Isaiah is a cracker-jack kid. He’s up and down and hiding and popping up and always full of surprises. As he is growing older, the outward ‘signs’ or appearance of his Sensory Processing Disorder are getting much, much less noticeable. For instance, it was a bugaboo to get him into and out of the mall (where our optometrist was located) in years past. If he didn’t completely melt down (hands over ears, crying, humming, rocking) by the time we left, we considered it a success. And swings and jump-trampolines? Forget it. That would be a full out I-am-absolutely-terrified-screaming and crying.

Guess where Isaiah’s favorite, most-requested destination is after Physical Therapy/Occupational Therapy on Fridays?

The mall.

Why?

Chick-fil-a and a jumpy-rubberband type giant trampoline, right smack dab in the middle of the food court.

I try not to get a wee bit misty every time he begs to jump. 

I will go to a thousand malls with a thousand trampolines for this kid. He is such a cool, cracker-jack kid. He is sweet and kind, creative and respectful. Even if the kiddo never. stops. moving. It is hilarious to be downstairs ironing or folding laundry while he is above, drawing at the kitchen table- you can hear his chair: wiggle, scrape, wiggle, scrape, scrape, scrape. It doesn’t stop.

Homeschooling Isaiah has been both a joy and a unique challenge. He excels in math and would happily sit there for hours, computing. He listens well to stories and read-alouds. On the other hand, he is behind his age and grade level in handwriting and reading and struggles incredibly with both. Much of this has to do with physical capability: up until about a year and a half ago, he couldn’t really grip a pencil properly and direct the pencil’s motion. Neither could he physically read for more than a few minutes- just getting him to sit up straight enough to see the page was troublesome. (Imagine the floppiness of a six month old baby who is just learning to sit up and use the core muscles? Isaiah’s poor muscle tone much resembled that.)

As Physical/Occupational Therapy continue, we have seen vast strides in muscle tone, fine motor, and gross motor skills. So how do I bridge the gap? Here’s a few things I do specifically for Isaiah that you might find helpful if you have a particularly wiggly or distractible child.

1.The Secret Weapon: Earmuffs.

I can’t take the credit for this one. My husband thought of this after observing Isaiah this summer. He was working on some math pages (which he loves and do not cause him to struggle) but the air conditioner was particularly noisy to him. He was very frustrated, and kept slapping his hands over his ears, eventually edging near a melt down because he could not both hold his ears and write at the same time. My husband has earmuffs for hunting, and brought them upstairs. It has been like night and day ever since. It is something Isaiah controls. He decides when he needs it (or sometimes at the gentle suggestion of mama, who sees these things).

2. Wiggly wiggles head on out.

This is something I learned from his therapists. We try to couple physical movement with learning, as much as possible. Sometimes, this means I have him do a couple of jumping jacks or hop on his foot, clap his hands…any number of things. Sometimes I do a head to toe game: “Wiggly wiggles get on out of Isaiah’s… right arm. Wiggly, wiggly, woo!” And he shakes and wiggles the body part (and giggles too). This is especially important before handwriting and reading tasks. The physical pressure of wiggling (or jumping, etc) helps his body ‘feel’ itself in space. I ought to show the very measured difference between a handwriting page done without wiggling and with wiggling- the firmness and shape of the letters is much solider in the after-wiggle page. Sometimes, it is just as simple as looking past his constant wiggling while he works. Within reason, I just let him move as long as he does the work in a timely manner. At his age now, this mostly resembles a kind of back and forth sliding across his chair- and I’ve noticed- the more interested he gets in what he’s doing, the less he slides. We do whatever wiggling we need to do to get through the day, and I always make sure to head him outside as soon as the school day is over so he can jump and holler and run.

3. Give space.

Isaiah is both very loud and wiggly and introverted and quiet-seeking. It’s a combination that at first confused and stymied me. This kid could be right up in your face hooting and jumping around one minute, and the next minute you’d find him curled up under his covers in his bed, yelling at his brother for being in the room. The more I began to understand SPD (and I understand Autism has similar traits), it made perfect sense, because kids like these are both sensory seeking and sensory avoiding, and they tend to do this without a ‘governor’ on their sensory engine. Because they have such a hard time processing sensory input, both reactions are a way of trying to order and make sense of what they are receiving. They tend to go to extremes either in the seeking or in the avoiding. My job as Isaiah’s mama is to help him find the balance. (And to be fair, most of us ‘normal’ humans struggle with this too- it’s just not so obvious.)

I have to make a caveat here, before I explain what this looks like for Isaiah right now. I think there is a tendency in parenting today to go sort of all-or-nothing with kids, and make all sorts of excuses for behavior. To me, there is a big difference between Isaiah, for instance, being truly defiant, and having a melt-down because his senses are overloaded. It takes a lot of prayerful discernment for me each day to decide which is which. So while I won’t let him act out, yell, scream, or hit at things because he is overwhelmed, (and he is punished accordingly if those behaviors occur), I will identify to him and myself that he needs some space. I think this is true for most kids, but especially kids who have additional struggles. To whit, I also try to make sure I schedule a very intentional ‘nest’ time each day, where he is encouraged to do the things that soothe him.

Some days are particularly bad for overwhelmed-ness, and I try to take my cues from him. Sometimes I can tell physical input is really bugging him because I’ll find him constantly under the table, under a blanket (or wrapped up in one). This is my cue to let me know that he is having a really hard time figuring out where his body is and he’s probably feeling dizzy or the like. I cut back on anything that is really intensive in fine motor skills, because it will frustrate him to no end and he won’t accomplish anything. It might mean we just write the letters twice instead of finishing the row; that sort of thing. He doesn’t not work- it’s just that the work is tailored to the need. (Autistic and SPD children often burrow or wrap themselves up when they feel like they are ‘all out there’ in space. Much like a baby being swaddled, they use the weight of what’s on top of them or wrapped around them to find themselves and feel the pressure against their nerve endings.) At certain points over the years, we’ve even used weighted vests or weights on his wrists as he writes- I’ve noticed lately that he is totally fine with having a blanket wrapped around or a sweatshirt on (even in the heat of summer)…and I roll with it as much as I can, within reason.

Space for Isaiah looks like:

* listening to classical (or Allison Krauss, his personal favorite) on headphones. We allow him to do this in public places, depending on his level of need. We always encourage him to go without, but there are days he struggles very much. This may happen once or twice a month at this point, but used to be a bi-weekly occurrence.

* permission to shut his door and ‘read’ (and kick his brother out- this done only with mama’s permission)

* walking/climbing on the elliptical machine

* drawing. ( I literally go thru a ream of paper in about two weeks- this brings Isaiah an unparalleled sense of peace, and he does it often.)

The bottom line for me with Isaiah (and all of my children for that matter) is that we try, as much as we can, to bring out the best in them. I think homeschooling is such an incredible gift because we can always endeavor towards excellence for each child, specifically tailored to them: their personalities, their needs, their failings. Isaiah would struggle so much in a traditional setting. Homeschooling lets us feed his brain while we fix his body– such an awesome thing. He doesn’t have test scores or school administrators pushing medication; just his mama, his therapists, and the world at his feet.