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!!

Safe

I think most of us most likely take for granted that (generally) we feel safe. Right? I mean it was probably pretty obvious when the pandemic hit and suddenly we had reasons to not feel safe. 

Suddenly, we were thrown into a situation where even going to the grocery store could jeopardize our safety, or the safety of those close to us. This seemed especially apparent at the beginning of the pandemic, since the scientific community was still trying to even figure out how the virus spread, how long it lasted on surfaces and all that.

This post however, isn't about the pandemic. It's about safety.

In the post titled "The Baby Brain", I talked about the Triune Brain Theory that we use at Brain Fit Academy. Triune- the three parts of the brain that we refer to as the "baby brain", the "emotional brain", and the "thinking brain". In that post, I focused more on the role of the emotional brain. When thinking about safety, we're talking more about the "baby brain".

You see, the baby brain (brain stem) is in charge of our sense of safety. It has this continuous communication with the emotional brain (the limbic midbrain) to help us know whether we are safe, or whether we need to fight, flight or freeze.

It's like the baby brain and the emotional brain have a cool walkie-talkie system between them. 

BZZZ..."Hello? Baby brain? Are you there?"

BZZZ..."Yeah, I'm here. What's going on up there?" 

BZZZ..."I've got some incoming sensory input that I'm sending down to you. I don't don't know how to respond, so I need you to react. You ready?"

BZZZ..."Yup- all systems go. I'm ready to kick up those stress hormones, tighten up the back of the body, send the blood to the big muscles, and move the eyes to the periphery. Just send it on down!"

So imagine that for a minute. Incoming information comes into the brain, the emotional brain decides if it's safe or a threat and sends the information along- up to the thinking brain (neocortex) if it's deemed safe, and down to the baby brain (brain stem) if deemed a threat. 

That walkie-talkie system continuously on, continuously communicating. But what if the baby brain is getting too much action? Too much information being sent down there and the body is in a constant state of stress? A constant state of not feeling safe?  

Let's go back to the pandemic analogy for a minute. 

Think about the first time you went into the grocery store after the lockdown started. If you were anything like me, you were probably nervous about touching anything and wiped down the cart with multiple sanitizing wipes. You wore your mask and made sure that it fit well so that you weren't breathing in any one else's germs. As you walked around the store, your eyes darted around the aisles- making sure you were keeping the appropriate amount of distance from those around you and that you were following the "one-way" system of walking through the store.

Now imagine, that as you were in the middle of that trip, the store manager came on the loud speaker and said that there was a mandatory meeting for all shoppers and you needed to meet him by the milk section- it was time for the first lesson of the day- how to read the labels on milk bottles. 

Being the diligent shopper that you are, and not wanting to cause any trouble, you make your way over to the milk aisle- still on guard, alert and nervous about the virus. 

When you arrive to the gathering, the manager proceeds to give all the customers the lesson about reading labels. You're thinking- what is happening? Why is this person trying to teach me some (seemingly) unimportant thing when I'm just trying to make sure I survive this shopping trip?!?

Now, some of you may have guessed by now where I am going with this. 

And if not, let me tell you.

Replace "grocery store" with "classroom". And replace "you" with "a student".

Every day, kids in schools are expected to learn when their body is in a state of just trying to survive. It may be an actual, physical, survival feeling- such as that of extreme hunger. Or- it could be a perceived threat to the system due to what we call a "disorganized brain" caused by unintegrated primitive reflexes. It doesn't matter. In both instances, the brain and body feel the same. 

The physiological reactions are the same. 

The behavioral reactions are the same. 

Either way- do you think in that state the child is going to learn? I mean really learn? 

Would you? Would you learn how to read those labels on the milk bottles in the grocery store? Think about it- would you really?!?

I would like to say emphatically that the answer would be NO! You wouldn't learn in that state, and a child wouldn't learn in that state either.

So, all that being said, what do we do about this? How can we help kids feel safe so that they can learn? 

Well, one way is with movement. At Brain Fit Academy, we use movements that help calm the nervous system. We use movements that address the physiological responses to stress and bring the body back to a calmer state.

We can use movement activities to (literally) move from that survival mode to learning mode.

Because- honestly? Without moving out of survival mode, we aren't going to learn how to read milk bottle labels in the middle of a pandemic grocery store trip. And children aren't going to learn their math, or spelling or history in a classroom either.

Let's do our best to limit that walkie-talkie conversation between the emotional brain and the baby brain, and get it talking to the thinking brain instead.

BZZZ..."Hello? Thinking brain? I don't need the baby brain this time. I've got some sensory input I'm sending up to you. Here it comes. You ready?"