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THE SJ CHILDS SHOW
Looking for an inspiring podcast on education and parenting? Check out "The SJ Childs Show," ranked in the top 10% of podcasts globally. It covers diverse topics, including neurodiversity and inclusion, featuring interviews with experts and thought-provoking discussions. This show aims to challenge your beliefs and enhance your skills as a parent, educator, and global citizen. Tune in for unique insights and perspectives!
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THE SJ CHILDS SHOW
Episode 290- The Autism Hero Project: A Conversation with Tamika Lechee Morales
Join us as we welcome the remarkable Tamika Lechee Morales, founder of the Autism Hero Project. Born from her personal journey with her son's autism and ADHD diagnosis, Tamika's nonprofit has been a beacon of hope since 2015. Originally focusing on providing essential medical insurance in Illinois, the Autism Hero Project has grown to include educational scholarships, inclusive events, and first responder training. Tamika opens up about the raw and emotional process of accepting her son's diagnosis and shares how building a supportive community has been crucial.
We'll also tackle the real-life challenges and triumphs of raising a neurodiverse child. From transitioning between school stages to the importance of self-regulation and acceptance, we discuss it all. Hear firsthand about impactful initiatives like Autism Acceptance Week and practical strategies such as noise-canceling headphones for public outings. This episode is a heartfelt celebration of neurodiversity and underscores the necessity for empathy, understanding, and celebrating the unique qualities of autistic individuals. Don't miss this powerful conversation!
Welcome to the SJ Child Show, where a little bit of knowledge can turn fear into understanding.
Speaker 1:Enjoy the show. Here we are. We have some guests. I'm guessing is it SJ Childs in the back. If she gives us the thumbs up, you know we're going to bring Sarah to save us Hi.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm so excited to see you guys. We're excited to see you too. Oh, it's so cool. I can't wait to come and see you in person. Yeah, maybe next year SJ Child's Tour.
Speaker 1:SJ Child's Tour Coming to Pittsburgh 2025.
Speaker 2:We'll just start saying it and then she's going to be like darn it, now I have to. Now, right? No, and I wish I would have thought of this earlier. I kind of laughed in my head that I should have sent you guys I Know Sarah shirts, because I have this joke with Phil and he was asking people I want to come visit this state this day. And then I knew a bunch of people and I was like Phil, you should just wear an I Know Sarah shirt and then you can connect with everyone. I love that. I love that they worn it. I Know Sarah, yay.
Speaker 1:Is Sarah pronounced like the A-H in Utah?
Speaker 2:Oh, there's no H needed, no extra letter needed here. Thank you very much. Raw Extra, no extra needed.
Speaker 2:I was trying to make a Utah joke, well, and I'm excited I have a wonderful guest that I brought today. Uh, well, and I'm excited, I have a wonderful guest that I brought today and she's doing amazing things in that wonderful you know niche that I like to speak on and that's the autistic community. So, uh, you're gonna love her. She's doing amazing things and helping thousands, maybe millions of families. Who knows? It's just the things and the people we meet.
Speaker 1:We just spent 10 minutes plugging your event and I see the banner behind you, the one in 36 mix virtual autism summit. I know that comes out. Is that August, every August? Is that when you're usually?
Speaker 2:doing that. You know, Jeff, I can't even believe I did it without you. I mean, it was heartbreaking in a way. At the same time it was wonderful. But we did have a couple of days. But I got a really great review afterwards because there were a couple technical things and they said, not even technical difficulties could let the fabulous Sarah not put on a show. And I was like, oh, thank you.
Speaker 3:That's amazing.
Speaker 1:And is the guest backstage? Is there another guest? She's ready. Get the thumbs up, Carolyn.
Speaker 2:Oh, there we go. Give a thumbs up, Tamika.
Speaker 3:I was born ready.
Speaker 1:Well, welcome to the podcast theater inadooty on Corbett Street in downtown Tarentum. We're so glad to have the SJ Child Show. We're going to go ahead and when we wrap up here, we're going to put up your speaker card and we'll get off stage and then when we come back, you're free to start. We'll have a nice clean edit for you whenever we go to cut this all up.
Speaker 3:Love it. Thanks guys.
Speaker 1:Welcome everybody. It's the SJ Child.
Speaker 2:Show. Let's go to that speaker card. Hello, oh, thank you so much for joining me here today, especially the audience and the viewers, but and my incredible guest, who this is our time, first time getting together like this, and I always find that this is my favorite way to meet someone and connect to someone is that authentic, organic, getting to know you session kind of kind of thing. So thank you I'm.
Speaker 3:We've been wanting to do this for I don't know how many years now, but we we finally have made it happen, so I'm excited yes, chase each other down just at the right moment.
Speaker 2:love it well. I'm sj child sarah bradford. I host the SJ Child Show podcast, where I talk about and speak to neurodiverse individuals and families, experts all sorts, and we dive into the world of neurodiversity, education, parenting. And today I have a really special guest. This is Tamika, and I've been following her journey, like she said, for a few years now as well, and it's always amazing when you are able to connect with people in the same space and feel that, just like you said, you were born ready. You have this passion, this drive. Let us get to know more about you and get to know you better. Please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about why you're here today.
Speaker 3:Okay, so my name is Tamika Lachey Morales and I run an amazing nonprofit organization After my own heart. I always say it's called the Autism Hero Project, and the genesis behind it was my autistic son. Back in 2015, june 4th 2015, you know, you never forget those important dates my son was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder and ADHD and two years later, when I kind of say that I got to all the level and stages of grief, I came into acceptance and I started a nonprofit and the Autism Hero Project does so many great things. We started out in OnePillar, which was purchasing medical insurance for children on the autism spectrum, because we started at first in the state of Illinois and unfortunately, back then the state of Illinois didn't basically give families on Medicaid access to autism therapies, specifically applied behavior analysis, aba therapy and I just thought it was honestly criminal that you know every children's journal, every doctor, every psychologist, everyone is saying you know these are the therapies your child needs, this is the gold standard therapy. But you know I was fortunate I had a job, medical insurance that covered it, but so many families didn't and you know, so it was a barrier and so we decided to be that financial bridge to cover, you know, children on the autism spectrum who didn't have access to all the therapies that we believe they needed to thrive and strive and reach their full potential.
Speaker 3:We have expanded so much where, a couple years back, we started doing education scholarships, because we know that autistic children are going to become autistic adults and we know that there's this huge cliff at the age of 22 where there's such a lack of services out there, and so we started giving out education scholarships that are not just for university, because we know not all of our children thrive in, you know, the college bound but they have, you know, whether it's culinary or vocational or cybersecurity, or there's so many other lanes. You know arts and theater that our children really you know hyper focus and do amazing things, and so we didn't want to limit it to just university. So these higher education grants are just for any adult who's looking to honestly find a talent or hone in on something that they love, a passion that they have, and be able to close that unemployment gap that our autistic you know families have, where it's 80 to 85% of underemployment or unemployment rates, for you know our autistic individuals, and so we wanted to help close that gap and we do a whole lot of inclusive events, raise a whole lot of autism awareness. We believe you should be able to come as you are, whether that's theater, shows. So we, you know, we honestly sponsor sensory theater.
Speaker 3:We sponsor basketball Windy City Bulls out of Chicago. Obviously. We, you know baseball games, sports events, holiday events, inclusive events. And then over the last four years almost five now we've also been sponsoring first responder training and that has become a huge pillar of ours paying to sponsor police departments and hospitals and fire departments to get trained on how to deal with our population and deescalate and prevent crises, and so yeah, so we've done a lot in seven years, lots of projects and so many families impacted by all of these efforts put in.
Speaker 2:You know, it really all does start with that experience that you have at home, and you see that struggle that you're having, and you know that other families don't even know how to look for help or how to ask for help, and it's heartbreaking to think that, and that's why I love that we're both doing these amazing community service projects, if you will, to really just help like not only help the community, raise their awareness, but help create a place that we can send our children to someday.
Speaker 2:100% Right, and that really embodies the special kind of like perception that you need to have to be with them, and I think that that's important to kind of clarify for people is that it all comes down to your perception like where are you going to give in your heart, your mind, whatever the space to learn more, become more educated and more um, like you said it, it takes time to to take that acceptance, um journey and um it comes. It comes with so many ups and downs, and there is nothing better, though, than finding a community, finding your community. What did you? There must be some kind of like inspiration, or where did you maybe find some community that helped you understand you were not alone. I know I didn't. I didn't mean to bring the tissue box people.
Speaker 3:But you know it's funny, my vice president and I we just released a video at our gala. Every year we I kind of I produced this documentary of like where we're at and what we've been able to accomplish in the year. And it's funny because we immediately talked about like when we got our diagnosis and so she was fortunate that she had a lot of friends that had children on the spectrum, so she immediately had a village like she had her tribe and that's so important right when I honestly only knew one person and that one person didn't even live in the same state, who was a friend of mine, but she was the first person I called eventually when I could talk, right, and so I actually I created my village. That's really what I did. And it's funny because we were just talking about this story, because I wrote a book.
Speaker 3:I've written a few book, you know kind of writings in this space and this is my last book, called For the Love of Autism, and it has Dr Temple Grandin, it has Dr Carrie Magro, eileen Lam, andrew Arbo, it has all these famous autistic influencers and but what's funny is my tribe was immediately my closest friends and it took me almost two years to tell our family that we had an autistic child, like about closest friends. And it took me to almost two years to tell our family that we had an autistic child, like about the diagnosis, and it took me you know that's almost that long to even tell my closest friends. I just, I just couldn't like talk about it, like without getting so emotional. And so we were just laughing because we started a book club with this with our church group and we were just kind of recounting the story, how she was telling them that it was that the way that we all, that they had all found out was because I put a PowerPoint presentation together. That's like the teacher in me, because I am, I'm a teacher, I'm an entrepreneur, but I put this PowerPoint presentation together because I figured it took me so long to wrap my head around it that I didn't want them to take two years to do that presentation I talked about, you know the data, the prevalence, you know how, you know what are the symptoms, the signs, what they believe the research shows, but really how to support you know my legendary kid and myself, and it was such an emotional like all of us were all together and they became my immediate tribe. They were the first ones that and none of them had an autistic child.
Speaker 3:But I was taking classes that night because I was in the middle of beyond my master's degree and doing all this stuff, and they would babysit, they were just like everything to me and then eventually, through my son's therapies, they had support groups. Eventually, through my son's therapies, they had support groups and then I would go to them and honestly, in the beginning I was like, ok, it was amazing to hear, like obviously, where my child was and you know what I could expect. But at the same time it actually was killing my soul to hear some of these stories that I could only take so much right, because I'm taking on my own stuff. But then, you know, I felt like an empath and I was taking on their stuff and I wanted to help everybody and it was like like my husband is like Tamika, this is very unhealthy for you, like I just couldn't. I just couldn't like be all things to all people and my own self-care was kind of going out the window and and eventually, you know, we I kind of build my, my community through the Autism Hero Project.
Speaker 3:The more stuff we did, the more families came and they shared theirs and we, honestly, the beauty about our nonprofit is that so many of our families have become our closest friends. Yeah, and we know that we can call each other and you know we can be there for one another and we can. You know, like our latest video, one of the moms say you know, you call one of them up and we're like immediately, do you need tequila? Do we need to go beat somebody up?
Speaker 2:Like, do we just need to go get some nanny patties, Like what?
Speaker 3:do we need to go? Do you know?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I love that. It really is so important that you and you know kind of that. You and you know kind of, as you had said. It's like this isolating journey.
Speaker 2:At the very beginning I was really lucky. My husband had a sister with Down syndrome, so he had already grown up in this like special mind space, this way to treat special, you know, people with with Down syndrome and on autism, and so that was nice. I mean, he didn't know, obviously, how to be a dad to an autistic son, so that was to. It takes just a journey of trial and error and living. But what a beautiful journey it's become.
Speaker 2:And since then, you know, our whole family has received our, our diagnoses and we understand that we're all on the spectrum in our family and that really brought us close together, closer than I could have ever imagined or expected, especially with my husband, when we both kind of were able to say, wow, this 20 year friendship is just even more than that. It is this like a meeting of minds that just was meant to be and I feel that way about like, about you and about the connections that I find like kindred spirits. You know, we all go through this journey and while we're at this process, it feels so lonely and so scary and so sad, and it's not until some years later, when we can reflect and when we meet people like each other that we're like oh yes, this is it.
Speaker 3:That's exactly what I wrote about when we wrote about For the Love of Autism. I mean, these are honest, raw stories from autistics parents, mothers, fathers because there's such a lack of men speaking about their, you know, journey and how they're navigating this for themselves. But you know sibling stories. I mean we have it all in here Autistic interpretations. They have such an amazing following and they're just so amazing to to Jesse, jessica, their daughter and sister, daughter and sister. And so it's just been, honestly it's.
Speaker 3:I always say that, like because we're so busy, focused, like as a, as a system, right, and there's so much systematic change that needs to happen, but because people are just so focused on the milestones and the perceived timelines that people should meet these milestones, right, the fact is that there is so much beauty in autism but we're so focused in what the world has deemed as deficiencies, right, these timelines, versus you know that I think they're just not living in the present to see and feel the beauty of what is right in front of their eyes.
Speaker 3:And it's funny because when you look at neurotypicals and you see all the movies and you see all these social, you know influencers on social media, and you see all these people and everybody's trying to do everything possible to stand out, right, yeah, to be unique and to be different. And yet our own children don't even need to do that. They're just, you know, different that way, and yet they just want to fit in and they don't want to be standing out. It's like the whole opposite and I'm like you know why? Fit in when you can stand out, right, and it's like you don't need to change. It's not you, my love, who needs to change. It's not you.
Speaker 2:I love that. In fact, I do these daily today's missions on my Facebook page every day that just kind of give everyone a little bit of quote of a day to try to live by.
Speaker 2:I see them every day I say I love it, I love it. The other day, I think, you know, be yourself, they'll adjust Just. And the other day, I think was you know, be yourself, they'll adjust, just be you, they'll adjust Absolutely, and that's it. That's just it. And you know, I think we all through experience kinds of of feats, then we support them in the best way we can, by supporting their strengths, by, you know, lifting them up, by their, um, love of what they, what they love to do, what, what are some things, some joy, if, if we can, if you don't mind talking about your son a little bit. What are some things that he loves? What are his special interests?
Speaker 3:So I have to say Legend is really funny, like sarcastically funny, and just he, just he loves you know he's a YouTube freak, right, so he loves YouTube. You know the typical things that boys his age teenagers, early teenagers like they like you know gaming and they like YouTube, and you know he's really no different in that aspect we just have to kind of control how many hours but he's really funny and he's constantly coming up with these dry, dry jokes that you know I find really funny and we're a very sarcastic family. I'm from New York, my husband's from Boston, and so we are just sarcastic by nature and he's also very like sarcastically funny. Obviously, you know timing is really important and so he'll be very sarcastic with a teacher or with another student and it's like, oh, we got to teach you when that's appropriate and when not appropriate. But he's just trying to always be funny and I think that's just a beautiful trait that he has.
Speaker 3:I mean, you know his journey is hard in the sense that you know the spectrum is so wide, right, and so he has what we would consider an invisible disability, right, like if, to look at him, you know you wouldn't necessarily know it would be like his, you know talking to himself because he's huge echolalia right. You know the vocalizations, the repeating right or him singing to himself or him incorporating himself in some of his scripting right and stuff like that. So you wouldn't at first really notice it, but after you know, if you observe you will right. But you know it's things that he's in. He just started high school this year. Middle school um, am I allowed to swear like?
Speaker 3:yeah, right right, um, and I'm an educator, so middle school was really bad. Like it was hard, like there was a lot of bullying and a lot of unnecessary. Like just I wanted to go down to the school and beat some asses, like that's how bad it is.
Speaker 3:And so and they just couldn't appreciate. You know that's how he self-regulates, right. And so it's that like just teaching others that you know what he's not bothering you Like you know, like you can still befriend him Like it's it's not, you know. So it's just that. And I think you know, the earlier we can educate children, that's kind of like why I wrote a law in the state of Illinois. As an educator, you know, before we take a you know a day off for a holiday, whether it's, you know, veterans Day, or you know Day or Christmas, like we teach around those holidays.
Speaker 3:And so I wrote a law that passed in the state of Illinois making you know April, the first week of April, autism Acceptance Week. And we did that purposefully because then it forces, you know, school districts and businesses and organizations to teach about acceptance and inclusion. And you know my whole idea behind it was we got to teach about acceptance and inclusion. And you know my whole idea behind it was we got to teach our youth now because they really are our future right, and if they can learn about how to be compassionate, empathetic, how they can, you know, make friends with someone who's neuro, you know, diverse than themselves, then you know it's going to make for a much more accepting world, and it won't seem like such a you know nuance to see someone who is maybe talking to themselves or flapping their hands, or walking on their tippy toes and talking, or you know, just these these things that some of our autistic children do, and so you know yeah, you know it's so interesting because I have this situation that happened over the last probably three years.
Speaker 2:I think about three years ago I ordered a bunch of noise-canceling headphones and we sent some off to like an event that was in town and then we kept some and everywhere we go, my son loves to wear them. He loves to wear his headphones, and I didn't realize it until maybe a few times in. But we get a different response from people when he's wearing his headphones. When he wasn't wearing them, I'd often get the look of you know what the heck and whatever else is going on. But when he has his headphones on, I can see this going on, but when he has, his headphones on.
Speaker 3:I can see this softness in people.
Speaker 2:I can see this better. Yeah, exactly, it's exactly. It's an identifier, and you know there were times where my husband and I struggled with well, do we need to get him a vest that says I'm autistic? Please be kind? Do we need to like? And we, the same way you did, came up with, all of you know, these books and safety kits and all of these things that we implemented in our own community, and just for that same reason, we want to just be at the store, having a grocery store, without having to explain why we are who we are. We're just people walking down the aisle, why we are who we are. We're just people walking down the aisle Like why do we need to explain what kind of behavior we're having that you don't understand?
Speaker 3:You know, some of our children don't want to be a walking billboard. Just why don't you just show kindness? Yes, I don't have to have a label for you to be kind or for you to look at me. All of a sudden it's a double edged sword, isn't it? It really is. It's like, yeah, it really is. And it's hard because you know some people you know will wear their, you know will proudly speak up and self-advocate. But then there are some who you know they don't want to do that and it's their prerogative. They're the autistic, they can make whatever decision they want. But I kind of agree. Like they shouldn't have to be a walking billboard for you to show kindness, right. Like that should just be intrinsically as a society. It doesn't cost anything to be nice, a human law. It's the benefit of a doubt, you know, yeah.
Speaker 2:It just doesn't, it's the benefit of a doubt. You know, yeah, it just doesn't Absolutely. And you know, you and I know, especially with your education background and things like that, that you know right now, one in 36 is the number of diagnosed autistics in the United States, of children that are diagnosed. Now, those numbers don't include, let's be real, undiagnosed, obviously underdiagnosed, underserved communities, females so many In your opinion and people. This is not fact data or anything you need to take. But what do you think the numbers are closer to? Dr Anneke Vandenbroek?
Speaker 3:So you know, I've actually so that they used to, you know, have as autism to this big spectrum, right, and we know that autism doesn't come alone, right? Most of the time autism has another co-occurring comorbidity, now known as co-occurrings that come along with it, and so autism really does. You know, they say, as they say, if you've met one child with autism, you've done exactly that, you've met one child with autism. Because it really does manifest differently in every individual because of these other co-occurrings, right, whether it's, like in my son's case, autism and ADHD, autism and epilepsy, autism and apraxia, autism and OCD, autism and sensory, just you know, processing disorder, like there's. So some people have two and three diagnosis, right, yeah, and so it's, it's really hard.
Speaker 3:And then I know that there's this fight within the community which really gets me you know, really even outraged, because instead of us coming together, you know, to raise awareness together to get our needs met together between employment and housing and disability, you know, and accessibility and medical and all this other stuff we're fighting with each other about within the community that we shouldn't be doing that. You know about whether you know high support needs versus you know less support needs and how. You know. Just, you know they don't want autism to be called a disability, but it is a disability and disability should not be a shameful word and it should not be a bad word, cause it's not. It's, you know, the environment that disables people, it's not them themselves, you know. So I feel very strongly about this and I very strongly about this. And so I just feel like it's hard for me to answer that question, because I'm number one, I'm obviously not a medical professional. But I will say that we know that the numbers are not exact. Yeah, because there's people who still don't even have access to a diagnosis, or they're waiting one and two years on a wait list, or they don't have the financial means right. So the numbers are definitely not completely accurate.
Speaker 3:But then, on the flip side, sarah, there are people who are self-diagnosing themselves and A? A because maybe they don't have access or because of their, you know, for their parents it may have been a taboo, or they just weren't educated. You know they're so culturally I'm latina, that's very cultural, right, there's a lot of things right. But I think, too, some people are self-diagnosing themselves who are not autistic, and that's just, you know.
Speaker 3:I'm just going to be honest, like you, and so, as someone who has worked with ADOS, which is the instrument right, and who has worked with cards and all these, you know, tools in the field that I was in and who had taught so many, worked with so many classes on this, like you know, you're not a mod five, which is the adult testing, as much as you say you are. You're not. So I think you know you're not a mod five, which is the adult testing, as much as you say you are. You're not. So I think you know. I think it's hard for me to say that and I will speak as a non-medical professional.
Speaker 1:I just want to be honest.
Speaker 3:You know, I see so many people who we know are are not diagnosed. And then we see people who claim that they are, that we know for a fact that they're not.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's really interesting, wow, and I guess, with a lot of exposure to the community itself and to the families and things, and you would get that perception and view of that, that some that somebody don't. Well, I think we have like three minutes left and I'm excited to hear about what's to come and I mean, I know obviously you're taking this all the way to Congresses and Senates and things and everywhere it needs to be. What is Autism Heroes Project next step that we can check out?
Speaker 3:So I'm excited because we have a first responder documentary that I just produced and we're going to release it. I believe the date is November 16th. It's going to be a public viewing with legislation in the room, police chief, angel sense, police officers who have autistic children, who are in this documentary. And we're going to really work to mandate um. You know certain states already have mandated autism training, but we want to make this documentary part of um police officer school, like the academy where, before they even get out on the street, that they understand what good policing and the signs to identify autism to avoid what could be the worst scenario which we've seen so much of that just this year alone and following what's going on in the community, and this is something that's very important to us. So we're working with legislation and we're going to make mandated and you know we start in one state and then we we take it across the nation and then later this year November is my birthday month and the audio book for For the Love of Autism, you know, with a lot of the authors who have recorded their own chapters, oh wow, and you can find the book right now on Amazon, and then the audio book will be coming out soon too.
Speaker 3:So a lot of great things that we're doing. I would invite everybody to go to autismheroprojectorg to kind of learn more about us, get involved. We have social media. We have like 70, almost 75,000 followers on Facebook. We're on LinkedIn, instagram, tiktok, youtube. Subscribe to our channel. You can watch some of the most amazing videos about the work that we do. The documentary for first responders won't be up there until November, after we unveil it publicly, but at least you'll get to know what we do in the community, and we're expanding, so I'd love that.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you so so much for being my guest today, tamika, and, like she said, please go to autismheroprojectsorg. You can also go to sjchildsorg to go find out more information about me and connect with us both, hi guys.
Speaker 1:Hello, why? How are you? All of us on the same stage, I know.
Speaker 2:I'm giving you all a big hug. If you could just huddle together so that I could just hug you all at once for a quick virtual hug, I love it.
Speaker 3:I have a background in theater. I did a lot of acting and plays and playwriting, so I love what you've done. Just to let you know.
Speaker 1:I love it. Thank you. Next time you're in Pennsylvania, I'll send you the address to go and visit a theater. I love it. We have more live events from the theater. Yeah, so that's what we're aiming for. Sarah's going to come next year.
Speaker 2:Did you hear that Uh-huh. Everyone holding me accountable. Oh, I love it.
Speaker 1:And Maria, oh, go ahead.
Speaker 2:You probably, you probably Maria and wise are also, um, you know, part of the community, the autism community, and are so close um to me and have been such great support and wonderful friends. And thank you guys so much. And Jeff is, I can't even tell you Jeff's been so great. He's. He's helped me put on four of my five autism events that I've held, live summits, and we've just all together have created so much awareness, so much education. So pack us all on the back. Good job everyone. That's the.
Speaker 1:Sarah, sarah, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 2:Love you guys.
Speaker 1:You have to keep the show moving.
Speaker 2:Our next backstage.
Speaker 1:Bye, sarah, we'll see you.
