Tactile Defensiveness and Floppiness

This week Clemmie and Theo started their OT sessions and PT assessments.

June 30th

We were at the Watchdog Jordan for their OT sessions and we worked with Connie. She is really well versed and also very impressed with Judy's evaluation of Clemmie. She feels that Clemmie needs more OT sessions which I agreed. She feels that Clemmie's tactile defensiveness really gets in her way with her experience of the world. She is not able to get certain needs of her proprioceptive input and vestibular input because she is afraid or caution to touch certain textures or things which interprets all her manners to be of a two year old. She is constantly seeking other available and tolerable sensations to compensate for her tactile defensiveness. And once an input is not registered fully she moves on seeking for other sensation. And all the sensations are symbiotic, one causes other disorders to surface. Since she has tactile defensiveness her gross motor skills to her fine motor skills needs help which leads to her lack of confident issue.

Connie gave Clemmie a bubble container with a wand. It was hard for her to blow the wand to make the bubble because she couldn't create the right shape for her mouth to blow. The bubble container is a hard container with a slit just enough to fit the wand. She was struggling to fit the wand into the container and instead of trying with a little bit of twisting of the container or the wand to fit, Clemmie gave up all together after two seconds. Connie held her hand and did a slight turn and the wand was able to fit in. Connie suggested not to say anything awhile holding her hands so she can concentrate on the amount of shifting and pressure to complete the task.

For Theo is he is extremely cautious. She said most of the kids that comes in would attack the pit full of balls and throw them all around, but not Theo. He was eying at the Lego box for the longest time when we walked in the center. And once he was in the OT room the Lego box seemed ordinary and not much of a desire. He loves the rock climbing stones on the wall. Most of the time he played with the different layers of elastic hammocks. And Connie said his grasps are primitive with no thumbs involved. Maybe that is why he doesn't like to write because he can't grasp the pencil well or it is awkward for his body to have the thumbs be involved in stabilizing the pencil for writing. He always hold his pencil the drawing way, the exact way I was taught at drawing classes.

Connie said they shared the similar kind of defensiveness to sensation, but reacts differently to the simulation. And of course personality comes into play with it. 

Overall the new OT observation on both the kids are on the dot.

July 2nd

We were at Watchdog Hong Kong Island for their PT assessments.

Theo started his PT session with Rachel. It is more of an assessment because of his low muscle tone. And Rachel agreed that he should benefits strengthening his core center. She noticed that his right shoulder is higher than is left and he is leaning on the side. She said this may lead to scoliosis if not corrected. And caused by his low muscle tone.

Clemmie on the other hand would benefit from treating her sensory processing disorder first in order for her to even be still to listen to Rachel. She was all over the place and refused to do anything. The only thing that she enjoyed was the balancing bar. Rachel doesn't recommend Clemmie for PT, but she told me to help her with exercising. She noticed Clemmie's tip toes and suggested to massage her calves every night and gently tuck on her heal and do heal exercise even standing on a reclining platform would benefit and counter act the other muscles.