Central Texas dad develops app to help families raising non-verbal autistic children

AUSTIN, Texas — Raising a family comes with unexpected twists and turns that can be both challenging and rewarding.

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), autism impacts 1-in-51 Central Texas families.

Bill Murray, of Bell County, is raising a child with autism and came up with an idea to better help families navigate the challenges that come with that.

“Around 2 and a half is when we first got an official diagnosis of autism,” Murray said, referring to his 6-year-old daughter Rowan. “There’s no guide, and that’s the other thing, it’s kind of ‘choose your own adventure.’”

Adventure often brings the Murray family, which also includes his wife and son, to A.W. Pace Memorial Park.

“She loves hanging out with kids, but in these types of scenarios she has no way to communicate, right?” Murray said.

The tech salesman went on a side quest of his own, reaching out to software developers to help develop the BrighterBuddy App.

“Overall, the app … the concept is helping kids on the spectrum like my daughter not only communicate right from a speech perspective, because there’s a million different apps like that,” Murray said. “It’s also taking that and building upon that speech in social scenarios, which is something my daughter gets into a bunch.”

Murray programmed the BrighterBuddy app for children. The app can test a child’s speech by having them tell it a phrase and then telling them when that phrase may be applicable to use with others.

The app also covers social settings by presenting the child with examples. One that Murray showed was of being in the park with a friend deep in thought. The app prompted the user to answer how they would respond to that situation.

There is even a physical component to the app. It includes the use of plushies that connect with the app through the use of an NFC. If a child is overstimulated, then tightly hugging the plushie helps.

These are all tools Murray kept in mind because he believes it could help Rowan and children like her take on the world.

“A lot of these kids want to be autonomous, right at the end of it they wanna be self-helping, and that’s where Brighter Buddy came and grew from there as an idea,” Murray said.

It is all an idea Murray intended to be a continuous adventure to help other parents who are on similar journeys with their children who are living with autism.

Murray said there are about 15 families currently using the app. He is hoping for more families to not only use it, but also provide feedback to help build on it.

Murray can be reached at william@brighterbuddy.com.