Preventing Your Child From Getting Over Stimulated

**Our first guest blogger ~ Tammy from Autism Learning Felt ... Thanks Tammy!**


Calming down an over stimulated child isn’t easy. There are a few things that you can do to help. First, learn to spot the signs that your child is getting over stimulated. For each child, this can vary. When my son would get over stimulated, it was difficult to spot the signs. For the most part, he didn’t display any.

Now, if he is over stimulated, that means that he will be up half the night, watching television and making noises. When he was a baby and toddler, being over stimulated was fine, until he started coming down from it. I could count on this happening during the holidays. A big family get together would get him over stimulated, and he didn’t know how to come down from it. I didn’t know how to help him. We would end up spending the night with no sleep. He would be crying and inconsolable. I would be crying, because nothing I did would help.

Things that I know now, that I wish I new then.

1. Take time-outs. Breaks away from everyone can help. Find a quiet, dark room for you and your child to rest in.

2. Recognize activities and situations that bring on a melt down from over stimulation. Keeping a log of these incidents can help you identify them, if you don’t already know.

3. If incidents happen at school, arrange with the school to have a quiet place for your child to go to come back down.

4. Cut visits to family, during the holidays, short. Don’t be worried about upsetting anyone if you leave early. You’ll benefit from it later.