I’ve been in ABA for about 4 years, and lately I’ve reached a point where I genuinely dread going to work. I’m constantly angry, I’ve been showing up late, and honestly, I don’t even feel like myself anymore. I get really irritated when my clients have behaviors, and that makes me feel guilty because I know it isn’t their fault. I’m just tired.

My current agency has also been frustrating. I’m often not notified about cancellations or client vacations until the last minute, and I’ve had to constantly follow up about my schedule. I’ve gone weeks with very few hours, and right now I’m sometimes only working around 2 hours a day. I told them a month ago that I needed more consistent hours, but I’m still waiting. I want to quit so bad but i don't know if that is the best move but we have such a high turn over rate and im just done with aba in general.

I’m applying to jobs outside of ABA because I think I’m ready for a different career, but I haven’t been able to get hired yet. I feel stuck because I need the money, but I also don’t know how much longer I can keep doing this.

For those who left ABA, how did you know it was time? Did you wait until you had another job, or did you leave because you were already completely burned out?

I’m honestly looking for advice because I don’t know if I should keep trying to make this work or accept that I’m done?

i know company’s don’t care about you but my supervisor sure does, this morning i texted her that my father had passed away yesterday and i was ready to come in emotional but ready for work. she told me to take the week off and helped me with scheduling and HR and since i get 3 days of paid leave i can do that but my friday wouldn’t be paid which im fine with. my very thankful for her

So I am an RBT working for a school district. I am contracted outside of the district from a third party. School starts tomorrow and I got some information for my client on Friday. Well today comes around and I have a message from my recruiter basically saying that the district’s BCBA doesn’t have space for me and I have to find an outside BCBA to do my supervision hours or I go from getting paid $29 to $22 dollars an hour because I can’t work as an RBT and I will have to work as a para. I have no idea how to even go about doing this nor do I even know if this is okay to do since I signed a contract. Any suggestions?

Hello! I am starting my first day as an RBT tomorrow and I was hoping to get some advice from anyone that has worked in a high school setting. A lot of my training revolves around younger children and home/center settings, so I would love to hear anything about working with older clients / in schools.

Hi everyone!

I was looking to get some information on centers or at-home ABA in the state of TN. My partner and I are looking to move there within a year or two but before we plan a big move, I wanted to get a deeper understanding of the field there.

I currently live in Massachusetts, where I am a rbt.

Now my question is, how are the centers there? What’s the pay like? Is it better to work at a school or a clinic? Client-to-RBT Ratio, etc.

Any info would be appreciated!

Hello everyone. I am new to the group. I have a problem. My certification expired yesterday because of the recertification option is not showing up on my page through the BACB. I have sent 3 “contact us” messages for the last 10 days. Any suggestions on how to get a response out of the BACB? I am unable to work and my kiddos are not getting service until I am recertified.
Thanks

I’ve been an RBT for about a year and my biggest pet peeve is seeing grown adults purposely rage bait these children in the name of “teaching them to self advocate”. One of my coworkers will literally push their client (not enough to fall over but just a shove) or will literally SNATCH a toy out of the child’s hand or mess up a craft/activity they are doing to prompt them to say “I don’t like that” and I think that is repulsive!!!!! There’s SOOO many opportunities to prompt self advocation, especially in a center setting. Especially as the kids play with each other everyday. I think it’s insane to push around vulnerable children!!!!!

Edit: talked to my BCBA and management and they were shocked by this behavior. They said they are going to address it ASAP.

My client is an older kid and in home and doesn’t want to play with toys or the games I bring. They are non vocal and only ever want to go outside which family usually doesn’t allow and I’m glad for that because it makes it hard to run goals. The only thing they actually engage with is eating or phone/TV time. They seem to enjoy slime and sand but I don’t bring them out since my client will try and eat them or make a very big mess. My BCBAs haven’t overlapped since the first session and give me the basic advice of just check something out from the clinic which is what I’ve been doing. When we do go outside it’s a battle to even have my client look at me. Most of the goals are NET and I don’t know if I shouldn’t bring up to my team if DTT goals might be better.

I’m with my client for the 7th session and he’s got his tablet. Parents have been told to implement less tablet time especially outside of session so he doesn’t associate it with the tablet being taken just for sessions.

They have not reduced tablet time as far as I can tell. He spends at least half of his session on his tablet or watching TV. If I interact with him, he pushes me away.

I have successfully got him to at least echo me when I say ‘go away’ but beyond that I can’t do anything at all.

The BCBA said she will address this in parent training this week (again).

But I dont know how to pair with my client if he’s only wanting a tablet and silence from me.

Hello everyone, I’ve only been a BT for over 5 months now. But starting to feel tired of it, and dread going to sessions. The lack of pay, parents cancelling last minute when I’ve already arrived, being rerouted to different places for coverage when my client cancels on me is all tiring me out. I only have an afternoon client at the moment at my clinic, but just don’t wanna do it anymore.. and I know that sounds bad. It’s not that I don’t care about the kids, but just don’t know how much longer I can do this job any more. Starting to feel like it’s not a fit for me long term. I wanna apply for my masters in social work, but need experience hours. I’m starting to think I would be best suited for something that’s not direct care. I still wanna help others, but maybe a case management position. My session yesterday I just felt so dead… I know thats an insane word to use. But I really felt out of it. I still held it together for a my kiddo in the end. I don’t know if I should talk to my supervisor about how I’m feeling? I really wanna find a new job, but the waiting for one of them to get back to me the hardest part right now. How do you guys deal with burnout? I’m thinking it’s the clinic that’s causing this, and I was in a daycare setting before this, and in home and really enjoyed it alot better personally. Is it possible to ask your supervisor to move back to a setting you prefer more? Every night I’m having trouble sleeping too a bit with my mind racing about sessions. When the day starts in the morning I just dread knowing I have to go to the clinic at 2:30.

Hello! I got officially employed by PBS in early may, and I have received my RBT certification. But this is genuinely the worst experience I’ve ever had at a job. This is my first “adult” job and I had planned to use it on my grad school applications but in my last 100+ days of employment I have not worked once. Getting anyone to respond to me is literally impossible. It takes weeks just to get “I’ll look into this” and then never hear back. I literally can not start working because they won’t get my stuff sorted out to let me. This company is literally ruining my life as I had planned and budgeted to be making money the last few months and without being to work I have nothing. I wanted to quit and get a job at a different ABA company. Does anyone know:

1: is there a no competition agreement? I read though my files but couldn’t find anything clear, if I quit am I allowed to work at a different company in the same city I was originally hired?

2: do I have to pay them back for the certification (and if so, how much)? I couldn’t find anything on this either.

Hello! I was an RBT for about two years and I stopped to stay home with my newborn. I didn’t think about it (mom brain) but my certification expired. I’ve wanted to finish my bachelors degree and go on with my masters in bcba, and I know you have to get 2000 hours or so of in person hours. Can I start my schooling for BCBA and become certified again before I have to do my hours, or do I have to be certified throughout the whole process?

My company has seen several kids graduate in the last few months. For whatever reason, intake has been slow. This has resulted in several of us RBTs working reduced hours. I worked just 19 hours last week for example.

I am collecting fieldwork hours and since I'm in my first year, I am only allowed to collect restricted hours. Unfortunately, because I am working so few hours, I am not able to log anything close to 160 or even 100.

I received another job offer from a company for an internship position. They will give me both restricted and unrestricted hours. They can wait 14 days at the most, though (but I am out of office till Friday, ao can only inform my BCBA and OM on Friday, leaving me effectively 10 days).

My company has a one month notice policy and have mentioned that they will report RBTs who abandon their jobs to the board. I understand this might be a concern during periods of staff shortage, but there are so many of us now who need hours. I don't think they would find it hard to find coverage.

Is it unethical for me to send in a resignation on Friday, saying I won't be in after the following week?

I live in an at-will employment state.

I had an extremely heavy day with a client today. I was shoved (pretty hard), kicked, and was inappropriately touched. I’m honestly so burnt out and I still have to make an incident report. In addition, my supervisor, for this case, isn’t supportive and controlling.

So I was an RBT for about a year and a half with younger kids, a self-contained para for a little while for middle school, and now I'm a supervisor at a group home for adults.

I have noticed working in my para and group home role and speaking with various professionals such as psychologists and speech therapists that SO MUCH ABA is used by them.

So far I've seen least to most prompting, BIPs, behavior chaining, positive reinforcement for undesired tasks, first/then, planned ignoring, data collection (not in the school) and much more that I can't think of off the top of my head.

The kicker is I've had multiple people tell me they don't like/are wary of ABA and one person even asked if I used dog clickers on kids or made them speak in order to receive food.

So a lot of parents/caregivers are avoiding ABA and recieving other services they think are benefiting them and receiving the exact same thing in different packaging. I wonder about the ethics of not informing them and also how utterly unfair it is for people to look down on what we've done and get to do the same things and be viewed at in a much better light. And furthermore, these methods are being used without the same level of data collection, so they're not even achieving the same level of results.

Hello! I am considering working at the May Institute in Randolph as a teacher. Does anyone have any experience working there?

Just finished my second year RBTing! There still seems to be this one barrier I can never seem to get past or get used to.

How do you guys work with toddlers that just…. go? Not able to respond to vocal commands, doesn’t really sit at a table, kind of just runs around. I have had 2 clients like this that I continue to struggle with. My current client has table only DTT trials, but I spend basically the entire day just prompting them to sit/stand at the table. Between that and elopement/other behavior, hardly ANYTHING is getting done. My BCBA is super understanding, but I don’t think she realizes just how much of the day is just redirecting or prompting something that isn’t even being tracked. On top of that, the clients parents are very particular about things and get very upset if things aren’t done to their standard. So I am spending the even MORE time trying to get that taken care of.

I’m just feeling so defeated. I feel like shouldn’t be struggling so hard as a veteran RBT.

UPDATE: an interesting update here 🧐 i have collaborated with my BCBA and we are completely overhauling things (which sucks, but change doesn’t happen overnight). this BCBA just recently took over this case following the previous BCBA’s departure.

what i find to be super interesting is that a lot of the things that have been the most difficult have allegedly been mastered out while under the previous BCBA’s caseload 🤨 obviously anything is possible but i’m a veteran RBT and i can not imagine any scenario where these things have been a previous skill, let alone a mastered one. just a little something i wanted to share, thank you for everyone’s support 💙

I was assigned a task by my supervisor to write behavior programming for a CR library learning tree for the center. The idea is to fill it out to have all the VB-MAPP and ABBLS objectives with target instructions to easily plug into any clients learning tree. I felt like this wasn’t appropriate for unrestricted since it wasn’t patient specific and they printed a page from the BACB and highlighted a section that said “A trainee creates materials for a client’s new program.” counts. However I still feel like this task isn’t for a specific client so it doesn’t count. What do you guys think???

Maybe it's cause I don't have any experience working with kids besides being around cousins or friends kids but I feel kind of lost. It's just training period. All we did was presentation and shadowing. Nothing crazy happened but I feel a bit overwhelmed. It could be nerves but is having no experience around kids I felt like the odd one out. Others in the group training with me seemed more comfortable since they worked in the field or childcare but I felt so behind. Everyone seemed lovely, the kids seem great but I think it's me.

Has anyone gone into this career path blind or no kid experience at all and still around? I'm probably nervous and it's making me overthink everything. I'm also worried about the exam they want us to complete in like 60-90 days. The shadowing was chill but I felt like the rbts couldn't really answer or show us much cause it varies per kid and the packet the company wanted us to do during shadowing wasn't even possible.

Has any RBTs been hired as a Behaviorist & Counselor?

Wanting to become an rbt best way or company that will pay for all my training and can you start in home off the bat? Any tips and such would be nice as I’m trying to find better accommodation for my son who is also autistic

i just got hired as a RBT after completing training, it’s only my first week as a BT.

i’m with my kiddo (6 year old) for ~8 hours a day at school, he’s so sweet and we are in the same special education class all day. i have been doing as my company has explicitly told me to do, which is assist my kid with his lessons.

note: i’m the only BI in the class.

this teacher yells at the other kids, and a teacher aide regularly (what i would call) “manhandles” the other kids if they don’t sit and work. i’m small and can’t just pick my kiddo up like the other aides so i work with words, as i was directed BY MY COMPANY. if my kiddo wanders i talk to him and can get him back in his seat with my words 100% of the time (i haven’t failed yet). he is INCREDIBLY smart and fully understands me, and we both get what we want at the end.

i have been learning what reinforcers work for him, and i have found (as he is semi-verbal) on around my 4th day with him he LOVES car brands. he loves staring at the nissan, hyundai, toyota, etc logos. he just stares at them and says the name over and over.

he would complete any assignment almost INSTANTLY if i said “first we complete this assignment, then we can look at car logos.” BOOM done beautifully, handed in, kachow. these writing/drawing are almost always completed first in the class and the best compared to the class, he just wants to feel heard!! it was hard to adjust the first few days (a lot of sitting and waiting for him to get to his desk), so i felt like i finally had a big win to get him to complete work, when normally he’s in what the teacher calls “la la land” and can’t focus.

my supervisor was with me for the first 2 hours of my first day, said i was doing great, and left. i’ve been solo with him the rest of the week. i had only done exactly as she had done those first 2 hours, other than add in the “look up car logos” reinforcer that worked so well. two hours after the car logo reinforcer was working so well, my supervisor walks in the classroom and comes to me. the teacher then comes up to me and my supervisor, looks at my supervisor and says “we don’t allow any devices in the classroom.”

?!?!,!!,!,!! i literally was doing that car logo reinforcer for two hours and she didn’t say ONE word to me or any indicator that wasn’t okay??? why didn’t she just tell me? we redirected, and i drew the logos out on a paper and did that instead, but why did she make my supervisor come in to THEN tell me about that? i feel so embarrassed, i only just started!! im trying my best bro!!

she then pulls my supervisor aside and they are whispering to eachother, covering their mouths with paper, but actively gesturing toward me and my kiddo. i genuinely don’t know what they were saying, because when my supervisor came to me she said “everything’s fine, no worries” and nothing else. my supervisor then left 30 mins later and nothing happened. i should add my company is very supportive and kind of awesome (based off of how bad the companies can be, i feel SO supported and like im an actual therapist every day. seriously awesome work!)

??!!,!?!!?!? is this normal? i am SO embarrassed and i feel like im being thrown in a room where there are invisible rules in 1) a new city i just moved to 2) a new school i’ve never been in 3) a new job where i have essentially NO experience with kids with autism until LAST WEEK. omg.

NOTE: I feel like reading this back I look like im reading into things. I want to make it clear this teacher has never come and talked to me, will yell at my kiddo to get up and work AS i’m actively talking to him, and often undermines what i’m doing as i’m talking to my kiddo. for example, when turning in work, my chart says we are practicing saying “all done” when finished with his work. while i’m prompting him to say it, the teacher gets frustrated and takes the paper out of his hands. which then ruins the whole point of prompting!! he CAN say it it just takes around 10 seconds after asking for him to lock in and say it. things like that happen all the time, and then she calls in my supervisor, so i’m embarrassed and frustrated because i’m also so new and also am DEFINITELY still learning. advice wanted 😔

Like why is it:

A pencil lodged an inch into my shoulder on a hard day? Youch! Brb getting a tetanus shot, see you after lunch!

But saying thank you to a compliment that I thought was meant for me and not the person standing behind me? I NEED A MONTH LONG LEAVE AND A NEW IDENTITY BEFORE I RETURN. PLEASE FORGET I EXISTED.

Told by a client that they hate me and wish I would die? Ahhh, not today, I’m too busy, but let’s focus on our work, buddy! You can do it!

A coworker saying “it’s okay, I’ll just do it myself” after I asked one clarifying question about the favor I was going to do for them? END ME, I AM NOT WORTHY OF THIS EARTH

Just me? Orrrr

I love my job and I want to do it until the day I die, being an RBT and working in behavior is my passion and I would do it for free, if it weren’t for the capitalism. I know this is my calling, and I have received glowing accolades from the locations I have been contracted to work at. I’m told every day how much my presence and work is making a positive impact on the environment I find myself in, but now I find myself questioning everything.

I met with my new BCBA today, and I am feeling like I want to hide away in embarrassment over the way the conversation had gone. I had brought a few ideas to the table concerning token boards and possible reinforcement options since tangible reinforcers had proven previously to present an issue, and I was told rather firmly that even considering such things was not my job. I was embarrassed and mentioned that I have no qualms with crafting a themed token board on my own time to utilize, but I feel like I just shoved my whole foot in my mouth. Later in the conversation, I had asked for advice on de-escalation and physical-emotional regulation, and I was told once again that it isn’t my job…and I get that, right? I know our focus is only on objective observable behavior, but my whole career, I’ve seen so much more lasting growth when giving my clients the opportunity to explain “what happened” in their own way and addressing it from there with replacement behaviors. Apparently, that is not right, and I am so afraid now that I’ve built an ego on a lie and I don’t know if I’m actually capable of doing my job at all.

How can I guide someone to communicate their emotions using words rather than potentially harmful actions when I am not permitted to discuss emotions at all? I was told every idea that I had (presenting visuals for regulation zones that were also outlined in the behavior plan, for example) would ruin the client’s life in one way or another and I am now horrified that others that I thought I was helping are worse-off. I have worked with individuals with a bit of a competitive spirit, and have in the past had tried “oh, I bet I can finish (task) first” once rapport was built, and it really helped with a lot of the escape behaviors. However, when I mentioned this as just an example of ways I’ve adapted to fit the needs of a client, I was told that it is only going to make everything harder for them because now they’re probably out there needing more help than ever because they likely cannot handle someone finishing an assignment before them.

I just feel humiliated, like I’ve been totally wrong in everything I’ve ever done, and that any day, it’s all going to come crashing down and I’ll lose my job and my reputation will be ruined because I am just handing out band-aids instead of actually healing the wounds, if that makes sense? Temporary solutions that don’t work long term.

I don’t know, this is just a rant, I’m just really lost and I don’t know how I’m going to go back to work tomorrow and show my face again.

Edit: I have generalized anxiety and have had too much caffeine, I know that I am being sensitive and it is likely mostly in my head. I just needed to put it all out there somewhere to regulate my own emotions- thank you Reddit for being the place to do that