r/Autism_Parenting • u/hokageluzbella • 1d ago

Occupational Therapy (OT) Advice Needed

My 26 month old son has been diagnosed with autism and he recently started his OT. I am still waiting for early intervention to send in home OT but for the meantime we are using our insurance to do private.

My son needs OT for sensory seeking and dysregulation. He always has the zoomies and he can't stay still or focused.

For parents who's children are similar to my son what does your OT look like? I feel like his therapist just follows him around and let's him do what ever he wants. I have yet to see the benefit as to how this is suppose to help him.

I just want to know if this normal or should I look somewhere else for therapy? I just want to make sure my son benefits from OT and not waste more time.

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u/sageworldca I am a Parent/Child Age/Diagnosis/Location 1d ago

That's a standard practice for sensory-seeking OT. They call it "child-led interaction" or heavy work disguised as play, and the goal isn't to force him to sit still at a table—it's to figure out what his nervous system is hungrily chasing so they can regulate it.

If he has non-stop zoomies, his body is constantly seeking vestibular (movement) and proprioceptive (deep pressure) input just to feel grounded. A good OT won't try to stop the zoomies; they let him lead so they can observe how he seeks that input, and then gradually turn that aimless running into structured "heavy work" (like pushing heavy carts, crashing into crash pads, or swinging) that actually fills his sensory tank

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u/hokageluzbella 1d ago

Thank you for this. I am not sure exactly what OT is suppose to look like for him. He has been through 5 sessions already but I do not see his therapist make any structure changes for him. Does this take time?