FASD Grows Up!

RED SHOES ROCK THANKS JUDITH KLEINFELD
FOR FOCUSING ON WHAT CAN GO RIGHT!

A compendium from parents and professionals of practical tools and strategies that can help alcohol-affected individuals and their families lead happier, more productive lives.

Judith Kleinfeld is founder and was the director of the Northern Studies program at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

She has published two early books with the University of Alaska Press on fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (referred historically as FAS/FAE)

Fantastic Antone Succeeds, with Siobhan Wescott, (1993) and Fantastic Antone Grows Up (2000) with Siobhan Wescott and Barbara Morse.

Fantastic Antone Grows Up is a field guide to life with an adolescent or young adult with fetal alcohol syndrome/effects.

Under the best of circumstances, adolescence is a trying time for young people and their families.

The budding adult seeks independence and autonomy while the resistant child within longs for protection and structure; questions about sexuality and work, social commitments, and solitary accomplishments loom large and can create a family battlefield.

For the challenged and the challenging young people with FASD, circumstances as they begin maturing can be even more difficult. Without minimizing the seriousness of FASD and the first priority prevention, Fantastic Antone Succeeds provides practical tools and strategies that can help alcohol-affected individuals and their families lead happier, more productive lives.

“This book provides a timely and important counterpoint to the gloom and doom that predominates in so many professional–and virtually all popular–sources that deal with fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) and fetal alcohol effects (FAE). . . . [It] gives realistic hope to those who have for too long been given virtually no encouragement in seeking better lives for such children.” (Addiction)

“This book is a gift to the many caring people who deserve the wisdom that is offered here.” (Winds of Change)

“Commonly as part of our treatment recommendations after we have evaluated a child, we include a recommendation for the family or caregivers to read Fantastic Antone Succeeds.” (Reader Comments)

“Fantastic Antone Succeeds is the first major step forward in helping parents and teachers to help the unfortunate victims of alcohol exposure in utero.” (Dr. Sterling Clarren, Director, Seattle Fetal Alcohol Program)

In this sequel to Fantastic Antone Succeeds young people with FASD and their caregivers report on their experiences coping with the problems of adolescence and young adulthood. Again the editors and authors have concentrated on the wisdom of practice as they candidly convey which techniques worked and which did not during the difficult passages of the teenage years and beyond.

The twenty-one chapters are grouped according to theme.

1. Section one discusses the meaning of success for adolescents and adults with FAS/E, and indeed the need to define success in new ways.
2. Section two discusses strategies that work in areas such as counseling, education, sexuality, trouble with the law, and independent living.
3. Section three covers what families need from the community, including innovative programs that help individuals with FASD and how to get a diagnosis at adolescence.

The book also contains lists of important resources, organizations to contact, and helpful internet sites.

More has been learned about how alcohol poisoning in the womb alters brain function and physical development, but science is far from providing the answers that affected young people and their caregivers need about everyday life with FAS/E. This is why voices of experience are so important–with their practical messages of coping, caring, loving, weeping, laughing, and–more often than might be expected–succeeding.

A fun sidenote:
Fairbanks Daily News has 975 articles containing information and news on Fetal Alcohol.

Books:

• 2012. The Frontier Romance University of Alaska Press 2003. Go For It: Finding Your Own Frontier Epicenter Press
• 2002. The Frontier Frame-of-Mind . Epicenter Press
• 2002. Nobody’s Perfect: The Kleinfeld Columns on the Psychology of Everyday Life. Vanessa Press
• 2000. Fantastic Antone Grows Up: Educating Adolescents and Adults with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. University of Alaska Press
• 1994. Gender Tales: Tensions in the Schools. New York: St. Martins Press. (with Sue Yerian).
• 1993. Fantastic Antone Succeeds: Experiences in Educating Children with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. (1993). (with Siobhan Wescott)

Journal articles:

• 2001. Using the Internet to Expose Junk Science: The MIT Study on the Status of Women. Society.
• Research featured in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Psychology Today, Chronicle of Higher Education, Education Week, U.S. News and World Report, Insight., The Atlantic Monthly and in columns by John Leo and Mona Charen.