Natalie completes program & improves her sleep, behavior, and academic work

Posted on December 7 2009

Written by Natalie’s mother:

Natalie had always had a problem putting herself to sleep since infancy. As an 11-year-old, it was really affecting her daily behavior. We were also trying to identify and isolate the root of her issues with angry outbursts, lying, disorganization, and irresponsibility. We knew she was a very intelligent, creative, outgoing, engaging person, but the other side of her was really making everyday life difficult. As parents, we were really struggling to do what we knew we needed to do (be consistent, follow-thru with consequences, set expectations) but were just not seeing any long-lasting results; she didn’t seem to be learning from consequences and our relationship was suffering.
Several years ago, when we had first heard of neurofeedback, we found a local psychologist that was offering it. We drove 40 minutes, round-trip, twice a week for 30-minute treatments and paid about $180 per visit, out of pocket. When we met with the psychologist, we paid $360 an hour, out of pocket. It was very difficult to afford, but for the first time ever, Natalie (then 9-years-old) was going to sleep on her own and staying asleep. Her daily behavior was much more consistent and we just knew this was the result of the neurofeedback. Unfortunately, we were not able to continue as long as needed because of the extreme cost.
Knowing that we had had success with the earlier experience with neurofeedback and Natalie’s sleep issues, we thought that it was worth a try with these current issues. When we heard about the Ready to Focus program and spoke with Brad Oostindie, it was such a relief and, actually exciting, to tell him about Natalie and have him really understand our dilemma and to help us to put some shape and scope to what we were dealing with and how neurofeedback would help. Getting started with the program was easy and so much more convenient to be able to have the whole system in our home. We were able to get in more sessions and not waste any time or expense driving to appointments. We were also able to complete many hours of training for Natalie at a fraction of the cost we paid several years ago in the office based program. The weekly meetings with Brad Oostindie really gave us an opportunity to learn so much about what was happening in Natalie’s brain which actually helped us, too, to know that a lot of Natalie’s behavior was a “brain mis-fire” issue and not necessarily a conscious choice that she was making.
We have seen great results. So many little things along the way have added up to a much more manageable child. Her progress reports from school used to have a list of missing tasks and grades that did not reflect her potential, but now we have not seen a missing task in months and she is consistently taking responsibility for getting homework completed and turned in. Having a 3.6 GPA in sixth grade is a big accomplishment! She still needs reminders for chores or picking up her room, but the difference now is that she responds to reminders instead of ignores or rebels against them. Overall she seems to hear and respond in a much calmer and cooperative way. When I asked her what was the difference, she said, “When I knew that I didn’t have my homework done, it would race around in my head and I would just get really stressed out. Now, I just do it and I feel sooooo much better.”  We all feel much better.

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