Many of the families that come to me have been told repeatedly their child wi...
or they're shocked by the diagnosis, within six months their child started talking.
“And what they really pointed out is in order to follow my recommendations, they had to leave their ego behind”
and trust that my recommendations would bring them the progress that they thought was impossible. Elissa Mendel is a certified speech-language pathologist, Autism Specialist, in founder of speech works by Elissa. She has over 30 years of experience helping non-verbal autistic children build communication and independence through parent-led strategies. I want to give a child the life that I was able to achieve. I want them to be able to talk
and live independently without struggles. It spans the goal, like a super high school, internet Elvis. Today Apple is going to reinvent the phone. It's not over, I'll tell how we're! The living your legacy podcast for those who live to leave a legacy.
Hello and welcome back to another episode, Saturday at Elissa and she is on a mission
to totally change help and disrupt an industry. Super amazing work she's got going on,
changing thousands of lives. I'm so excited to dive into today's episode. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much. So I know you're so focused and passionate about changing lives through the speech work you're doing and the business you've built to help people. If people don't know what that is, let's start that. Tell us a little about yourself and the business and how you help people. Sure, I'm Elissa Armando and I am a speech-language pathologist
in an expert in autism. I am also the creator of speech-work spy Elissa where I've taught out the most progressive techniques in the world, not just for my clients, but for myself. I'm late diagnosed and I guide parents of non-verbal autistic children and speech-laid children. How to teach their child and guide their child through developmental milestones in order to learn
“how to talk and live independently. It's so important because the general help out there is not”
enough information, not enough support, not enough help so you're trying to bridge that gap and give them the tools and the knowledge they need to optimize their life and the child's life and upbringing. Why is it that this was even needed? Why is there a lack of support out there?
Exactly. So many of the families that come to me have been told repeatedly their child will never talk
or they're shocked by the diagnosis and they have to go through a grieving process and get hope for their child and there are no services out there. It's very limited. It's hard for a parent to find those resources and I guide those parents so that they don't lose time. Once they get a diagnosis, they need to follow a different path of different journey that they thought they would have to follow and finding the resources and the professionals
“that they can trust to give them information and give their child a good life is very,”
very challenging for them and so I help them to do that as well as teach them skills. What are just an example for everyone listening? What are a few of the things you all really help and do and help provide and train them on? Well for speech, I specialize in motor planning and auditory processing and so anything that has to do with a muscle, you have so many muscle groups that coordinate for speech, you have muscles for speech breathing, you have the vocal cords,
you have the lip jaw and tongue and they only coordinate typical kids who learn how to coordinate their muscles through auditory feedback. For kids on the spectrum, they have different learning styles so they need visual prompts, tactile prompts, physical prompts to learn how to move those muscles. So I just don't target those muscles. I target bigger movements like gross and fine motor which we need to tire shoes, zip, brush our teeth, anything that is possibly needed. I also
help with special interests like playing a musical instrument which requires fine motor coordination.
Then also later developing skills like vocational skills, they might need to ...
thrive independently as an adult. What is an example of someone you can think of maybe where
“the parents were told this child's never going to speak, cry and they were distraught obviously”
in shock and then they came through your program and all your advice and implemented it and what was the end result? The end result is thriving, basically the latest family that I've helped, I just did an interview with them and I learned so much just from the interview but they
had in their mind that their child would never talk. And that was because of a medical professional
set down to them. Yes. And that they were had just before seeing me accepted that their child would be a baby for the rest of their life. And so within six months their child started talking and what they really pointed out is in order to follow my recommendations, they had to leave their ego behind and trust that my recommendations would bring them the progress that they thought was impossible. And how many children is this effect in getting a similar pattern where a doctor
diagnosed as they're now going to talk, it is what it is, you're enough to live with that and don't find you. Like how many people is this affecting yearly or in the world? Well we know that autism is being diagnosed more and more. There's a controversy on whether there is an increase in
“rise or if it's just professionals or getting better at diagnosing. And so right now I believe”
the CDC numbers are 136 and MIT did a study that by 2028 it will be one in two. Gosh and at what percent generally won't ever be able to talk? I believe that autism is a spectrum. So it's usually kids that need more support, that have more order planning difficulties. And is that where you specialize on those cases where they're generally being told
they'll never be able to. Yes that's where I specialize but I my specialties do hit every child
on the spectrum. And do you believe if everyone say every child on the planet that got diagnosed couldn't be told they couldn't talk and the parents came to you and went through the program
“do you believe from your experience and results a large portion would and that just because they're”
being told they won it's a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy right? The doctor says that's it you're not going to talk and then they just accepted and move on whereas actually a lot of them could maybe potentially actually break through with your program. Do you feel that it's a high percent that could actually help and support their child to talk? Yes that's the reason that I am pushing to make my product a household name because people are shocked that there is something out there
to help their child manipulate the muscles like motor planning if you think about the first time you
try to draw an end sport right? Exactly. It's a lot of repetition and practice but for these kids they need more repetition and more support maybe somebody next to them telling them exactly they need a physical trainer long term and that's basically what I am for parents. A trainer that's there 24/7 to answer questions and guide them. Time to figure out a way to put a camera on their head and your piece so I can be with them minute by minute throughout the day. And Juhing will be
more medical technologies evolving that can maybe support in it like you know now in the health space you have vibrating pads and muscle stimulation pads right? So do you see that coming into this industry and being able to provide a support that too? It already is and like I said I seek out the most progressive techniques I started doing that because I couldn't read them right so at age 28 when I became a speech language pathologist I sought out the most progressive programs and taught
myself throughout the last 30 years there have been so many progressive tools that prompt a muscle or there's a device that goes in the mouth and hooks up to the computer to give a child visual cues on where to put their tongue there's now infrared light that helps to improve executive functioning with a frontal lobe so there are so many techniques that are better and a lot of companies
Know that I search out the most progressive techniques and will contact me to...
system. So it's really for you now it's even during this a long time you have the the system
“sort of down obviously it's never 100% the human body is the human body you're not predict anything”
right but you know that you know what to kind of do when you sort of certain you know meet certain children and people and families and they're in certain situations so it's for you now a big part of it is getting out there right spreading the message and spreading the awareness so how do you plan to do that what are some things you're working on on the business side to really spread that awareness well for myself I've been in private practice for 30 years and I've
never had to market never have had to brand my approach was so unique that it just went through
word of mouth with a lot of high-profile clients all throughout the world and for the last decade I've been trying to figure out a way to get my approach out to more families I can only see a handful of
“clients within my private practice and my families have told me repeatedly you have to get this out”
it would be a travesty if you left this earth and nobody else uses a approach but the family is you're seeing right now and so for 30 years have been searching and then about three years ago Chrissy Morrell is one of my coaches also the team at ClickFunnels they have really helped me to learn how to create an online marketing program you as well thank you so much for your contribution and to reach more people learning marketing skills online marketing skills was a challenge for me as an
autistic adult I have unique learning style it's hard for everyone I mean no it is not in a room 120 people yes yes yes it is it's very challenging but I have to say click funnels what really embrace my needs I requested accommodations that I need to thrive and they really help me one-on-one and I am really grateful to be able to get my online coaching parent membership portal out there
and reach more families yeah you get different it's a great first step being out to create the online
side and then eventually branching into having trainers under your own certification because that's really you know how you can influence the world is obviously the online master class side and then get in your system out to a team that can then be all over the world right implement in this on the sort of on the ground right boots on the ground in each sitting country and continent yes I did see that and I mean it's so great what you're doing and helping in it and
it a lot of people say well their products change the light they look people's lives right it's one thing if you help someone lose weight it is life changing but this really it you know really
“is life changing so I think it's so great what are you know talking about life changing things”
what what does that mean to you that word legacy and changing lives and you know obviously I can kind of guess what you want to be known for and do but let's break it down I want to give a child the life that I was able to achieve I want them to be able to talk and live independently without struggles and empower parents to be able to give that to their child it's great and how many children you've helped so far
thousand is upon thousands and how many more do you want to help from if millions and billions I think every family deserves to have this information and you said one of us took out to me you know you said one in thirty six right now roughly predicted and you said that number's going to increase is that correct yeah well why is it going to increase is it more awareness and diagnosis of it or is it lifestyle and nutrition and effects in the womb that's increasing there's a lot of
different speculations on what the causes and why there's an increase but everything you just
named is being discussed now this past April was autism acceptance month and it was the first
time the whole world was really concentrated on it and aware of that specific month because are a FK in the middle of the month gave his speech yeah so I know there's controversy and I'm not political but I am happy that there is dialogue going going on at the government level and I feel like they're going to find more and more answers with diet, with nutrition, with that kind of change in the
Sport science world and I know there's a lot of things in nutrition you know ...
and stuff that's came into the western diet in the last forty fifty years has has linked back to
autism and a lot of different diseases and issues and birth defects and also it's right but I remember back in my nutrition days there was a lot of you know different dyes and additives and things being added so tuning that's one of the big reasons is that it's cases are increasing potentially
“it's because of the change in the diet in the last forty years I think it's a combination of”
everything there there seems to be a correlation between the immune system and children on the spectrum have a lower immune system so they a lot of the children on the spectrum they get sick more often in later life too do they yes got it yes and so nutrition obviously you know supplements and healthy foods are going to raise that immune system they've done research on vaccines they don't feel as though vaccines have cost autism but they feel because of the immune system
being a change in that they have a different vaccine as you create a vaccine you implement it
“but you don't see the effects of fifty years right right exactly yeah we saw that during COVID course”
on many previous vaccines you see the next generation you see a small percent right maybe one percent to three four that are now impacted because of them the vaccine and there's a strong correlation between genetics as well of course yeah of course good so last couple of
questions for you if people are wanting to support you which I hope everyone is so amazing what you're
doing and they want to find and learn more about you and maybe obviously they have a family member or no someone that could benefit from what you do where's the best place they learn more about this and become self-educated in the topic overall and how did they find you? Sure they can find me at speech works by ELISA that's SPECH works WRORKS by ELISA ELISSA.com we are working on your child can talk dot com so it's much easier but I'm on all platforms at speech works by ELISA and I also
am an influencer for adults at its ELISA Renee. Good love it well I hope everyone out there can show
some support love and obviously share and spread the work so amazing what you're doing I'm very
excited for your episode to talk about your story and everything you're doing and just as we finish today can you maybe tease a couple of things that people are going to learn from your episode that's coming out on your story a bit more. Sure I would love to share that I talked about the challenges when I grew up on diagnosed I wasn't diagnosed until I was 20. Yeah that's sort of tough it right then being you don't have a lot of support. And I was finally diagnosed going for my third masters degree
and it changed my life getting that diagnosis and it took me another 30 years to find the support I need to actually thrive. Well I'm excited for that episode and I'm sure that you know as inspiring as the work you do is I'm sure the story behind it is equally if not more inspiring
“too so excited for that to air and that's what we're all about here at the studios is these”
sort of stories and the entrepreneurial ventures like yours that changed the world and make a difference so super proud of what you're doing and excited for it all to come to to air and everyone out there checked around a supporter and thank you for coming on I'll see you guys soon take care. Thank you Rudy for helping me to make a difference in so many families lives. My pleasure take care guys.
