Towards the end of last year, I received a message from Wil Glaser on LinkedIn with a proposition. It was a simple one – revive MyABA and help autism families find ABA Therapists near them.
It appears simple, but there is soo much more…
After much discussion, we realized that even Google didn’t provide a user-friendly way to find ABA therapists at a local level. We also knew that autism families tend to reach out to others via sites like Facebook and LinkedIn in order to obtain recommendations.
You see, this website prior to its redesign was more of a collection of articles about ABA – with the hope of one day being a useful directory. Its initial design was a magazine-style website, showcasing articles. Suffice it to say, MyABA needed some work done with it in order for Autism families to use it as a resource.
I’ve been working over at Autisable for well over a decade, and in this time I’ve seen the challenges associated with families obtaining the right therapies, or even the right therapist. Not that parents are not trying, or that providers are not willing. But that parents are trying to navigate a part of the special needs community that isn’t entirely unified. After all, since autism is a spectrum of differences, each family and individual has to navigate their own specific path for their child.
ABA, along with Speech and Occupational Therapy, is the most common form of therapy promoted to autism families. However, of these therapies, ABA is often the only one that insurance companies will cover, depending on where you live. Choices available for families, therefore, are limited, and parents are often pushed into a direction that they are unsure of. Many parents who just received a diagnosis of autism for their child are told to dive into early intervention with ABA therapy, but they don’t really know what that means until they are knee-deep in it. MyABA aims to address this disconnect.
MyABA is here to help Autism Families learn more about ABA best practices, as well as find a provider.
At the time of this writing, we are just at the beginning of what will be a site where parents can easily locate an ABA provider. We’re still working on our directory and will be adding thousands of more providers soon. We’ll also be adding more features and resources.
For providers, having a listing in another directory is one thing, but having your listing in a directory that is promoted throughout an established online network of hundreds of bloggers and non-profits is entirely different. Parents need to know where they can find a provider, and MyABA is able to let them know.
We’re already partnering with several other businesses and organizations to promote MyABA and its directory. These businesses and organizations directly serve the autism community. So when articles are submitted to our site by providers in our directory, they will be seen by those parents and professionals who are wanting to learn more, or who need to find someone to help them.
… we’re just getting started, and I’m grateful to a great team of people in making this happen.
