Child Proofing Home - What Is a Good Website for Products?

I agree with Kate the last person who responded. Onestepahead.com is great good luck in what you need.

We've bought a few things from One Step Ahead that we like - I'm not sure if they will have everything you need but they do have furniture brackets and lots of other things.

www.onestepahead.com

Hello S.. I have never dealt with a child with Autism, but I worked with adults with MR/DD. This is some of the things we did. Remove things he can harm himself with in his bedroom. If he is pulling the dressor over, nail or screw it to the wall, or take it away. One client had to use milk crates for his clothes. And the crates where secured to the walls. I really liked the idea of half a door. I would put the door nob on backwards so you could lock it from the outside if he is being destructive, or at night so you know he is safe; just make sure he doesn't have access to something in his room to use to climb over the door with :( Duct tape should help with outlets once he discovers how to pull the child proof ones out, which all children learn how to do.

HI S., I dont know of any good web sites to go on but I do have a son with Autism, he is 9 now. When we bought our house it took a week just to 'Devon-Proof' everything. We looked around for all the neat safety stuff but couldnt afford alot at the time. What we did was, we took his door off and my husband cut it in half...well just about 4 inches above the door knob. He actually did this to out daughters room too, she was 3 at the time, Devon was 4. We also took one of the parts of the door and sat it on its side and made a door between the kitche and the living rom, Devon LOVED watching eggs fall and break all over my kitchen floor. For the windows, we went to a scrap metal place and bought expanded metal for the windows in the kids rooms. Devon used to bang his head on the glass...he broke a few and Thank God he NEVER got cut! Oh and BTW your windows will have to open from the top and botton to be able to put expanded metal over the bottom half...if not the Fire Marshall will not e happy. We had to do it by the books...my dad is a Fire Fighter by profession. :) my husband also built a door for the front of our entertainment center. He made the frame out of 1x3's and used chicken wire( I know it sounds crazy but it looks good!)on the imside to cover everything but the TV screen. This way our son can still watch his DVDs and use the remote but he can not drag out all the DVDs and Playstation out into the floor. We also have the door knob covers iver the bthroom door, when he has to go potty, I hear his turning the safety knob and then I got open it for him so he can use the potty. Otherwise he would be in the shower all the time. He LOVES the water!!I hope some of this helps, if you have anything else you want to ask or just need to talk you can e-mail me at ____@____.com I have been where you are and I love meeting other moms that have chidren with autism, it is fun sometimes to compair notes and try to help each other out on things. Take care

B.

try One Step Ahead. I used them for everything and was very satisfied with their products.

I am right there with ya' sister! I look for locking mechanisms and security drvices everywhere I go to shop and it is really sad that there are not more gadgets for kids safety easily accessible. I just found this in a search:

securityworld.com

they have the magnetic tot locks like the pediatrician's office has. I was asking my husband where he thought we could get those. they seem much easier. I am tired of being locked out of literally everything around here including my own house and yard. ugh.

ikea has some nice cabinet locks that go around knobs. Our safety first ones have all broken and the oven lock that is on the website above actually pops apart if you pull on it hard enough- just fyi, but still a good deterrent and it makes a loud sound when it comes open (unlike the oven)

For things and areas you cannot lock you may want to consider motion detector alarms. I have a couple little ones from Radia Shack that take 9V batteries.

also please attend the 3rd Annual Autism Expo and have the nice police officers (I hope they are coming this year) take your children's photo and make you a kit. I never thought it would happen to me but my 5 yr old who has autism escaped out of the house and ran away. I was so upset I was lucky I could even tell them what color he was... They will put the pics in their database and be able to pull the photo up instantly (I think that is the way it works)

http://www.familieswithasd.org/expo.html

there are also GPS "watches" on plastic bands you can lock onto their wrist or ankle.

hope this has helped! D. in Dillonvale

Those are all good places to look for items that will help, sometimes you will need two methods on the places that you do not want him to get into, and you might consider a latch high on the bathroom door so that he cannot get in to play with the water unless you are there. Something we learned the hard way, make sure your sink has an overflow vent so that the sink drains if it gets too full, espcially on the second floor! At some point, he will leave it running with the stopper in, so if it can drain, you will not have as big a problem!

Most police departments like for you to fill out a form for them with all the information about children with disablities in thier area so that they know if a call comes in that your son has wandered away from home that they have to move quickly and how to help you, etc.

We had a very high latch on our doors to the outside. We also had luck with the magnets (but he will figure out how to use these if he can get his hands on the key) and with the plastic door knob covers that you have to squeeze very hard to get the door knob to work, most of our kids have poor hand strength, so this is usally effective.

Don't under estimate the usefulness of duct tape...sometimes low tech is all that will work! For us, a storage unit in the back yard was a life saver too, we put anything out there that was just too precious or too dangerous for us to take a chance on.

Good luck to you!

M.

S.
Check out my web site and read about Shaklee and the results you may find at least in safe and eco-friendly cleaning products not to mention what supplements can work for you. www.livingwithsolutions.com Feel free to give me a call.
S.

I receive a One Step Ahead magazine in the mail. Here are some sites for individuals with Autism.

____@____.com (1-888-984-5500)
Sensorytools.net (Genevieve Jereb)
NutritionandAutism.com
Autism-Symptoms-Yahoo Health (Healthwise.com)

Hope you find some good information on these sites. We thought my daughter might have Autism and these were great sites. We discovered she has Sensory Integration issues. I purchased the cd's of Genevieve Jereb's and like them for calming down my daughter when she gets overstimulated.

J. R

I LOVE One Step Ahead (onestepahead.com). I have 3 kids under age 6. I've bought everything from toys to clothes to strollers to childproofing stuff from them over the years. I've never been disappointed after purchasing. Their customer service is first rate, too. They have the largest selection of babyproofing stuff I've seen. They have many 'exclusive' items that can't be bought anywhere else.... appliance latches, oven guards, tv guards, things to hold furniture to walls, a variety of cabinet locks, large selection of gates, etc.