About 5% of children have difficulty receiving “normal” sensory inputs from the environment — sound, light, smell, clothing, food, movement — and respond in ways that are deemed inappropriate, like crying, screaming, covering their ears, or tuning out.

Maybe they’re challenged in school or social situations; at the restaurant, mall, or airport; even with clothing tags or automatic flush toilets in public restrooms, to name just a few. Not all children are hypersensitive over-responders, however. Some might be under-responders who might be quiet, with a flat affect and low arousalresponse.

These children might have a kind of “neurological traffic jam” going on. If the adults in a child’s life don’t understand what’s happening, the child can be labeled and medicated in a variety of heartbreaking ways. The next time you hear that a child that is difficult, clumsy, picky, anxious, oppositional, quirky, etc., it might be worth looking into something called Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD).

What is SPD? Is it sometimes misdiagnosed as ADHD?
How does SPD differ from Sensory integration dysfunction?
What do parents wish that the medical community better understood about SPD?
Is there a connection between colic/gastrointestinal symptoms and SPD?
What kind of treatments are helping children today and what’s on the horizon?
How are parents leading the way?