Inhibition: Proceed With Caution

Inhibition: Proceed With Caution

It is important to raise your child as an individual. People often confuse developmental milestones for a developmental blueprint.  This can either inappropriately inhibit you and your child or put undue pressure on you and your child.  Just because the average child is toilet trained at three years old does not mean your child is average or must be.  I learned this one from personal experience.  When Beth* was 2 ¼ she wanted to play on the computer like her older siblings. (She was a petite little thing and back then the mouse only came in one size… bigger than …

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Autonomy and The Terrible Twos

Autonomy and The Terrible Twos

You have heard the phrase “terrible twos” and been taught to cringe, but are they really so terrible?  What is so challenging about that stage? Personally, it is one of my favorite ages.  It is when your child starts asserting more independence and learns to make decisions.  This means the child is moving away from you in their pursuit of autonomy.  This can mean butting heads when you decide your child must (you fill in the blank here) and he says “NO!, want__________”.  He is moving on from not just not wanting what you want, but moving towards knowing what …

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Balancing Act part 3: Realistic Expectations

Balancing Act part 3: Realistic Expectations

(In case you were wondering, I believe in practicing what I preach.)                                                                                                  To my loyal followers who were wondering what happened to my posting, for the last few months my parents unexpectedly ended up living by me – and my mother is quite ill.  Simultaneously, I just launched my new office which …

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So SAD

So SAD

SAD is the acronym for the Standard American Diet.  Amongst those in the know that the typical diet of Americans is indeed tragic we find it to be a most fitting label.  So many conditions clearly point to a dietary cause.  Including but not limited to leaky gut, celiac disease, crohn’s disease, the rise of diabetes in younger children, enuresis, high blood pressure due to too much salt, to name a few. Here I would like to discuss the two main contributors to our dietary woes. Sugar and overindulgence. Sugar is the biggest cover-up since the carcinogenic effects of smoking …

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The Most Common Toxin?

The Most Common Toxin?

As I said in the last post, otitis media is the most common childhood illness. At least 80% of children experience OM. The most prescribed treatment for OM is antibiotics. This medication does not discriminate, it wipes out all biotics, the bad and the good. In order to maintain a healthy gut you need the good biotics. In the 1950’s Dr. Orian Truss began exploring ways of treating what he called “antibiotic syndrome” and published his book, “The Missing Diagnosis”. Candida yeast is this missing diagnosis, caused mainly by antibiotics. Leaky gut seems to be the result of poor gut …

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The Ears Have It

The Ears Have It

Dr. Bock went for cute with the 4-A title. According to Dr. Bock the immune system is compromised in these children and food sensitivities trigger the immune issues, keeping the child in a vicious endless cycle that is responsible for distracting the body from developing normally. Since the body and brain are too busy fighting off perceived invaders, as that is what an allergy is, it cannot expend sufficient energy to learn. Hence the connection between the medical issues and the developmental delay(s) or educational difficulties. Here let us take a look at otitis media. I choose otitis media (OM) …

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Recommended Reading (1):  Healing the New Childhood Epidemics

Recommended Reading (1): Healing the New Childhood Epidemics

Recommended Reading 1: Healing the New Childhood Epidemics: Autism, ADHD, Asthma, and Allergies: The Groundbreaking Program for the 4-A Disorders by Kenneth Bock, M.D. and Cameron Stauth In When Learning Goes Awry we discussed many possible contributors to a student’s lack of performance. Since then we have focused mainly on physiological function. This to some extent, reflects the artificial divide between the services schools provide as “educational” vs. what insurance will cover as “medical” with the many gaps in between, as well as the move away from the country doctor who knew you personally and had a more holistic approach …

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Splintered

Splintered

In my last post I discussed remediation.  For a variety of reasons rehabilitation often is not done.  The main reason is because educational testing does not take the next step necessary to answer “why?” (is this child performing or not performing in this way).  As a result, rehabilitation is never even identified.  The result is the services provided more closely resemble tutoring.  However, this is an expensive mistake which I am going to explain here. Academic concerns is what drives a student assessment.  Since the school system is only obligated to provide the support necessary to help a child succeed …

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Remediation

Remediation

You have a good differential diagnosis, now you need to figure out how to treat the problem. We call this remediation.  There are other terms that are used interchangeably, which leads to confusion as each term has its own meaning.  Here I will clarify.  Consider Remediation the overarching plan to treat the problem, one that has different spokes, or parts, to it. There are three branches to remediation: 1) Rehabilitation 2) Compensation 3) Accommodation Rehabilitation is the work we do to strengthen or fix the weak area.  This may mean a corrective surgery, exercises or simply time to recuperate. Compensation …

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To Treat or Not to Treat, That Is The (Million Dollar) Question, Part I

To Treat or Not to Treat, That Is The (Million Dollar) Question, Part I

Sammy and Jake both have a hearing loss.  Do they need speech and language therapy? Some of you may know that hearing loss would be considered a presumptive diagnosis.  This means that this condition automatically qualifies these children for support services.  What therapy should you give them and how often? Should they get the same therapy?  If you answered “yes” would grouping them be a good fiscally efficient option? Without knowing anything more about each of these children it is hard to answer the above questions. What if I told you that Jake is 10 years old and has a …

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