Today I have Cheryl Bryant here, who is the amazing mother of Max, a 7-year old boy who was identified as having sensory difficulties at the age of 2 1/2.  She is here to share her knowledge, experience and advice with anyone searching for help out there.

When she first realized something wasn’t right with her child’s behaviors, she went out and bought a whole bunch of books that she states “were the wrong ones”.  She was looking for help on potty training, poor verbal skills, transitions (which easily took an hour), breastfeeding, following directions, and problems with eye contact.  Sadly, doctor’s laughed at her and thought she was crazy.  As a result of all of the concerns she expressed, Max’s primary care doctor gave her a prescription to get his hearing tested.  She was frustrated and insulted.  She was ready to take Max to a child psychologist, when she ran into me at the park, working with another child who had sensory regulation difficulties.  Max and my client were quickly attracted to each other, as sensory kids are often magnetically attracted to other sensory kids!  After the two had an outburst, I spoke with Cheryl and shared my concerns, hoping she wouldn’t be mad at a stranger telling her what to do in the park.  Desperate and sleep deprived, she was thankful and took my business card.  Why I had a business card in my pocket in the middle of a therapy session at a park is beyond me!  I guess it was meant to be.

This is how she began to find out about sensory processing disorder and realize that there was help and hope for her family.  Her husband was reluctant to be on board as he’s highly analytical and the research didn’t seem to be enough for him.  He quickly came on board as he saw changes pretty fast.

Cheryl shares her stories on how Max had severe and unbearable sensory processing and modulation problems at an early age, up to now, as he’s entered first grade in the public school system this year in Orlando, FL.  His teacher didn’t realize Max had any difficulties until later in the year when reading started to become challenging to him.  She is flexible in letting her students move around the classroom as they need to, which also helped him regulate his body without standing out, compared to his peers.  He still gets overstimulated in busy places and needs to have quiet places and things to do in order to self-calm.  He also continues to do physical and movement-based activities in the morning before school, mainly swinging, jumping and climbing in the house, to get his body and nervous system ready for a good day at school.  These are important activities for Max to do daily, as he can still have meltdowns if he’s not well-regulated.  The nice part about this is, his parents have the resources to know what to do, and to be able to follow through with a plan to help Max, without having to go to ongoing weekly therapy sessions.   They try to make their home program activities fun, to keep him engaged.

Cheryl offers insight to parents, teachers and healthcare professionals, including:

• Do your research to find good places and professionals that can help.
• Be open-minded, without snapping to a judgment on a behavior or coping strategy your child may be using.
• Be flexible with these children and allow them alternative seating options, like a bean bag to sit on in class instead of always at a desk.
• Allow quiet time on school campuses to prevent emotional outbursts in sensitive children.
• As school administrators, make sure you have swings on your playgrounds.  All kids like and benefit from this kind of movement, but many sensory kids need it to get through the day.

Cheryl validates that finding help for your child’s sensory processing difficulties is a tough road to go down, and she encourages all the parents out there to be easy on themselves, be open, not to listen to those who label your child’s responses as “bad behaviors”, surround yourselves with good people to help, and ask for help from your family!

Thank you so much Cheryl for sharing with us today, you are an inspiration to many!

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This week we have Marcy Rosenbaum on the show who is a supervisor from the Jewish Community Center Preschool Program, in Orlando, FL. She is here to share her experiences on children that have varying sensory needs, and how these children can be supported. I have had the pleasure of working with her for the past 8 years now, and I can tell you first hand she’s like a quiet little angel that comes in to help so many parents, teachers and children with tough scenarios, and she makes it all look so easy!

Marcy has a background in Childhood Development, has been a teacher for 20 years, and a team supervisor for the past 9 years. She supervises all the four-year-old and pre-k classrooms; she has taken many seminars related to sensory; and she has many years of experience with children who have sensory challenges.

She started off by telling us about the Orlando JCC Preschool program which includes infants through pre-kindergarten. The administration is really big into receiving outside sensory training and setting up an environment where every child can learn and feel successful. They are very willing to make any simple accommodations, based on each child’s individual needs, which often includes: getting these children on their tummies to support their posture; providing deep pressure hugs for calming when upset or over-stimulated; allowing a child to sit in a rocking chair vs. sitting on the carpet for circle time; adding a large cardboard box to the classroom for the children to have a calming place; providing predictable transitions with verbal reminders and visual picture sequences; allowing and encouraging the children to bear walk around the room or down the hall; providing seating cushions to satisfy the constant need for movement and motion; and matching teacher personalities with the child’s demeanor in order to provide a firm but forgiving atmosphere in which these children can feel safe and supported.

Marcy first became aware of sensory issues 12 years ago when she was a teacher and she had a boy in her class that cried over everything! He could not transition successfully at first and he had a shadow to help guide him through each activity. She was successful in helping this child throughout the course of the year, due to her innate nature to observe the child’s behaviors, to stop and think, and to have an open mind to trying all recommendations from his therapist- who worked with him and the teacher in the classroom on a weekly basis.

She is most thankful for the Shadow Program they instilled years back that allows a child with sensory difficulties to work 1:1 with a lay staff member that can help the child be and feel successful in a regular mainstreamed program. This is a tremendous program that supports the success of the child and eliminates many “behavioral” problems from the classroom. The challenge that comes with offering this service, is that the parents have to pay the Shadow to be there with their child during school hours, based on a reasonable hourly rate. The best part of this program is that the Shadow can take the child in or out of the classroom as needed, for calming and muscle work breaks to help regulate the child’s nervous system.

Marcy claims she is not a diagnostician, yet she and her team of teachers are excellent “kid watchers”. They refer out to professionals in the community to figure out complex childhood symptoms, which provides them with results and a plan on how to help support the child in their environment. They often refer to primary care physicians, occupational therapists, school-based speech and language therapists, and developmental pediatricians. Her favorite book to recommend is the most popular book called, The Out-Of-Sync Child, by Carol Stock-Kranowitz, though there are many more.

Her tips for other teachers are:

-If you have any feelings toward working with special needs kids, go for it, as you will see both the teacher and the child will be rewarded. Reach out to professionals in the community for inservices to train you and your staff on how to help these children get better. Give your staff information to read such as recent articles, books, and resources from the newspaper. Also, be aware that children who have the labels of ADD, AD/HD, and ODD (oppositional defiant disorder) are children who are uncomfortable in their own bodies, so try to have some compassion! Smaller class sizes can be more beneficial for these children too (with a total of 6-7 children maximum in one room).

Advice for struggling parents who are trying to find resources to help their children:

-You have to be willing, and you will need to work together as a team with your child’s teachers and any therapists or alternative healthcare providers. Early intervention should not be a chore, make it fun! Try not to be on the defensive if a teacher tells you she has concerns about your child, as the teachers are there to help you understand how your child will do best in their program. Lastly, Marcy recommends to all parents, do your research! The internet, books, word-of-mouth, articles, etc. are available for parents to educate themselves, and to find a good practitioner in your area.

Please tune in to this podcast for more detailed info. If you would like to contact the JCC in Orlando, you can email Marcy at: MarcyR@orlandojcc.org or contact Carol McNally- Preschool Director, or Jodi Alter- Assistant Director at 407-645-0923. You can also find them on-line at www.orlandojcc.org. Thanks for listening, and thanks Marcy for all the wonderful work you do!

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Sensory challenges are very common in the academic environment, as this is a very structured time of a child’s day where he/she is expected to sit still, pay attention, follow directions and learn without standing out in any way from his or her classmates.  The services that are available to children are often limited due to the lack of awareness and understanding by administration and governmental agencies of how sensory integration therapy helps improve underlying processing deficits, which can in turn help a child perform much better in school, in terms of their behavior and learning.

Today I have some tips to help your child be more successful in school, if he or she is struggling now.  The services and level of support recommended and provided in schools can be very different across the country.

First, find a supportive school, with an administrator that shows interest and wants to help.  Talk to administration and give them current information on your older grade school kids, not a history of when your child was at his or her worst in years passed.  See if you can visit the classroom.  Ask for a teacher that compliments your child’s needs, one that is firm with the structure of the classroom and the expectations, and yet very forgiving.

Second, look at the teacher/student ratio, the size of the classroom, the acoustics and the overall setup of the room.  Is the room visually over-stimulating and are there places for less distraction, like a calming station?  Do they offer a quiet corner that any child can go to when needed?

Third- find out if they’re open to a therapist working with them on campus during school hours, being at team meetings, or accepting phone calls or letters with recommendations from therapists to support them.  Also, are they willing to help by making reasonable accommodations recommended from a therapist?

Fourth, do they have a network of resources- such as psychologists, social workers, therapists and/or doctors to refer you to if needed?

You can listen to other episodes for sensory activities that can be incorporated before, after or during school, or you can consult with your current therapist to establish a list of activities or modifications that are most appropriate for your child’s specific needs.

Next week, Marcy Rosenbaum from the Orlando JCC Preschool program will be on our show to talk about ways to support sensory kids in a preschool environment, from a teacher’s perspective as well as a supervisor’s perspective.  Make sure to listen to that episode as she talks about many accommodations they make for these children in the least disruptive ways for the entire classroom.

These are very common concerns amongst most parents, so do your homework, and know that you are not alone!  Thanks for listening!

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Meggin is an awesome parent that I have had the privilege of working with as her daughter Kate was identified as having sensory processing problems at a very young age.

Meggin talks about the symptoms Kate displayed at 1-4 months of age, 6 months, at 1 year and then at 2 years of age when she finally sought help from an occupational therapist.  Her daughter was very easily stressed, she did not like baths, she screamed when she felt a cold breeze, didn’t like many foods, refused to wear socks and spent many hours of the day wanting to be in her crib with the lights out and with soft music playing.

This was her chance to self-calm, which resulted in difficulty with her bonding with her family.  Various doctors said she had Autism at 1 year of age, diagnosed her with Oppositional Defiant Disorder at 1.5 years, and recommended that she put Kate on Zoloft at 2 years of age.  Well, she certainly had behaviors that were undesirable, but they were related to her having sensory defensiveness, which is defined as being hypersensitive to two or more types of sensory stimulation (light touch, sounds, movement, smells, tastes, and/or visual stimulation).

Meggin shares her insight and stories on how it feels to have a child with a condition that is not well recognized or understood in the field of medicine and in the general public.  She was ecstatic that she had someone who believed her when she described Kate’s behaviors and symptoms to her occupational therapist.  It was hard to get some of her family members on board until they all saw Kate getting better. This is a very trying time for a parent that is not well supported at any point in their journey to find help, when they don’t know exactly what they are looking for.

As a parent with a child who thrived with sensory integration therapy and who has taught grade school in the past, Meggin was able to offer a few suggestions for teachers out there looking for insight or ideas, including:

• allowing a child to sit on a ball at his/her desk to improve attention
• allowing children to chew gum to help them focus (especially for tests)
• providing physical activities to motivate these kids, and help them process so they are ready to learn and pay attention

She saw that many schools, teachers and parents did not understand the sensory symptoms and challenges that were present in multiple children in each classroom.  Certainly more research and individual education is needed here.

Her words of wisdom to parents that are going through a hard time right now include:

1. Use your parent intuition! A lot of people did not get this right!

2. Get rid of your internal rules of how to run a household!  Meggin has a large platform swing suspended in her playroom, she lets the kids jump on the furniture and has lots of pillow fights, all of which she did not expect to ever allow in her household.

Children with sensory processing challenges are quite often very bright, they are great kids, and they are very capable.  Help is out there!  Try to find a local therapist who has additional training in sensory processing disorder that makes you feel comfortable and confident. You will be your child’s best advocate.

Thanks for listening!

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