We've started The Listening Program. What is it? What does it do? Is it helping? Let's explore this in a three-part blog.

Two weeks ago we started LuLu on The Listening Program (TLP) through her private occupational therapist. This is an auditory stimulation program that trains the auditory system to accurately process sound. It is administered at home in two 15-minute sessions each day. This is our second full week on it and we are noticing some subtle changes (both positive and not-so-positive).

In... more

A friend sent me the About.com's Parenting Special Needs newsletter for last week. Topic: Be an At-Home _____ Therapist (Speech, Occupation and Physical go in the blank).

In the Top 5 Ways to Keep Speech Therapy Going Over School Breaks Terri Mauro outlines some books and materials to help with fun techniques. She also lists sites from which you can purchase a variety of tools that speech therapists used.

In the Top... more

Ok, by now you understand that I think Bruce Perry's article: "Applying Principles of Neurodevelopment to Clinical Work with Maltreated and Traumatized Children." really "rocks" (as my teen would say).

The final point I want to share from this article is his fifth principle:

Neural systems can be changed, but some systems are easier to change than others.

Only a few years ago neurologists didn't believe in brain plasticity. I remember hearing in college that you... more

How well would the logic part of your brain be able to calm you down when the fear part of your brain(which is at a lower level than your reasoning) is pumping out the chemicals of fight, flight or freeze 24/7?

This brings us to the second of Perry's principles in this article:

Neurons and neural systems are designed to change in a "use-dependent" fashion.

What I think this means in mom-language is that whatever... more

As I worked on my presentation this weekend, I re-read this Bruce Perry article: "Applying Principles of Neurodevelopment to Clinical Work with Maltreated and Traumatized Children." This is an awesome article that confirms much of what I've come to believe about parenting a traumatized child, even though I had never read it explained so clearly in one place.

His first principle in the article is that

"The brain is organized in a hierarchical fashion, such that all incoming sensory... more

I'm totally blown away by the "light reading" I did at the pool earlier this week. It is a chapter out of Working with Traumatized Youth in Child Welfare entitled "Applying Principles of Neurodevelopment to Clinical Work with Maltreated and Traumatized Children" by Bruce Perry, MD, Ph.D.

If you're not familiar with Dr. Perry and the Child Trauma Academy, you should be, especially if you are parenting a traumatized child (one who has been abused or neglected,... more

I started out to blog about an article sent on a listserv I read about a study of international adoptees. The study showed a higher level of psychiatric disorders in adoptees than the general population - or at least the summary of the study pointed toward that as being their conclusion. But in trolling around the Internet looking for other research that would support or refute the premise that internationally adopted children have psychiatric problems more often than other children, I ran across something much more interesting.

Here... more

This title may shock you. Or it may not, if you're living with a child with aggressive tendencies and sometimes violent behaviors. And if you've looked, searched, scoured to try to find the causes, triggers and remedies for those behaviors.

I received an email from a listserve of parents with special needs children that linked to an article talking about the relationship between High Calorie Malnutrition and Child Violence. The article was based on research done in 1994 (yep, 12 years ago!) that basically... more

On Tuesday, I took LuLu to the pediatrician. Her DAN! doctor and I had been discussing whether or not she was showing signs of strep. When KayKay was sick too, I decided to pull a two-fer at the doctor's and see if either child qualified for a diagnosable illness. Well, KayKay had a raging sinus infection and ear infection. But LuLu's rapid strep test was positive. LuLu has a history with strep tests --sometimes the rapid test has been negative and the culture was positive -- sometimes just the opposite. So we opted to wait on the antibiotics until after we had the culture results.

Yesterday,... more

My eagle-eyed husband called me early this morning. He's on the road and was reading the USA Today and noticed the whole front section was covered with articles on children and antipsychotic meds. This same sweet husband is a regular reader of this blog (perhaps my only regular reader). And he knows good blog material when he sees it!

The article: New Antipsychotic Drugs Carry Risks for Children sheds light on the increase of antipsychotics being prescribed to children, even young children. The article cites an 80% increase in the last four years and... more