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SUWS Wilderness Therapy For Aspergers
Feb 12, 2007, 19:29

The therapeutic camping experience of wilderness therapy helps children and teens with Asperger's Syndrome develop social skills and learn strategies to deal with frustration.

He has trouble making friends with kids his age.

She seems so uncoordinated.

He has a strange obsession with bugs.

She misses social cues and doesn't recognize it when her peers react negatively to her behavior.

Can these teens go camping?

Jeffrey Derry, MA LPC NCC, clinical director of the SUWS programs, believes so.

SUWS is an outdoor, short-term therapeutic program headquartered in Shoshone, Idaho, that has been serving struggling youth for over twenty-five years.

Derry believes that teens with Asperger Syndrome could benefit as well.

Asperger's disorder/syndrome is a fairly new and often misdiagnosed condition in adolescents and adults. Some of the common symptoms of this Disorder are marked impairments in the use of multiple nonverbal behaviors such as eye-to-eye gaze, facial expression, body postures, and gestures to regulate social interaction. In addition there is generally an inability to develop peer relationships appropriate to developmental age and restricted repetitive and stereotyped patterns of behavior, interests, and activities.

Teens with the disorder often have high IQs and become experts on one particular subject. However, what often causes them the most pain in life is their inability to connect with others. "Children/adults diagnosed with Asperger's disorder" often have to learn intellectually how to make eye contact, read body language and other social skills that come naturally to others.

Being different is particularly painful for teenagers, who notoriously care what their friends think about them. For Children diagnosed with Asperger's this is especially difficult due to how they view the world. Most Children diagnosed with Asperger's face exclusion and rejection, especially in mainstream schools. Most experts on the disorder believe that it is impossible for Children/adults diagnosed with Asperger's disorder to learn social skills and sensitivity to others in an ordinary high school classroom. If Children/adults diagnosed with Asperger's disorder receive one-on-one training and intervention, they can go on to lead productive adult lives.

Derry believes that time in the wilderness could "jump start" a new understanding of others and social relationships for these teens. SUWS teens camp and hike in small peer groups that always have no less than a 4 to 1 ratio student to trained wilderness staff. In addition each student is assigned to a field supervisor/therapist who sees him/her 3-8 hours each week. The 24 hour/ 7 day a week interactions with the staff, therapist and other students help create a nurturing and open environment. This way learning social skills becomes a natural part of enjoying the outdoors together.

Derry individually selects each group of campers in terms of the individual's needs, behaviors, and functioning level. With this level of selection the ability to create a small nurturing and supportive peer culture allows for the first time, an Asperger's disorder diagnosed student to be with a small group of friends who accept and like him or her as a real "camping buddy."

"The use of appropriate and often hand-selected peer interaction will help with delayed social development and self-esteem," he says.

He also explains that the counselors and therapist will use the latest techniques, such as Dialectical Behavior Therapy. This therapy helps people learn to better tolerate stress and interpersonal conflicts. The therapist also works extensively with the teens' parents and family helping to educate them on the process and to understand the condition. There is a long orientation process before any teen goes into the wilderness. Derry explains that he requires extensive testing of each teen before any wilderness experience to make sure "the diagnosis is solid and to develop a program individually structured to the age, sex and needs of the child."

SUWS enrolls teens ages 11 to 17 for a wilderness experience of four to nine weeks, depending on the individual's needs. Then the staff helps them successfully transition to a home setting or a therapeutic boarding school, if necessary.

To learn more about how SUWS works with teens with Asperger Syndrome visit www.suws.com or call 888.879.7897.