always been a wanderer, but now that he’s bigger and stronger? It’s scary as hell. Especially when he gets agitated and starts messing with the locks.
I’ll never forget that night I woke up at like 3 AM for no reason and just had this gut feeling something was off. Went to check his room—empty. Found him outside in the backyard in his pajamas. I had a heart attack. Just standing there, totally calm, while I’m internally freaking the hell out thinking about what could’ve happened if he’d made it to the street.
After that, we got these things called Deadbolts Secure. Nothing fancy—just this little $20 plastic doohickey that clicks onto your deadbolt and keeps it from being turned. Simple as that. Our son still tries the door sometimes, but that cheap little piece of plastic has been the difference between a good night’s sleep and me sitting by his door all night.
Sometimes I feel kinda silly telling people about our “high-tech” safety system that’s basically glorified plastic. But honestly? It works better than all the expensive smart home crap we tried first. If you’ve got a kid who’s figured out locks, seriously, just get one. Best twenty bucks you’ll ever spend on your sanity.
Smart Door Locks: Adding Another Layer of Security
While the Deadbolts Secure was a game-changer, as we’ve embraced more technology, we’ve upgraded our security system with smart door locks. These locks allow us to control the entry and exit points remotely, giving us greater control over who’s coming and going, and when.
We can set up unique codes or thumbprints for each family member or caregiver, and the best part is we can track who’s entering and leaving through the smartphone app. This feature has been particularly helpful when our son is with a caregiver. I can check when they leave, making sure the door automatically locks behind them. No more wondering if the door was left unlocked or if he might wander out.
We invested in a system that cost around $150-$200, and while it required a bit of setup, it’s been completely worth it. The only hiccup was the Wi-Fi requirement—our home internet runs on 5 GHz, but the locks need 2.4 GHz. So, we bought a Wi-Fi extender to solve that problem, but that was a minor adjustment.
These smart locks are an extra layer of security and give us an unprecedented level of control. They’re perfect for families who need to ensure doors are locked securely and that their loved ones can’t wander without supervision.
Conclusion: Tech Can Make a Difference
Raising my son with severe autism comes with daily hurdles that can feel overwhelming. But we’ve discovered some simple home upgrades that have been game-changers for our family. Basic things like child-proof locks, temperature controls that I can set and forget, and secure door locks have transformed our house into a place where we all feel safer and more at ease.
We didn’t spend a fortune on any of this stuff – just made smart choices about what would help us the most. While these gadgets aren’t magic solutions, they’ve taken some weight off our shoulders and helped us worry less about the day-to-day challenges.
For other parents walking this path – I wanted to share what’s worked for us, hoping it might spark some ideas for your own home. I’ll be back with more real-life tips and tricks that have made a difference for our family.
Remember, there are so many of us figuring this out together. Sometimes even small changes can make life run a bit more smoothly.
Transcript
Mike Carr (00:05):
Welcome back to our second episode of Autism Labs, where we’re going to share a technology that’s worked for parents of severely or profoundly autistic individuals. Our son’s 34 years old. He’s nonverbal. He’s incontinent, he has seizures, he has pica behavior. Sometimes he has physically aggressive behavior. They’ll cover three areas today. The first has to do with bathroom hygiene, in particular, urine smell in the bathroom. Number two has to do with temperature control. The third thing has to do with door security, preventing him from opening a deadbolt lock. So let’s talk with the first one. Bathroom hygiene and the urine smell. So we found something on Amazon called P Guard. It’s a little plastic piece that fits between the seat of the toilet and the base of the toilet on the front. So when Michael sits down and when he was little, we trained him to go to the bathroom sitting down.
(01:02):
We didn’t want him standing up because he didn’t understand the aim for the water in the toilet. And so this P guard prevents the urine from going out of the crack, dribbling down, and sinking up the bathroom. Second solution has to do with programmable thermostats. This is about 60 bucks. I think you can program it by day for the entire week weekend, so it automatically adjusts the temperature, turns it up, turns it down, don’t have to worry about it. Highly recommended. We bought one that worked with the system we had, so all I had to do was snap it on the wall, reprogram it, and it was ready to go. The third has to do with deadbolts and basically entry and access within his area as well as outside. My wife, Kay found this little thing here on Amazon. It’s about 20 bucks. It’s called Deadbolts Secure, and there are other brands and it’s very easy to install and has this little clamp that comes over and it keeps him from flipping the lock back and forth.
(02:00):
Highly recommended. The last thing we’re playing with, and we’re still in the middle of doing this, so I’m not sure this is going to really be perfect for you guys just yet, but so far it’s been pretty cool for us is you get these programmable locks that go on the outside of your door. Every colleague can have a different code. So we’re just using their seven digit phone numbers, right? So they know their seven digit phone numbers, or you can program their thumbprint, unlocks the door when they leave with our son to go play basketball, whatever it is, the door automatically locks up to 30 seconds or a minute, whatever. It’s you can get an app that lets you on your smartphone, see a record of all this stuff, right? When are people arriving? When are they leaving? The one problem we had was it requires a 2.4 gigahertz internet.
(02:43):
Our home internet is five gigahertz, so we did have to buy another device. This thing from Wise, it’s basically a second wifi network that we’ve installed downstairs. I’ll share with you more next week how that’s gone. But I wanted to share with you today these three things which hopefully make your life simple, some of which are pretty cheap, right? P Guard, the programmable thermostat, 50, 60 bucks, and then the deadbolt cover, which is helped pretty well. Or the more fancy, more expensive. I think this one’s like 150, 200 bucks. You can get this on Amazon too. So best of luck to you and stay tuned next week for more goodies.
