I have worked with children experiencing acute significant physical and verbal aggression, self-injury, elopement, property destruction, unsafe behavior, prolonged escalation, shutdown, refusal, and difficulty recovering after distress.

Much of this work has involved situations where behavior significantly affected safety, learning, relationships, participation, or a child’s ability to remain successfully engaged in home, school, or treatment environments. Working with children at this level of intensity has given me experience looking beyond the behavior itself to understand the patterns developing around it.

A significant portion of my career has involved supporting autistic children across a wide range of support needs, including children diagnosed across Autism Levels 1–3. I have also worked extensively with ADHD, developmental differences, learning disabilities, language and communication needs, executive-functioning challenges, and complex diagnostic profiles.

Many children I have supported have had multiple needs occurring at the same time, including anxiety, depression, PTSD, ODD, and significant regulation difficulties. Years of working within ABA have also shaped how I understand both its strengths and its limitations—particularly the importance of using behavioral principles in ways that account for communication, development, mental health, individual differences, and the context in which behavior occurs.

I have worked with children whose needs occur alongside trauma, attachment disruption, instability, loss, chronic stress, disrupted caregiving relationships, placement changes, and repeated crises.

This experience has required attention to how a child’s history may influence trust, felt safety, relationships with adults, responses to limits or expectations, need for control, and ability to regulate during stressful situations. It has also reinforced the importance of considering trauma and lived experience as part of the picture without assuming they are the sole explanation for behavior.

I have worked within urban and suburban public schools and residential education programs with children whose needs affected their ability to access education consistently. This has included school refusal, avoidance, shutdown, repeated removals or suspensions, shortened school days, difficulty entering or remaining in class, and behavior that significantly interfered with learning or participation.

My work has also involved reviewing and working with IEPs, evaluations, FBAs, behavior intervention plans, goals, accommodations, services, progress data, staffing, and educational programming. I have helped caregivers better understand school-based plans and records, identify questions to bring to the Team, and participate more confidently in conversations about their child’s needs and supports.

My work has included supporting children and caregivers navigating DCF involvement, foster care, adoption, kinship care, separated or divorced parents, changes in placement, and situations involving multiple adults in caregiving or decision-making roles.

These circumstances can create very different routines, expectations, relationships, resources, and perspectives around the same child. Working within these family systems has given me an understanding of how important it is to consider not only what a child may need, but also the realities of the caregivers and environments responsible for providing that support.