Toxic Stress and SPD, Dr. Jamie Chaves, OTD, OTR/L, SWC - Dr. Jamie Chaves, OTD, OTR/L - 0 views
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Stress isn’t necessarily a bad thing—it can mobilize us and allow us to function well.
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“toxic stress” and it has a myriad of negative implications for the body, brain, emotions, and relationships. Examples include inattention, poor emotional control, decreased memory, difficulty learning, poor frustration tolerance, irritable bowel syndrome, and even a compromised immune system.
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children with SOR experience a stress response on a more frequent and more intense basis. And, they can remain in elevated states of stress for longer periods of time than neurotypical children.
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Our brain must integrate all of this input in order to determine the most important stimuli or information to attend to in order to socially engage and function in the situation. This requires our brainstem to receive all the sensory information from our nerves and our amygdala, and to interpret whether or not the sensory information is a threat. When the brain works the way it’s supposed to, sensory stimuli that is not important is filtered out
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After several exposures to those negative situations the brain begins to anticipate the threat, thereby heightening the stress response even more. They cannot be “talked through” the situation or “reasoned with” because access to the higher, thinking, cognitive cortex has been blocked by the stress response.
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Because it is impossible to control all sensory-related aspects of the environment, children with SOR can present as highly anxious, controlling, withdrawing, or with acting out behaviors-- all of which are responses to repeated, elevated stress
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Children must be in a state of regulation, or optimal arousal, or what we can call “tolerable stress” before they have the capacity to learn, develop new skills, and try novel activities.
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Changing the way the neurological system responds to incoming sensory stimuli, however, takes time—usually 6-12 months of ongoing therapy. In the meantime, it is important that parents, educators, relatives, and other professionals recognize that acting out behaviors may actually be a sensory-related stress response, and the child may need support, soothing through co-regulation, and intervention instead of behavioral interventions or punitive responses.
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Caregivers and professions can also be more aware of scenarios that cause stress in children with sensory overresponsiveness and take steps to decrease the intensity of those sensory experiences to prevent a toxic stress load.