Home became Therapy Center !

Hi All,

this post is to share how our home became a therapy Center for our Son ….

1) You must have been told plenty of times by all therapists/doctors/relatives/neighbors to take our kid(s) to Playground to observe other kids, good exercise for joints and muscles, which is a very valid advice. However not everyone is lucky enough to have a park nearby or the time and other resources to visit such parks on a daily basis. Some times the daily routine of the kids does not allow the time for visiting the parks. Needless to say that late evening in Chennai parks are a massive nest for mosquito’s. Even if we made it to the park, it is difficult to Get him to play in the park, other kids in the park who are much older are in to rough play, where they play in a way that does not give chance to other kids of younger age and they are not patient till our kids complete a ride/slide/swing. Climbers and slides are the ones he get to play, he used to climb few steps and seek help to complete the rest of the steps, he is happy with Swing and Merry go around as he likes spinning sensations. Also the equipments are NOT maintained in the public parks, as a result we see rusty surfaces, broken holes in spiral sliders, unbalanced chains in swings etc .. To take him to places like Fun city, Funky Monkey etc .. is even more difficult due to the time management. Hence the probability of the time frame where my son is free and someone from our family who is also free to take him to the park is very unlikely to happen.

2) Also for kids with Sensory Processing issues (under/over responsiveness), sensory walk and Sensory board is being suggested to be used. Even though most therapy centers suggest it, very few centers have it. Sensory walk is to walk on different type of surfaces with items containing different textures, which helps the kid to processing the sensory issues. Similarly, sensory board has different items sticked out where the kids are expected to touch by hand, which helps the sensory processing. Most of the parks have a part of floor where pebbles are laid along with concrete, walking on those will activate pressure points and provide better sensory integration. It will be a good thing to have kids walk on that over and over.

3) Playing with Water through swimming/splash pool, beach, also messy play with beach sand like building sand castle etc.. were also suggested by many to improve his sensitiveness. We stay in Neelankarai which is much closer to the beach; however I find time to take him to beach like twice in a month.

Keeping all the above in mind, i did the following with help of our family members and it helped a lot for my son: I decided to create a play area in my terrace for my son, so he gets his physical activity due on a daily basis. Part of the terrace was covered with steel roof and inside which i have setup a play area with play equipments you find in park. Ever since my son began to walk, he was very cautious of heights, even while walking on a floor, if there is an uneven flooring that is of 1-2 inches height, he will keep both his palms in the floor as support to climb up that step …! This Play area helped my son to loose the fear of heights; he is comfortable climbing up on climbers above 6 feet with ease. We also have placed a Trampoline for his jumping activity which is necessary for his sensory craving. We placed a small tunnel with balls so he does his crawling on knees to reach the other side to play with the balls.

Sensory Walk was kept inside the play area where objects with different textures are placed in individual trays, like beach sand, rock stones, pebbles, soft cloth, synthetic grass etc ..

Sensory Board was created by us, where he can touch and feel the different textures. A Plywood was purchased and different partitions were made, and each partition contains different texture items like bottle can, nylon wire, bangles, salt paper, balloon etc …

A Bean bag which i was using for watching TV was now used for therapy purposes, he jumps on it or crash lands on it. (Gone were those days i was laying back on the bean bag watching TV with a bowl of snacks on my lap, and dozed off ..)

We kept a bond / container that can hold sand, along with the beach toys used for building sand castle. He plays with sand and water in open space outside the house but within our compound walls, so that he is exposed to the sun light to get the Vitamin D as much as possible.

There is a bamboo swing that is hanging in the portico, for him to get that swinging sensation needed for his body. He does cycling within our compound, once or twice made him ride in the street.

There is rope ladder bought which is again used for his sensory issues, this is being done by OT in his therapy, we wanted to make use of it at home as well.

I also have future plans to draw the remaining part of terrace in paint for playing hopscotch and other terrace games. Below are the few pictures of the above setup done at my house ….