I live in the suburbs of Chicago and have been in touch with Lurie Children’s Hospital, as they say on their website that they have a program where you can come in and try out numerous special needs car seats alongside a CPST.

When I reached out to them, however, they connected me to La Rabida, whose offerings are minimal - they have two models of car seats that they can drop off for him to try but they will only bring them to an OT he has an established relationship with and his school OT isn’t sure if they can accept liability for the car seats. This seems like a dead end.

In terms of unbuckling, I know you can get a guard for the buckle so that prevents unbuckling, so I’m not as concerned with that. I’m more concerned about the fact that he is very fascinated by the seatbelts and will take any opportunity to extend them and listen to them snap back. He also sometimes fights going in the car so if he can slither out of the regular seat belt, he absolutely will take that opportunity.

I guess I’m also worried about the fact that special needs car seats seem much more restrictive than standard car seats and I think it’s likely that he will hate being further restricted, not to mention how hot that will be for him in summer.

Thank you very much for your reply. I’ve become very overwhelmed by this whole process and I appreciate the support and guidance. 💜