I wrote a couple of weeks ago about silly-dysregulation for the first time on here. It’s the winter school holidays here in Australia, and it turns out that same silly-dysregulation was kind of the theme of the break. The pattern would be heralded by a grating new stim of hoarse shrieking and then escalate into … Read more
We ran an errand today, and my kids, 7 and 6, had a lovely cheerful moment on the way there. “Summer, you have so many ideas because you have a DHD brain,” my son Apollo enthused, somewhat out of nowhere, with his iteration of the vocabulary we’ve been explaining and discussing over and over … Read more
I wrote recently about preemptive co-regulation with my child — when I stepped in to help regulate escalating emotions and energy back down before a meltdown had even started. Here’s another example. I’m gonna be slightly technical here and say that this was an example of me defusing silly-dysregulation. I have loads of writing on … Read more
My kid woke up disgruntled. There wasn’t really any discernible reason for it. I’m not identifying which kid because honestly, I swear they take turns doing this. I had stayed up late the night before, and I knew I was on “wake up” duty in the morning. (Rev. Dr. Mr. TOPT and I usually swap … Read more
How is driving on the opposite side of the road like your kid hitting their sibling? *** My family recently moved to a new country. Now I’m driving on the right side of the car and the left side of the road, instead of the left side of the car and the right side of … Read more
Sometimes success can’t be measured because in this instance, success literally means becoming unmeasurable. The meltdown that didn’t happen. The dysregulation that lasted only for a few beats before their safe adult was there. The day when “nothing getting done” was far superior to “everything going wrong”. The trip that was able to exist instead … Read more
One of my absolute favorite things about our new life in Australia is that we’ve made best friends with the neighbours, who have several kids close in age to both of my children. All of our kids are neurodivergent and watching these gorgeous ND friendships flourish is giving me life every day. (All of this … Read more
During one of the recent snow days home, my kids were getting really sick of being cooped up inside and struggling to be able to play with one another successfully. They both needed more space than was available inside, and they were both sick of trying to play bundled up in the snow, and the … Read more
Imagine this scenario: A seven-year-old with “just” fine motor difficulties (i.e. — no formal diagnosis of any medical/social/emotional condition) wakes up in the morning. He struggles to get himself dressed, because the clothes that he wants to wear have small buttons on them that he doesn’t know how to do. The last time he tried, … Read more
We came back from the usual 2-week holiday break, and then had school cancelled for an entire week due to snow and road conditions. So, when my kids went back to school yesterday (with a 2 hour delayed start, on top of everything) for the first time in 23 days, I knew it was going … Read more