Can Sensory Issues Worsen Autism In Children?
How often has this happened?
- Your child is super sensitive and anxious to the point where they won’t allow anyone at daycare to touch them.
- One minute you have a nice, calm child, and the next minute, he’s slamming doors and screaming because something made him angry.
- On bad days, your child spends most of the day screaming and yelling “no” even when they mean “yes.”
- You’ve tried rewards and consequences, and other methods, but nothing seems to work and your child’s behavior is becoming increasingly difficult to deal with.
If you answered YES, your child might be struggling with sensory sensitivity, especially sound sensitivity.
Soon, I will introduce one of the most effective tools – the Safe and Sound Protocol – that can help improve your child’s drastic behavior and mood swings without any tears or side effects.
But first, let me share what neuroscientists have discovered about children with autism.
For years, medical professionals and researchers had been working hard to understand autism. While they haven’t found a single gene that causes autism, they did discover that individuals with autism have a highly activated sympathetic nervous system.
Essentially, this means that their nervous system is in a chronically stressed or depressed state, which can lead to symptoms:
- Anxiety
- Agitation
- Outbursts of anger and violence
- Disconnection
- Shutdown
- Depression
- Restlessness
- Rigidity
- Panic
- Withdrawal
- Rigidity
- Hypervigilance – a state of increased alertness and awareness of potential threats
Researchers have attempted to determine what causes individuals with autism to experience chronic stress or even depression.
Then came the neurodiversity movement. The neurodiversity movement regards individuals with autism, ADHD, and other cognitive or neurological impairments as people with normal human differences in behavior.
This approach has been embraced by many parent coaches, professionals, and organizations in the mental health industry, and may have provided comfort to parents and families of those with autism spectrum disorder and ADHD.
Unfortunately, it has also buried the efforts of serious seekers for the causes and solutions to autism or ADHD.
Whether you fully embrace neurodiversity or not, one thing is clear: families and individuals with autism and ADHD are still suffering, and the need to find the most effective way to relieve their loved ones’ symptoms remains.
Standard Approaches Often Just Don’t Work
Children with sensory sensitivity often experience stress, anxiety, and fear in response to everyday sensory stimuli.
These stimuli can include loud noises, bright lights, strong smells, specific tastes, and certain textures.
However, many parents are unaware of the extent of stress and anxiety their child is experiencing.
They may not understand the causes of their child’s emotional disturbances, which means the child continues to be exposed to triggers on a daily basis. This can result in extreme autism meltdowns and shutdown behaviours, such as:
- Hiding
- Avoiding eye contact
- Yelling
- Hitting
- Being hyperactive
- Fidgeting
- Having anger outbursts
- Refusing to be touched
- Suddenly plugging their ears
- Kicking
- Throwing objects
- Impulsive
- Experiencing sudden mood changes
Sensory sensitivity and anxiety are significant problems for highly sensitive children with autism.
Additionally, chronic anxiety diminishes attention, cognition, and memory, all of which are essential functions for learning.
This is why conventional approaches to autism based on cognition often do not work for your child.
The Learning pyramid (see image above) illustrates that the brain develops from the bottom, beginning with sensory organs, and advances to learning and cognition at the top.
As a result, if your child is experiencing difficulties with sensory issues at the foundational level, therapy and learning focused on cognition will not be effective.
To make meaningful progress, you need to help reduce your child’s sensory sensitivity and anxiety, especially their sound sensitivity, as it is the most significant aspect of sensory sensitivity.
Introducing The Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP)
The Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP) is a safe and effective intervention that helps reduce sound sensitivity and anxiety.
The SSP has a proven track record of helping individuals with autism or ADHD by addressing sound sensitivity and reducing difficult behaviors. This has led to improved social communication abilities and overall well-being.
The best part about the Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP) is that it’s easy for your child to use. All they have to do is listen to happy children’s songs while doing their favorite activities at home. As they enjoy the music, their nervous system will work hard subconsciously to promote a natural state of well-being in their brain. The SSP creates an enjoyable experience that has no side-effects.
Here is a summary of the benefits of the Safe and Sound Protocol:
- Decreased sensitivity to sound and other stimuli.
- Reduced stress and anxiety, leading to increased feelings of calm and safety, and improving mood and behavior.
- Assistance with smoother transitions between activities or environments.
- Improved eye contact and social connections.
- Reduced resistance to leaving the house.
- Laying the groundwork for future speech and learning abilities.
- Overall better health and well-being (as the vagus nerve is also stimulated by these activities).
- Easy and enjoyable for children to use.
- Perfect for non-verbal children as they don’t need to talk.
- Can be done at home, so there’s no need to travel to a therapist’s office.
Choose Sensitivity Care with confidence!
- picky eating
- allergies or food sensitivities
- poor gut function, etc.
As the gut and brain are in constant communication with one another, an imbalance and inflammation in your child’s body affects the production of hormones and neurotransmitters that contribute to their brain function. This, in turn, can worsen symptoms of autism.
When you work with Sensitivity Care, you will not only receive the Safe and Sound Protocol, but also have the option to receive complementary nutritional support to transform your child’s health.
Here is a summary of the benefits of working with Sensitivity Care:
- Addresses sensory issues especially extreme sensitivity to noise.
- Perfect for non-verbal children as they don’t need to talk.
- Can be done at home, so there’s no need to travel to a therapist’s office.
- Lays the groundwork for other therapies or learning later on.
- Provides bonding time with caregivers.
- Shows progress from the very first week.
- Improve digestion
- Reduce- food sensitivity, allergy, and picky eating
- Strengthen- gastrointestinal functions – getting regularity
- Enhance energy and mood
Interested in working with me directly? Check out my coaching.
To learn how to reduce noise sensitivity and anxiety, sign up for the webinar waitlist below. You will be the first to be notified when it takes place.
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