Have you ever seen a child in an emotionally intense environment, such as fear of being scolded for a behavior and watched them cover their ears? How about children who are in a noisy place and cover their eyes and curl up?
Our sensations – visual, auditory and tactile – are pathways into the brain and are all mediated through the same system on their way to the cortex. In my practice I am watching children who have been through auditory therapies who are still covering their ears when presented with any form or degree of stress in their environment.
I am working with children whose sensory systems will not be likely to calm down until we deal with the underlying issue of anxiety.
Anxiety can put the whole sensory system – visual, auditory, tactile and even emotional cueing – on high alert, so that even if a specific sensation is addressed, the underlying problem remains.
In these cases, therapy for the specific issue -auditory therapy, vision therapy, “sensory integration” – may be futile until you go deeper into their developmental issues to address the earliest, non-verbal anxieties that throw off the whole system.
We know that cortisol, the stress hormone, will cause the eyes to diverge so the child cannot focus. Imagine the poor kiddo who is already stressed about reading and then is asked to read out loud to his class. Stress goes up, eyes diverge, the words look blurry, and his fear of reading may increase.
This concept illustrates to me why we need to be looking at the whole system from the bottom up in order to support the whole child. We can’t deal with just one sensation, one symptom, one developmental anomaly.
This is why I love this work so much. Reflexes, movement, sensation, in the context of mindful informed parenting, is what every child with a neurodevelopmental challenge needs.