Bubble Gum Queen

One way to mimic nursing for an older child is chewing gum. The jaw motion and sweetness are calming. So I've become the bubble gum queen.


Here are my couple of rules:

1) anytime between breakfast and dinner (or when the sun is up, etc) you ask for bubble gum in an honoring way (May I please have bubble gum?), I will say yes.

2) You may not touch your gum, take it out of your mouth, etc.

This not only calms them and gives them great sensory input but it also helps build trust. The always affirmative answer helps my RADish trust me with a fun want. Everyday for the first week, I had to remind her it was there and what the rules were. It was over a week before she mustered the strength to ask.

Sensory Input

Purvis said the vast majority of kids with wounded pasts will deal with some degree of sensory processing issues. She suggests doing the checklists in a book like Kranowitz's Out-of-Sync Child. You can also have an OT do an evaluation. You can also use one like Dawn has suggested here, too.

A lot of sensory issues will mimic attachment and vice versa. Babies learn to interpret their worlds and learn to later make decisions through their senses. If they don't learn how to interpret senses coming at them, they interpret all of it as danger. I love that Purvis wants parents to use a breastfeeding newborn as the standard of a sensory bath. Think of all of the ways a baby is washed with + sensory input when nursing. Our kids need sensory baths. all. the. time. However, everything she does is age appropriate.

~massage

~Out-of-Sync-Child Has Fun

~Simon Says

~Breathing

~Chair sit-ups