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ADD Child, ADD Mother

 

Alice was brought to me aged 6 by very worried parents. At age 3 she had a meningeal infection in the brain that caused her to be in hospital for 3 months, and had nearly died. She never really recovered, and was struggling at school. She had been labeled as ADD, but on first meeting her the tightness around her cranium was apparent. I sensed the symptoms were likely to be due to the contstriction in her meninges and spinal cord, which would most likely have been a result of the illness, since her twin sister was normal. The difference to her twin sister was vast, and Alice seemed like a ghost by contrast. She was withdrawn, unable to make eye contact, clingy and gangly in her movements. However, she seemed very willing to accept help, and extremely good natured despite her awful early experiences…

 

 

In the first cranio session the high degree of trauma was apparent. Alice could not feel her body at all, and lay on the couch looking very fragile and sick. It was a hard experience for her mother to witness too. There was no energy moving in her core, and she had no boundaries or ability to express herself. It was a very moving experience, both for her distraught mother, who was having to face the reality of her situation, and for myself as practitioner, due to the extreme sensitivity needed to get Alice’s system to trust another human.

 

I followed her queues intently, allowing her turn on her side, and working gently to allow her core energy in the sacrum to begin to awaken, and sensation to return to her abdomen and limbs. Throughout the session her mother talked to her, and played with her with toys to help her feel secure. After working with the cranial base Alice began to be able to feel her tummy and hips, and signaled that she’d had enough.  She jumped up off the couch smiling, and the colour had returned to her cheeks.

 

 

Alice brought books and her favourite velvet cuddly toy to the second session. She lay on the couch and read as I worked with her. The primary shock was no longer evident in her body, and we could work more directly with the brain and meninges, and the whole spinal cord to release the contraction right down to her cocxyx. The session passed quickly and Alice was laughing and talking throughout, no longer afraid to feel sensations in her body, and eager to take part and allow me to touch her. A huge change.

 

It became apparent that her mother’s concern for the daughter was actually smothering her, and that without teaching her mother to centre and calm down, Alice would not have space to recover and move on developmentally from the point when the illness occurred. The mother’s fear was affecting Alice’s nervous system so she could never relax fully, and also sending her the unconscious message that she was not capable. So I suggested a session with the mother, who was happy to agree, since she said she had been ADD since childhood, and had always thought there was no hope for her.

 

Although the mother did act as if she were ADD – flighty, forgetful, nervous, fast talking all the time, inability to hold eye contact etc. – the first session proved the in fact the issue was lack of grounding. She was a very energetic and creative woman and was simply not used to feeling her belly or feet. We worked on her pelvis and sacrum to open up the core and ground her, and on the cranial base to release tension and get her life force flowing through. After the first session she could feel her feet. She came back the next time without ADD but still insisting she had always had it – it can take a while to let go of illnesses that have defined your personality, even once they have gone!  At this point she was able to look me in the eye. For the first time since meeting her I had the sense she was actually relating to me, and able to stay in the room with her awareness. She was calm and centred, and making sense rather than jumping from topic to topic in conversation. Of course this was wonderful since it would have a huge effect on her daughter’s ability to learn to regulate her emotions, and would also help her daughter to learn to relate normally again.

 

Alice’s father brought her to her third session. This turned out to be a very good thing since they had a very warm connection, and she seemed much more at ease with him than with her mother. During the session Alice’s life force opened and there was an expansion throughout her whole system. She giggled and laughed most of the way through, and it was very instructive for her father to witness the way I interacted with her, and how she responded. She left the room glowing, and played with her sister afterwards in a way that left me satisfied the worst of the trauma from the illness was undone, and she would now continue to improve on her own. I explained the process of the life-force opening to her parents so they would not be concerned at her new-found joy in life… Alice couldn’t stop smiling and giggling and jumping around exploring her environment, and was uninterested in being normal or sensible or in doing what she was told. But in her case, these were very positive developments.

 

The father then also came for a session as a result of seeing what happened with his daughter. He was astounded to begin to discover his own sadness and held-back anger, and really rather shocked, although on one level also greatful. Sometimes children’s issues can be the catalyst for parents to begin to look at themselves, though to begin to discover your truth at over age 40 can seem daunting. Nevertheless parents who really care soon realize that they need to start unraveling their own issues, and the sooner the better for the sake of the children.

 

Both parents commented that they didn’t really know how to be with their daughter not being so sick anymore, and that the other daughter was also suffering due to her getting better. This can happen when a family member who has been sick for a long time recovers. The dynamics have to change, which can be an uncomfortable process, even if it is in a positive direction. Humans don’t like to change on the whole… The summer holiday had arrived, so this family didn’t come back. I sensed that the things they were discovering about themselves were things they would rather not see, even though the most supportive thing would have been for the other daughter and father to have a few sessions too, so there could be a support for the shift in the whole family dynamic. Nevertheless, I always accept and acknowledge the wisdom of resistance that comes up, and this family may seek further guidance in their own time if they need further assistance in discovering themselves…