W
hen Owen Essendrup was 18 months old, he was a typical little boy meeting all the major milestones. He was saying words like puppy and cat and mom and dad. But his mother, Anya Essendrup of Cosmos, said that changed shortly after his second birthday when he stopped talking. Totally stopped talking. “It was literally overnight,” Anya said. “I put him to bed on a Tuesday and he was talking and he woke up Wednesday and he said nothing.” Owen is now 3½ years old. He was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder about a year ago. “Owen is awesome,” said Anya. “He’s not verbal but he’s awesome.” The same can be said about 4-year-old Brody Hinderks. Jackie Hinderks of Renville said her son is a happy, smart, energetic little boy with a contagious laugh. He makes lots of sounds – but does not say a word. “He’s the noisiest, most talkative little boy for not being able to say anything,” said Jackie, who first had concerns about Brody’s development when he was 18 months old. He was diagnosed with autism when he was 2.
Preschool for autistic children
Owen and Brody are part of a group of seven children who currently attend a full-time preschool center in Willmar specifically designed for young children with autism. Called Nolan’s Place LLC, the center – which is for children 3 to 7 years of age – is open 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., five days a week, all year long. It opened at the end of June 2018 in the Skylark Center with the goal of mimicking a school but focusing on social and everyday skills rather than academics. Nolan’s Place is named after its first client, 6-year-old Jackie Hinderks and Brody, 4 Nolan Graves, a bubbly little boy who “loves to love people” but has difficulty expressing it, said his mother, Sallie Graves. Sallie said Nolan – like Owen – was developing on schedule and was saying typical, simple words until shortly after his second birthday. That’s when changes started to happen. “It was like a slow regression of Nolan fading into a world of autism,” said Sallie. Videos of Nolan as a young toddler document how he “slowly slipped into a fog,” she said.
No place to go
When Nolan was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder in October 2017, Sallie frantically began looking for a center that could provide therapy beyond the limited in-home services offered by local schools and county family service departments. She filled out lengthy applications – a total of about 500 pages – for a dozen autism centers for preschool-aged children. They were all in the metro area and they all had a yearlong wait list. Faced with that limited choice, Sallie said she and her husband, Ron, agreed that she would get an apartment in the Twin Cities and take Nolan to classes during the week. She and Nolan would return home to Prinsburg on the weekends to be with Ron and the couple’s younger son, Max. That’s when Jill Fellows – a therapist who had been
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coming to the Graves home twice a month – told Sallie that rather than disrupting the family to get Nolan services in the Twin Cities, the two women should instead open an autism learning center in Willmar. So – even though Sallie Graves, left, and Nolan, 6 they really didn’t know each other very well – Sallie and Jill said they knew there was a need for these services, felt the power of God’s hand in the plan and dove head-first into plans to open an autism learning center. “It was a huge leap of faith, but it never felt risky. It never felt uncomfortable,” said Jill. “It never felt … ” “ ... Like we wouldn’t be able to do it. That it wasn’t attainable,” said Sallie, finishing Jill’s sentence. Almost as soon as the doors of Nolan’s Place were opened, there were names on a waiting list.
Long commute
Melanie and Ryan Nelson of Willmar know all about the challenges of finding services for young children with autism. Their 5-year-old daughter Harper was 18 months old when they started noticing signs of autism. She had stopped talking and didn’t respond when her daddy called her name. After receiving an autism diagnosis when Harper was 2, Melanie said she and her husband made a commitment to help their daughter as much as they could by finding a place that provided comprehensive therapy. That meant attending a center in Eden Prairie – about two hours away from Willmar. They bought a house midway in Montrose where the family of four lived on weekdays. For two years, Ryan and the couple’s older son traveled every weekday from Montrose to Willmar for work and school while Melanie and Harper traveled to Eden Prairie for therapy and classes from 9 a.m. to noon, five days a week. They all returned to Montrose in the evenings for supper and sleeping. On weekends, they went to their home in Willmar. “We did a lot of driving,” said Melanie. That changed after they learned about Nolan’s Place. The family recently sold their house in Montrose and Harper began attending Nolan’s Place full time in April. Being “under one roof” has been good for the family and the full days of therapy have been beneficial for Harper, said Melanie. “It’s been great,” she said. “They’ve really gone above and beyond what we expected.” Within one week of attending Nolan’s Place, she said, Harper went to the bathroom by herself. “My jaw hit the floor,” said Melanie, who quickly messaged the news to her family. Although she’s also non-verbal, Harper can now identify which letter makes
Melanie Nelson and Harper, 5