Winter can start to feel long by this point in the season, especially for those of us living in cold climates! The holidays are long gone, early mornings and routines are back in full swing, and our bodies are likely digesting more fat and sugar than normal. The sun seems rarely to shine, at least here in Michigan; and exercise is hard to come by with snowy, blistery days. Let’s just face it; winter can be a tough season leaving many people in a slump, depressed, and finding that motivation takes effort. Below are a few helpful tools for beating the wintertime blues – and feeling good while doing it.

1. Take your multivitamins: Include a little extra vitamin C and D while you’re at it! Fresh fruits and sunshine can be hard to come by in the winter, but our bodies need those essential vitamins to function properly. Vitamin C will help build the immune system to fight all the miserable viruses that seem to love winter. It also helps keep our energy levels up. Vitamin D is what we get through our daily dose of sunshine, but when the sun isn’t shining, our bodies are lacking! There is a lot of research discussing the importance of vitamin D in preventing things like multiple sclerosis, but it’s also good for boosting the mood and building a healthy immune system.
2. Indulge in a warm bath: Baths are a great way to unwind and relax, but there has also been evidence that warm baths help to remove toxins from our body. Sit back, relax, and work out those toxins! Another benefit to a bath is that muscles relax. This is a great time to stretch out or message some tight muscles.
3. Exercise: Exercising just a few minutes a day can make a difference. If the weather isn’t good, find a way to workout in your home or at a gym. Set up an obstacle course in the house, or let loose and dance to some music. The kids will love to join in and can benefit from these simple exercises. This can help burn some of the holiday calories, and boost your mood and energy at the same time.
4. Allow yourself to cry: Everybody needs a good cry now and then. By allowing yourself to do this will relieve a lot of stress and there is some great research out there supporting this. This suggestion isn’t just for women either; it’s good for everybody to let out a good cry!
5. Eat Healthy: I know when I’m feeling down and am lacking motivation, I have a tendency to reach for easy food. The problem is that by eating cookies, muffins, ice cream, or chips, our body is not getting the nutrients that we need. This also has a tendency to cause the depression and moodiness to get worse due to sugar crashes, weight gain, and other unhealthy results of eating so poorly, resulting in a vicious cycle. Eating proper foods can help our bodies lose unwanted weight, increase our energy, and help build a strong immune system.
6. Take time for yourself: It is so easy to get caught up in the business of life, always planning, preparing, cleaning, organizing, caring for children or others, or any other of the many things life throws your way. It is so important to have a group of friends to laugh with, cry with, or share experiences with. Think of the last time you’ve given yourself this time to fellowship. This needs to happen on a regular basis. If you reenergize more by alone time, then sit in a coffee shop, get your nails done, or hit some golf balls. Think about what gives you that renewal and go do it – regularly!

These of course are just a few things you can do to maintain a healthy and stress reduced life. Make sure you do these things and take care of you! It’s the best thing you can do for you and your family! Consider these things a gift you can give to yourself and by reducing your stress, you are giving your family one of the best gifts ever!

“My dog has a canker sore.”  “My dad ran over the mailbox.”  “I named an alligator after my boyfriend.”  “Is she from here?”  “Can I touch her hair?”  This list could go on and on.  Why is it that random strangers feel compelled to ask personal questions that they wouldn’t even ask their own mother?  What makes people feel comfortable telling strangers about their problems?  When did we stop helping people understand social boundaries?

This type of behavior is seen as cute or even funny in young children; but it quickly becomes uncomfortable as that child becomes a teenager, and yet it happens everyday even among adults.   I have had several of these instances in the last few days, where perfect strangers shared private information with me or asked me personal questions.

I will admit that I tend to be more on the private side; but I think there is a limit to how much information people should feel comfortable sharing with acquaintances and strangers.  I know things that I should not or do not want to know about perfect strangers.  This isn’t because I’ve asked, but because they felt compelled to tell me.  I’m sure we have all been in that uncomfortable situation while sitting in a restaurant, or in line at the grocery store; and you hear someone talking on their cell phone about some intimate detail of their life, or the person in line behind you starts asking you questions about yourself or your purchases.  These situations are very awkward, and can be very uncomfortable.

So how do we help our children learn social boundaries in a society where freely sharing personal information is being displayed for them?  I think it is very important to be a good model for your child.  Demonstrate how to interact with others including friends, acquaintances, and strangers.  Use teachable moments; and when your child tells a stranger something that you consider to be private information, take time to talk with your child about why you shouldn’t share that information with someone you don’t know.  I’m not saying you should teach your child to be unfriendly; but understanding social boundaries is important.

The first step in teaching your child social boundaries is to exam your own boundaries and limits for what is acceptable to you.  Think about how you have felt in situations where people shared personal information with you, and then think about your style of communication with others.  Reflect on what you are modeling for your child.  It may be that you feel comfortable with what you are demonstrating for your child, or you may decide that you need to make some adjustments.  Think of some ways that you could model appropriate behavior for your child.  Helping children learn social boundaries is a skill that is important now and in the future.  Children learn a lot from watching their parents, so we need to make sure we are setting good examples.

What is an oral motor deficit?  An oral motor deficit affects the musculature of the mouth including the lips, tongue, and jaw.  The following are causes of oral motor disorders:

• Incorrect motor programming of the muscles of the mouth.  In other words, the brain sends a message to the muscles of the mouth, but the muscles don’t receive the message or it is misinterpreted.  This causes the muscles either to not move at all, or to move in an incorrect fashion that results in mismanagement of food in the mouth.

• Low muscle tone, meaning the muscles of the lip, tongue, or jaw are weak.  Many times children with low muscle tone in the jaw have an open mouth posture.  Difficulty with puckering, drinking from a straw, or frequent spilling of liquids when drinking is caused by weak lip strength.  Poor tongue strength can result in an inability to stick the tongue out, or move it from side to side.  Drooling can also be caused by weakness in the muscles of the mouth.  Strengthening these muscles can be very important in improving both feeding deficits and speech intelligibility.

Weakness of the muscles of the lip, tongue, or jaw can have a great impact on the ability to manipulate food in the mouth, including chewing and swallowing.  The ability to remove food from silverware and keep food from falling out of the mouth are also difficulties results from weak musculature.  Having weak muscles can affect a child’s gag reflex, which makes feeding even more unpleasant.  Weak musculature can also result in episodes of choking that can affect a child’s willingness to eat altogether, creating a feeding disorder.  Muscles that are weak or receiving incorrect information from the brain can cause chewing, swallowing, and manipulating the food within the mouth to be hard work.  When children are faced with unsuccessful eating because they gag, choke, or spend long periods of time eating, it reduces the motivation to continue with this activity.  Strengthening the muscles and resetting the neural pathways is essential for improving feeding disorders.

So how do we improve oral motor deficits?

• Undertaking an oral motor program designed to strengthen the lips, jaw, and tongue.  The program should utilize a developmental approach that increases in difficulty as the muscles begin to strengthen.  Parents should be involved in the oral motor program, and should have an understanding of what the exercises entail.  Daily practice is essential in not only improving strength in the lips, tongue, and jaw but in strengthening the neural pathways and improving motor programming.

• Utilizing food as an effective tool in strengthening the muscles of the mouth.  Try blowing a marshmallow across the table to improve lip rounding.  Suckers can be used to strengthen lip and tongue muscles.  Have a seed spitting contest to improve tongue strength.   Strengthen jaw muscles by having the child try to make deep teeth impressions in a slow poke sucker or piece of taffy.

While not all children with feeding disorders have difficulty with the muscles of the mouth, a certain percentage do.  Improving the oral motor deficits for these children is essential to the success of correcting feeding disorders.  If you recognize any of the symptoms listed above, you are encouraged to seek assistance from a speech/language pathologist or occupational therapist in your area.

The snow is falling here in Michigan, and the winter season has begun to set in.  Neighborhoods are buzzing with children sledding down snow covered hills, and families are busily decorating their homes.  It really is “beginning to feel a lot like Christmas!”

Before we know it, school winter breaks will be here and our children will be home for a couple of weeks.  With the holidays right around the corner, I thought it might be helpful to share some tips and activity ideas that will help you and your family thrive during this busy time of the year.

• Keep a consistent schedule.  During this busy time of the year, it is very easy for families to get away from their regular routine.  Before you know it, the kids are eating breakfast at noon and staying up until all hours of the night.  It is important for families to keep a fairly consistent schedule even through the holidays.  Keeping regular bed, wake, and meal times will be important to maintain your routine.
• Have some jolly holiday fun.  There are so many fun activities that you can undertake during this holiday season.  Making holiday cookies and snacks, having a red and green meal, going sledding or caroling, decorating the house, and making holiday ornaments for friends and relatives are just a few of the fun activities that you and your family can enjoy.
• Don’t overdo it!  The holidays tend to be an extremely busy and stressful time of the year.  When you are looking at your calendar and scheduling activities, be sure that you are limiting them so that you are also including time for just your family.
• Make a family new year resolution.  The new year is a great time to start a new endeavor.  Are there things that you would like to work toward in the new year?  Keeping the house clean, sharing chores among family members, and saving as a family for a desired trip are all great things to work toward.  As a family, sit down and create a family resolution for the new year.  Be sure it is something reasonable to which all family members will be able to contribute.
• Enjoy the season.  Even though the holidays can be a busy and stressful time of the year, it is important for everyone to sit back, relax, and enjoy the season.  Be sure to take time for yourself to get some well deserved rest and relaxation.

By following these simple suggestions, your holiday season will be merry and bright.  I wish you all a wonderful holiday season, and look forward to sharing more with you in the new year!

If your life is anything like mine near the holidays, it’ll probably sound a little like this: “Mom, can I get that for Christmas?” “I’ll put it on your wish list honey.” As the next commercial comes on, “Mom can I get that for Christmas?” “That does look like fun. I’ll put it on your wish list.” The television, newspapers, and billboards are inundated with advertisements for all the hot toys and gadgets for this year. As parents, aunts or uncles, and grandparents, it can be very overwhelming to know what gifts to buy that will be both fun and “educational.”  Knowing what gifts will be best for our children – that they’ll enjoy – leave many of us going “hmmm.”

Here are a few things to keep in mind when shopping for all children:

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“I just want to have a quiet evening! Why won’t you just go to sleep?!?” Do you ever have those nights? Maybe this is your night every night! Whatever the situation, it makes life much more stressful when you are tired and can’t get your child or children to fall asleep and sleep well! Rest assured, you can have more relaxed evenings and get your household the way it was intended to be – kids in their own beds, at a reasonable time, for the duration of night.

In my several years of working with families, many different situations have arisen. Keep this simple acronym in your head to ensure a good night’s S.L.E.E.P.

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Since weather is an unpredictable phenomenon in life, I have begun to appreciate a variety of activities that I can do with my family whether we are stuck indoors due to rain or snow, extreme hot or cold.  Although it is hard to find an activity that they whole family can enjoy together, it is not impossible. 

Here are a variety of ideas that you can use when you are stuck indoors with your family, and unsure of what to do.

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As a former itinerant staff member in a local school district, I can identify with how difficult it is to feel like you are really making an impact.  From the large caseloads to student schedules, to the traveling from building to building, and everything in between, it can be hard to know if you are making a difference.  I lived that life for more than thirteen years, and there were many times when I walked out of school wondering if I had made any impact at all that day.  I saw improvements in my students, which told me that I was doing something right; but I often wondered if there was more, a different way of providing service that could make a bigger impact or have more benefit.

On this path of discovery, I asked myself a few important questions that helped me to make the decision to change the way I was doing things.  The questions I asked were: “Do I just want to fix the holes on the surface, or do I really want to get in there and solidify the structure that will lead to longer lasting and farther reaching results?”  “Do I just want to teach the child to say words, or do I want him or her to communicate meaningfully?”  Once I stopped and thought about the answers to these questions, I knew what I needed to do.  I couldn’t just keep shoring up the house with ‘jacks,’ I had to find a way to firm up the foundation so the house could stand without supports.  I needed to find a way to make communication meaningful, and not just a rote skill of learning words to say.

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We see many children and young adults in our practice, and we are finding that most of them (70-80%) benefit from a special diet, elimination of certain foods, or use of supplements.  There are many conflicting studies out there that make it difficult to know for sure if there is a connection between nutrition/gut issues and autism; but I can say that in our experience it seems to be true for many.  Like the population as a whole, one rule doesn’t apply to all.  I see some children who do not seem to be affected at all by the things they eat – no gut problems, bowel issues, or behavior that would indicate feeling ill, or high levels of yeast – while others seem to be very affected by all of these things.   It can take a lot of time and effort to sort this all out, but the differences can be remarkable when a child is feeling well and getting proper nutrition.

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It was one of those perfect days. The sun was out, the temperature was just right, around 70 degrees. The pressures of life were minimal for a few hours, but a wonderful few hours they were. I walked outside to join my daughters while they played. I planted some flowers, pulled some weeds, and freshened up the look of my front yard landscaping. Once I finished, one of the girls suggested that we go for a bike ride. The males of the family were taking a nice Sunday afternoon nap, so I thought “Sure!” – and off we went with the girls’ “American Girl Dolls” in the baby seat behind me. We rode around and ended up at a nearby park. The girls and their dolls enjoyed a little time at the park and then we journeyed home. When we arrived back, the boys were awake, so we started a riveting game of family kick ball. This to me was a perfect afternoon. I felt refreshed and reenergized as I faced a new week.

So what makes you tick? Are you giving yourself the time to do the things you need to do to stay healthy and be fully available and calm for your child(ren)?

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