Making sense of it all

I must admit when I think about Sensory Processing Disorder sometimes I have an idea of what it means but there are so many components to it, that I do get lost. So in order for me to attempt to get my head around this I need to take a deeper look at the way it all works.

As I mentioned before (in other blog entries) there are seven senses that we use everyday:

Tactile or the Somatosensory System - sense of touch

Visual System - sense of sight

Auditory System - sense of hearing

Gustatory System - sense of taste

Olfactory System - sense of smell

Vestibular System - sense of balance

Proprioception System - sense of body position

Each sense works to provide us with our perception of the world, not all people have the same experience of the world as we do as a person. This is why there can be so many misconceptions and misunderstands when dealing with an undiagnosed person with sensory processing issues. Another person will see a child who has sensory processing issues can see their responses and behaviour as unreasonable, illogical and naughty. This is precisely the reason why some children get punished at school for their behaviour or ostracized socially because of how they act. Without understanding through a diagnosis, these people are not able to make sense of their world and be at peace with it.

The first image most people see when we are told about Sensory Processing Disorder or even more commonly Autism (it is common for SPD to be diagnosed with Autism) is about children who struggle with tags, their socks, touch or sound. With my son it was a little different we noticed small things like as a baby my son hated the beach and the sand it took years for him to be able to tolerate it, to this day we are not able to use the hand dryers in the toilets, sound for us is the biggest issue. However tantrums and meltdowns also come hand in hand with these situations. Then strange situations when our son was overspun on the wizzy dizzy and vomited afterwards it took six hours plus the possibility of a CT Scan and suddenly he was able to work straight again. 

Over the next few posts I am going to look at each different sense, how it works and what activities you can do to assist in that area. Bare with me I will attempt to provide a comprehensive idea of how it works, from my point of view as well.