Sleep is both restorative and unfortunately, at times, elusive. But how important is sleep for adults’ health and well-being? Several studies would suggest very. Sleep gives us much needed rest from physical activity and provides our brain with time to establish new memories and learning. In contrast, lack of sleep leads to decreased alertness and irritability. It decreases physical performance and response time, impairs concentration and memory. The greater the lack of sleep, the more impaired these functions become. So how do we improve the amount and quality of sleep?

Take a Pill

Although this would be the easiest and quickest route, it is not always the best. Most sleeping pills are not meant to be used long term, meaning not beyond four to eight weeks. Sleeping pills can have undesirable side effects and further impair physical performance and cognitive function. Frequently reported side effects include drowsiness, lightheadedness, impaired thinking and poor reaction time. There is also the risk of interactions between sleeping pills and other prescription drugs, and certainly with alcohol use.

Fortunately there are non-drug remedies that have been proven to improve sleep. Some we have heard many times, such as, avoiding caffeine and getting more exercise. Others, such as the following take time and are best used together. They have been shown to be safe, effective and long lasting. But they take time and effort.

Improve sleep for adults by establishing a daytime routine

Activities in your daily routine can affect your sleep for good or for worse. Three of these are exercise, diet and sunlight.

Exercise

Regular exercise improves our energy, weight control, mental health and longevity. Regular daily exercise also helps us sleep better. Exercise uses up energy, regulates our body temperature and produces endorphins, those feel-good hormones, all of which lead to better sleep. Participating in both aerobic exercise and strength training promotes both better health and sleep. Make it a goal to exercise five to seven times per week, for 30 to 60 minutes per day. Studies have shown that the timing of exercise is very individual. For some people it is better to exercise earlier in the day so as to not have difficulty sleeping. For others, exercise right before bedtime is relaxing and facilitates sleep. Do what works best for you.

Diet

Mind what you eat and drink. Caffeine is often used to promote wakefulness or alertness. It reportedly does so by blocking a natural chemical in your body that builds up during the day and facilitates sleepiness at night. However, research regarding this is inconclusive. Some studies have shown that there is little or no real association between caffeine intake and subsequent insomnia. It is may be that some people are more sensitive to the effects of caffeine than others. It is worth limiting your coffee, tea and soda to earlier in the day to see if you sleep better at night.

Alcohol is another sleep disrupter for adults. Although you may fall asleep more quickly, you may not remain asleep. Again, no clear cut distinctions have been proven, but it is worth avoiding alcohol if you notice it affects your ability to sleep through the night.

Daylight

Light exposure influences circadian rhythms. The more light in your environment, the more awake you are. When our surroundings are dark, our bodies produce melatonin which makes us sleepy. Try to get sunlight during the say to set your circadian rhythm and promote sleep.

Develop Sleep Inducing Habits

Create sleep routines. Try to go to bed and get up at the same time each day including weekends and holidays. This helps establish your sleep-wake cycle to promote better sleep. Add to this relaxing activities to transition your body from wakefulness to sleep. Activates can include taking a warm shower, reading a book, listening to relaxing music with low light or meditating. If you worry about something, write it down to deal with it the next day.

Prioritizing your bedroom can improve sleep for adults (and children). Eliminate from your bedroom non sleep activities such as eating in bed, using electronic devices, answering emails or watching TV. Screen time alone may interfere with sleep. Make your bedroom conducive to sleep – cool, dark and quiet. Not to mention a comfortable mattress. Go to bed when you feel sleepy. If you do not fall asleep within 20 minutes, get up and do something that is relaxing. Be sure to avoid stimulating activities such as using electronic devices, cleaning the house or eating. You cannot force sleep, but you do not want to increase wakefulness.

With a bit of persistence and effort, sleep will not be so elusive and a restful night will be something to look forward to again. If you want more information about sleep, check out the Sleep Foundation. To learn about how poor sleep can affect your kids, check out this blog. And stay tuned for Part 2, an updated blog about sleep and children.

Swinging is a great activity that can be engaging across all generations. Why is it that most individuals enjoy swinging, especially kids? Swinging stimulates different parts of a child’s brain simultaneously. Swinging helps the brain develop skills such as spatial awareness, balance, rhythm, and muscle control. Even a quiet moment on a swing can help a child regulate their sensory system and help them develop the ability to adapt to different sensations.

Everyone develops in a particular pattern. Some may be faster while others may take longer to develop. For example, one typically has to be able to sit up by themselves before they can crawl and eventually walk. This is part of why a child starts to love swinging sensations when they are developing coordinated motor movements. Their sensory system is ready to organize and interpret moving information, and swinging is a fun way to do that. Our sensory system is comprised of our vestibular, proprioceptive, tactile, visual, gustatory, olfactory, and auditory systems.

the proprioceptive system

The proprioceptive system, located within the muscles and joints, helps keep track of and control different parts of the body. It provides everyone with a sense of body awareness and also detects force and pressure while they swing. The proprioceptive system works in conjunction with the vestibular system. The vestibular system is a complex network within the inner ear that helps keep the body balanced and upright (orientated). The vestibular system detects movement and gravitational pull. These two systems together make unconscious changes to the muscles and joints in order for the body to achieve the desired movement and balance necessary to respond. The timely development of these senses can help a child learn to calm down if they are easily overwhelmed by sensory stimulation. Or it can help bring alertness to a child who needs sensory stimulation to facilitate attention and learning.

Give your child time to swing

Being on a swing as an adult comes so natural. That balance that feels so natural to an adult is a complex process of large muscle groups working together to maintain postural control. As an adult, we can easily minimize play and not take the time to encourage various exploration on play equipment for our children. Try to make extra time for your child to engage in these fun play opportunities. They make a huge impact on brain and body growth and health.

It is very easy to forget how much we all loved swinging when we were little, or to minimize it as frivolous play without serious and necessary developmental benefits. Sensory play is great for kids! If your child loves to swing, try to make some extra time for them to explore this super-activity. You will be helping their little brain grow in harmony with their body, and they will love you for it. Click here to learn more about how swinging, sliding, and climbing will benefit your child.

Fine motor skills…exactly what are they, and why are they so important? Fine motor skills are those skills that require refined use of the small muscles of the hand. These muscles are responsible for controlling the hand, fingers, and thumb. Development of fine motor skills make it possible for children to complete important tasks such as writing, feeding, and dressing, as well as object/toy manipulation. There is a progression of development that gradually occurs through experience and exposure to a variety of toys, textures, and experiences.

Little hands need to develop strength and dexterity. Encouraging children to play, explore, and interact with a variety of items and textures promotes development. Fine motor skills are heavily dependent on having good proximal strength and stability. Developing shoulder and arm strength begins in infancy through tummy time. During tummy time your child learns how to use arms to push up and shift from side to side. This leads to reaching for items and eventually to moving into all fours to begin the stages of crawling. While doing all this your child is building that proximal strength. In addition, your little one is gaining input through their palms and exploring a variety of textures, all of which promote fine motor skill development.

How to encourage development of fine Motor Skills

There are a multitude of ways to encourage the development of fine motor skills. Finger feeding is a great example. Allow your little one to finger feed as much as possible. Picking up small pieces of food will help develop pincer grasp (using thumb and index finger). This grasp pattern is used throughout life from writing and dressing to completing crafts and hobbies. Encourage play with small items (as appropriate for your child’s age/safety) through activities such as block stacking, bead stringing, small knobbed puzzles, and toys that connect (pop beads, Duplo blocks, LEGO). Using clothes pins to pin pictures or coloring pages on to a string or along the edges of a cup or paper plate will help develop pincer grasp strength.

Play dough is one the best ways to build hand and finger strength. These activities require use the fingers, eyes, and hands in a controlled manner. Many of them offer resistance, which builds strength.

Tactile activities

Giving children the opportunity to play with and in a variety of textures and tactile materials is a fun way to develop fine motor skills. Hide small items in rice, beans, sand, or bird seed. Let then use their fingers to locate and pick out the items for a simple and fun activity. Use tweezers and tongs to pick up items to promote strength and grasp patterns.

As your child moves in to the 2 ½ to 3 year age, they typically develop an interest in coloring. Providing small crayons that fit small hands will help develop grasp patterns that are used for drawing and writing.

While the development of fine motor skills is important, it is reassuring to know that there are lots of opportunities throughout the day for your child to manipulate small items, push, and pull with their fingers to help them practice and develop skills. So many opportunities are just waiting “at your finger tips” to encourage development of fine motor skills! Check out LEGO…Beyond Just Play to learn more about how LEGO can be used to work on fine motor skills.

Stress incontinence after childbirth is common, but it is not normal. Physical therapy can help. Whether you had a vaginal birth or a c-section, a weakened pelvic floor can lead to lack of urination control. However, a weak pelvic floor isn’t always the culprit. This is why it is important to be evaluated by a physical therapist. More than 75% of women experience significant improvement in their incontinence symptoms with appropriate diagnosis and treatment.¹

How Can Physical Therapy Help stress incontinence?

• Evaluate and determine cause of incontinence
• Provide information specific to your problem
• Teach you exercises and strategies to manage your symptoms
• Develop a program to meet your goals

Furthermore, pelvic floor dysfunction can lead to other symptoms including back pain, pelvic pain, and decreased sexual satisfaction, to name a few. Physical therapy can provide the tools you need to get back on track and feeling better. Click here to learn more about stress incontinence, diagnosis, and how a physical therapist will treat it. If you know you have issues with stress incontinence, call MOSAIC today to schedule an evaluation with our pelvic health physical therapist.

Reading disability is often attributed to dyslexia. People frequently use the terms dyslexia and reading disability interchangeably. However, not every student who experiences difficulty with reading is dyslexic. The student may have a developmental language disorder which impairs reading skills. Although both impact reading comprehension, the term reading disability is part of a more general classification and due to multiple causes. Whereas dyslexia is a specific learning disability that comes with its own distinct symptoms.

dyslexia

A child with dyslexia has difficulty primarily with phonological processing, and thus confuses letters and struggles to sound out words. As a result, oral reading is slow, laborious, and inaccurate resulting in decreased comprehension.  When another person reads a story aloud, a student with dyslexia usually comprehends and remembers the information. The difficulty is with written language, not spoken language.

Reading difficulty

Kids with reading deficit due to developmental language disorder will present with deficits in understanding word meaning (vocabulary) and word order in a sentence (grammar) and how word order affects meaning. The child may sound out words easily and read fluently but will not comprehend the meaning of the words. They read fluently because they know the sounds letters make and the rules for pronouncing words. But, they cannot tell you what those words mean. For example, the sentences “The dog is on the rug” and “The rug is on the dog” have the exact same words but a different word order resulting in very different meanings.

A child with developmental language disorder may read the sentence accurately but not recognize the difference in meaning. This difficulty is not specific to written language. There are similar impairments in understanding spoken language. Spoken sentences such as “The dog chased the boy” and “The boy was chased by the dog” have the same meaning but the later sentence may not be understood because of the different word order. Thus, a differentiating characteristic from dyslexia is that difficulty with reading comprehension reflects difficulty with comprehension of spoken language.

Students experiencing reading difficulty may have over lapping characteristics but different causes. Regardless of the cause, a child experiencing difficulty with reading requires treatment to prevent academic struggles and frustration at school. You can learn more about dyslexia by reading Understanding Dyslexia. If you are concerned with your child’s reading or understanding of spoken language, we offer free screening for speech, language, and reading skills. Contact MOSAIC Health and Rehab at (406) 388-4988 for further information.

Have you ever heard of interoception? Interoception may be identified as our eighth sense. Firstly, interoception allows us to understand what is going on inside our body. Then, it helps us know what action we need to take in order to respond to what our body is telling us.

• When our bladder is full, we use the restroom.
• If our stomach growls or feels empty, we eat a meal or snack.
• When we feel cold, we wrap up in a blanket or put on a jacket.

Interoception activities for children are designed to help them learn to identify and recognize the importance of these internal cues. Therefore, it helps them to take action upon these cues. These activities can be utilized in the classroom, at home, or during therapy. These activities will help with self-regulation, flexible thinking, social skills, and problem-solving skills.

Children often struggle to make sense of what is occurring inside their body. They don’t recognize these important cues, or if they do, they do not know how to respond appropriately to them. When this disruption occurs, it can often result in frustration, excessive meltdowns, or other behavioral challenges that seem unprompted.

Does my child have interoception challenges?

Your child might struggle with interoception if they have a tendency to over or under respond to stimuli, such as:

UNDER Responsive:

• High pain threshold
• Unable to register if they are full OR hungry
• Can’t tell differences in temperatures (hot vs cold)
• Challenges with potty training

OVER Responsive:

• Extreme reactions to sensations (hunger, pain, temperatures)
• Worrisome over small events
• Difficulty with focusing due to internal sensations

what activities help?

Interoceptive difficulties can, and often do, have a significant impact on daily functioning. It is important to keep the internal system balanced and these activities can help.

Regular body scans

Teaching your child (or yourself) how to perform regular body scans is a great first step in teaching how to recognize interoceptive input. Do a full body scan before eating or drinking, when outside in hot or cold weather, before using the bathroom, and before and/or after exercising. Then, ask them to identify the internal feelings that hunger, thirst, heat, cold, a full bladder or bowel, racing heartbeat, etc. create. At first your child will most likely need help in being able to identify these feelings. Engaging in this activity often will help them to do it independently.

sensory diet

This activity will require the professional help of an occupational therapist. An occupational therapist can help to involve interoception activities that will combine various tools, activities, and tactile input to help your child’s specific needs. By engaging in a sensory diet both at home and during therapy, your child will learn how to interpret cues their body is giving them in an appropriate manner. Learn more about sensory play ideas here.

yoga for interoception

Engaging in yoga geared towards kids is very beneficial for relaxation, mental health, focus on breath support, and heart rate. Children that struggle with being able to regulate emotions and reactions have challenges with those things. There are many free videos on YouTube showing poses. If you would like to avoid the use of a screen, Yoga Pretzels or Yogarilla are great resources.

heavy work

Otherwise known as proprioceptive input, heavy work activities involve a “push” or “pull” of the body. Heavy work provides a very calming effect on the nervous system. Therefore, it helps children with self-regulation, organization, and body awareness. Often heavy work is included in a sensory diet, so a consultation with an occupational therapist may be necessary. For example:

• Carrying groceries
• Jumping and jumping jacks
• Wheelbarrow races
• Raking Leaves or shoveling snow
• Vacuuming

If you think that you OR your child may have challenges related to their interoceptive system, reach out to your physician to discuss.