And so can you talk to us about how the holidays, just by being out of routine and all that jazz, affects the nervous systems of all humans and also specifically of our neurodivergent children?

Yeah.

So I like to teach people about the nervous system in a way that they can understand it.

So that shows how it's more of an accumulation of dysregulation that we can respond to, right? So it's not like one seed of dysregulation and then it comes out after you behave in a certain way and then it's like back to factory settings.

Like it has an accumulation, right? I talk about something called the nervous system budget, which is an analogy I created as a sort of a spinoff of the spoons theory, but it's similar, where it's this idea that we all start the day with a certain nervous system budget and certain tasks or environments are more expensive to some people than others.

And so, you know, we might start our day with $20 at the beginning of the day.

And then someone who's sensory sensitive, it might take like $3 out of their nervous system just to put socks on.

folks through this a little bit?

Can you explain what that is? Why do people need to know about it? And what do we do with that knowledge?

Yeah.

So the nervous system budget is something that I – it's a concept that I use to explain to my clients.

One time I came up with it like on the spot.

And then I like fleshed it out because I was like, this applies to a lot of kids.

I was using it to help my clients understand the importance of accommodating your kids proactively.

Yeah.

Yeah,

So tell me a little bit more about that side of things, like the side of things parents can do with or for their kids without needing that active participation.

Yeah, so exactly like you're talking about.

When we're thinking about lowering demands, like you said, we're also thinking about lowering demands of the environment and really scaffolding the task.

So again, we're starting at the end.

The end goal is for them to consume the meal, to chew it and swallow it.

And we don't have control over that.

Like I always remind parents, we don't have the three most impacting activities on regulation in our day are the ones we have the least control over, sleep, toileting and eating.

So why is that happening? Can you tell