Category Archives: preschoolers






What works for me?










Since writing my first e-book, The Practical Guide to Toilet Training Your Child With Low Muscle Tone, I have fielded a ton of questions about the later stages of potty training.  One stumbling block for most children appears to be “potty fatigue”.  They lose the early excitement of mastery, and they get wrapped up in whatever they are doing.  What happens when you combine the effects of low tone with the inability of a  young child to judge the consequences of delaying a bathroom run?  This can lead to delaying a visit to the bathroom until it is too late.  Oops.

Kids with low tone often have poor interoceptive processing.  What is that?  Well, interoception is how you perceive internal sensory information.  When it comes to toileting, you feel fullness in your bladder that presses on your abdominal wall, in the same way you feel a full stomach.  This is how any of us know that we have to “go”.  If you wait too long, pressure turns to a bit of pain.  Low muscle tone creates a situation in which the stretch receptors in the abdominal muscles and in the bladder wall itself don’t get triggered until there is a stronger stimulus.  There may be some difficulty in locating the source of pressure as coming from the bladder instead of bowel, or even feeling like it could be coming from their back or stomach.  This leads to bathroom accidents if the toilet is too far away,  if they can’t walk fast enough, or if they cannot pull down their pants fast enough.  You have to work on all those skills!

Add in a child’s unwillingness to recognize the importance of the weak sensory signals that he or she is receiving because they are having too much fun or are waiting for a turn in a game or on a swing.  Uh-oh.  Not being able to connect the dots is common in young children.  That is why we don’t let them cross a busy street alone until they are well over 3 or 4.  They are terrible at judging risk.  Again, this means there are skills to develop to avoid accidents.

What should parents do to help their children limit accidents arising from being “too busy to pee?”

  1. Involve kids in the process of planning and deciding.  A child that is brought to the potty without any explanations such as “I can see you wiggling and crossing your legs.  That tells me that you are ready to pee” isn’t being taught how to recognize more of their own signs of needing the potty.
  2. Allow kids to experience the consequences of poor choices.  If they refused to use the potty and had an accident, they can end up in the tub to wash up, put their wet clothes in the washer, and if they were watching a show, it is now over.  They don’t get to keep watching TV while an adult wipes them, changes them, and cleans up the mess!
  3. Create good routines.  Early.  Just as your mom insisted that you use the bathroom before leaving the house, kids with low tone need to understand that for them, there is a cost to overstretching their bladder by “holding it”  Read  Teach Kids With Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome Or Low Tone: Don’t Hold It In! to learn more about this.  The best strategy is to encourage a child to urinate before their bladder is too full, make potty routines a habit very early in life, and to develop the skills of patience stretching Stretch Your Toddler’s Patience, Starting Today!  from an early age.  Creating more patience in young children allows them to think clearly and plan better, within their expected cognitive level.

Looking for more information on managing daily life with your special needs child?

I wrote three e-books for you!

My e-book on toilet training, The Practical Guide to Toilet Training Your Child With Low Muscle Tone, and my e-books on managing pediatric hypermobility, are available on Amazon as read-only downloads, and on Your Therapy Source as printable downloads.  The JointSmart Child:  Living and Thriving With Hypermobility  Volume   One:  The Early Years and Volume Two:  The School Years are filled with strategies that parents and therapists can use immediately to improve a child’s independence and safety.

Your Therapy Source has bundled my books together for a great value.  On their site, you can buy both the toilet training and the Early Years books together, or buy both hypermobility books together at a significant discount!





What kid isn’t right for this toy?








I just found this online after a parent asked me for recommendations for equipment.  She isn’t sending her two kids under 5 to camp this year, and needs some ideas to turn her backyard into a fun place to spend the summer.  This is the Little Tikes Magic Flower water table.

Why do I love this one?

Watch their video on Amazon and you will understand!  But before you do, here are my reasons, as an occupational therapist, for recommending this water table:

  • Multiple levels mean that children of different ages can both have fun.
  • Multiple ways to explore helps kids take turns without having to choose between “the fun thing” and the “barely OK things” on the water table.
  • The animal theme works for lots of kids.  Not everyone likes pirates.  Or even understands pirates.
  • It is big enough to have at least 2 kids playing at the same time, maybe 3.
  • They include 2 duckies (who doesn’t love duckies?), 2 frogs, 3 turtles, a fish, and three pouring choices.  I hate tables where you STILL have to go out and buy stuff to make it fun.  This table is “one-and-done”.
  •  All of my clients with low tone and hypermobility that can stand will be motivated to do so; there isn’t really any way to lean on this water table.  They can stabilize by holding an edge, but they cannot drape themselves over it.  They will be bending and reaching.  A lot.  That is a good thing.
  • Kids that use a wheelchair or need to sit while playing due to mobility issues will still be able to have fun with their friends and siblings that can stand and bend.  This water table is inclusive.

I really hate sand tables.  You would think that as an OTR, I would love them.

Nope.  Sand gets everywhere.  In clothes, in body folds, everywhere.  Kids get sand in their mouth and in their eyes.  It tracks into the house unless you shower your kid outside, and maybe it will be found inside even then.  Sand is a pain in the neck.

As long as you empty your water table and hit it regularly with some soap or a diluted bleach solution to keep it clean, it is much easier on everyone to have a water table rather than a sand table.  This one is going to be a lot of fun!

Need more ideas for fun this summer?  Read The Preschool Water Arcade Game You Need This Summer If Camp is Cancelled (and maybe even if it isn’t) and Doing OT Telehealth? Start Cooking (And Baking)!



Doing OT Telehealth? Start Cooking (And Baking)!


Parents are looking for ways to survive the lockdown without daycare and preschool.  Even the easiest child is starting to chafe under the oppression of the COVID quarantine.  As an OT, it is my job to help parents support growth and development, but I don’t have to make it feel like work.

Enter cooking and baking as OT activities!

The simplest recipe I know has two ingredients and cannot be ruined unless you step on it:  Chocolate rolls.

You need:

  • Baking sheet, preferably non-stick or lined with parchment paper.  This dough is sticky, and the melted chips are a pain to clean off a surface.
  • Work surface: possibly another baking sheet, non-stick foil, or parchment paper.  
  • One container of crescent rolls (8 to a package, usually) Keep it cold until you are going to use it.  When it gets warm it gets very goey.  Kids either love it and mash it about, or won’t touch it.
  • 1 to 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips, separated into two small bowls.  You will need only about 1 cup, but have extra since kids will taste a few.  Or a lot.  A mom only had a chocolate bar, and she broke it up into small pieces.  I think she needed to smash something that day!   COVID has made us adaptable….


Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Unroll two triangles of dough, one for the adult, and one for the child.

Demonstrate how to gently push the chips into the dough, then roll up, starting at the wider end.  Assist your child to imitate you. Don’t over-fill with chips.   If it becomes a squishy mess when they roll it up, don’t panic.  This will bake off just fine.  I promise.

Repeat with all dough triangles.

Place both rolls on the baking sheet, and once filled, place the baking sheet on the center rack of the oven.

Bake for about 8-12 minutes or just until the bottom of the rolls turns light golden brown.  You will have to check them after 8 minutes, as they bake quickly.  They keep baking a bit after you take them out of the oven, and if you overbake, you will have 8 chocolate hockey pucks.

Cool and enjoy!


I ALWAYS make a recipe by myself first before baking with kids.  Why?  Two reasons:

  1. I need to know what can go wrong and how my oven responds.  Every minute counts in baking.  Kids take failure personally, so I want to make mistakes and fix them before I ask a child to try a recipe out.
  2. You have a finished product to show them.  Young children cannot look at dough and chips and imagine what it will be like when it is done.  Showing them the actual, real, tasty end product makes it understandable to them.

Is your child likely to snack on the supplies?  Use an “eating bowl”.  I often tell parents to assemble a small amount of chocolate chips in a separate bowl and designate this as an “eating bowl”.  Rather than criticize a child’s desire to sample, they can eat from this bowl without altering the amount needed for the recipe.  Even Julia Child liked to snack on her supplies!!

If you want to get fancy, you can place a few raspberries at the wide end of the dough.   Toddlers and preschoolers aren’t gourmets, and they can reject things that aren’t simple, so don’t insist that they copy you.  But this is a way to expand a child’s awareness of food variety as well as make your chocolate roll tastier.





Gifted Child? Try “How Does Your Engine Run” For Sensory Processing


I love working with gifted children.  OTs get referrals to work with gifted kids whether or not they have been tested by a psychologist.  Some have motor delays amplified by the asynchronous development, but many are sloppy at handwriting because their motor skill cannot keep up with their language skill.  Some are sensory avoiders or sensory seekers.  Or both.  They aren’t always in distress.  They are almost always out of synch with their families, peers, and teachers.  Without understanding how to manage sensory processing issues, these kids are driven by the need to handle motor demands and sensory input, often driving their teachers and parents a little bit nuts.

Some gifted kids really do need motor skill training and sensory processing treatment.  They are struggling with tolerating their world, and can’t achieve their potential in school, with peers, and at home.  While many kids are “twice exceptional”  and have a learning disability or other disorder in addition to being gifted, simply being gifted creates permanent processing challenges.  The gifted brain will always be driven, and it will always prefer intensity and complexity to an extent that exceeds people with typical skills.   Almost all younger gifted kids need help to understand that their brains will always respond this way, and they will constantly bump up against the typical world in ways that can create problems.  Knowing how to manage this conflict in daily life is our wheelhouse.  Occupational therapy is focused on function.  Always.  We don’t stop with a neurological explanation of giftedness.  We have solutions.

One of the most useful strategies to address a child’s aversions or sensory seeking behaviors is to create a “sensory diet”.  This can be very simple or very complex.  A sensory diet provides activities and equipment that help people tolerate sensory experiences that overwhelm them, but it also “feeds” the desire for sensory experiences that can derail them from interaction and participation.

Avoidant kids learn that more proprioception will help them tolerate noise without wearing headphones and blocking out all interaction.  Sensory seekers learn that they don’t have to kick another kid’s chair to get input; they can do wall push-ups or wall sitting quickly in the hall between classes.  Therapy that includes a sensory diet helps the child who has such pressure to speak that they interrupt everyone, and it helps the child that learned to escape bright lights and scratchy clothes through daydreaming.

Developing a sensory diet that a child can use independently is the goal of Mary Sue Williams and Sherry Shellenberger’s book “How Does Your Engine Run?  Children learn about sensory modulation by thinking about their ability to perform sensory processing as an engine.  Running too fast or too slow doesn’t allow for great performance.  Running “just right” feels good internally and allows a child to learn, respond appropriately and achieve mastery.  Finding the right activities and environments that allow for “just right” processing is based on what therapists know about neuropsychology, but this program asks the client to assess what works for them, and asks them to use these strategies effectively.

This book isn’t new, and it isn’t perfect.  But it is a good place to start.  It explains behaviors using neurological strategies that work, and provides a framework for inexperienced therapists to move from prescribing to guiding.  A gifted child can begin the process of using a self-directed sensory diet far earlier than their typical peers. I have seen 4 year-olds start to master their own drives once it is explained to them.  They feel terrific when their abilities are recognized, and adults are seen as supporters instead of controllers.

The biggest problem I encounter is unlearning the behaviors that children have developed before their parents and teachers understood that giftedness is more than a big vocabulary.  Children may have learned to push a parent to exhaustion to get what they wanted.  They may have bullied adults or intentionally alienated adults to be allowed to do what they want.  They may have become extremely bossy and gotten away with it.  They may have decided that any skill that takes time to develop isn’t worth it.  They will lead with the things that they find effortless.  This will trip them up over time, but without understanding the life of the gifted child, these behaviors sprout like weeds.

Gifted children are still children, and they need guidance and support to grow into their gifts!  Occupational therapists can help them and their families do just that.

Looking for more information on helping your gifted child?  

I am writing an e-book on this topic, but you can also call me for a consult as well.  Visit my website Tranquil Babies  and use my contact information to set things up today!











How To Pick A High Chair For Your Special Needs Child












Want Your Child to Show Hand Preference (Righty/Lefty?) Where You Place Their Spoon Matters


I get a lot of questions about this issue, based on my experience as a pediatric OTR.  Starting at 12 months, some children show a strong hand preference and never look back.  Other kids are switching hand use long after 4.  Without the existence of disorders that directly affect hand dominance such as orthopedic disorders, cerebral palsy, or untreated torticollis, hand dominance is hard-wired and emerges naturally.  But there are situations in which it is delayed or incomplete long after the typical window of skill development.

Here is what can be happening, and here is what you can do as a parent or a therapist:

Hand dominance only emerges with the development of refined hand control and the child’s awareness that they need more skilled control for an activity.  I tell parents that I can pick up my coffee cup with either hand to drink, but that doesn’t make me a lefty.  If you paid me $100, I probably couldn’t thread a needle with my left hand.

Children that aren’t practicing refined skills like feeding or assembling blocks, or even intent on picking up every darn piece of lint on the carpet…they don’t need refined grasp, and they probably will not demonstrate hand dominance on time.  Kids that are scribbling wildly but haven’t tried to draw a circle with closure ( a 36-month skill, BTW) also have no need to develop dominance.  The self-starter, the baby and toddler that watches you intently and decides to learn all these skills?  They won’t need much help.  But the child who avoids challenge or gets help because it is easier and faster for an adult to feed them or help them build a tower?  They may lag behind in hand development.

Some kids are very tuned into adult actions, and copy the hand that a parent or teacher uses.  These are the children that are great mimics.  They can see that you are using your right hand, and even if they naturally grab with their left hand, they transfer objects into the same hand you are using.  Adults are naturally inclined to assume dominance as well.  I cannot count the number of times I absent-mindedly handed a pen to a left-handed parent into their right hand.  If you do that to a child under 5 , they assume that you want them to use that hand, and will struggle on.  This is where spoon placement matters.  I encourage parents to place the utensil in the center of the placement or tray, and watch which hand (both of the child’s hands must be free) their child chooses over many trials.

If a child is inconsistent but clearly uses their left hand more often, placing their spoon on that side of the tray should boost use, and with skilled use comes more skill and awareness.  I never pull objects out of a child’s hand.  I don’t need to.  They will drop their crayon or spoon frequently enough for me to have another chance to offer it back to them.

What if I (or a parent) picked wrong?

Dominance isn’t that easy to alter.  Ask your grandmother what the nuns in Catholic school did to alter dominance in lefties (it was considered “the devil’s hand”, and what they did wasn’t pretty).  Children will eventually simply transfer their spoon over to the other hand.



How To Help Your Toddler Hold a Spoon







How Therapeutic Listening Enhances Motor Skills



















Screen Time for Preschoolers? If You Choose to Offer Screen Time, Make it Count With These Apps

Parents have to make the decision to offer or restrict screen use to their youngest kids.  I won’t take sides on this, as it is a decision that is made by knowing the child, the family    dynamics and the risk/rewards at the moment.  I believe that if young children are going to use screens, that they should be using them with an adult and they should have well-designed apps that build skills rather than simply entertain.  Easier said than done.  There is a lot of poor material out there.  It may keep a child quiet for a time, but it isn’t teaching them anything except that if they protest loudly enough, their parents might cave.

Two app designers that I can strongly recommend are Tiny Hands and Duck Duck Moose.  Both have fun apps that require a child to think and listen.  Nothing happens by randomly tapping a screen.  The graphics are fun but not so intense that they are overwhelming for kids with visual processing issues.  Tiny Hands has apps for younger toddlers and older toddlers, and Duck Duck Moose starts out with simple games and progresses to math and reading apps.

For older toddlers and preschoolers, THUP has Monkey Preschool Explorers, Monkey Preschool Lunchbox and Monkey Math Scholastic Sunshine.  All very well designed and impossible to play without paying attention.   Filling the aquarium with sharks is totally fun!!

My readers may know that I like to pair screen use with a tablet stylus to build pencil grasp and control.  Want A Stronger Pencil Grasp? Use a Tablet Stylus Make sure that it is a stylus that doesn’t have any metal, or your glass screen will not survive.  Young children can break off the rubber tip, so they need some initial supervision and instruction.  Since I highly recommend that screen time is done with an adult, that shouldn’t be a problem!













Is this recess in your house during the COVID crisis?















Why was he using a dot marker for anything?








Is Your Toddler Home From School Because of COVID-19? Save Your Sanity With Fun Routines


Many families have toddlers that are not attending daycare or preschool now.  They are at home.  All day.  They are off their schedules, and sometimes seem off their rockers!  Here are some ideas to help their parents retain their sanity:

  1. Create a routine for them.  This means that they get snacks at a certain time, outdoor play at a certain time, look at books, take a nap, listen to music, etc.  all in a predictable sequence.  Paint rocks, tear up scrap paper and glue it onto a bigger piece of paper, etc.  Crafts are fun and they can be cheap.  You don’t have to reproduce the school routine, you just have to be consistent about your home routine.  They will learn to anticipate what comes next, with all the calmness that consistency provides.
  2. Have some emergency items/activities.  Bake off some pre-made cookie dough, open up some new toy you saved for a special time.  It is special now!  Root through the back of the gift closet or the toy box and find something that is new or seems new.
  3. Turn on music and calm everyone down.  Music is powerful, and these days we need it.  Sing out and be silly.  You probably could blow off some steam too.  Consider using Quickshifts  Binaural Beats and Regulation: More Than Music Therapy if your child has sensory processing or low muscle tone.
  4. Make sure they get to move.  Every day.  Even if all you do is dance around the room, make it active.  Jump on pillows, log roll around safely, etc.  I treated kids in tiny NYC apartments, so I know it can be done.  It isn’t about having a lot of space.
  5. Reconsider the use of screens as rewards.  I know it works, but there is a price to pay after that initial quiet time.  Think carefully about what will happen when time is up, or when meals of bedtime come.  It could get ugly.  I have used screen activities in treatment, but NEVER EVER a reward, or even a consistent activity every session.  It is another fun thing we do that isn’t always available, and certainly not received by howling for it.  For apps that teach instead of entertain, read Screen Time for Preschoolers? If You Choose to Offer Screen Time, Make it Count With These Apps


Joint Protection And Hypermobility: Investing in Your Child’s Future


allen-taylor-dAMvcGb8Vog-unsplash.jpgParents of hypermobile kids are taught early on not to pull on limbs while dressing them or picking them up.  It is less common to teach children how to protect their own joints.

In fact, parents may be encouraged by their child’s doctors to let them be “as active as they want to be, in order to build their strength”.  Without adding in education about  good joint protection, this is not good advice.  This post is an attempt to fill in the space between “don’t pull on their limbs” and “get them to be more active”.

Why?  Because hypermobile joints are more vulnerable to immediate injury and also to progressive damage over time.  Once joint surfaces are damaged, and tendons and ligaments are overstretched, there are very few treatments that can repair those situations.  Since young children often do not experience pain with poor joint stability, teaching good habits early is essential.  It is always preferable to prevent damage and injuries rather than have to repair damage.  Always.  And it is not as complicated as it sounds.

The basic principles of joint protection are simple.  It is the application that can become complex.  The more joints involved in a movement or that have pre-existing pain or damage, the more complex the solution.  That is why some children need to be seen by an occupational or physical therapist for guidance.  We are trained in the assessment and prescription of strategies based on clinical information, not after taking a weekend course or after reading a book.  I am thinking of writing an e-book on this subject, since there really is nothing much out there for hypermobile people at any age….

Some of the basics of joint protection are:

  • Joints should be positioned in anatomical alignment while at rest and as much as possible, while in use.  Knowing the correct alignment doesn’t always require a therapist.  Bending a foot on it’s side isn’t correct alignment.  Placing a wrist in a straight versus an angled position is.
  • Larger joints should execute forceful movements whenever possible.  That means that pushing a heavy door open with an arm or the side of your body is better joint protection than flattening your hand on it.  The exception is if there is damage to those larger structures.  See below.
  • Placing a joint in mid-range while moving protects joint structures.  As an example, therapists often pad and thicken handles to place finger joints in a less clenched position and allow force to dissipate through the padding.  We discourage carrying heavy loads with arms held straight down or with one arm/hand.

Remember:  once joints are damaged, if joints are painful, or the muscles are too weak to execute a movement, activity adaptations have to be considered.  There is no benefit to straining a weak or damaged joint structure.


How to Get Children to Wash Their Hands


phil-goodwin-TxP44VIqlA8-unsplashThis season’s flu and viruses have parents and teachers wondering how to raise their game regarding infection control.  Washing your hands is one of the most important things anyone at any age can do to protect their health.  But small children aren’t always cooperative.  Getting them to wash their hands can be tough.

The families I work with know that I will not begin a session in their home, and especially that I won’t touch their child, without washing my hands first.  Not only is this to protect them, it is to model good practice for the kids.  Some children will ask me why I am washing my hands.  I always answer them by naming two things familiar to them.   I tell them that when I touch the outside of my car, my hands get dirty, and I don’t want to put dirt on our toys.

Cars and toys.  Most kids over 2 know what those two things are, and they know that one is not so clean, and the other one shouldn’t have dirt on it.  They get it.

But only a few parents insist that their child wash their hands before they begin working with me.  Some children want to share my sanitizer spray, and if a parent agrees, I will show them how to use it.

Now that we are facing both a serious flu season and a new virus, it seems like a good idea to provide suggestions to help parents out with hand washing:

  1.   Model good hand washing practices with a bit of drama.  You have to be a bit of a ham, and remember that kids need simple but dramatic explanations for information to sink in.  Something along the lines of “Oops, I FORGOT to wash my hands!  I will be RIGHT back as soon as I find some soap and water.  Do you know where it is?  Raise your vocal inflection, and use some gestures like stretching out your fingers.  Now say “That is SOOOOO much better.  My hands feel good and clean”.  Interrupt lots of things you are doing with a calm departure to wash your hands.  But make sure they hear you say where you are going and why.
  2. Get soap that they like.  Whether it smells good to them, has a character they love on the bottle, or is foamy or even tinted, soap they like is soap they will use.  Liquid soap is so much easier for young children to handle than bar soap.
  3. Make it easy.  They should be able to reach the water by using a spout extension, and possibly help you get the soap on their hands.  Paper towels that pop out of their holder ready to dry hands are easy to hold and the best way to avoid spreading germs.  Unless a cloth towel is changed very very frequently, it isn’t the cleanest choice. I treat a child whose mom is a cardio-thoracic surgeon.  There is a hands-free soap dispenser and a box of pop-up towels in her main floor powder room.  Enough said.
  4. Ask your partner and other people in the house if they have washed their hands when your child is paying attention to you and watching them respond.  Young children don’t take notice of these practices of others unless you point them out.  Hearing about who washed their hands, and hearing their enthusiastic replies, sends home the message that everyone washes their hands.  It is what we ALL do.
  5. Spin it positively.  Some children really become frightened if you message things about getting sick.  The message is to stay healthy.  Keep it that way.
  6. Make a habit of it.  Infection control staff know that making actions into habits is the best way to ensure safety.  Create new rules about washing hands throughout the day, and gently insist on them.  They will become habits.  Good ones.


Sensory Processing and Colds: Nothing to Sneeze At!


Here in the US, it is cold and flu season.  Most of my day is spend with kids recovering from some upper respiratory virus.  A few seem to have a continuous runny nose and cough.  They also have an increase in their sensory processing issues.  Is this connected, and if so, what can be done?

  1. Anything that affects health will make sensory processing harder.  Anyone, at any age, will struggle more when they don’t feel well.  If a child is super-sensitive, feeling ill will make them edgier and more avoidant.  If a child is a sensory seeker, that funny feeling in their head that changes when they flip upside down will probably make them do it more.  If a child is a poor modulator, and goes from 0-60 mph easily, they will have more difficulty staying in their seat and staying calm.
  2. Colds often create fluid in the ears.  This is a problem for hearing.  This is often a problem for speech and mealtimes.  It is also a problem for vestibular processing.  Fluid in the ear means that children are hearing you as if they are underwater.  Their speech may be directly affected.  They probably realize that biting and chewing open the eustacian tubes from the mouth to the ear, so they may want to chew more.  On everything.  They may also be unable to handle car rides without throwing up.  They may refuse to do any vestibular activities in therapy.
  3. Children sleep poorly when ill.  Anyone with sensory processing issues will struggle more when they are tired.  Young children cannot get the sleep they need and don’t understand why they feel the way they do.  Enough said.
  4. Spatial processing problems will get worse.  Being unable to use hearing to orient to the space and the people and objects in the room, children will roam around more, touch things more, startle more, stand still and look disoriented, and may refuse to go into spaces that are hard to process, like gyms or big box stores.  Uh-oh.

So what can you do as a parent or a therapist?

  • Understand that this is happening.  It is real.  It may not be a personality issue, a deterioration in their ABA program, or a problem with therapy.
  • Ask your pediatrician for more help.  There are nasal sprays and inhaled medications that can help, and some, like steroids, that can create more behavioral issues.  If your child needs steroids, you need to understand what effects they can have.  Saline sprays, cold mist humidifiers, soups and honey for coughs, if your pediatrician approves, are low-tech ways to help a child suffer less.
  • Alter your daily routine if needed.  Making less appointments, fewer challenges, and more rest could help.  Kids can be over-scheduled and under-rested.  Therapy sessions may have to be adjusted to both be less stressful and more helpful.
  • Your child may benefit from vestibular movement if they do not have an untreated ear infection.  Your OT can help you craft a sensory diet that moves fluid, but not if there is an infection.

Read more about sensory processing here: Does Your Child Hate Big Spaces? There is a Sensory-Based Explanation and Spatial Awareness and Sound: “Hearing” The Space Around You