suggestions for son's noise sensitivity?

[Guest guest]

my son is diagnosed with mild high functional autism/Asperger's. he goes to

public school in first grade.

he has always had a fear/sensitivity of loud noises (esp automatic toilets).

something new happened at school thiis week.

he went to the guidance counselors office at lunch on thurs and fri this week,

upset and crying, holding his ears because he said the lunchroom is too loud.

this is the first time since the start of school in sept that this has happened.

we started a new technique the week prior with his OT: brushing and joint

compression every 2 hours or however often we could do it. the OT said that if

anything negative arises, we should stop. i have stopped and emailed the

counsellor, teacher and OT on Friday evening. dont expect to hear anything

until tomorrow.

my son started in a social thinking group that the counsellor suggested. these

started in early january and happen every tuesday. she said its possible he is

used to coming to her office (and its considered a privelidge to the children)

weekly and prefers having lunch there. this is not something she can do on a

daily basis.

if this sudden sensitivity to the lunchroom noise continues, what do you think

we could try? we have tried earplugs but havent found anything that he feels

confy with. my mom suggested an MP3 player during lunch but i dont know if the

school will approve (our sencond IEP meeting will be in Feb) since its a

valuable item...

anny thoughts? if so, please send me a personal message. i like this group

but dont have time to read through all the posts so i dont get digests or

individual emails....

thanks much

dana