Jumping on a trampline, or crawling through an obstacle course might also be good ways to provide more imput. If he craves deep pressure in general, you might want to look at getting a body sock for him, or doing blanket swings (he lies in the middle of a blanket, two adults pick him up-one by head one by feet- and swing him in the blanket), or doing blanket wraps (he lies on the edge of the blanket, you roll him up in the blanket and squeeze the blanket around him.)
Glad to see his OT was able to find this out for you!
Jess
deep pressure input provides stimulation to their bodies deep down, through the layers so to speak. Instead of a touch that is purely surface, you are providing input that is felt deeper in the tissues. It is normally firm but gentle, slow and deliberate.
As an example of HOW it works, do this. Sitting there you can FEEL your foot at the end of your leg. But if you stomp your foot two or three times and stop, suddenly that sensation of your foot is much greater, right?!
Examples of this type of input for sensory kids would be gently "squashing" them with a pillow over their legs, torso, arms, etc. You can sandwich them between pillows and apply pressure. We use a bean bag chair that isn't super full and we do a "taco" so that his whole body is surrounded by the beanbag and then we squoooooosh firmly, slowly for a few seconds and release.
There are tons of sensory activities that provide this type of input. If your child likes this sensation (depending on his/her size) you can also get a laundry basket and put a pillow in it, have them sit in it for a TV basket while they watch TV.
Joint compressions are when you isolate a joint and by using your hands on either side of the joint, gently compress the joint together. Normally you want to do three or five (more if the child tolerates it) compressions slowly and rhythmically on each joint before moving to the next. Do all of one leg and then the next leg. Then one arm, the other arm. End with shoulders.
If you decide to do compressions be sure to have your OT or PT instruct you on them so that you do them properly.
moderngnome,Have you thought about a weighted blanket,my son loves his he crawls under when he is stressed,and sleeps with it ,he also has a weighted puppy,its designed to go on a childs knee,when they have to do tasks that take a lot of attention.
God bless,Linda
Our early intervention OT taught me joint compression exercises which I did with Andrew quite often for 6 months (age 2 to 2 1/2) and then on a more occasional basis. He loves to cover himself in pillows now and crawl under the big comforter on the king sized bed. We have a body sock, but that hasn't helped much. He loves to jump...He could not do this until he was about 3 1/2 years old.Thanks, Denise...My son used a weighed vest at preschool last year.
One thing to note is that to purchase a weighted vest or blanket it is quite costly but there are resources on the internet to describe how you can make one at home if you can sew.
There is no need to purchase expensive vests or quilts if you can sew. To make a quilt simply determine how much weight you want to use. This will vary depending on the child's age and size. For a child under 5 years about 5 lbs or so is good. For older children you can go up to around 10 lbs and for kids 10 years or so or older 10 - 15 lbs can work. Use white or natural color aquarium gravel from your pet store..no colors...they run if you wash the quilt. Decide how large you want the quilt...24 inches wide by about 36 inches long works for most kids. Use a soft heavy duty velour or fleece material. Sew up three sides and leave one short side open. Take the length of the quilt and divide by 4 inches...for 36" that makes 9 divisions from top to bottom, take the width and divide by 4 inches..for 24" that is 6 divisions across making 54 cells in the quilt each 4 " square. Take to total amount of weight you want to use...say 10 lbs (or whatever you decide)and divide by the number of cells (54). That tells you that you will use about 3 oz. of gravel in each cell. Sew "chanels" from top to bottom, each 4 " wide. Dump 3 oz of gravel down each chanel and sew off the bottom row of squares 4 " from the bottom. Dump another 3 oz in each chanel and sew off another row of squares 4" from the last row. Continue to the top and sew off the top. The weight will be equally divided across the blanket and it is washable. For a weighted vest simply go to you local sporting goods store and get a small children's size or small adult fishing vest...one with lots of pockets. Sew small bean bags of about the aquarium gravel that weigh 1 - 2 oz each. Make them small enough to fit the pockets. Rule of thumb for weight varies depending on who you talk to but if you keep it to about 10% of the child's weight you should be fine...i.e a 40lb child should have a vest no more than about 4 lbs. Some kids can handle more but 10% is pretty conservative. Just distribute the weights throughout the vest. Wear it for around 30 - 60 minutes at a time then remove for 30-60 minutes and repeat. See your OT for more recommendations on wearing time and weight for your particular child.
My son uses a weight blanket as well, he also had a hard time in school so I made him a weight vest. Right now he is up to 3.5 lbs on his weight vest but it truly is a godsent because he now can sit through his spelling and reading classes fully. I really did not know much about the DPI intill the OT told me about the weights they used. I made his weight blanket as well as a vest. It seems to have helped him so much with focusing. He used to have to have pressure treatments in circle-time as well but with the weight vest he sits well through everything. When he uses the computer, he used to use a weighted pillow across his legs, then i made his vest and he seems much more comfortable with that. It's amazing how little things like this can make all the difference for a child.
Bless,
Jo
I used deep pressure on my PDD-NOS son as he was a low tone baby. The day, at two, when he held my hand, let me hug and kiss him I knew I did the right thing.