Autism Testing in Charlottesville, Richmond, and Harrisonburg Virginia
Over the past years, we’ve sat down with a number of parents and adults to share—for the first time—that their child or they themselves were on the spectrum. Sometimes it’s surprising. How can my child have autism if no teachers have ever waved a flag at school? How can my child have autism if they talk with people? How can my child have autism if they’re not consistently in a corner and flapping their hands? How can I have autism if I’m a married and successful professional? As one woman recently said (and better than we could), “Sorry, but I don’t want to work up the courage to finally get assessed and then be told I can’t possibly have autism because I’m not a five-year-old Caucasian male who likes trains.”
Our understanding of autism is growing, and our assessment of autism is shifting. Our job and passion is this: providing a super-thorough evaluation. Not missing any details. And making sure this evaluation leads to both understanding and growth. This could be helping parents navigate supports at school, helping them shift routines at home, helping a college student access accommodations, helping an adult find balance at work and navigate accommodations there, or simply help a relationship or marriage become more sustainable.
Wesley Shelley & Associates
Offices in Charlottesville, Harrisonburg, & Richmond, VA
Autism testing for kids, teens, and adults
Autism testing includes a lot. For kids and teens, we start with a parent interview that’s often between one and one-and-a-half hours. It’s during this time that we clarify goals for the evaluation and what progress looks like, so that we can keep focused on this end goal. After this, there is the direct testing session with a child or teen–this usually lasts two hours. For adults, we combine these two meetings, so plan on three to four hours. It’s a lot, but being super-thorough is important for us. For adults, it’s important for us to hear from people who know them well: a friend, a parent, a spouse, even a counselor. Why? Because although we try our best to understand our clients, there is something to be said about a person who’s known you for years and years. That’s certainly longer than four hours! Because there is no single test for autism, it’s important to triangulate results. So, in addition to interviews and an interview-style assessment (like the MIGDAS or ADOS), we typically have clients and/or parents complete questionnaires.
Now, after everything is said and done, we forward you a report and set up a day and time to review results. For children and teens, we’re happy to offer informing sessions for them. To help them wrap their head around what all this means. And it’s at these meetings when we come up with a gameplan to move forward. What we don’t want to do is dump-truck our clients, as in “Here are two dozen recommendations for you, now good luck!” This is ridiculous. So, we talk through recommendations and–most importantly–we prioritize. We make sure that the plan moving forward is clear and do-able. No dump-trucking here.
Why choose us for autism testing?
We’ve worked in the field long enough to know this: not all evaluations are created equal. We have two simple goals. First, we go to great efforts to empower our clients with knowledge and understanding. That’s why we strive to make our reports clear, detailed, and also accessible. No psycho-babble jargon. After all, the more our clients understand about themselves and their brain, the more empowered they are. Our second goal is this: making this process personal. We’ve worked in enough systems to know that sometimes–oftentimes–evaluations can be rushed, and evaluations should NEVER be rushed. We value truly taking our time to understand each one of our clients–whether it’s a family with a little kid, a teenager who’s not so sure he even wants an evaluation, or a college student or adult who’s skated by for years. Evaluations shouldn’t be rushed, and we are a small business who values connection and relationship.
Also know this, I (Wes) do not believe in hiring psychologists. I do, however, believe in training psychologists. What I mean is this, the values that I have are the values that my staff have. And their passion and–more importantly–their skills, these are top notch. Because I have supervised each of them for over a year, because we check in regularly about serving clients well, we check in about doing better and being better. After all, in this world there is goodness and beauty in doing our job well, no matter the job. I see clients in Charlottesville, Rick primarily sees clients in Richmond, and Jess and Anna primarily see clients in Harrisonburg. For a bit more info about each of us, see our about page.
One more thing. We also leave space in our schedules to support families after the evaluation process. For kids, this could mean helping parents navigate support at school, whether this is 504 accommodations, Special Education, or similar. We can and do even attend school meetings with parents. Or, maybe this is tweaking how we parent kids who–let’s be honest–can be really challenging to parent. For teens and adults, there are times when we meet with them after testing–like setting up new rhythms and routines so that college starts to go better. We’re flexible, and not many of our clients and families have the same exact needs, but we’re here to listen and make sure they are supported for the long haul.
Recent Google Review
“We recently went through Wesley Shelley, Anna Weaver, to have our child tested for being on the spectrum and having anxiety. Anna met with us as parents first, followed by our child. During both sessions, she made us feel completely comfortable as we maneuvered through the questions, some of them emotionally difficult. Anna made our child feel affirmed in the struggles and feelings, so our child’s answers were sincere. The responses given by Anna were balanced between affirmation and hope. Following the diagnosis, our child has been through months of counseling with Anna that have provided significant understanding, clarity, and tools to move forward. We were looking for ways to understand how our child processes, followed by tools to move forward. All these expectations were met. Understanding the spectrum can be scary and intimidating, but working with this group has made this process manageable and hopeful. I highly recommend anyone with anxiety and autism (and more) to seek out the services of this group. They were also timely and responsive through the process.”
Costs and insurance for autism testing
Our current fee for an autism evaluation is $1,900.
Autism evaluations are investments. Most are literally four hours of face-to-face time. Add to that interviews with parents, teachers, sifting through all the data, writing the report, and taking time to review results with you—it’s a lot. And for kids we often set aside a time to review results with them, and in a way that they can understand. I have no doubt that you’d be able to find autism testing for less money, and I also have no doubt that you’d be able to find autism testing for more. But please know this, our fees are based on our core mission: to provide an excellent evaluation. This takes a lot more time than most, but we’ve heard from people time-and-again that it’s worth it.
Since we are an out-of-network provider, we do not accept insurance. Our services are considered self-pay. However, we are flexible, we do offer payment plans, and we gladly accept HSA and FSA cards. For more specific details, check out our fees page.
What Next?
Have more questions about autism testing? Or, ready to schedule an appointment? Use the link below to schedule a phone call, or send us a message here.