Tag: neuropsychologist

SCIENCE MATTERS WHEN IT COMES TO DYSLEXIA

On By Britani MartinIn The Journey4 Comments

science

I’ve had so many discussions about learning with parents of past, present and future clients of The Morris Center.  Parents from all over the world with one major thing in common……giving our children the best possible opportunity to reach their learning potential.  Individually we’ve studied and researched all we can to understand our children’s specific learning challenges and how to help them.  Individually we’ve invested and immersed our children into programs that didn’t meet our expectations.  These disappointments have left us feeling helpless and our children discouraged.  But with each failure, we refused to give up.  In our search for an answer, each on our own, found The Morris Center.  While there’s been trepidation and uncertainty, we’ve all come to the same conclusion.  The Morris Center is legit!

When I first heard about The Morris Center, I thought, “Cool, another intervention, claiming to be the answer.”  I just added it to my long list of programs to look into down the line.  When I finally took the time to look it up however, I thought, “man, this place is bold! They are making some really big claims about what they are able to do.”  The TMC website states, “on average, our clients with dyslexia jump one or more grade levels in reading in one month of treatment.”  I’m sorry, what??!!  One month? We are on year three of a program and haven’t seen that kind of growth.  That can’t be right.  So, I dug deeper. Who is this Dr. Tim Conway?  Like all good investigators, I googled him.  He’s a neuropsychologist (yeah, I had to google that word too just to make sure I knew what it was).   I found his TedxTalk,  “Mixing Oil and Water so Nearly Everyone Learns to Read.”  After watching the video I was intrigued.   In my search for information I found a lot of testimonials about how great TMC is and how it had “changed their child’s life.”  Okay, but who are they?  Are they actors?  Paid spokespersons?  I was hearing the good, but I wanted to find the bad reviews.  I was looking for someone to prove it was too good to be true.  Alas, my search came up empty.  There simply weren’t people talking about how bad this program was.  When I googled other reading programs however, I found a multitude of reviews, both good and bad.  So what’s the difference?  While browsing the TMC  website again, this got my attention:

“TMC changed his life” is a common response we receive after our teams’ treatment. One of the most misunderstood aspects of helping children and adults improve their functional skills is the difference between making weak skills stronger versus learning compensatory “strategies” to cope with weak skills. TMC’s known for using research-based methods, the proper intensity and frequency of treatment and a foundational approach to make weaker skills become stronger – improving functional abilities & leading to long-term improvements.

Dr. Tim Conway, Research Neuropsychologist and Director

Research-based methods…  Isn’t every program “research-based?”  Sure, lots claim to be.  But where can I find this research? And what is the average growth for clients receiving treatment?  I looked but either didn’t find this information on their websites or the information was vague.  When I checked The Morris Center website however, there was a tab just for RESEARCH.  Go ahead and see for yourself. You can read all about it.  I did and immediately noticed something different from other explanations of programs……the terminology. It didn’t sound “educational.”  It sounded “medical.” (neural networks, neural plasticity, functional neuroimaging, left hemisphere, normalization of the activation).   Essentially, the approach is less about helping my kids learn to “cope” with their learning disabilities, and more about rewiring their weak skills to be stronger.  Hmmm…. okay, prove it.  I want to see the proof.  With one click, I was able to see the results of 25 years worth of research TMC has to back up their claims.  Real results. Sustained results.  And a new way of looking at dyslexia for me.  I’ve been told (not by my School district or the educators at my school – they have done an exceptional job with the interventions that have been available to them) my child was born with this and their brain is just wired differently.  I’ve learned that’s not true. Brains are wired the same, but some have inefficiencies (weakness).  I’ve been told my kids will always have to work harder than their peers.  Not true. The Morris Center can “strengthen the processes and develop the skills that are weak. As weak skills become stronger, then learning becomes more efficient and the child or adult feels more competent and confident. TMC helps them unlock their hidden, true potential. Self-esteem comes from success.”  Okay.  Even though it sounds too good to be true, I can’t ignore the opportunity in front of us.  If I can make something easier for my kids, I’ll do it!  So we did. Good move.  TMC is definitely delivering on their bold claims!   It’s been a relief to see dyslexia differently and to actually watch my kids grasp things they couldn’t before.  I see less frustration in their faces and more confidence in their eyes.  I see them recognizing how this is helping and starting to dream bigger dreams. Isn’t that what we all want.  So now more than ever, I’m convinced…..SCIENCE MATTERS!

Run Your Own Race

On By Britani MartinIn The Journey, UncategorizedLeave a comment

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I haven’t mentioned much about my nephew, Brady who is also here attending The Morris Center.  With his parent’s permission, I would like to introduce you to one of the bravest, most energetic, competitive kids in the world.  When you see this copper-headed, rough-and-tumble boy headed your way, you just want to grab him and wrap him up in a huge bear hug. But here’s the problem…..you won’t be able to catch him!  Brady has one speed.  FULL SPEED!  Since day one, he’s had a fearless approach to life.  He was climbing from his crib by 11 months of age.  He makes others around him gasp with his daredevil jumps and flips.  He cries when roller coasters are over because they were too short. One of my favorite stories about him was when he was 3.  Usually he stayed in the nursery on Sundays while his parents attended the worship service at church.  But this particular Sunday, he joined them.  Our church is a beautiful, old church with almost a gothic style, complete with cathedral ceilings adorned with  large wooden beams.  It almost takes your breath away to see.  Brady sat in his Mimi’s arms and studied his surroundings, looking up at the tall ceilings.  He leaned over to his Mimi’s ear and asked, “What is this place?  Is it a castle?”  His Mimi replies, “it’s our church sanctuary.”  He paused and looked around and then said confidently, “I wanna climb it.”  That’s our B.  Fearless from birth.  Adrenaline seeker.

Brady and my daughter, Avery, are two weeks apart (thank goodness he’s older since he likes to be ahead).  They’ve grown up more like brother and sister.  Where he’s bold and busy, she’s calm and content. They can be the best of friends and the worst of enemies.  They will be fighting one minute and laughing the next.  They both have tender hearts and compassion for others.  With natural athleticism, Brady stood out among his peers from the start.  He was the fastest, strongest, bravest.  We all believe he fits the mold of a Navy Seal.  He takes on life with an intense need to not just succeed, but to be the best!  This is the kid that started off with all blue ribbons at his Kindergarten track and field day. Eventually he got a red one for second place. While most of the others traded to have one of each color, Brady took his red ribbon and tore it in half!  He’s competitive to a fault.  A coach’s dream!

He entered school with confidence but quickly became frustrated and overwhelmed.  Sight words and spelling tests seemed impossible.  The days were too long.  The classroom was confining.  The schoolwork was hard. His parents spent countless hours in the evenings trying to help him memorize and understand only to feel defeated to learn he had not  retained any of it by the next week.  It was exhausting.  Thankfully, Brady’s mother was a school counselor who had taught special education for 12 years. She was trained in reading therapy and quickly recognized Brady’s deficits and knew he would need intervention.  She found him the best tutors and stayed on top of his academic needs.   Brady is a smart kid, but even with the extra help, his work was not reflecting his intelligence.  It was in the middle of first grade when he had outside testing that determined he was dyslexic (and possible processing deficiencies that couldn’t be determined at his age).  Second grade was  difficult to say the least.  He tried one reading program with no success.  School continued to be challenging and he began to lose confidence in himself.  He dreaded school every day.  He would hide in the hallways on his way to after-school tutoring to keep his friends from seeing him. He held it together while at school then had angry outbursts at home.  He was mad, frustrated and tired.  So were his parents.  Third grade was a much better year thanks to a wonderful teacher.  She made him want to go to school.  He made progress in her class with a different reading program but was nowhere near where he needed to be.

Enter present day.  Cannon, Brady & Avery are here at TMC.  It was identified through testing that Brady had inefficiencies in his language processing.  That automatically puts him behind the starting point for Avery.  The things she struggles with are different than  his struggles.  It just happened to be the first program that was his weakness. This program follows a very specific progression plan.  New skills are added as you master others.  We saw right away that Brady wasn’t moving as quickly as Avery.  My sister and I started to worry.  Naturally, kids want to compare notes on what they did each day, not to mention living in a tiny apartment together where their only playmates are each other. What would happen when Brady realized Avery was further along?  This was not good for our competitive child.  My sister and I started to panic, but Dr. Conway and the team at The Morris Center quickly eased our fears.  One of the major “rules” in place at TMC is no comparison!  The kids are not allowed to compare with each other.  They know everyone progresses differently and each have different areas that are more difficult.  No two kids are alike and this is not a competition.  After that first week, the talk about the details of their day went away.  They talked about breaks, lunch and fun OT activities but never compared sessions with each other. My sister and I breathed a sigh of relief.

No one wants to see their child struggle.  It’s heart-breaking really.  It always helps when you find others who understand your struggle because they are living the same one.  My sister and I, along with our husbands share in this dyslexia journey.  We support and encourage, vent and listen.  We came here together for one mission.  To change our kids’ lives.  We couldn’t anticipate the process because it’s impossible to describe without experiencing it. So we dove in head-first and soaked up all we could with every observation and meeting.  We teamed up and attended meetings together for all three.  My skepticism  lessoned as I saw the growth my children were making.  For my sister however, I would imagine it wasn’t as comforting.  While she was thrilled to see Cannon and Avery advance, it was probably also discouraging to see Brady progressing, but at a slower pace.  Doubt creeps in and makes you wonder if you’ve made a mistake.  You’ve invested financially and emotionally into this program and your expectations for progress are not being met.

These thoughts and concerns led to a conversation with Dr. Conway where we point-blank asked him if this program would help Brady.  Dr. Conway assertively answered with this: “we can help Brady.  It’s what we do.  He’s in the right place.”  Some of you might be thinking, “well of course he’s going to say that.  It’s his program and you are paying customers.”  I dare you to spend one hour with this man and tell me you think he’s bogus afterwards.  Dr. Conway is a Neuropsychologist who has committed the last 30 years to this program.  He has the science to back him up .  There are no other programs that I’m aware of that have scientific evidence that shows their program works.   Dr. Conway speaks with passion and you can see the fire in his eyes as he talks about helping children and adults with dyslexia.  His family is riddled with dyslexia.  His professional mission in life is to get this program into schools around the country and make the science of learning the standard for everyone.  It’s tragic when I think about how many people he could help if his voice could only be heard.

As Brady continues along, here’s the good news.  He is progressing every week. We are seeing growth.  His confidence is improving.  He’s receiving praise and affirmation from people who believe in him.  They are helping him believe in himself as well.  Sure, the language processing has made him start 100 yards behind the others but that’s okay.  This is not a race.  There is no time limit.  Everyone runs their own race.  We want them all to cross the finish line but we don’t care how long it takes.  What matters is that Brady is making progress, and every day he’s one day closer to changing his life for the better.  I applaud  Jamie and Davin for making this sacrifice for Brady and I hope they are able to block out comparison and celebrate Brady’s race.

 

Wait! Could You Say That Again?

On By Britani MartinIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

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Vincent Van Gogh once said, “Great things are done by a series of small things that are brought together.”  Well I certainly hope he is right!

This week we finally had our comprehensive evaluations for all three kids.  If you’ve ever had a battery of testing done, then had to sit down with a physician to hear the results, then you’ll somewhat understand what this was like for us.  We spent almost 7 hours of our week just listening to the team break down every test, every observation…. what it all meant, how it affected our kids and how they could help.   There were three doctors from different fields of study in this meeting explaining basically every fiber of each of our kids.  We listened, took notes, asked questions and recorded the conversation (thank goodness!).  After the meeting, on the drive home, we couldn’t formulate the words to even talk about all of this information.  We needed to digest and process all that they said.  It’s been 3 days since and I’m still wrapping my head around it.  We have so many questions, so many concerns and so many doubts.  But at the same time…..it all makes sense!  All of it.  While we may not have understood the science behind it all or how the testing could pinpoint such intricate details, we do see how it all relates to our kids!  And each kids’ results were different but spot-on when you look at his/her behaviors/thinking/reactions/etc..  You know that thing you notice about your kid that’s a little different or unique?  You think it’s just something you notice, maybe a little quirk about him/her.  You keep it to yourself, but one day someone else notices it too.  When they mention it to you, you say, “YES!!!  I THOUGHT IT WAS JUST ME THAT NOTICED THAT!”  Yeah, that’s pretty much what I was thinking the entire time.  So much of the things we notice (or don’t notice) aren’t just quirks.  There’s actually a scientific reason for it.  These doctors not only pointed our these nuances, they explained the why behind them and then how they could make it better.

I’ll be honest, after hearing all the testing results and then analyzing what every sub-category means for your child, we left feeling a little sad.  So much of their struggles, beyond academics, have now been explained.  So much of what they do/don’t do that drives us crazy are things they can’t help.  Cue the mom-guilt.  I can think back to hundreds of times I’ve been irritated, aggravated, confused about things they have said or done, or things they haven’t been able to do.  It makes no sense!  Until now…. now it all makes sense.  Now I see that they weren’t being lazy, defiant, distracted, negative, slow.  They actually couldn’t help it.  Poor kids.  No wonder they did that……  it broke my heart a little.  However, to the credit of TMC staff, they were quick to discourage us from feeling any kind of guilt.  That’s not the point.  The point is to fully evaluate my child, find their deficits and find a way to help them.  The OT said something that resonated deeply with me regarding senses.  She said, “I would never tell a parent their child doesn’t have any vestibular, proprioceptive or interoceptive senses at all (more on those big words later).  It’s just not working efficiently.”  That’s encouraging and if we can keep our eyes focused on that, it will make all the difference.

Leaving the meeting wasn’t all sad.  We left with a better understanding of why we are here.  We’ve found the deficit, now let’s help them overcome it.  There is hope in knowing that a clinic that can identify such things can also make them better.  They are shooting us straight in all areas and giving us realistic expectations.  Some seem a bit reaching but we are hoping for the best. I now understand what each discipline (speech, language, Occupational therapy and psychology) is doing for my kids.  How this trans-disciplinary approach merges and intertwines together for the overall result???  I’m not really sure.  But like Van Gogh said,”Great things are done by a series of small things that are brought together.”  Let’s press on!

Do I even know you?

On By Britani MartinIn The JourneyLeave a comment

This whole experience has been similar to looking at your children from a different perspective.  I know my kids better than anyone else on this earth.  I know how they handle happiness, sadness, disappointment, triumph.  I know their struggles and their strengths.  I know them like the back of my hand.  Or do I? As parents our hope is that we can guide and teach our children to grow into kind, responsible, confident young people. We focus on teaching them “our ways” of doing things, encouraging them to overcome adversity, and modeling what we think is important.  Some of it seems to be getting through.  Other things are missing the mark.  When that happens, we are quick to try to “fix” the behavior/habit/struggle that they have.  But how often do we take a step back and ask “why are you acting/responding/melting down?”  Are they just being defiant, strong-willed, or even dramatic?  Maybe.  But it could be about something completely different.  It could be something at a deeper, physiological level.

The more we meet with the staff here at TMC, the more we are studying our kids from a different angle.  So much of what we see at home and don’t understand is starting to make sense.  Why they do certain things or find simple tasks more difficult may actually be related to inefficiencies in their development.  Who knew?  I have been blown away so far by what I’ve been learning.  It’s reminding me of the editing process of photography.  For example, you take a picture of a baseball field.  To everyone else it looks amazing.  But when you load the image into your photo editing software, you start to pick the image apart.  You zoom in on every part of the image and start noticing things you didn’t at first glance.  The exposure could have been brighter, the shadows could be lifted, the color more vibrant.  The original picture was good, but with a little tweaking, it could be even better.  Piece by piece, you are able to make small changes to the image to make it brighter, more defined, enhanced.  And once the editing is complete, you can step back and see how every little part molded together to make an even more beautiful photograph. People are like pictures.  From the outside, we can look great, but when you look closer, you see things that need improvement.  And this place is in the business of making small developmental changes in brains to make them work more efficiently.  How these changes correlate to reading?  I haven’t quite figured it out.  But my friends have assured me to just trust the process and watch the pieces all come together.

I came here confident I knew my kids, but I have a feeling when I leave, I’ll be able to not only know them, but to understand them better.  So go ahead TMC! Keep reminding me of all the ways my kids are amazing.  Then show me how you will make them FEEL just as amazing for themselves.

This Week has been the LONGEST Year Ever! (Week 1 @ The Morris Center)

On By Britani MartinIn The Journey, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Whew!  What a week!  For the kids and the adults.  So much testing for the kids, and lots of information for us.  On Monday, we arrived with three nervous, uncertain kids.  We were greeted by the smiling faces of some of the staff who quickly ushered them through the office to show them the routine…..where to put their lunches, how to read their daily schedule, etc.  They came back looking a bit timid still.  Just then, Dr. Conway walked in and said, “Kids, before you get started, come outside.  I want to show you something.”  After a minute I peeked out the door to see 3 smiling faces laughing and examining a souped up mountain bike.  He had their attention!  In that moment I saw their shoulders relax and their chins tilt up a little.  To make it even better, Dr. Conway sat on the couch and softly explained the day to them. (okay, maybe I was too harsh in my initial impression post about those couches…they are comfy…but still…) In that moment, I wanted to give Dr. Conway a big bear hug for easing their anxious hearts (and maybe mine too).

You know how the first week of school is fairly easy…..more about learning the routine than actual academics?  Well, this first week  was NOTHING like that.  They hit the ground running and never slowed down.  The comprehensive testing usually takes 1 week for a kid, but since there’s three of them, they’ve had to split it up over two weeks.  When they aren’t testing, they’re already starting the first language sessions for the program.  The clinic runs a tight schedule every day so that the kids can maximize each moment of learning.  According to Brady, the 10 minute breaks between sessions last only 2 minutes.  OT and scheduled outside play are a welcomed escape from the rigorous mental work required.  We’ve heard, “my brain hurts,” multiple times by all three of them. And you know what?  We believe them!  By the week’s end we had no trouble getting them to bed. They are exhausted.  Each has had his/her share of meltdowns and arguments so we’ve offered a large amount of grace since we understand how hard they are working.  This is some intense testing and we are only on week one. Bless it.

While the kids were busy testing, Mom and I spent about 8 hours at the center in meetings. The actual number of staff members at the clinic  is surprisingly small to me.  It almost feels like they are running on a skeleton crew.  Only certain staff are certified to administer testing, and their plates already appear overloaded.  By the end of the week I could see fatigue on both the kids and the staffs’ faces.  For good reason too!  Some of the staff members aren’t usually in the office 5 days a week but did so for us.  Administering, then scoring the testing results for three is no doubt time-consuming!  These people wrapped up a tough week of end-of-treatment testing for 2 of our friends from Arkansas, then  put in another strenuous week to get us started on our journey.  To their credit, they gave us their undivided attention at each meeting, never rushing us to wrap it up and never showing their fatigue.  They listened patiently, explained things thoroughly and took ample time discussing each kid. We left every meeting feeling better and better.  Why?  Because they love what they do, believe in the program and truly want to see our kids succeed.  The meetings included Clint, Davin & Jamie via FaceTime and left us feeling impressed….and surprised…..and intrigued…..curious and fascinated by what we’ve heard.  We had individual meetings for each child with the psychologist, occupational therapist, and neuropsychologist (i.e. brain scientist).The information we received at each meeting was more than we expected.  Within the first 2 days, they had already identified areas of concern that aligned with concerns we’ve had with each kid.  Even more so, they were pointing out areas of deficit we didn’t realize had anything to do with dyslexia.  It was like an “ah ha” moment for us.  So much of the things our kids struggle with outside of the academic realm are affected by this inefficiency in their brains.  Already we’ve learned so much, yet it’s only the beginning.  I can’t wait to get even more information in the weeks ahead.