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Tuesday, January 27, 2015

The Magic Keys - Sleep, Routine, Less Sugar

If you read my last post, you may have identified your child as highly sensitive.  I will share a few lessons learned that might make things easier.  Trust me, these do not come from a place of judgment or criticism.  These are truly lessons learned - often the hard way.

BTW, I'm intentionally skipping the commiserating in this post.  Trust me, I feel your pain.  I have felt more stress, anxiety, and frustration in the past few years than I have ever felt in my entire life.  But for my daughter's sake, I'm going to focus on the constructive side of this discussion.  What I will say is (if you are in a rough patch), it's gets better.  When I step back and reflect on where we are now vs. where we were 2 years ago, even 1 year ago - wow, it's amazingly better!  So don't give up.

Back to the constructive part -- I have learned there are three key things that need to be in place to give your highly sensitive child the best chance at managing stimulation and emotions successfully -

1.  SLEEP - There is no underestimating the importance of sleep in a HSC.  Of course, all young children need lots of sleep.  But some kids can still function successfully even if they miss a nap or stay up late.  For HSCs, their brains get so much stimulation, they really, really need adequate rest for their brains to recover.  For example, our daughter (almost 5) needs at least 12 hours of sleep a day.  Our son who is not an HSC (barely 2 years old) also needs 12 hours of sleep a day.  If our son doesn't get enough sleep, he gets silly and delirious.  If our daughter doesn't get enough sleep, she melts down and usually can't recover.  If our son misses a nap, we put him to bed a little early and the next day he's back to normal.  If our daughter misses a nap, it will take 2 days of early bed time and longer naps to catch up and get back on track.

So even though all of your friends are telling you their child quit napping at 3 or 4...if you have a HSC, your child will likely need naps much longer.  It's okay.  Don't give up on napping just because everyone is doing it or because your child doesn't want to nap.  What kid wants to nap?

2.  ROUTINE - Again, routine is important to all children, but it's critical for HSCs.  Why is that?  Well, HSCs take in so much information with everything they do.  And if they do something new and out of routine, then their brains really go into overdrive taking in all of the new information.  For example, it takes my daughter a good 1-2 minutes to get in her seat in the car every time, because she has to assess the books in the car, the state of her booster seat, where her cup is, if there is anything new in the car.  Oh, it goes on and on:).  But she needs this to feel comfortable.

Another is example is a restaurant.  An HSC walks into a restaurant and is overwhelmed by the new smells, the decorations, the lights, the sounds, the food, etc.  If they are used to the restaurant, this experience is less overwhelming to them.  Therefore, limiting the number of new and different things they do each day reduces the HSC's overall anxiety.  Thus, it reduces the chance of having a melt down/rage.

There may appear to be exceptions.  For example, our daughter is a total extrovert.  She loves parties, bounce houses, amusement parks, etc.  But I still have to remind myself that even though she loved that experience, that experience probably heightened all of her senses a great deal and made her very susceptible to a melt down when the experience is over.  It's still frustrating when the melt down occurs, but I can at least anticipate it and hopefully not lose my cool.

3.  SUGAR - We all love sugar.  Our brains get tingly and excited when we have it, right?  Well, for HSCs, their brains REALLY get tingly and excited.  We have resorted to using sugar as a reward (and occasionally still do), but we realized we were only hurting ourselves.  The less sugar our daughter has, the better she behaves.  Her brain is just more stable and more able to deal with instruction, sadness, disappointment, just normal everyday issues.

BTW, if you are like we were, we felt like sugar was sometimes the only motivating tool we had.  Weaning our daughter off sugar seemed impossible, but I can say we actually reduced her sugar intake significantly and it was pretty painless.  Check out my post about the sugar point system.  It has worked amazingly well!

I think it goes without saying that HSCs should not have caffeine.  I can't even imagine how old my daughter will need to be to handle coffee!

Putting these three things in place won't fix everything - it definitely won't.  But it's like building the foundation.  If you are struggling with your child's behavior, make sure these things are in place first.  Then, you will be able to better identify the other issues that need to be addressed.

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Is Your Child Highly Sensitive?

After much thought, I decided to write about a topic that is top-of-mind for my husband and me most days - should we have tacos or spaghetti for dinner?  Ha.  Kidding.  The thing we think about a lot is our daughter and how can we can have more patience and just be better parents for her.

You see this is why I had to give this a lot of thought.  I never want a blog to hurt my family.  And while my almost five-year-old daughter can't read this now, she will one day be able to read whatever I have written on the internet. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized this could actually help her one day.  Hopefully, she will read this and know that even though we sometimes seemed frustrated (because we often are), the source of the frustration is really because we don't always have all of the parenting answers.  There is nothing wrong with her.  There are just gaps in our parenting abilities and knowledge.

So by now you must be wondering what is going on.  Our sweet, very bright, pretty daughter is also highly sensitive.  Does that mean she gets her feelings hurt easily?  Well, yes, it does.  But there is A LOT more that goes with it.  For example, I couldn't take her outside in sunlight until she was four months old because the bright sun made her cry.  I couldn't use a vacuum cleaner while she was awake until she was three, because the noise scared her to death.  We have lived and died by nap and sleep schedules since she was five weeks old, because constant screaming would ensue and continue until she was put to bed if it was nap or bed time.  Her temper tantrums as a two and three (even four) year old could last for 2 hours and could more accurately be described as rages rather than tantrums.  I know the difference because I now have a two-year-old son who has much more typical tantrums - trust me, they are literally laughable compared to those of our daughter.

As a new parent and as someone who has spent virtually no time around babies and little kids, I didn't know there was anything unique about these behaviors.  I just thought, yep, raising kids is hard.  About the time, we reached two years old, I really started to think, "Is this the way every kid is?  I can't believe I don't see more mothers visiting therapists."  Fortunately for me, I joined a mother's group where one of the leaders had a daughter (now in college) who had demonstrated the very same behaviors as our daughter.  The mother talked about it... a lot.  And I realized every child doesn't behave this way.  BUT there are other kids who do behave this way.  It then, sent me on my typical internet research path to learn more.

So that's why I decided to occasionally write about this topic.  If there are other parents out there who feel stressed, concerned, alone, inadequate (you know the list), I want to give them some resources to help them better parent highly sensitive kids, and I want them to know they are not alone.

To start, here's a bit about what I learned:

1. The brains of highly sensitive people take in much more information and process it more quickly that the brains of the rest of us.  Thus, these people are easily over-stimulated.  Over-stimulation leads to anxiety and melt downs.
2.  20% of the population is categorized as highly sensitive
3.  Of those, only 70% are introverts.  That's right.  Highly sensitive people can be extroverts (which our daughter definitely is).
4.  Highly sensitive people are usually very bright, because their brains process information so quickly.
5.  The brains of highly sensitive people are less capable of regulating emotions.  Therefore, these people often appear dramatic or likely to overreact.  But their feelings are very valid.  They just feel things more intensely than most of us do.

If you are wondering if your child or you is highly sensitive, there is an easy questionnaire that can help you.  Answer each one with True or False.

My child...
1.  Startles easily
2.  Complains about scratchy clothing, seams in socks, or labels against his/her skin
3.  Doesn't usually enjoy big surprises
4.  Learns better from a gentle correction than strong punishment
5.  Seems to read my mind
6.  Uses big words for his/her age
7.  Notices the slightest unusual odor
8.  Has a clever sense of humor
9.  Seems very intuitive
10. Is hard to get to sleep after an exciting day
11.  Doesn't do well with big changes
12.  Wants to change clothes if wet or sandy
13.  Asks a lot of questions
14.  Is a perfectionist
15.  Notices the distress of others
16.  Prefers quiet play
17.  Asks deep, thought-provoking questions
18.  Is very sensitive to pain
19.  Is bothered by noisy places
20.  Notices subtleties (something that's been moved, change in a person's appearance)
21.  Considers if it is safe before climbing high
22.  Performs best when strangers aren't present
23.  Feels things deeply

If you answered TRUE to 13 or more, you have a highly sensitive child.  For perspective, I answered TRUE to 19 of these for our daughter.

There's so much to say about this topic, and I will continue to post about it.  But in the meantime, if this sounds like your child, I encourage you to check out this book - The Highly Sensitive Child by Elaine Aron.  It was written by a clinical psychologist who is highly sensitive and has a highly sensitive child.  It's a great parenting resource and it's on Kindle.

Tuesday, January 13, 2015

For the Love of Running

It's that time of year - the time of year when lots of people decide to exercise more.  So for those of you considering taking up running for exercise, I thought I would offer a little inspiration.

I run.  I run a decent amount - 25 miles a week - but I'm by no means a competitive runner or even a marathon runner.  But I'm sharing my story because I went from absolutely hating running to really liking (not quite loving) running.  So it might help somebody else get over that initial hump of hate.

15 years ago, I couldn't run down the block.  I couldn't think of many things that sounded worse.  But out of peer pressure (I lived in San Francisco and was 1 of like 3 people who didn't run) and the desire to have something cool to say on a first date ("I'm really into running"), I decided to give it a shot.  First a 5K.  Then a 12K.  And eventually a half marathon.  I was disciplined in training and completed the goals.  But did I like it?  Not really.  I would rather be watching a Real World marathon (remember those?  great for hang over days).

I spent many years in cycles of running for a year and then, not running because my life got busy and stressful.  Then, I would push through the agony of being out of shape and start all over again.  Finally, I got really tired of pushing through that agony.  So tired that I stopped the cycle.  I finally realized starting over again sucks way more than just going out and exercising.  And truthfully, reminding myself of that is sometimes what gets me out the door for the run.

So you know what happened along the way?  I actually really found the love in running.  It is by far the best, healthiest stress reliever in my life!  I can do it anywhere with minimal gear.  And most importantly, it is the one place I don't hear "mommy" or a ding of a new email/text or the phone ringing (do not run with your phone).  And even if I feel like there aren't enough hours in the day or my day isn't going well, if I get a run in, I feel like it was a good day.  Love that!

Here are my words of inspiration to get you going today - 
1.  The pain of the run is less than the pain of being out of shape.
2.  Look forward to the 30+ minutes of no one being able to talk to you and ask you for something!
3.  And if you need a 3rd, buy some cool new running shoes or clothes.  That gives me a extra boost.

Monday, January 5, 2015

New Year's Resolutions Offer Helpful Insight

Like many families, our family took a few minutes at dinner Friday night to discuss everyone's resolutions.  I will say that of course, I hope we follow through with our resolutions, because they were good.  But I actually found just hearing everyone's resolutions to be helpful by itself.   So what did everyone resolve to do?

Four year old daughter:
1.  Be kind to her friends and family
2.  Give more stuff to Goodwill

What I hope it means - She has learned to be a very generous soul and may be the next Mother Theresa (even though we aren't Catholic).
What it probably means - She knows her mom likes to throw stuff away and she's finally tired of hearing us tell her to be nice.

Husband:
1.  Praise his wife more
2.  Spend more time with his family
3.  Exercise more

What I hope it means - He will appreciate and celebrate me on a daily basis!  He will spend less time on his numerous hobbies and will incorporate more bike rides into Monday - Friday and less on Saturday and Sunday.
What it probably means - He knows his wife is totally exhausted after the holidays.  He probably should do more, and he feels a little bad right now.  He has genuinely good intentions about spending more time with my family and exercising more but his love for fishing, college basketball, fantasy football, his aquarium and hunting will likely be more powerful than he anticipated.

Two year old son:
1.  Give up his pacifier
2.  Learn to pee and poop in the potty

What I hope it means - He is really maturing and taking on more responsibility.
What it probably means - Mommy made his resolutions.

Me:
1.  Get back to healthy eating
2.  Cut back the number of things I do and am involved in, so I'm less stressed and have more to give my family.

What I hope it means - I will reduce my stress by doing less and holding my family accountable for more - SO that I am not tempted to consume another gallon of peppermint ice cream to reduce stress.
What it probably means - I will just eat dark chocolate instead.

I hope you had fun with your New Year's resolutions, too!  Happy 2015!