I spent the first part of my professional life trying to wear the right clothes, say the right things and
do therapy the same way as the other therapists. As a clinical social worker, I felt a great deal of
pressure "not to rock the boat". Kansas City is a small town for a therapist who has her own ideas;
and believe me, if you work for a large agency, your ideas are not appreciated.

Then I became a mom~ which turned out to be both my biggest blessing and the greatest turning
point in my life.

My son was born with Autism; however, we did not know it until much later in his life.  In fact, alot
of things happened that I never planned on.  As our family grew in size, so did the number of
diagnosis assigned to my children and  grandchildren.  Now, years later, our dinner table is filled
with many wonderful people who collectively have a wide range of diagnosis including: ASD, Bi-
polar, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Attention Deficit Disorder, Tourette’s Disorder, Oppositional
Defiance Disorder and a few other disorders much too difficult to spell.  

I am not going to tell you that raising my family has been an easy journey.  Actually, it has been like
running a  50-mile marathon in high heels when I signed up for the 50-yard dash.  

I think I got through the baby “never-sleeping-throwing-up stage” pretty darn well.  I handled the
toddler “laugh-when-told-no-and-runaway stage” not too bad.  During the preschool “line-up-every-
toy in-the-house and-if-you-touch-it-I-will-meltdown stage” better than most.   However,
kindergarten was a little more challenging.  When the rest of the kids sat, my son stood.  When the
other kids stood, my son ran around the room. When the other kids went to lunch, my child refused
to eat, opting for doing back flips in his chair.  And when it was recess and the other kids finally ran
around and did back flips like they were supposed to, my child ate worms.  Yes, I definitely lost
some points that year.  

And then came first grade...  

This was the year that I stayed up late filling 25 party favor bags with tootsie pops, stickers and
matchbox cars.  My son was turning seven.  We had invited every child in his first grade class to his
birthday party.  I baked a strawberry cake and decorated it with a yellow smiling happy face.  The
tablecloth also had happy faces.  So did the napkins and the balloons and the party hats.  In fact,
lots of things in our house were covered with happy faces because our son was fascinated by the
concept.  He would draw row after row of little happy faces, all in different colors.  In fact, we had
enough happy faces to wallpaper our kitchen.  Nobody thought there was anything wrong with his
hobby, or if they did they never mentioned it to me.  I just assumed he was very passionate about
what he loved.  “A sign of creativity I told myself!”

“Is it my birthday?” he asked me, for the tenth time that day.  “Of course it is,” I answered.  I knew
that he knew it was his birthday because every seven year old child knows when it is their birthday.
He was just playing a game because he liked the attention.

“How do you know it is my birthday?” he asked.  “Because I was there the day you were born,” I
replied, with a chuckle.  

The party started at 1:00.  I waited for the doorbell to sound.  Silly me, I had forgotten to include the
RSVP part on the invitation so I wasn’t sure how many kids would be coming.  Soon 1:00 passed,
then 1:30.  I looked out the window at my van sitting by itself in the driveway.  At 2:00 I thumbed
through my desk drawer to find the extra invitation, just to make sure I had written down the right
date.  Sadly, I had.  

At 3:30 I sat rocking alone in a chair still staring at the clock.  My son sat at my feet drawing happy
faces. No one had come.  “Is it my birthday he asked?” as he looked up from his masterpiece.   This
time, I had to choke back the tears.  He wasn’t playing a game after all.  


For me, learning that my kids had various forms of  mental illness felt like a trick.  Years earlier,
when the doctor handed me my baby, I distinctly remember him saying that he was "healthy and
normal".  Then, like all new mothers, I frantically counted ten fingers and ten toes, just to make sure
he was right.  Throughout the years that followed, "normal" would become the standard explanation
from the doctors and therapists despite the fact that my kids' behaviors were often significantly
different from other children their age; because after all, " boys will be boys”.  

Then one day, BAM! My son was diagnosed with ADHD, followed by Bipolar and eventually
Asperger's.  It was the last thing I was expecting.  In the years that followed, I later learned that
mental illness was rampamt in my family and I was just the last to know. Being a therapist didn't
make it any easier to accept my parental reality, after all, these were my children and my
grandchildren we were talking about.  I was in pain and I felt very much alone.

If you or someone you love has mental illness, I don’t know how you handled it when you got the
diagnosis, but I fell apart.  I ate a gallon of rocky road ice-cream, watched old reruns of Little House
on the Prairie and went to bed for a week.

Getting the accurate diagnosis is seldom easy; it sure was not for us.  My kids all started with one
diagnosis, then moved into another as they got older, always accompanied by a medication change.  
I am not blaming our doctor. He was actually very good.  The diagnosis itself hid and made things
very unpredictable.

Once we finally had our kids diagnosed and medicated, we eagerly waited in line for services from
community providers.  But like us, these professionals  also struggled to manage the "meltdowns"
often caused from the accompaning diagnosis of mood disorder, OCD, ODD and ADHD.

That’s when my obsession with finding  better ways to get into the minds and hearts of children with
ASD started. I read scores of therapy journals, went to conferences and workshops and classes.  I
talked to professionals all over the United States and in Europe.  I started twisting and revising
therapy methods that had proven to be effective with other diagnosis, to meet the needs of the ASD
population.  I became OCD about how to teach social skills to kids with ASD.  My self prescribed
medication~ Hershey Kisses.

Then I packed up my agency of over twenty years (previously called Therapeutic Interventions For
Families, renamed it ASAP Expert Counseling and moved us all over to Kansas to focus on helping
children and adults with ASD.

You can find me, Dana,  at ASAP Expert Counseling Monday through Friday.  Sometimes when you
call, you may hear a meltdown in the background.  That noise will be one of my wonderful kids
dealing with the daily challenge of life.  Despite the roller coaster ride, I love my family very much
and I am so very grateful they are in my life.    

ASAP's therapists  are very special people.  They have put in countless hours training to be the best
clinicians in Kansas City, because your family deserves nothing less.

If you think we can help you~ then please call us today, because we truly care.
A Few Thoughts From
Our Director...
Dana Fitzer, LSCSW
ASAP Expert Counseling