TINSLEY HOUSE SUPPORT THREAD - PART 3!!!! :)

[Badvoc]

Well, here is the shiny new thread for all of us either doing the TH programme, doing part of it, or thinking about doing it! :)
A brief synopsis of stage 1 of the programme can be found in the books "is that my child?" Or "the brain food plan" by robin pauc;

Stage 1 of the TH therapy consists of:

1. Daily Multivitamins

• Omega
• Zinc & Magnesium

1. Healthy eating

• High protein, low sugar, no artificial sweeteners, additives etc.

1. Specific neuro development exercises done 3 times a day

• Takes about 4-5 mins

And that's it :)

Stage 2 involves computer programmes to sort out eye tracking and convergence which over 80% of children with reading/writing problems have.

• www.engagingeyes.co.uk

We are coming to the end of our time doing TH I reckon...certainly by the end of the summer I think. It has been in many ways much easier than I thought at the beginning but of course takes commitment and time.

I am so glad we "took the plunge". It has made such a difference to ds and to our lives :)

Hi everyone! We've been on holiday for the last 2 weeks. I'm sure you were all wondering where I'd gone! Great to catch up with all your news.

We were in the US and had a fantastic time, however, 1 year old + 3 year old + long haul flight and resulting jet lag means I am very tired... They were up for hours last night.

badvoc so sorry to hear your sad news. I do hope the funeral went ok and that your mum is improving. I have no helpful words of wisdom but am thinking of you.

DS is doing well, considering we had 2 weeks of carb/sugar fest on holiday, with no vitamins or exercises. Trying to keep to the diet was a disaster and he ended up eating all sorts of horrors. Do chocolate pancakes count as a cooked breakfast? But they loved the holiday so I think the break from things was good for us all. Back to strict TH programme now.

We did have one momentous event, where DS answered a lady that spoke to him, told her his name, and his sister's name, and that I was called mummy and that he wasn't sure where daddy was (daddy was off looking at something)! Then told her he was hungry and he wanted to go and have lunch! I wasn't even sure he knew what a name was. It was amazing and I was !

He starts nursery in 2 weeks so a little anxious as to how that will go.

prince how is you DS doing now? Reading your post about made me remember something. My brother used to do exactly the same kind of thing. He's 31 now but I think if he'd been a child today, he would definitely have been dx with ADHD and OCD. If he, for example, brushed a doorframe with one arm, he'd have to go back and "even up" by brushing the other one against it. But if he did that too hard, he'd have to do the first one again. It could go on for ages. I don't think we were nearly as knowledgable about these things back then but he completely outgrew it. The only thing I can remember my mum doing was removing all the colouring/E numbers etc from our diet. I hope that maybe helps make you feel a bit better but I'm sure Robin can help with it too.

Hi everyone,
Lots has been happening chez RogersNelson.

I have the kids around at the moment and we are off to homebase to buy plants, but I'll be back later to update.

Good to hear that everyone is doing well and have been having good holidays.

Badvoc thinking of you :)

Hello again,

Lookslikerain - DS is doing better thanks. Still a bit on edge and he is still doing things with 2 hands, but will stop if I ask him to (when eating for example) and doesn't seem distressed.
I think holiday club was the trigger; he obviously found it incredibly stressful, but I will ask Robin if he thinks he is worth getting him assessed by him.

DD is going well. A few screechy days.
Away from TH things have moved on for DD. We went to see the Child Development Team (which is one Dr who I don't have much faith in). He has referred DD to CAMHS as he thinks she should be assessed for ADD.
When I mentioned this to her (private) SALT she was horrified and really quite upset at the thought of her being assessed and was adamant that she does not have ADD.
So we have decided that we need to get off the NHS bandwagon. This goes against all my liberal principles, but we are getting nowhere and I don't have faith that they know what they are doing and the people that could help her (OT and SALT have limited contact due to funding).
So we are paying to get a private assessment with a neurological paediatrician which will hopefully mean that we can stop the endless rounds of assessment and get DD the help she needs at school.

Yesterday she had an assessment with an ED Psych who was wonderful and the end result was that DD is of average intelligence (she has been diagnosed as having a learning difficulty with no evidence to back it up) and she thinks she is dyspraxic (physical and speech).

We are hoping that we will get a confirmation from the paediatrician.
I have written the request for a statement and will get that in tomorrow. Then we will gather all reports (both NHS and private) and battle for a statement.

As the Ed psych said yesterday she could do the tasks that were asked of her but only with 1:1 attention and LOTS of support. She is not going to achieve at school without that adult support.

Blimey - that was long sorry. But it feels like the right thing for DD.

I have been saying since she was 2.5 that she's dyspraxic but noone has ever listened

Prince - I attended one of www.sossen.org.uk/SOS-SEN's workshops when I was considering getting a statement for DS1. It was very helpful and informative, although it did end up putting me off the statementing route and choosing home ed instead! However, I learnt a lot there. They also have a helpline you can ring.

I don't blame you for getting frustrated by the NHS bandwagon. I know how exhausting and discouraging that feels. Best of luck with the private assessment, which will presumably give you lots of valuable advice on how to help your DD.

I have been saying since she was 2.5 that she's dyspraxic but no one has ever listened - yep, I wasn't listened to either when I suggested that DS1 might have Tourettes, in spite of multiple vocal and motor tics. The best line (after DS1 was given an emergency referral to CAMHS because of severe OCD, which often goes with TS) from one silly counsellor to me was, "Why do you want to medicalise your son?". "Er, I don't... But he seems to be - er - ill and I'd like him to get better...."

Working link for SOS!SEN here

Hello again - so we went to see Robin on Wednesday, after a bit of a wobble as while looking for directions came across the Bad Science article and I must say I was indeed shocked he wasn't actually a neurologist as the book definitely gives that view.

He said a lot of my sons neurological symptoms all originate in the same part of the brain - poor temperature regulations, lack of control over sympathetic nervous system, anxiety driven control issues, obsessional/addictive, carb and sugar cravings. He also said the left cerebellum and right brain were also weaker (think this is right way round).

We have 2 sets of exercises to do - the walking up stairs eyes closed etc, and spinning on spinny chair.

He said the issues are not huge and seemed confident we could get a positive impact quite quickly.

My son seems so NT a lot of the time, but then has flashpoints (10 mins through to days and days) where all the ASD type traits rear their head. He also has some gross motor issues and sensory issues, but they do seem to be improving with age. He is 4 next week.

We are doing very individualised supplementation anyway based on stool, urine and hair testing, and he is having the same supplemets Robin recommends, and our diet is very clean/organic anyway. We have been on the healing path for a while on this side of things so it was mainly for the excercises that we went.

PS I was posting as desperatemumofpdachild before

Welcome, and good luck. Keep us posted with your son's progress :)

We saw robin on Thursday, what a lovely man.

We have whack a game and the firing game - bought the package, glasses come tomorrow. We have the teeth and the steps exercise to do. Food wise like everyone else, loose some of the crap and replace with good stuff, although tbh he doesn't eat that much rubbish as he's coeliac and I make most things from scratch, but he does like fizzy drinks he normally has an ice lolly or ice cream for pudding for the calcium (coeliacs don't absorb as much calcium as "normal" folk) so last night he asked could he have 2 as they needed to be eaten up before he starts this new diet am going to freeze smoothies and make my own ice cream.

Skype follow up in October - will he need to "see" ds or will it just be a chat with me ?

Fingers crossed, hold on tight and off we go ......

Thinking about this - the fizzy drinks are what he's going to miss most, could I use a soda stream and make fizzy water and add that to fruit juice ?

Hello again. This might become a long post - apologies in advance.

Well, we are now 18 days into doing stairs, teeth, aliens and target practice A and we are already noticing some interesting changes. After thinking about this for a while, we can't put the changes down to anything other than TH. It could be coincidence, but they're a little strange and a bit too sudden to be otherwise IMHO. My ds1, just 9, has suddenly become very affectionate (almost clingy). He was already a very sweet, affectionate boy. He is now much more interested in cuddles and comfort and is altogether more demonstrative with affection to his siblings (I have 4 dcs 9, 6, 4, nearly 1). He is also much better at telling especially ds2 to get lost if he's being a pain. He has chosen to spend his birthday money on a new cricket bat - he has played some cricket locally, but was not at all into it. This was before our Ashes win too (dh is an Aussie). It is like this lovely boy of ours was in a bubble and now he's starting to come out of it. That's the best way to describe the changes in him. He is also very keen to make dh and I snacks and drinks (unheard of) and I have caught him looking at a graphic novel. I know it's early days (and we have not even tried to do any reading, spelling or handwriting with him yet) but I wanted to pass on these interesting developments - TH is definitely messing with his head in a good way.

He is coping really well with EE but finds it very hard. The tips from this thread about not looking away during target practice have definitely helped - thank you. We are slowly working through our weekly shopping and ditching all the things we "shouldn't" have and so far there's not been too much moaning. I can't manage the cooked breakfast thing at the moment, but I will have to crack on with that when school starts again. We are still watching way too much TV and using computer games too, but that will get easier to police once term starts.

Wanted to also let you know that we get the Kindervital supplements via Ocado on a 3 for 2 which is quite a big saving. I'm not sure how long this offer lasts for and it's costing a fortune! But as I say to ds1 - he's worth it!

notapizzaeater - we do the fruit juice + fizzy water thing and the kids really like it. But we've never really allowed fizzy drinks except on special occasions so they know no different. I think it's not a good idea for every drink because the fizz strips calcium (but you need to check this). Our kids don't even realise that their "juice" is half water. Hope this helps.

That's fantastic the difference already

I wasn't going to give him every drink fizzy (his fav drink is iced decaf coffee or black decaf coffee - odd child !!) but thought I could give him a fizzy drink every now and then as this could be a battle and if I've something in my pocket

Cereal flakes, that's great news.
Notapizzaeater, re calcium, have you tried natural Greek yogurt with fruit or honey in it? Personally I would use this as a chance to ditch the fizzy drinks and coffee for good. We went cold turkey on black currant squash and I thought it would be really tough as they only drank that all day. They didn't once mention the change and both only have water or milk now. I allow squash at birthday parties because I don't want them to stand out but they are not particularly excited to get it.

Totally agree you have to have things like that in your arsenal. I water down lemonade for mine sometimes and they don't notice? I think my son is craving sugar (and also likes a coffee!). I made some courgette cake and he wolfed it down - would probably have moaned about the green bits before but now he's grateful for the sugar and cocoa powder .

Just a quick tip, if you do carry on with decaf coffee get organic as the decaffination process is pretty chemical laden :)

Hi Everyone - so good to hear of the new visits and good luck to all. Cerealflakes it's lovely to hear your progress - very similar to my DS when he first started TH and it's nice to be reminded. How much better he was at talking and telling things, stuff I've forgotten and take for granted now. I think shifts can happen quite early on.

EE is really hard - my DS has been to see Robin 3 times now, we just saw him on Sunday and we're still on Target Practice B but it's fab to see his scores go up and up. I thought maybe he had a tracking problem before Robin but clearly he had other vision issues - his convergence scores are nearly perfect now and I now have a boy who 'loves' reading and will put his nose in a book unprompted for chapter upon chapter. It's fab to see.

Robin very unconcerned about DS's tics and OCD things he's started doing but I have to be patient and wait till we get onto that front part of his left brain. Think that's the hemi work....I want to do it all now but we have to finish EE and poor DS can't really cope with much more than that to be honest. Although it def gets easier and he moans a little now but no tantrums about it!

Do wish we'd managed a get together. Maybe we could look at a weekend once everyone's back at school and got some idea of schedules?

x

Can anyone help with a few lumosity questions please?
We started a fortnight ago and I think I misunderstood Robin's instructions because I just clicked on the button to allow lumosity to set up a programme itself for ds. We tried this for a week and although he was doing really well we kept coming across games that ds was too young to do. Eg division and multiplication - he's only 7 and crap at maths so couldn't do them. Plus a stupid penguin game that I couldn't do either.
So I asked Robin who said I should choose one speed, one attention and one memory game per day instead. Is this what everyone else is doing? If so how many lumosity points should he be aiming to achieve daily? He got 6 today across the three games. Do you think I should vary which game we choose each day? He loves the migrating birds one but I'm not sure if its more benefit to him to do several different games?

Hi Shopping, I try to get ds to play whatever the program sets up for him but sometimes (often) when he is reluctant to do it, we compromise and he chooses. Sometimes I stipulate what he has to do (during negotiations!) but usually let him get on with it I am just glad he is doing it He has started to do the program more on the iPad and on that, he can't choose I don't think.

We had our appointment last week won't mention that we were an hour late, oops Ds was upset to have to do even more lumosity but Robin feels he can boost his scores up higher and that will help him in Sept when he starts 'Big School'.

Robin did say that lots of people find the problem solving games very hard and not to worry about that being lower scoring than the rest.

Have had a manic week since then, still down in the NF, looking after dogs and having visitors every day. Enjoying the sunshine so the children can enjoy the garden though.

Great to hear how everyone is doing and still enjoying my happy, relaxed ds here.

Sending thoughts to Badvoc again x

Thanks daft, can you remember what his scores were when he first started? Mind you my ds is younger so maybe there's no point me comparing anyway.

Hi all, just been reading through some of the posts about lumosity - thank goodness there is an exercise coming up that ds1 might actually enjoy instead of giving me attitood! (although I secretly quite like the attitude, it's such huge progress to see him move on from meltdowns!).

He's at first university this week and is learning so much - totally different from his first 5 years at school, I'm totally puting it down to TH

Shopping, for what it is worth, ds' first scores varied hugely - from pinball recall 130 to Lost in Migration 4350. His BPI was 301, it is now 810. Comparatively, he is in the high 60's percentile but, as you say, he is much older than many others on here, so should be higher.

P of P, I wouldn't say that ds has really enjoyed any of the tasks nor done them willingly but, at least Lumosity doesn't hurt his eyes unlike the convergence program he did!

Thanks daft, ds loves lost in migration too. I am impressed with how much faster he is than me at most of the games

HI everyone, haven't been on for a while. Thinking of Badvoc and her family and hoping they are managing to get by.

Shopping- My DD ( age 9) has now done 4 months of luminosity. She does the games that come up. My DS ( age 7) has done 2 months.It has been harder for him and we do have the odd day or exercise when he reacts like he did with HTS Like your DS he finds the raindrops game hard. TBH I help him a bit ( not a lot) but figure he needs to do it. Although I think it may inflate his scores my opinion is that he needs to play the games and that is how I can get him to do it. He is improving and now needs less help, so soon the scores will be genuine. I am sure it will even itself out in the long term and I try not to get hung up on BPI. DD BPI is over 800 now and DS is 580. We are going to see Robin on Friday and I have lots of lumosity questions for him so will post with his answers when we return.

Both my DC have come on leaps and bounds in the past month or so. DD ADD is virtually non existent now. DS is a different child. He is happy and confident and says his brain feels good ( Not upside down or horizontal anymore!) He is doing a tiny bit of throat clearing and still likes to give and receive equal number of kisses but very minor stuff) I haven't tried to do any school stuff with him over the holidays so will be interesting to see what the year 3 teacher makes of him when he goes back to school.

Just been to pictures and managed to convince ds they only sold salted popcorn

Good news re progress beautiful possum. Ds is like a different boy this summer too. He's suddenly become thoughtful and self sufficient. Has spent hours reading, making his own comic books and playing lego this holiday.
I think I will go back to letting the lumosity programme choose the games then. He was perfectly happy doing 5 or 6 a day but just struggled with the maths ones. He can cope fine with the addition and subtraction, just can't do division or multiplication yet. Perhaps I'll just do those sums when they pop up.
Couldn't do the penguin game myself though either