Author name: Ahmad

My name is Nick and this is my new friend Taylor. He is very important to me because I have a hard time making friends. I try, but my autism makes it hard for me to understand others. It is also hard for them to understand me. My life was getting pretty bad before I met Taylor. I was attacked by a bunch of boys and beaten up pretty bad on my bus. I didn't do anything to them, but they hurt me anyway. I guess they don't like kids that are different. Now that I have Taylor, I am hoping to make more friends! Taylor is a Labradoodle, which means his mother is a Labrador and his father is a Standard Poodle. He is very smart and is being trained to be my support dog. Unfortunately I have a problem. Taylor and I need a fence in our back yard for his protection. We have the labor, but need to raise money for the materials. North Star Foundation and SOS Health Care have already helped us through donations and support, but more is needed for the fence and care of Taylor. North Star Foundation has combined with SOS Health Care to place this puppy-in-training with Nick and his family. We need your help. If you would like to make a tax-deductible contribution to help fund a fence for Nick and Taylor please make the check out to SOS Healthcare. For more information about this project, please contact Bill Davis at www.SOS-Healthcare.com or Patty Dobbs Gross at www.NorthStarDogs.com, who have partnered up to improve the quality of life for the children in our community. Together, we can help children find their way.

Hi People. The following is a copy of an email sent to me which I think was interesting and worth sharing so I got permission from the author- another artist with autism, to share it with you. I know that left-right integration issues don't apply to all people on the spectrum but I have noticed there is a big difference in processing between the more artistic and scientific minds on the spectrum and I think people like me and Temple kind of capture those two poles. The authors view is that many people with autism get stuck in right brain mode wherea many people with Asperger's have a better communication between the left and right hemispheres of the brain. What I feel happened to me was I was stuck in right brain mode till left started to switch on at about age nine and remains rather rusty. I've done a lot of patterning exercises to get the two sides working together and I have written a bit about this in two of my text books- Autism; An Inside-Out Approach and Autism And Sensing; The Unlost Instinct ( see www.donnawilliams.net ). I also believe some Aspie people are as stuck in left brain mode as some autie people are stuck in right brain mode and that left-right integration exercises and activities to increase right brain function might help some Aspie people to become more intuitive. Anyway, for what its worth, here's what this other arty autie wrote..... I have a thought about "autism/ autistics" that I gathered from your yellow book and indigo book, and from past papers collected about brain functions, precisely, left & right hemispheric functions. As you probably know, the right hemisphere of our brains knows no sense of time, order, abstraction, speech, rational or logical-- interpretive processes. Those aspects are reserved for the left hemisphere. The right side is purely aware, without connection to words, synthetic, concrete (this just 'is'), spatial, imaginative, intuitive-- purely sensory. There is constant communication between the two hemispheres through the corpus callosum, however research shows that the callosum of autistic cadavers are abnormally undersized, or at average size, they are "pinched" closed in such a way, as to impede normal communication between the two hemispheres. From what I've experienced and observed we 'artistics', diagnosed autistics, are functioning primarily with our right hemispheres. My experience and education with infants, leads me to the assumption that right hemispheric dominance at birth is normal and natural. I think levels of functioning in autism are in direct relationship with the corpus callosum, and how the right & left communicate. Cerebral allergies cause inflammation: Was your callosum inflamed hindering your ability to access left hemispheric functions? I was evaluated by a psychologist when I was 15 yr. old, and he stated, "...she is obviously a right hemispheric learner and uses her right hemisphere almost exclusively. She may have trained herself to do this..." I'm a natural artist in any medium, including photography, drafting, and interior design. I'm a natural percussionist, singer, and I can recall any music I've ever heard after hearing 30 seconds of it. I have the gift of synesthesia, a crossing of senses; I see music in 3 dimensional shapes, lines, and colors. People I know or meet are not recognized by their faces, but by the colors, shape, and feel of their names. Past experiences are played out in front of me like a video movie-- complete with all sounds, voices, temperature, smells, and emotion. I believe there are many caught in the left hemisphere as well. I think that the delay I have when I'm spoken to, the 5-8 seconds it takes me to understand and reply, is evidence of my difficulty with both hemispheres working together via the corpus callosum. Peace, Jo

By Muriel Reddy in Australia In a photo, he is enjoying a foot spa with a tranquil expression on his 12-year-old face. This is a happy look for Michael Ainsworth, whose world has more often than not been defined by uncontrolled screaming and tantrums. And to the staff at the Bayside Special Developmental School in Moorabbin, it stands as a testament to the wonders of a technique they have been piloting over the past 11 months. Michael, who suffers from severe autism and intellectual disabilities, is one of 15 children in the pilot project that uses a technique called "intensive interaction" to enter their worlds and to communicate with them. Although it has been used extensively in Britain where it was developed, it is thought to be breaking new ground in Australia. "Intensive interaction is based on looking at what the child does and going there with him," explained Mark Barber, who has introduced the approach at Bayside. "We enter their world as opposed to making them come into ours. You look at the things that seem to have meaning for that child, and you see if you can get an invitation into the conversation he is having with himself." Children with profound intellectual disabilities or autism tend to live in a world they cannot control, and typically are withdrawn. Intensive interaction attempts to intrude into that world, using a form of communication that the child recognises. "The whole approach is based on communication," said Dr Barber. "You are using the behaviour that the person uses in isolation to bring him into a social activity. The communication currency is his, and the teacher uses that currency to establish a line of communication." At the heart of the approach is giving a sense of dignity and value to the person with the disability. "One of the phrases that has guided me was coined by Phoebe Caldwell, a renowned practitioner of the technique in Britain. She asked, 'Do we value people with intellectual disabilities for the people that they are, or for the people that we want them to be?'" Dr Barber said that up to 15 children, ranging in age from five to 16, were involved in the Moorabbin pilot project, and none had any formal communication skills. "All but one has been diagnosed as being on the autistic spectrum. These are young people who have tended to be very hard to reach. They may have a very solitary focus, not willing at all to communicate with the outside world." Although emphasising that the technique was not a cure, Dr Barber said he was hugely encouraged by the results so far. According to Rosemary Gallagher, principal at Bayside Special Developmental School, there is great excitement about the results being achieved. She said teachers at the school had invested long hours in learning how to apply the technique. Michael, who was one of the school's most challenging children, is now beginning to communicate in words, sometimes even sentences. "He is also showing signs of being able to enjoy the company of other people," she says. "He always actively resisted company and comfort." To learn more about "Intensive Interaction": http://www.bild.org.uk/factsheets/intensive_interaction.htm

Written by Temple Grandin INTRODUCTION I am a 44-year old autistic woman who has a successful international career designing livestock equipment. I completed my Ph.D. in Animal Science at the University of Illinois in Urbana and I am now an Assistant Professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University. Early intervention at age 2 1/2 helped me overcome my handicap. Two of the subjects covered in this chapter are the frustration of not being able to speak and sensory problems. My senses were oversensitive to loud noise and touch. Loud noise hurt my ears and I withdrew from touch to avoid over-whelming sensation. I built a squeezing machine which helped me to calm my nerves and to tolerate touching. At puberty, horrible anxiety "nerve" attacks started and they became worse with age. Antidepressant medication relieved the anxiety. In the last section of the chapter directing my fixations into constructive activities and a career will be discussed along with the importance of a mentor. My skill and deficit areas are covered in detail. All my thinking is visual, like videos played in my imagination. Even abstract concepts such as getting along with other people are visualized through the use of door imagery. LACK OF SPEECH Not being able to speak was utter frustration. If adults spoke directly to me I could understand everything they said, but I could not get my words out. It was like a big stutter. If I was placed in a slight stress situation, words would sometimes overcome the barrier and come out. My speech therapist knew how to intrude into my world. She would hold me by my chin and made me look in her eyes and say "ball." At age 3, "ball" came out "bah," said with great stress. If the therapist pushed too hard I threw a tantrum, and if she did not intrude far enough no progress was made. My mother and teachers wondered why I screamed. Screaming was the only way I could communicate. Often I would logically think to myself, "I am going to scream now because I want to tell somebody I don't want to do something." It is interesting that my speech resembled the stressed speech in young children who have had tumors removed from the cerebellum. Rekate, Grubb, Aram, Hahn, and Ratcheson (1985) found that cancer surgeries that lesioned the vermus, deep nuclei, and both hemispheres of the cerebellum caused temporary speech loss in normal children. Vowel sounds were the first to(1) return, and receptive speech was normal. Courchesne, Yeung-Courchesne, Press, Hesselink, and Jernigan (1988) reported that 14 out of 18 high- to moderate- functioning autistics had undersized cerebellar vermal lobules VI and VII. Bauman and Kemper (1985) and Ritvo et al. (1986) also discovered that brains from autistics had lower than normal Purkinje cell counts in the cerebellum. In my own case an MRI scan revealed cerebellar abnormalities. I am unable to tandem walk (the standard "walk the line" test done by the police for drunken drivers). I end up toppling sideways, but my reactions are normal for other simple motor tests of cerebellar dysfunction. Vestibular stimulation can sometimes stimulate speech in autistic children. Slowly swinging a child on a swing can sometimes help initiate speech (Ray, King, & Grandin, 1988). Certain types of smooth, coordinated movements are difficult for me, even though I appear normal to the casual observer. For example, when I operate hydraulic equipment that has a series of levers, I can operate one lever at a time perfectly. Coordinating the movement of two or three levers at once is impossible. This may explain why I do not readily learn a musical instrument, even though I have innate musical talent for pitch and melody. The only musical instrument I mastered is whistling with my mouth. RHYTHM AND MUSIC Throughout elementary school my speech was still not completely normal. Often it took me longer than other children to start getting my words out. Singing, however was easy. I have perfect pitch and I can effortlessly hum back the tune of a song I have heard only once or twice. I still have many problems with rhythm. I can clap out a rhythm by myself, but I am unable to synchronize my rhythm with somebody else's rhythm. At a concert I am unable to clap in time with the music with the rest of the people. A lack of rhythm during autistic piano playing is noted by Park and Youderian (1974). Rhythm problems may be related to some autistic speech problems. Normal babies move in synchronization with adult speech (Condon & Sander, 1974). Autistics fail to do this. Condon (1985) also found that autistics and, to a lesser extent, dyslexics and stutterers have a defective orienting response. One ear hears a sound sooner that the other. The asynchrony between ears is some- times over one second. This may help explain certain speech problems. People still accuse me of interrupting. Due to a faulty rhythm sense, it is difficult to determine when I should break into a conversation. Following the rhythmic ebb and rise of a conversation is difficult. AUDITORY PROBLEMS My hearing is like having a hearing aid with the volume control stuck on "super loud." It is like an open microphone that picks up everything. I have two choices: turn the mike on and get deluged with sound, or shut it off. Mother reported that sometimes I acted like I was deaf. Hearing tests indicated that my hearing was normal. I can't modulate incoming auditory stimulation. Many autistics have problems with modulating sensory input (Ornitz, 1985). They either overreact or under-react. Ornitz (1985) suggests that some cognitive deficits could be caused by distorted sensory input. Autistics also have profound abnormalities in the neurological mechanisms that control the capacity to shift attention between different stimuli (Courchesne, 1989). I am unable to talk on the phone in a noisy office or airport. Everybody else can use the phones in a noisy environment, but I can't. If

Beverly Peffer, a Scranton resident has been Nominated "National Poetry Ambassador 2006" by the International Library of Poetry. As Ambassador, she has chosen to dedicate these select poems written for the Autism Community, in hopes to help the understanding of looking inside oneself and to give hope. While she has made this accomplishment not only in poetry, she is also one of the Founders of "The Pocono Equestrian Center," a therapeutic riding program for Special Needs Children which has been an incredible asset to the community and appears to be the hope for these families and others in the future. April is Autism month as well as National Poetry Month. Writing poetry most of her life was and is a way of expression. In doing this, Poems have been published in the International Library of Who's Who in Poetry and Invoking the Muse of The International Library of Poetry. If any one would like to inquire about purchasing these selected poems for a $5.00 contribution, which would benefit "Autistic Children's Therapeutic Riding Programs" at The Pocono Equestrian Center (a nonprofit organization.) Feel free to contact them at: 210 N. Lincoln Ave, Scranton, PA 18504, Phone: 570-348-9795. www.PoconoEquestrian.org

The prevalence of autism in the US has risen from 1 in approximately 2500 in the mid-1980s to 1 in approximately 300 children in the mid-1990s. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether mercury from thimerosal in childhood vaccines contributed to neurodevelopmental disorders. Neurodevelopmental disorder dose-response curves for increasing mercury doses of thimerosal in childhood vaccines were determined based upon examination of the Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) database and the 2001 US' Department of Education Report. The instantaneous dosage of mercury children received in comparison to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA)'s maximum permissible dose for the oral ingestion of methylmercury was also determined. The dose-response curves showed increases in odds ratios of neurodevelopmental disorders from both the VAERS and US Department of Education data closely linearly correlated with increasing doses of mercury from thimerosal-containing childhood vaccines and that for overall odds ratios statistical significance was achieved. Similar slopes and linear regression coefficients for autism odds ratios in VAERS and the US Department of Education data help to mutually validate each other. Controls employed in the VAERS and US Department of Education data showed minimal biases. The evidence presented here shows that the occurrence of neurodevelopmental disorders following thimerosal-containing childhood vaccines does not appear to be coincidental. PMID: 14534046 [PubMed - in process] .

By Donna Williams America's TsunamiI'm terribly sorry these things are happening in the US. Australia is called a country of drought and flooding rains. We have bushfires every year. In Ash Wednesday we lost many towns, villages, rainforest, animals and some lives. In Cyclone Tracey it flattened the city of Darwin completely. I lived near Worcestershire in the UK when Worcestershire was hit but flash flooding and shops and homes were a meter under water and the road into Worcester passed not through fields anymore but through two massive lakes that stretched on and on. I was in a flash flood that hit my own city, not at all like New Orleans but we were all in an exodus walking out of the city for miles up to our waists and chests with rushing water suddenly gushing fast down side streets and all our trams halted so it was walk or nothing. Back at my flat, mine was ok but my friends was lower and under water and we all pulled together and helped where we could. Another year I was in a library during a gale that blew the roof off the college library and everyone upstairs ran down with umbrellas soaked and the computer room had no roof and electricals popped all over the place, so I can imagine how scary this must be if its like all these things put together. Many people in the world think of America as able to take care of itself (we have a saying which goes 'you're big enough to take care of yourself'). But what does a country do when it has a president that has spent so much of its budget and manpower being involved in other countries it reserved too little for major disasters in its own? Whilst many people may have no time for the president of the US, George W Bush, it is not him who is suffering right now, it is real people, the poor people of New Orleans without a car or enough money to evacutate in time before Hurricane Katrina hit and left them in a lake that once was a city, a lake filling with sewerage in a place where people have begun killing for access to food and water, in the absence of social structure. For them it is the end of the world, their world. The lucky ones got out but tens of thousands are still trapped there, babies and infants, the elderly, people with disabilities, men, women, now threatened by disease, by hunger, by violence, and the water, animals among them, not merely the four legged kind but the armed gangs who have seized guns and are shooting innocent people. So when you think of America, think of these people and the lucky ones who got out, their homes and jobs gone, nothing to return to, many of whom have only strangers to turn to in places they've never even been before. If you think America is the enemy, look at these faces. They could so easily be your own. There have been times they were the faces of those in your own countries who saw a kinder face of America when it was on the other end of food parcels, clean water, tents and rescue equipment, medical treatment units, not guns and bombs. And that kinder face is what America's people are looking for right now; those in New Orleans and every American who looks on with compassion and empathy and pleads 'where are our resources now we need them? Can we not do more?'. The Red Cross is an international organisation which gives aid in times of natural disasters like this one, America's Tsunami. If you want to make a statement to America that you care about people, without predjudice for its country's politics (and almost 50% of American's did NOT vote for Bush and many were unable to vote), its people's race or nationality, then help these people as you would help your own. After the rhetoric, beyond the mindsets through which we see others we think of as foreign, perhaps irrelevant, we are all the same, mirrors of each other and who we might, in different circumstances, be. The website for the Redcross is www.redcross.org Thank you for taking the time. ... Donna Williams *) www.donnawilliams.net .

TV Character who talks to God By John Morgan, Spotlight Health, with medical adviser Stephen A. Shoop, M.D. in USA Today On the CBS hit Joan of Arcadia, Amber Tamblyn's character talks to God. Now the actress wants to talk about something equally important -helping people with developmental disabilities such as autism, cerebral palsy and mental retardation. "Developmental disabilities affect millions of people either directly or indirectly," says Tamblyn, who also appeared in The Ring. "I wanted toget involved because getting treatment can be really expensive. To know there might be help for your child or someone you love but not be able to do anything about it simply because of money is terrible." Tamblyn literally took steps to help make sure that doesn't happen. Tamblyn supports the Achievable Foundation, a Los Angeles charity that endeavors to improve the lives of people with developmental disabilities such as autism and cerebral palsy but who cannot afford treatment. "I got everyone from the show to join me in their annual 5K walk," says Tamblyn, who is excited about the show's premiere Friday, Sept. 26, 8 p.m. ET/PT on CBS. "It was a fun day, and we raised money for a great cause. We had entire families out walking with their sons and daughters who had autism and other developmental disabilities. It was a day full of a lot of smiles." Tamblyn is particularly familiar with autism, a developmental disorder that adversely affects early brain development, often causing communication difficulties and problems with social interactions. "My co-star Joe Mantegna has a daughter with autism," Tamblyn says. "And one of my friend's has a brother with the disorder. So it is always close to me. Does anyone not know someone with autism?" Perhaps not many. Autism statistics are steadily getting worse. Up to 10 million people have a developmental disability, an umbrella term referring to an adaptive challenge caused by cognitive and/or physical impairments. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,autism is the most common developmental disorder. As many as 1.5 million Americans - or 1 in 250 live births - have some form of the disorder. Based on the current growth rate, by the next decade the prevalence of autism could exceed four million people. God's work But scientists and researchers are hoping to stem the tide on the flood of autism. At the Autism Society of America's 35th National Conference on Autism held two weeks ago in Seattle, new research was presented that brings some hope to families dealing with the disorder. "Right now we are employing a two-pronged approach to solve the autism puzzle," reports Geraldine Dawson, professor of psychiatry and director of the University of Washington Autism Center. "One is a long-range strategy based in genetic research to try and understand at a biological level what causes autism. We have virtually no understanding of this mechanism. We don't have any medications. We can't even explain to parents why their child is behaving at a molecular level the way they are." Dawson says genetic research into the cause of autism will undoubtedly pay off at some point - the question is: how long will it take? "Maybe within five years we might know enough about the genetics of autism to have what is called a biomarker - where at birth you could look for an abnormal product from a gene in the blood and are able to determine that the child is at risk for autism," Dawson says. "This would allow us to start the intervention as early as possible." Early diagnosis is critical because the second prong is effective behavioral interventions. These behavioral interventions - like applied behavioral analysis - if instituted early enough may even prevent autism by essentially "re-wiring" the brain. Dawson reports that initial evidence shows that these intensive interventions can actually stimulate brain circuitry that hasn't worked normally before. "We are targeting parts of the brain that aren't working well, like the ability to process information from faces," Dawson explains. "We have a study where we are teaching people with autism to be face experts. We hope to determine whether we can activate brain regions through these behavioral interventions that were not working properly." Scientists have demonstrated that the brain develops in response to specific types of input. But a child who is never exposed to language is not going to develop normal language skills even if they had the potential to do so. "While the brain comes ready to receive certain types of information, it doesn't develop normally unless it actually receives that information," Dawson states. One of the classic signs of autism is that children do not become socially engaged - like paying attention to faces or speech. Behavioral interventions teach children with autism that the world of social information is interesting and important. Divine intervention "Once they begin paying attention to this social information, the brain systems can start to get the input they need to begin developing more normally," Dawson says. "We don't know yet how much of the autism symptoms we see is secondary to just failing to get the appropriate input at early points in development." Dawson has launched an interv ention trial for infants 18 months of age. The children will receive intensive intervention over a two-year period where they get up to 30 hours a week of one-on-one intervention. Ultimately, Dawson says the goal is to prevent up to 25% of cases of autism in the long run just through early intervention and early identification. To help identify infants with autism sooner, Dawson is collaborating with the University of Connecticut on a more effective screening checklist that is used at 18 months. "The kind of impairments you see in autism - like not having an interest in other people - are something we should pick up early on because even a very young infant is interested in looking at other people," Dawson states. In the meantime, MRI technology may also provide help in understanding early

Mother credits hyperbaric oxygen therapy for daughter's progress BY SUSAN JENKS FLORIDA TODAY Shannon Kenitz missed her daughter's first steps, which took place at school earlier this year -- two days shy of her seventh birthday. Ever since then, Gracie -- who suffers from an extremely rare genetic disease that starves her brain and muscles of oxygen -- not only walks, she tears around nonstop, her flowered sandals clacking behind her. "At age 3, she was blind, she was on a feeding tube, and she was taking 42 medications," her mother said. "The doctors told us: 'Let her die.' " Today, Gracie attends a mainstream public school, has close to 20/20 vision, speaks about 50 words and no longer takes any anti-seizure drugs, according to her mother, who credits hyperbaric oxygen therapy for the dramatic turnaround in her medical condition. Shannon Kenitz was in Melbourne on Wednesday with her daughter to tell "Gracie's story," already featured on several national television shows, and to raise funds for the nonprofit International Hyperbarics Association, located outside Los Angeles. She is the foundation's executive director. Hyperbaric oxygen therapy, which involves the use of 100 percent oxygen in a pressurized chamber, is widely used to treat radiation-associated injuries; deep non-healing wounds; bone infections; and deep-sea divers' decompression sickness, known as the bends. But the use of this therapy for neuromuscular disorders, such as the one Gracie had, still is viewed by many doctors as alternative therapy, even though a number of independent centers, including Dr. Jeffrey Bradstreet's International Child Development Resource Center in Melbourne, do use it "off-label," or outside its government-approved use. In Gracie's case, Bradstreet said, "we are not able to undo her genetic defect," called Mitochondrial Cytochrome C-Reductase, an enzyme deficiency leading to oxygen deprivation in the mitochondria, the energy producers of all the body's cells. But Gracie has "shown way more improvement than we thought possible," he said, because of her daily, one-hour hyperbaric oxygen treatments, which are delivered at an atmospheric pressure roughly equivalent to being 23 feet below sea level. "And she's alive," he said, considered quite a feat, given the rarity of the condition and the fact it is viewed as a terminal disease. Bradstreet said he knows of five children diagnosed with this particular genetic defect in the United States -- and the other four children have died. Dr. Paul Buza, a Melbourne neurologist who runs Wuesthoff Health System's Wound Care and Hypberbaric Center, said hyperbaric oxygen therapies have begun moving into neurologic applications nationwide, including in Bradstreet's area of expertise, autism, a spectrum of illnesses associated with developmental delays. "There is a growing body of evidence suggesting there may be a benefit," Buza said. "And why not try it in Gracie's case?" he asked, referring to the hyperbaric oxygen treatments in this particular situation. "The disease is so rare and the prognosis so poor, while hyperbaric oxygen therapy is so safe. You have nothing to lose." David Bass, the coordinator for the hyperbaric department at the University of Florida, agreed. He said hyperbaric oxygen treatments for Gracie make sense because "her body is not able to convert oxygen to energy," so it is being starved and forced to shut down. But with hyperbaric oxygen and "the way it works," he said, "oxygen is forced into the plasma carrying the red blood cells and into the interstitial tissues," so it can reach every area of the body. As for Gracie's mother, she has few doubts the therapy eventually will emerge as a mainstream treatment. "It's not widely accepted yet, but I think it will be," she said. And, while she waits, Shannon Kenitz helped bring a hyperbaric center to Madison, Wis., where she and Gracie live, with a healthy 9-year-old sibling, Lilly. Although that eliminates the need to travel to Melbourne for these treatments, she said, she plans to keep traveling to Bradstreet's office for chelation therapy for Gracie's autism, which was diagnosed two years ago. Chelation therapy is another alternative treatment, in which heavy metals are removed from the blood. "What keeps me going is I remember Gracie in a vegetative state," she said. "And I do have faith, in the sense I have hope. Without it, you don't have anything." Contact Jenks at 242-3657 or sjenks@flatoday.net.

Hi folks, I've sent you all an art poster for my upcoming art exhibition. Hope you can open it. If not click here to see it: If you can't make it, feel free to tell others. In any case, enjoy the poster. The exhibition, featuring 40 new works, is called: Alternative normalities - an introspective by autistic artist Donna Williams. it's at: Gallery 15, 15William St Melbourne 11 April – 2 May, 2007 Gallery Open Hours Monday – Friday, 8.00am – 6.00pm Warmly, Donna Williams *) www.donnawilliams.net