Josiah's First Neurofeedback Appt

We had a really hard day yesterday and I couldn't wait to go to his first appt. He couldn't either. It was yesterday at 5 pm. It was interesting watching him play a game with his brain. No hands, just his brain. If he did what he was supposed to the game progressed. He played a game called Highway. He had certain color boxes on the bottom that he had to keep within the black box that was around it and it told us if he was paying attention, one was whether he was relaxed, and I forgot what the middle one was but he had to keep it stretched out between the other two. If he did everything that he was supposed to, it would put the white strip down in the middle of the highway and as he earned points he was rewarded with stars in the sky and if he got so many stars, it would give him rewards of other things to see. He got to see 2 hot air balloons. The dr said he did very well. However, it was very interesting to see that he sometimes he's paying attention, but it's not for long at all. And most of the time, he's just zoned out. It helped somehow to make me realize that I really need to ask for eye contact and give him short 1-direction commands. He came home last night and was very calm. This morning, he got up and where he's normally jumping around and very loud...he's a calmer kid. He's still loud, but he's calmer. I don't know how to explain it, but it's something that makes my heart soar. I'm proud of him. I have hope. I feel really good about this.

Granted, he did have an angry outburst this mornign over it not being his day and that he couldn't go first and that somebody took the cup that he wanted and he started screaming and ran behind the chair, but I was able to pull him into my lap and he was able to stop before it escalated into him flipping furniture at people or over. The neuropsych told me that as he gets better at doing what he's supposed to do on the games, that it will carry over to help him not fly off the handle over every little thing and we'll see an improvement there too. I can't wait for Saturday when we go back.