DYADIC REPAIR: A CLINICAL APPROACH TO AUTISTIC RECOVERY AND PRODIGY RETRIEVAL

Authors

  • Rima Laibow, M.D. CORRESPONDENCE: Rima Laibow, M.D., Cerridwen, 13 Summit Terra.:e, Dobbs' Ferry, NY 10522 • Voice: 914-693-882 • FAX 914-693-8827.

Abstract

Clinical evidence with the group of autistic and autistic-like children treated through Dyadic Repair in this count!)' and in Europe suggests strongly that many, perhaps most, autisti.: persons are prodigies. It appears that autists are pefiOns gifted with prodigiously high intello..-rual and empathetic endowments who. early in their devdopmental lives, learn to use an overwhelming. pervasive withdrawal and rejection of the environment. &.:ause ofa combination of intrinsic and extrinsic fa<.'[ors (coincidence), these children remain in a position of extreme withdrawal and retreat with defidts which potentiate (and are potentiated by) pervasive and sadistic rage in the face of failed attachment. Appearing unreachable and out ofcontact with the environment they are. in fact, intensely conne<.'[ed to it. RegardJess of the pervasive and discouraging appearance of the neurological, metabolic and physical damage which may be present, the apparendy untreatable state of the autist must not he taken as conclusive proof of the unassailable nature of these disabilities. Rather. they may he potentially remediable deficits.

Author Biography

Rima Laibow, M.D., CORRESPONDENCE: Rima Laibow, M.D., Cerridwen, 13 Summit Terra.:e, Dobbs' Ferry, NY 10522 • Voice: 914-693-882 • FAX 914-693-8827.

References

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Since there are other therapies designed to encourage bodily contat.'t and tender embr.lIX, "Dyadic Repair~ provides a misleading picture of the therapy under discussion and will no longer be used to describe this modaliry. The essential aspect of the retrieval of seriously retreated individuals is not the physical relatedness of bodies, but the very repair of the dyad, I have chosen to refer to the therapeutic modaliry as «Dyadic Repair."

Because of the discrepancies inherent in the diagnostic process (over 150 diagnostic schema have been published fur autism), outcome studies invariably include methodologic difficulties. Loretta Bender fuund that. among psychotic children with LQ.'s of less than 70 by age 11. 87% were chronically institutionalized in adulthood. Sioce autistS are far more numerous in the low l.Q group than in the higher funl.'tioning one. substantially more than this pero:ntage of autistic individuals is chronically hospitalized. Later studies have shown similar results. See L. Bender, The Life Course of Schizophrenic Ll1i1dren, In Biologic Psychiatry 2 (1970). pp. 165-172.

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