I haven't written in a while because nothing has changed.  They still do the same exercises and she hasn't shown any dramatic improvement. She keeps leveling up in the same things she has been doing.   I had the nutrition consult today.  She has to cut out dairy, eggs and malt.  If dairy or eggs are a minor ingredient then it is okay to consume it.  Minor is defined as not being listed on the package in the first four ingredients.  In four weeks we can challenge her with dairy for one day, wait 3 days, challenge her with eggs, wait 3 days and challenge her with malt.

I had told Dr. Naumann that she doesn't seem tired, but today she had a farewell to dairy day and consumed a lot.  Ice cream, yogurt, chocolate milk and stuffed shells with cheese may have been the reason she couldn't even do 5 sit ups and didn't even try push ups today.  It will be interesting to see if there is a change in her with eliminating these foods.  I'll find out on Monday what supplements they recommend.

I wasn't going to tell her I was a nutritionist, but when she broke out the Kreb's cycle and started to explain it to me, I just couldn't take it any more.  It did speed up the consult, which is a good thing when you have a roaming three year old.

Thanks to Jason Marucci for finding out what glasses my daughter is using a Brain Balance to dilate her left eye!  It is at http://eyelights.com/.

This is the inside of it.

She went up in balance beam, prone core, dichotic listening and brachiation.  So Friday she should have some new things to do.  For homework she was able to stand on her left leg for 14 seconds with her eyes closed.  We are making progress.

I asked her today if she felt there were any real changes.  She said she felt she could focus for longer.  Before she would fall asleep at the computer while listening to her online classes, but now she can sit through an hour online class with no problems.

So we went to Disney World for spring break with the intention of doing the Brain Balance exercises.  That didn't happen.  She went up another level in proprioception today. I didn't have much of a chance to talk to her about what they did today, so I will post that later.

Waiting room talk:  A mother was telling me about the effect the nutritional changes has had on her son.  He was diagnosed with an intolerance to milk and eggs after doing the labs.  They cut out all dairy and eggs and he immediately started having a lot more energy.  Before he was normally found lying on the couch and rubbing his face like some do when they are tired.  Every three months they can reintroduce dairy to see if he is still intolerant (he is already okay to eat eggs now).  If he goes back to his old sleepy ways, they take him off of the dairy again.  Eventually his body and brain should mature enough to where he is no longer intolerant to dairy and he will no longer have diet restrictions.

Dairy seems to be the common factor among the ADHD group.  Several of the autistic children have a lot more eliminations which include gluten.  We should be taking our daughter to do labs this week.  I think she will just kill over if she finds out she can't have Nesquik milk.

It has been nice this week seeing my daughter is becoming a bit more tolerant of other's weaknesses. She also went up in auditory processing and up a grade level in auditory processing.

Auditory processing was her lowest score from her original evaluation.  I have a niece who was diagnosed with auditory processing disorder, so it runs in the family.  We just had our progress report and she has moved up 4 age levels in auditory processing since we started.  They feel they can move her up seven more levels by the time she completes the program.  This is when you tell your child to get the paper from the first drawer on the right side of the desk, and they say "Okay" and then come back having no idea what they are supposed to be getting or where they are supposed to look.  

They have added more homework to her daily routines.  She continues all the original exercises, but now she also has an auditory processing exercise, a fine motor and timing & rhythm exercise and a proprioception exercise.  She also has a whisper phone that she places on her left ear and needs to speak in for 15 minutes a day.

The whisper phone allows her to hear her own voice and is placed on the left ear to stimulate her right brain.  For the proprioception exercise she has to stand on her left foot for 30 seconds with her eyes closed.  She was able to do it with a lot of wiggling and scooting around.  I couldn't even do it for 15 seconds.  I could do it forever with my eyes open, so I was really surprised how hard it was to do with my eyes shut.  Try it!  The goal is 60 seconds.

For fine motor and timing & rhythm she can play Bop-IT, Simon, Operation or Jacks.  She can also learn how to play the "Cup Song".  And for auditory processing she can choose between one of the following activities:

Catching up on Brain Balance with my daughter from last week.

Friday, in addition to the vibrating strap on her left leg she had another vibrating strap placed around her left arm.  They placed an ipod shuffle on the back of her shirt with a wire that attaches to glasses that have a little red light blinking to help dialate her left eye.  And there is a little earphone by her ear that beeps consistently.  While wearing all of that she had to work on the computer exercises with the arrows, remember words, do fine motor exercises with pegs,  keep time with the cowbell, and walk forwards, backwards and side to side on the balance beam while looking up,.  Then all the equipment comes off for her to hang on the monkey bars for 7 seconds and do 9 push-ups and try to hold a side plank for 60 seconds. She still holds a front plank on the exercise ball.

She went up some levels while I was out in Utah.

This was the first time I saw her go up in the academic room, so that is nice.

       My daughter went up another level in lateral core (ability to hold a side plank on her forearm), balance beam (walking on beam forward, backward and side to side), fine motor (ability to quickly put pegs in holes) and dichotic listening (hearing a different word in each ear at the same time).

       We had a discussion last night about her new found attitude and she explained it like this:  "I just feel like I'm more aware of everything, so I've become more sensitive to things."  This is true, because when we were in the car and she spoke with frustration, all I said was "tone" and she recognized what she had did and apologized.  Before she wouldn't have recognized immediately why I would think something was wrong with what she said.  Also, her writing has become better without the sloppy mistakes that were being made only two weeks ago.  She feels this is because she has been writing essays at Brain Balance.

      She's happy she got to start on the exercise ball today. She has to hold the following position for 60 seconds.

    Usually when I whine and complain about something I immediately discover that I'm wrong, and so it is the case with Brain Balance this week. I complained that her auditory and visual processing are not improving then I see her write a perfect rough draft essay and pick up on cues not previously recognized. I'm not sure if that means I should not be so impatient and withhold my whining or if I should complain more and see more results.  A parent told me that when she levels up in dichotic listening then she is getting better in auditory processing.  

     I'm flying out west for next week so my husband will be taking her to Brain Balance.  I'll make sure to get the details from him so I can continue to make the posts.

    Thanks for the comments!  It keeps me motivated to continue blogging.

     Today, my daughter went up one age level in supine and prone core, upper body, brachiation and dichotic listening.  For her homework today I noticed she could do thirty sit ups in a row with her feet tucked under the couch.  The age goal is 37 unassisted.

      To be honest, I'm a little tired of her doing better in physical abilities and not improving on her auditory processing and visual processing.  I'm paying $6,000 for her to do better academically and to recognize social cues better, not for her to be able to say, "Look at me!  I can do push-ups!"  I haven't taken her to do the nutrition lab part of it yet because of the money, but it is time for me to suck it up and pay the $500 to have her assessed.  I hear rumor they charge even more for the supplements.  I know it is not right of me to judge a program if I don't do everything they ask.  I just hate those red numbers.