Dear New Parent, How are you? Really? It’s totally ok to say you are not ok. You are in your own uncharted territory. The way you are feeling right now does not begin and end with you. There are other Mum’s and Dad’s that have felt the way you do right now. Parenting is challenging. Challenging is just the beginning. There are many new Mum’s and Dad’s that are going through the same changes, the same difficulties, at the same time as you.

Neurofeedback

Neurofeedback is a drug-free treatment that uses a sophisticated brain-computer interface to ‘strengthen’ or ‘re-train’ the brain and has been the focus of considerable research for over 60 years. Neurofeedback training is a proven and effective treatment for ADHD that provides long-lasting results, and can help whether someone is taking medication or not.

A is for Assess

Assessment can be a fascinating journey of discovery. When we uncover the details of what is contributing to the symptoms of ADHD, we can take the informed steps we need to improve. Assessments may include those with a GP, Psychiatrist, Paediatrician, Psychologist and Allied Health Professionals.

What if for a moment we took the few words that are the name of a diagnosis out of the picture? To see if this might help to shift the frame from what fits into four words (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) to the story of the individual and their brain.

The way NOT OK shows itself is rarely obvious. When asked ‘how are you?’ most people, that are NOT OK, are still going to say they are ‘fine’, ‘good thanks, and you?’, they may even overcompensate with a ‘living the dream’. We might do this, partly, because we are on autopilot when responding, maybe we’re kind of conditioned to respond that way, and because it feels like it’s way too much to open up and say (to a somewhat trivial greeting) things that are sensitive, complex and intensely personal.

From a mindful point of view, there could be a lot of value in the possible state of whelm in this evolved wordy context. Whelmed in this sense could mean - content, at peace, perfectly challenged, inflow, or ‘in the zone’ perhaps Certainly, a state of mind that would be nice to be in more often, rather than being over or under.

In the 7 minutes it takes to read this article, around the world, about 140 people will be newly diagnosed with dementia. Every three seconds another person is diagnosed. The number of people grows each day and each year. It’s a huge challenge for humankind and it’s only getting bigger.

There are so many ways to describe anxiety. There are so many ways to experience it. So many ways it gets inside, so many ways it shows, and so many ways to try and hide it. It’s exhausting. It’s stressful. It’s a thief. Of time. Of moment. Of person.

Your pain has a colour, a shape, a size, a volume, loads of feelings, things that make it bad, things that make it better, places it likes to be, a memory, it has a whole damn personality…

Possibly the fastest and most usable shift in your nervous system happens when you yawn. You move from the stressed ‘fight, flight, freeze’ to relaxed ‘rest and digest’ in a moment. Sitting with that moment for a minute can start to rebalance your nervous system and calm your quick brain.

Just how much time we are spending on, and indirectly surrounded by, screens is scary. They are everywhere. The Royal Children’s Hospitals Health poll reveals excessive screen time is the #1 health concern for parents in 2021. So, if the problem is right up there at the top, surely we’ve got to get to the bottom of it, and do something about it!

Because, at the soul of it, perhaps we don’t want to know it. It can feel horrible and impossible to talk about devastating things that have happened to people, it is overwhelmingly hard to trust enough to ‘find the words’. There is an unquantifiable range in the trauma experience. The immenseness of trauma may immediately feel as though it is already ‘too much’. And it is exactly this potentiality that is key.

Likely the first thing we think of with the word ‘connection’ is people. Connections to our families, friends, mates, groups, communities, and culture. The superhuman glue that holds our world together. But important connections start between tiny things in our world and in ourselves.

Migraines are intensely personal. From chatting with many individuals who experience all kinds of different migraines, a common thread is often the only way to get through them is on your own. The presence of others and their sounds, smells, their touching, their ideas, even their well-meaning attempts to soothe you can often make the migraine worse.

The health of the family is vital to the health of the individual. The way a family lives powerfully shapes the brain development and lifelong brain health of every single member.

Deep down we are all in love with nature, we just might need to get out and woo the wild world a little more to really feel the affection. The term ‘biophilia’ captures our innate love of life and the natural world. There is a tree out there that has been waiting 100 years for your perfect embrace, get out there and feel the love.

It is an altruistic theme, set to inspire a big global shift, this year for Autism awareness. The call to us all to ‘Embrace Difference’ evokes the deep human feelings of wanting to be and do better for a better world. It is a call we should listen to and act on.

First, we are alarmed, we are told there is something serious to worry about, we enter the intense stress state of ‘fight, flight, freeze’, then the action we are told to do is freeze – that’s your only option, and that doesn’t work well for most of us. It’s been going on for so long, and in some parts of the world so severe, that there would be identifiable changes in brain structure and function as a result.

OK, Team…we’ve got, give or take, 6 weeks or 42 days of school holidays to survive, thrive and make some happy holiday Family memories!

2020 has been a massive year! So we are going to go big and serve up 42 inspirations for you to whack on the fridge and check off those that sound like great ideas for your Family. In our next article, we are going to explain why these activities are brilliant for your brains too. We have done our best not to repeat any suggestions from last year, so if you are looking for even more you can always download the 2019 list and pop a big bright magnet on it as well.