Root Cause

Whack-a-mole. Remember that game? You know the one- people play it at carnivals and amusement parks. You hold that big soft hammer looking thing and try and "whack" as many moles as you can in a certain amount of time. 

Ever played it? 

Ever felt successful at it?

Maybe you were able to hit some of those pesky moles and score pretty well. But darn it- each time you hit one, another one popped up, right? Or maybe even two- or THREE!!

When you have a child that struggles, sometimes it feels like we're playing whack-a-mole. It certainly felt like that to me with my son. 

Just when you think you figure one thing out- something else pops up. 

Difficulty focusing- whack!

Executive functioning difficulties- whack!

Sleep difficulties- whack!

Anxiety- whack!

Whack! Pop. Whack! Pop. Whack! Pop. On and on and on it goes.

Sound familiar? Anyone?

If it sounds familiar- have you ever stopped to think about why? What is causing the whack-a-mole in your child's life?

At Brain Fit Academy, we recognize that whack-a-mole scenario. We hear it from parents all. the. time. And here's the thing. We recognize that whack-a-mole scenario and we go beyond it. We look deeper. We look to the root of the struggles.

We look to the brainstem. 

Just like I explained in my post "Roots", the brainstem supports us- right from the beginnings of our development. The brainstem is where those automatic, stereotyped movement patterns of the primitive reflexes are housed.

When you're playing whack-a-mole, you're only hitting the surface of what's actually going on. You're "whacking" back the symptoms of a disorganized brain. 

It's like when you have a cold. You might take cold medicine to knock back the symptoms, and you might feel better for a bit. But is the cold really gone? Chances are, it's not. The cold is still there- lurking in the background- waiting for the medicine to stop working and then- POP! There it is again. Just like it was before the medicine. Sometimes- it's even worse because you masked the symptoms of the cold so that you could go about your day and didn't rest like maybe you should have!

It's the same thing with a disorganized brain. You can "mask" the symptoms (so to speak) by providing compensations. And, those compensations may help- for a bit. But it doesn't change the fact that the reflexes are still unintegrated. It doesn't change the fact that the brain is still disorganized and that the brain/body system has to work so hard to fight that reflex activity- every. single. day. The system has to work so hard that there's not much left for anything else. 

Get to the root cause. That's what we do here at Brain Fit Academy. We work on the brain from the bottom up, to strengthen and organize the brainstem so that that whack-a-mold scenario? It doesn't happen as often. Or maybe it happens in less intensity. Or maybe- doesn't even happen at all!

Let's keep the whack-a-mold game as just that- a game. Head to the carnival or amusement park to play it. 

Here- at home, with your child? Get to the root cause. The primitive reflexes. 

Call us. We can help.

Labels

We have clients come to Brain Fit Academy with a variety of "labels". As I wrote about in my post titled "There's Someplace Else", we often have families come to us after they have tried other methods, therapies, and modalities. We are the "someplace else" that often seems to come further along on a family's journey to help their child.

We have children who come to Brain Fit with such labels such as ADD/ADHD, Anxiety, Sensory Processing Disorder, Autism, Developmental Delay, the list goes on!

Now, I fully understand how labels can be helpful to have- especially for a school-aged child. Without labels, it can be very hard to receive any kind of support services through a school district. Or- if you're lucky, the school may give your child support but it won't be long-lasting or is inconsistent. I get it. Remember- I have a child that is labeled autistic, and that label has been helpful since he was two years old to help him receive the support and services in (and out) of school that he needs in order to help him be successful. 

The reason why I'm writing about labels now though is because I was thinking about them the other day. The labels I mean. I was thinking about them and how they relate to how we look at kids that come through our door.

And do you want to know what I realized? Well- I guess I already knew this but just hadn't really thought about it. What I realized is that although we ask about labels during our intake process, they aren't a focal point for us. 

Yes, knowing the label can be helpful in understanding what kinds of struggles the child might have in/out of school. And yes, the label can be helpful for guiding families in what kind of support they might want to ask for at school. But ultimately? We aren't too concerned about the label that the child has. 

It's not that we don't care of course. It's just that we are looking at the child in a deeper, different way. We are looking at brain organization and how that is affecting the child. So it doesn't matter what the label is for us- not really. It doesn't really matter because we are looking at that child on an individual basis and moving them along from where they are. At the brain/body level. We're looking at those unintegrated Primitive Reflexes and how they are affecting the child.

We could have two children with exactly the same label come to us and see two completely different profiles when we look at them from the Brain Fit stand-point. And vise versa- two children with similar Brain Fit profiles and completely different labels. 

So you see, although labels can be helpful in many ways, and can give us some information initially, ultimately- we still work with the child based on what we see. We use the information we receive from their body. Their body knows- it just might need a reminder. We meet them where they are and move them forward- regardless of their "label". 

Like I said, labels can definitely be helpful for certain aspects of helping a struggling child. And, I totally understand why they are necessary in order to get support for children. 

But here at Brain Fit Academy, we're looking at the child a little differently and those labels don't carry as much weight. They don't need to. 

What matters is that we see progress. 

What matters is that we see positive changes. 

What matters is that kids feel better in their brain/bodies when they come through our program- no matter what their "label" says.

Babies

We talk a lot about babies at Brain Fit Academy. We talk about the Baby Brain. We talk about babies in our reflex class. We talk about babies when explaining our methods to parents.

Why do we talk so much about babies? It's because that's where movement first begins. From the earliest in-utero movements of a fetus, to the first steps of a toddler, it's where movement first happens and where the brain starts "growing" itself. 

You see- movement is what helps to build the brain. As we move our bodies as babies, first automatically (like the primitive reflexes) and then more intentionally (like reaching for a toy) our brains are "building" and growing. That's why, if you take part in our program, you'll probably notice that not only do we talk about babies, but we do a lot of moving like them too.

We crawl on all fours like babies do. 

We lay on our backs in the "fencing" poses like babies do. 

We rock rhythmically like our parents did with us as babies. 

We move our bodies in many different ways that mimic the movements of babies because we are working to grow our brains too.

Remember- the brain can change. Neuroplasticity is the official scientific term, but really- it just means that the brain can change through growth and reorganization. We can grow the brain by doing those movements that we might have missed as babies.

For babies, their movement is initiated by their desire to interact with the world. They want to learn about the world around them so they move to reach for the toy for example- or to get to another part of the room (rolling!)

The primitive reflexes- those stereotyped, automatic motor patterns, are on a "timeline". It's like a template or blueprint of human movement. So as babies grow and develop, they progress along that template with their movements. They work through the template as they interact with the world- through movement.

That movement, in turn, leads to brain development- from the bottom up. Babies build their brains from the bottom up, starting with the brain stem- or, as we like to call it the "Baby Brain". 

When we work to integrate Primitive Reflexes in our Brain Fit sessions, we are taking advantage of that neuroplasticity I mentioned. We work to "re-organize" the baby brain. We pick up where the template or blueprint got stuck or interrupted and we move it along. And when we do that, things get easier for the person. They just do- it's that simple.

So when we think about what happens in Brain Fit sessions, it makes sense that if we are working on that same template that we had as babies, many of the movements would be the same, right? We're working on the template we had as babies, so we mimic the movements we had as babies.

There's that word again- babies! I told you we say it a lot!

Now- don't worry. You're not going to see the coach and the child crawling around all session acting like babies. But you will see them doing movements that you might have seen your child do when they were babies- along with a lot of other fun activities and movement!

So yeah, babies: 

• They are where the movement starts. 
• They are where the brain begins its development. 
• They are who we mimic. 
• They are our inspiration.

After all, if babies can grow their brains, so can we!!