139: How to Support your Sensory Kids with Laura Petix
/Let me ask if this sounds familiar:
Your child freaks out if there are tags of seams on some of their clothes or the transition to weather appropriate clothes is a nightmare...
Or it feels like your child is always crashing into you or things, jumping off of high stuff or needing a wrestle...
Perhaps loud noises or bright lights overwhelm them...
Or maybe they are just so. dang. loud. themselves?
If this does sound familiar for a kiddo in your life, your child may need some support with sensory processing! I hear this sort of thing from parents all the time, but sensory processing needs are still something that a lot of the professionals in our kids lives aren't fully versed in, let alone in how to help. So, to help us understand how to recognize "sensory stuff" when we see it and figure out if Occupational Therapy could help, I brought in the wonderful human behind one of my favorite Instagram accounts, The OT Butterfly (@theotbutterfly). She is a mom to her own sensory kiddo, wife and pediatric Occupational Therapist. With a degree in Neuropsychology and Masters in Occupational Therapy, she teaches parents how sensory processing impacts their child’s behaviors and how to support them.
Here's an overview of our discussion:
Occupational Therapy: How it helps neurodivergent kids or children with a sensory processing disorder
Sensory IS behavior (rather than the debate “is it sensory OR behavior?)
Figuring out if your kiddo needs more support from an OT and understanding what happens in an OT session
How to support sensory kids at home
If you want to get more support for your kiddo, you can schedule a consult with Laura Petix here www.theotbutterfly.com/parentconsult. And, follow her on Instagram @theotbutterfly.
RESOURCES
Sensory W.I.S.E. Solutions Course for Parents (waitlist) www.theotbutterfly.com/waitlist
Sensory IS Behavior course: www.theotbutterfly.com/behavior
Heavy Work Freebie: www.theotbutterfly.com/heavyworkfreebie
Sensory Sensitivity Checklist: www.theotbutterfly.com/checklist
Website: www.theotbutterfly.com
TRANSCRIPT
Parenting is often lived in the extremes. It's either great joy or chaotic, overwhelmed. In one moment, you're nailing it and the next you're losing your cool. I want to help you find your way to the messy middle, to a place of balance. You see balance is a verb, not a state of being. It is a thing you do. Not a thing you are. It is an action, a process, a series of micro corrections that you make each and every day to keep yourself feeling centered. We are never truly balanced. We are engaged in the process of balancing.
Hello, I'm Dr. Laura Froyen and this is The Balanced Parent Podcast where overwhelmed, stressed out and disconnected parents go to find tools, mindset shifts and practices to help them stop yelling at the people they love and start connecting on a deeper level. All delivered with heaping doses of grace and compassion. Join me in conversations that will help you get clear on your goals and values and start showing up in your parenting, your relationships, your life with openhearted authenticity and balance. Let's go!
Laura: Hello everybody, this is Dr Laura Froyen and on this week's episode we're gonna be talking about occupational therapy and how to support kiddos who are not necessarily neuro typical or have some sensory processing issues like I know many of your kiddos have. I will also touch on how to figure out if you need more support from an OT and to help me with this conversation, I'm bringing in one of my favorite accounts on instagram, the… what is it? The Ot butterfly? Yes, yeah, that's for your handle on instagram Laura. So we're having a Laura chat today. Laura, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for being here. Why don't you tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do?
Laura Petix: Thank you so much. I'm excited to be here. I love talking to everybody about parenting and OT. So I am a pediatric occupational therapist. I specialize in working with children ages 2-10 and I work in a private clinic part time. But the rest of my time I spend on instagram, on my podcast, on my website, on courses. I really have a passion, a deep, deep passion, like way too obsessed with this. Like I think about it all the time teaching parents and teachers and really anyone who doesn't have the lens that island, I love teaching everybody how sensory processing impacts and learning and behavior.
And there's a lot of hidden things about sensory processing that can contribute to learning and behavior that we don't always think about. And I have a 4 and a half year old who is a neurodivergent kid. She has anxiety and sensory processing disorder. So I just really have a soft spot in my heart for parents who are going through this, particularly the ones who are no stranger to 45 minute meltdowns when I coach parents through it, I love saying like I'm in that club too. I get it and it makes me feel like I'm a better parent coach and OT because I lived through it too. So there's already that added connection and I have a lot more practical solutions that I know is doable.
I cringe when I think of some of the things I used to recommend to parents in my early OT days when I was like a brand new, like straight out of grad school, like textbook learning grad school, like telling the parents what to do and I was like now I'm looking back and like I would have, I would have never done that as like a parent of like a brand new kid. So anyway, yeah.
Laura: I want to just highlight this too. So I have one of these kiddos who's had lots of hard times, you know, just lots. And I don't know about you but for me and being in this space in this position of being an expert, supposing, supposedly having all the answers, all of the tools in my toolbox and still having a hard time that can be hard, you know? To be in that place of like, gosh and at the same time it makes me have so much compassion because it's like with all of the well really like wealth of knowledge and resources were still struggling, like it's just sometimes it's just hard.
Laura Petix: Oh yeah. A 100% and I say that all the time and I find that parents like hearing that like, like I don't know I don't want this to come off weird but like you have to know how comforting it is to know that you have a hard kid too. They're like, that this OT is still having a challenge raising their neurodivergent child and I'm like yes I was that pregnant first time mom was like I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that, my kid's gonna hit all the milestones, I'm gonna do all the sensory play. We're going to be like the textbook, like all of this set up right? Like I could program my child.
If, as the kind of person I am, that would be the person, that would be the child I would want because I'm so I need to be in control of things and I do things by the book, I study everything. And so I was like this is what's going to happen, this is how it's gonna work out and guess what it did not work out that way. Because she has her own personality, her temperament, she has her own brain wiring that I, even as much as I try to shape and mold our daily experiences, I have no effect on how her brain perceives the world and how she learns and communicates. And that's something that I am now very comfortable and have come to terms with and I love helping parents get to that part of their journey, even if it means using myself as an example. Like, hey look, I'm an OT. And I still struggle with this and I have no shame in admitting that.
Laura: Yeah, absolutely. And there's this piece of relief that, like, okay, wait a second, it must not be my fault. There's nothing wrong with me, and there's actually nothing wrong with my child. They are just wired a little bit differently and they need different supports and they need different inputs coming in, they need different, you know, different environment that helps them feel safe and stable. Right?
Laura Petix: Exactly. Exactly.
Laura: Okay, so let's dig into that a little bit because a lot of the parents I work with have these intense spirited kids who are who reactive or the book I was reading most recently by Mona Delahooke - Brain-Body Parenting and she calls them…
Laura Petix: I haven't read it yet, but I heard it, it's amazing.
Laura: It’s so it's so good, you'll love it. But she calls these, these are kids with unstable platforms that just kind of get thrown into fight or flight so easily. Yeah, I love that phrasing the unstable platforms, I just love it. And so for lots of the parents that I have, you know, I can tell immediately when I just when I hear them talking about their kids that their kids would benefit from OT. But why don't you just give me a quick rundown around how is OT helpful for these kids who maybe have a sensory processing disorder or has a neurodivergent. What is, what is it that supports them?
Laura Petix: Yes. Yeah. So I just want to quickly, I also want to mention one thing that you said from Mona Delahooke book that reminds me of something that my husband said at the time. Just if this resonates with other parents and I hear parents say this all the time when you have a spirited child or a child who easily gets dysregulated and just goes and goes into meltdown mode. Like quote out of nowhere, right? My husband said one day he's like I just don't get it like how can she go from like 0 to 100.
And I'm like because she's not at zero, she's not hovering at 75 every single day, like she does not get down to zero and that is the best with no context, like that's all I say and parents like yes that is exactly my child. She is not a zero. She is always hovering, her nervous system is always kind of, at this like high alert state. So it doesn't take much for her to pass that threshold into dysregulation state. So how OT helps with that. So if you have a child who is always hovering around 75, always seems to be like - on alert, cautious, fearful, easy to react to certain things. So what happens in their brain is the brain has developed like a shortcut pathway to dysregulation.
Usually in a context that is repeated for them. That has maybe some sensory triggers for them. Right? So let's take the example of the bathroom. There's a lot of things that happen in a bathroom that might be stressful for kids with sensory processing challenges, particularly sensory sensitivities, right? So there's, if they are sensitive to like teeth brushing or hair brushing or washing their face or taking a bath or washing their hair or going to the potty, all of that happens in the context of the bathroom. And so what may start as a sensory sensitivity, like those things trigger their nervous system to have this big emotional fight or flight reaction that for neurotypical people feels like either out of nowhere or like exaggerated, right? We don't really get it over. Like, what are you talking about? It's not even that loud or it doesn't smell that bad or it's not even you're not even wet, like it was a splash of water.
So that triggers their brain into fight or flight because they have a different threshold for getting dysregulated. They have a lower threshold for getting dysregulated. And the more often that happens, the brain starts to create an association, a learned pathway to dysregulation and it does that sort of to like protect your body where it's like, hey, every time we're in this bathroom it makes our heart race, my pupils are dilated, I start sweating, I don't feel good in my body, I feel stressed out. Let's not go in here again. Every time we go in here, we're gonna have a fight or flight reaction to keep us out of this bathroom because it does not feel good to the nervous system. That is what the brain is automatically doing. But on the outside, this is your child avoiding bath. This is your child running away. This is your child screaming, putting their hands over their ears. This is them screaming, bloody murdered while you're trying to just like wash their face and you're scared your neighbors are going to call CPS because it's so loud and you're like, I swear I'm just trying to clean my child.
So the brain creates these like shortcut pathways to dis regulation. And it does so in a way that sometimes it's like, okay, you keep going to the bathroom. So now to save us from even going there, we're gonna start, the brain is starting, it's gonna start triggering this regulation. Maybe when we see the bathroom or when we hear mom say it's gonna be bath time. Now, when we hear the word bath time, our brain is creating stronger and stronger pathways to dysregulation.
So what OT does either through parent coaching, like what I do online or within person, sensory into both of these are a great supplemental way to work on this. Is OT help your child create pathways to regulation? So the way that I like to visualize it is if like if you were taking like a shortcut route through this like wild field and there's like there's weeds and grass is really tall pieces of foliage and all that, and you're trying to take a shortcut to get somewhere and there's no path. So you're like pushing your way through right? That's like the first way that your brain is creating like the first neuron connection to this right to regulation when you're in the bathroom. But the more often you take the same path, what happens is you create this little paved pathway in that field because you take it every single day over and over.
So now your brain has created this pathway to regulation and OT does that by like I said coaching parents on how to set up their environment at home and how to offer their kids more positive associations with a certain environment or context, and the clinic if you work with an OT with sensory integration, they are actively teaching your child how to experience moments of regulation. Not so much in the context because they're not always gonna be like in the bathroom where they're not gonna have the same triggers in the clinic but it's truly just giving your child's brain more experience in your child's nervous system. More like game time of like, this is what regulation feels like bringing them a little below 75 if we're going to 0-100 scale right? Their body, their nervous system like oh this is regular, this is what it's supposed to feel like. And the more that the brain and nervous system feel that way. Hopefully it can then lead to like less meltdowns or less intense meltdowns and just more times of regulation.
Laura: Yeah. Okay so I love this. All right so there's kind of two directions Laura, that I want to go here. So I'm making a mental note for myself to come back to the one that I'm not going to take to that path that I'm not gonna take. So I'm gonna take right now. Is that a lot of my clients and community members who have gotten their child into OT, it seems to me when I hear from them about their experiences that they're not fully accessing the wealth of knowledge that OT’s have. That they're not fully accessing, that they don't necessarily even know how to fully access the experience of OT over these past two years. A lot of the OT has been happening virtually. Which I can't even imagine when, when my daughter was an OT. We were in person in the room, a parent was always with their, and was heavily involved in the O. T. It was crucial for us to be involved and I know that that's been really difficult over these past two years.
If you had anything for I guess, any recommendations or ways for parents to really engage with their OTs and work with them. Start partnering with them with their child's OTs. Do you have any like kind of jumping off points? Because I feel like there are a lot of the parents I talked to there is this kind of almost like a lack of understanding of what is happening in the OT session with their child. And how it translates to things at home and it sounds like you're very you know, I know all OTs have different experience and training. And I'm sure some are better at others than like really walking a parent through things. So, if that you are a parent who doesn't have one of those OTs who's walking through, you through it, or you haven't had access to because you haven't been in person because that's just the reality for these past two years. This is the longest question ever. I'm sorry.
Laura Petix: I know I love the way you're explaining it because setting it up perfectly.
Laura: Okay, good. Yeah, so for those parents, how can, what can they be doing and saying to really partner with their OT and really understand what the OT is doing for their kid? And how they can start applying those principles and really starting to embody them and build them into their parenting? Because that was the thing that I think helped us so much in my child's OT experience and I'm happy to talk about that too. But go ahead.
Laura Petix: Yeah. So, the first thing I want to say is I always preface this with saying that I am a private clinic OT. So I work in sensory integration clinics and it is not affiliated with a hospital like outpatient setting, and we are not affiliate, like we help parents get reimbursed by like providing them an invoice but we don't take insurance’s directly, right? And so that frame, that already like mindset already kind of shapes how I… the freedom that I have as an OT and I know from speaking to parents who have different, have their kids in different settings or from colleagues who are in different settings. I know that not all settings are able to do what I'm going to share with you, but if but it's always worth asking. Right? So I will already separate if your child in school based OT that is a whole different layer of red tape and things to get through just to like email your OT and get a response back. Like they can't even access their emails sometimes outside of school, like wifi. Like they have a lot more steps to get in contact with them. Right?
Laura: So, that’s such good contextual information, thinking that you are…
Laura Petix: Exactly! Because I get that too. I'll try to email someone, an OT that I'm collaborating with on a client that we both see and I will get an email back like this weekend, I don't have access to my email because I have to be within school whatever. And I'm like oh that, that makes sense. So that already is a piece. So, and then the other part is even if you're just if you're in an OT clinic with your child, but you are more of like an affiliate, you're in a clinic that's affiliated with the hospital or you're going through insurance. I know that these clinics typically have really really high caseload numbers and are also very like… they can seem quick with the information because they have to get to the next kid. Like right away there's like no time in person. So I kind of get that.
Laura: Can we just have like a moment for, of compassion for these providers. I mean and I know that as parents, we're so focused on our individual child and it can be so frustrating. But for these providers are our kids therapists and OTs. They've been living through this, this time too. They've been seeing all of the stuff that the kids are living through, right? We get just this little picture of just our child often who have been in very privileged positions. You know, been very well protected from the just the trauma of these past two years and they're still these kids are still having big reactions and then they have been exposed to just so much more. You know, I just, just a moment of compassion for all the works that your colleague…
Laura Petix: Yes. When I hear those, when I hear colleagues of mine going through that, oh that really seems like a big stress to your, like nervous system, just talking about your nervous system. Like daily waking up stress and the level of productivity that they are held to by their companies by the insurance where like literally down to the minute they have where they don't even have time to go to the bathroom. Like there's a lot of stuff going in there. So for parents to have compassion for that, but so I'm going to share with you some ways that I have been privileged enough to be able to afford my clients and offer to them because I would say in these private clinics we have a lot more free reign. We are not limited by a lot of insurance parameters on my goals or like only 12 visits. Like there's a lot of like I can work on so many things, but again, it's a privileged setting to work in for myself and for the families who are able to come because a lot of them pay out of pocket. So I understand that that is definitely an aspect to this, but…
So something that, what I feel like wasn't stressed a lot in grad school when I went for an OT. I don't know if it's different now. Maybe times are changing maybe even after Covid but they did not stress a lot. The importance of having regular one on one like parents OT conference consultations, coaching sessions. They did not stress that. We talked about like the parent coaching model but they never were like you should be doing this every month or every three months or things like that. And what I found was when I was more full time in the clinic pre covid. I like you or like my colleagues, like after each session I would spend like five minutes debriefing with them. But there were two things wrong with that. One was I was like my mind was like split like okay I gotta clean up that room, get ready for this kid and try to go pee. But I really want to spend time telling his mom how great her son did this but it comes out of me spewing so we did this obstacle course with vestibular input inappropriate stuff. Like I'm splurging all these things that I remember she and I did have this conversation about it. But it was like six months ago when I first evaluated her son and we sat down for the parent conference but like I don't… Why would she remember that each and every time?
Laura: It’s overwhelming as a parent.
Laura Petix: It’s overwhelming. So that's like one piece, the speed of it. The second piece was the kid is always there like next to us right? And so there's that distraction of them ready to go home, Mom let's go or mom look what I did and they want to be part of the conversation. But then there's the other piece of like not talking about the kid in front of the kids so then I can't be fully candid about things that were hard for them. So I'm like sugarcoating things and I can't really tell mom like hey we should look out for this thing I noticed like… and so then I would spend outside hours emailing parents and then that was just like a, like not balanced lifestyle for me as well.
So once Covid hit I heard a lot of pros about teletherapy was that the OTs finally got to really spend time coaching parents or parents really got to sit in and notice the language that OTs use. The really creative ways we get to motivate kids through tasks that they would otherwise refuse. And what I noticed was that, so during Covid that's when I started. I wasn't seeing kids, I was in between clinics and I just started focusing on coaching parents and telling them how they can support their kids at home and even without their kids seeing me in person they were still making progress. So then fast forward to when things got more manageable and now I'm back in the clinic less time.
Now I've made it a point to when I evaluate a family, I say I have that first parent evaluation and I say, hey, this is what I noticed going on. We're gonna work on it this way. So explaining explicitly what they're going to see in the session. Yes what you are here for feeding for handwriting, but we are going to be spending time doing obstacle courses playing games on the floor. It's going to look a lot like playing, it is playing, but I promise you we're working on skills. And then I say I recommend having parent consults, parent coaching once a month for at least the first 3 to 6 months depending on how severe or how much information I need to give them.
And I've noticed such a huge impact from the parents' understanding, from my confidence, like not worrying. Like you know, I know if any OTs or other therapists are listening like there's a, there's this like hidden stress sometimes when I'm playing with the kid and if I didn't get to connect with that parent and they like come and observe the last five minutes. I feel so much pressure of them thinking like I'm not doing anything because we're like sitting and talking about like dolls and doing pretend play. But I'm like I promise this is really impactful. So now I feel way less stressed and I feel more confident and then the parents feel more confident. It's just all around great. So for parents, if you can ask whatever setting you're in, it doesn't help her to ask if there can be set aside time for one on one, uninterrupted parent consultations within your therapist caseload.
Now to be creative with this, if your therapist is like I don't have time to add that to my caseload, right? Then I have sometimes and I have again, I have the flexibility to do that. But some, I know colleagues who are just like back to back to back. I've had parents substitute. So if your kid is going once a week for the fall like a full months or four visits, I would have parents substitute one of those four visits to be just parent and OT and then parents like, but wait, aren't they not going to… like I don't want them to miss a session. I'm like trust me the the value you're gonna get from a parent coaching one on one is going to supplement or even make it better your experience even if your child is not getting it, getting that direct OT.
Laura: Because you're only together one, you know, one hour a week if you're doing weekly sessions and there's so many other hours in the time in between sessions. Yeah, so I really love that emphasis and so being able to ask for that, you know, there were times two we were able to do like a half session with my daughter and then a half session with just us, where we were, this was during Covid. So we were at a park doing sessions, we were doing outside park and so she would just go and play and we would say…
Laura Petix: I love that. So you could be super creative with the settings and doing it. You just have to ask. And it's interesting because since I've been talking about this like the current clinic at I went into when I started working there, I was like I am happy to work here, but I was just so you know, this is what I'm going to be recommending to all my families, like I have to make parents part of it. And then the clinic director, she was like that's amazing. And so now she's having all of the other therapists offer that. And then there's other… my colleagues that I have instagram that are other OT. So like I started doing that in my practice too and it's made such a difference. like it's not something that's standard, but once they start offering…
So, so when I'm saying that because when parents ask OTs, they might be like - oh we don't do that because they've never done it, but they've never considered it will be like, are you willing to like substitute a session? But knowing that parents again coming in like this is definitely one of those privileged pieces. So you probably you will have to pay out of pocket for it sometimes if you're going through an insurance plan and probably won't be covered by insure unless there's a some insurance is great with parent coaching, but just so you know that that would be like an typically an added charge added fee to it, but it's definitely worth asking if they could do phone calls, zoom calls in person, some uninterrupted time to talk at length about your child's progress, their strengths, things that they're noticing, things you're noticing at home and this gives the OT chances to coach you on specific things at home. Because that's the number one thing I hear from parents when they come to me for virtual coaching is there like, yeah, we're in OT, but they don't really help us with home stuff. They just like work with my kid and they don't help me deal with the meltdowns. I’m like, oh they should be helping you with the meltdowns. Like you should ask them, I'm happy to coach you through it. I love that. But also it's probably more bang for your buck if you get, if you work with the OT who sees your child person and knows them. So definitely ask.
Laura: Okay, so I love that. It never hurts to ask and I really, I think that that's so important. So kind of, can you give us… what… I think in my experience with OT with my oldest daughter who's nine now and she graduated from OT when she was seven. So she went from, when she was 5 to 7 and it was wonderful. I think the thing that helped the most in terms of OT for her, was her therapist very carefully helping her tune into her body and listen to what her body was communicating and to what it needed. And so we would go through various, I mean she had a lot of reflex integration issues, a lot of… she didn't crawl so she had a lot of crossing the midline stuff that needed to be happen to. But most of it was spent kind of engaging different sensory systems doing different things and figuring out does this activate you or does this regulate you?
Does this you know, does this make you feel more calm? Does this make you feel more alert and really tuning in? And I think I wasn't expecting that that would be part of OT. You know what I mean? And I'm curious if you can… So the other issue that I see in my communities right now is that people who know their kids need OT and they cannot get in. And because it's the wait lists are so long. And so like, what are some of the things we can be doing as parents at home with our kids when we know something's going on for our kids and we feel very ill equipped to help them. What are some of the things we can be doing?
Laura Petix: Yeah so first of all it sounds like your OT, was an amazing OT because that's definitely that is A plus gold standard, real good OT-ing right there because it's not just doing onto the child is not just playing with them. But it's really take then you bridge the gap. That steps towards self regulation so that your daughter knows what works for her body. And this is where I really love highlighting like what's that quote? It's like, if you give a man a fish,
Laura: He will eat for a day.
Laura Petix: If you teach a man of ill.. what that thing? Yes that ,that whole thing that's what I focus on with parents because they're like what can I do to regulate my child? She's hyperactive.What can I do to regulate my child? She is having meltdowns? And I'm like well it really depends because whatever regulates me might not regulate your daughter, what might regulate your daughter, might not regulate your son. And it’s everybody's another system. It’s different. So you really do need to know how to be a sensory detective, which is what I call or so, in my parent program I talked about becoming sensory detectives and so there are some general sensory inputs that are pretty universally regulating mostly. And I was like tread lightly there because obviously everybody is different but it's about… So that's heavy work. It’s like any input that's to your muscles and tendons and joints anytime you're chewing, pushing, jumping, carrying all of that input to your muscles and tendons and joints is highly regulating to the nervous system. No matter what kind of sensory threshold you have, it's pretty universally calming. Just like deep breaths are those are the two that are like, start here, right? And so…
Laura: This is one of the reasons why I think runners love running so much. Like runners, who are intense runners. You pound the pavement. I’m like you guys are sensory seekers…
Laura Petix: Sensory seekers or people that go to the gym every day and lift and they, and they're like, I don't feel good unless they do that. I'm like, that's great, I wish I had that sensory profile, I don't have that one, so that's amazing. But parents always ask like, is my kid going to grow out of this? I'm like, they might not grow out of it, but they will adapt their lifestyle. Like they might be the person who wakes up at five in the morning to make sure that they get their yoga running working out and not to be a fitness person, but because it feels good for their nervous system.
So they might, or they might grow up and be like a skydiver because they're such a sensory seeker. So parents to notice what you think regulates your child. When I say, regulate, like, what do you notice is most calming for your child do? is it when they move and they swing a lot, then you notice like wow like they were like sitting all through dinner super quiet and like had conversations they weren't just regulated. I wonder if I had to do with the hour of swinging they did before or today was a swim day. After swim they seem to always be super regulated. Or I noticed when my child is having a meltdown like the only thing that calms her down is when I'm hugging her and humming or something and so you're trying to take little clues and then you can try to categorize like is it a touch close body thing? Is it a movement thing? And then try to find different activities that can target that.
Again, this sometimes needs some guidance from an OT. But even if you can't work directly with an OT, there's a lot of information on instagram. I have a lot of stuff on instagram to dive into the sensory regulation stuff but my point is whatever like, Pinterest list you print out of. Like if you type in heavy work there's probably gonna be some free thing of like 101 ways to do heavy work.
Laura: Can I tell you when I started recommending heavy work to parents seven years ago there was nothing. There was one article and an OTs website with list of heavy work activities.
Laura Petix: It's great but it's like it can be overwhelming and so what I like parents to know is that like not all heavy work. Not all regulation activities are created equal. Like oh I found this 101 list I'm gonna do 101 of these every single day. It's - take that list and I would narrow it down like what do you think is something your child might like to do, like oh I see them crawl all the time, maybe they would like this army crawling like activity or whatever. And then once you do it, then that's when you really become the detective and you can involve your child if they have speaking abilities and and they have the other cognitive abilities to help dissect what's happening like your OT was helping your daughter.
So you do the activity and then you ask them. How did that make your heart feel? How did that make your body feel? I noticed you started moving a lot slower. I noticed the volume of your voice got down to my level and it wasn't super loud or opposite. I noticed your body started moving really fast and silly. Maybe that's not such a good calming activity. What do you think? So you can really like try these out and involve your child in the process if they can, but really for you to observe how is this regulating the body?
The other thing I want to mention to parents whenever you're trying like a sensory strategy heavy work activity or deep breathing activity is like if you try it once and like it feels like it “doesn't work” or didn't “do anything”. I'm putting a lot of air quotes here. I usually recommend to parents to try something. Like for a couple of weeks consistently before you truly notice anything, because it takes kids sometimes that initial time to get over a new routine where they might be like fighting back to it, or the novelty of it is really exciting and then they do great with it. But then after a while, like, well it doesn't work anymore. So I say give it a couple of weeks before you decide if a sensory strategy is really working for you.
Laura: There's a piece of it, like of the “do’s” too, like write, you know, doing it over time. It builds those neural connections and it helps with those things. And then there's also like, I don't know for if this is true for all folks, but for my child swinging to a certain point is really groundin., But if she goes past it and gets too much, then it's, she's wild. You know? And so helping her, like hone in on like what is the limit, where is that boundary? And you to like, as a parent noticing and helping them notice. I think, well, you know, they're gonna own this body forever, right? This is their body. They're gonna have this nervous system forever. And they need to learn how to use it for their best highest self.
Laura Petix: Yeah so that's why I spend most of my time teaching parents how to notice signs of this regulation because I can't tell you… like well how long should I be doing heavy work? Like well it depends what the heavy work is? what your child is? how much… like there's so many it depends, it depends. I don't… you won't see me give like a full list of like here's a sensory diet. If you have a sensory seeker here's what you should do. That is not what I do. I give like ideas of how to structure certain activities but it's really your job as a parent. And maybe in conjunction with an OT to help craft a list of things that might work for your particular child. And then you really do have to sit and observe and it's a constant re analysis of what is working what might not work noticing other patterns and context that might be contributing to that. Like while swinging works on Monday but not on Fridays, why? Oh well because on Friday she also has gymnastics. She also has swim, it's half day at school that we do the water park. Like there's a lot that goes into it. It's never just a one size fits all thing, for sure.
Laura: I love that. The individualizing pieces of it. Alright so you have a course that where you support parents with figuring some of these things out for those of us who don't have access to OTs, or to awesome OTs like you, who are really going to be supporting our kiddos.
Laura Petix: So I have two courses that are kind of helpful. So one is a, just a very like crash course mini course. If you are kind of starting out as a parent and you're still trying to figure out your child's behaviors or you do know your child has a sensor, has a sensory challenge but you're like - oh, whenever they hit their brother, I can't tell like is that a behavior, is that a sensory thing? Like what is this? Are they doing it on purpose or is this some other thing? There's usually that debate like what is going on here? And yes and I love when parents are asking that that means you're already like step one is already like curious about the behavior. You're not just like jumping to a conclusion, but it does take some like troubleshooting and taking things apart.
So I have this course called sensory is behavior by the time this podcast is out, it will be live. So you can go to the OT butterfly dot com slash behavior and that's where I really talk about like 10 really common childhood behaviors. And I brain dumped all the potential reasons why it could be a sensory trigger and I could and I bring them all the potential reasons why it's not a sensory trigger that includes no need for a parent connection. Language challenges, cognitive abilities, all of those things and then giving you some general ideas on how to support a sensory behavior versus a non sensory behavior.
Again, I never go into too much detail and these like widespread courses because it's not a one size fits all. So if you're looking for like a one side and oh, not one side. If you're looking for more guided support for particular, like very unique behavior or something that's happening, I offer one on one coaching which is the OT butterfly dot com slash parent, consult one word, where I can really talk through all of the nuance to it. But then the other, the last offer that I have that's really helpful for parents is very niche specific if you have a child who is sensory sensitive. So they have a hard time with clothes. This is my daughter. Like the feel of socks, the feel of like seems the feel of the way the pants fit jackets and any of that or if they are a picky eater or if they're sensitive to any of the grooming things. I kind of talked about earlier in the bathroom, like brushing hair, washing hair, taking a bath, nail clipping, haircutting. If they're sensitive to sound or sensitive, too messy play. All of those things I focus on in my parent program called the sensory wise solutions program. And it's an online, it's a course with a group coaching.
So this is where I can give you, because I'm focusing on very specific sensitivity to bathroom. I can give exactly what you should do and some ideas to tailor it for your kids and there's group coaching there as well. So that one enrolls a few times a year, the next time I'm opening, it is probably in June, but if you want to know more, you can always just go to the Ot Butterfly dot com and everything will be there or find me on instagram and I will happily guide you in the right to resource. But a couple I want to mention to free sources, resources for parents who want to just find out more. So one of my favorite ones is if you're curious what sensory sensitivity really looks like more fleshed out, I have a checklist for that. So you can go to the OT Butterfly dot com slash checklist and to see if your child is sensory sensitive or if it is like leaning that way and at least gives you kind of like talking points to bring up to professionals if you want to talk about your child's behaviors. And then, since I did mention heavy work and if you want to learn more about that, I have a freebie called who needs heavy work. So it talks about like the different behaviors that would benefit from extra heavy work and then some general ideas of what that is and that's the OT butterfly dot com slash heavy work. I'll have to make sure that that's the right thing. I'll send you the link for sure. But yeah, so there's lots of stuff out there for parents to get started if you're in that long, long wait list for OT, which I know it's just getting…
Laura: I'm so glad that there's resources out there for folks. Can I ask you one question? And this is maybe like a professional, professional question. So, but you all get to listen to it because I know we're wrapping up, you've got to go to a session. So when you were talking for, I got completely like, just down in like a thought wormhole when you were talking about, is this a sensory thing or is this a behavioral thing? And I just want to make sure I'm thinking about things, right? Because I'm not an expert on, like, on sensory stuff. I've done a lot of self educating. I work with a lot of folks who are, you know, I work on the parenting side of things and you're definitely the expert on the kind of the censoring what's going on in the, for the child from that perspective. And so when I'm, when I'm thinking about things like, you know, if a kid is refusing, you know, you're driving on the highway and the kid is refusing to put the window up because, you know, it's rushing on their face, right? That's clearly a sensory thing. But if the kiddo is, you know, dysregulated and hitting their sibling, so I'm just checking to make sure I'm thinking about this, right?
If they are doing that, it could be that they have this need for connection right then, or they have some jealousy and they need some emotional support to help them be regulated. But in my experience with my kiddo, it could also be that they've had this other, this whole day that was just challenging for them because of their unique neural wiring where just existing, like literally walking through the world is harder for them and their platform is already at that kind of at that 75 we were talking about. And so it can, it can be this, I don't know this muddy thing to tease apart. And so even if that behavior when she's hitting her sister is really about getting connection, right? There's also other sensory things at play there, is that right? Am I thinking about this, right?
Laura Petix: That's, that's right, That's exactly right. And that's, that hitting is such a calm. I mean, all behaviors are more complex than what we see obviously, but hitting is one that I get asked a lot and like, you're right, there's that emotional component to it. And then if your child is maybe more prone to dysregulation, there could be like this build up of things throughout their day, sensory inputs, routine changes, things that just were like thrown at their nervous system that now they're just in no place to be in control of it and it's all just spilling out. And so in that case it could be a sensory thing and an emotional need, peace. It could be both right.
And the thing that I like to say about sensory triggers is that, it doesn't always have to be such a clear cut, like you said like window or like the toilet flushing and then that happens and then cry and then it's done like, oh that was clear that the toilet. It can be a build up, like you're talking about, it can be a build up from that day, it could be a build up of weeks, it could be right, and it could just be like, maybe even if a kid like didn't sleep well the night before. I sometimes still consider that a sensory issue. If they have interception and challenges with their internal states and their nervous system is even more dysregulated and they are a dysregulated child. Like more often I could still consider that part of it. So it really is complex. And then the other piece is sometimes the actual act of hitting gives feedback, appropriate corrective feedback.
So it's a tricky way that it actually feels good to their body even if they know they like should not. So that's the piece, right, as parents. But you know, you're not supposed to hit but either like one, it feels good to my body. Two, it felt good to like express that emotion. Three, I really have no control over my body, right? There's like a lot of things that go into it and that first step of noticing that there's so many different reasons for this gives you an ounce more, I hope, of compassion, to be able to make it through to respond in a more intentional way to your child. Although I know I'm like the first to admit, I'm not always perfect with the way that I respond to my child's behaviors, but it can help when you have the right mindset most of the time.
Laura: Absolutely. And you know, all of us parents, we know from experience that the knowing and the doing, like the knowing the right thing to do and the doing of the right thing, are two completely different.
Laura Petix: Even for us. Yes, exactly. So it's like, so when parents are like, well she knows not to hit, I'm like, well, you know, not to yell and you still yell. They're like, oops, and I'm like, I mean I do too, but it's just like pointing it out that we are human. Exactly. Exactly.
Laura: And if it's confusing to us to like think about piecing it all out with our fully developed brains. I just, I can just imagine how confusing it is for kids to have to be in this dysregulated state and then have these impulses and emotions boiling to the surface with very few skills and experience.
Laura Petix: And executive functioning. Like that's not even developed until you're like mid twenties. Why are we not talking about that?
Laura: Yes, exactly. I feel so much the same, So much compassion to parents and kiddos and wonderful. Thank you Laura for this time you spent with us. I really appreciate you helping me shine some light on some of these.
Laura Petix: I'm so happy too. I'm so happy too. It fills my cup to be able to talk about this and knowing more people are hearing about OT maybe for the first time or feeling reinvigorated to go back to their child's OT with more ideas or feeling more confident at home. I just want parents to feel like more empowered really to either child's best advocate. So..
Laura: Yeah, absolutely. Parents are amazing. Don't you love them? I love, I love working, getting to work with parents.
Laura Petix: I used to, I used to be afraid of working with parents when I wasn't one. And every time I had a parent console I'd be so nervous and like, oh my gosh, she doesn't like me or like, I don't know how to tell her, but now it's my favorite. It's my absolute favorite. In fact, even when I started the OT butterfly, I used to only talk to therapists and they're like, can you give parents? And I'm like, no, I only talk to a therapist, my audience is there. I'm giving them… Because I was scared to talk to parents even as a parent, but now I'm like, once I open the door I'm like, oh you are my people and I connect with you and it feels it's so rewarding to know that like you've given parents these tools for a lifetime so that you can set them up for success. So they can set their kids up for success. I love it.
Laura: It's beautiful. Thank you. It's a gift. Thank you for working through that and starting to share because we need it.
Laura Petix: Oh, I love it. I'm glad that I'm on this path now. I would never, I would never change that.
Laura: Beautiful. Thanks for being here Laura, thank you so much.
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All right. That's it for me today. I hope that you keep taking really good care of your kids and your family and each other and most importantly of yourself. And just to remember, balance is a verb and you're already doing it. You've got this!