SPD Support Forum

I decided to go ahead and paste this to make it a bit easier. I'm not so good with introductions sometimes.
1. What brings you here?
I found the forum while searching for information on SPD, some information for me as well as a way to explain it to academic advisors. I thought about joining it then, but things got crazy with midterms then finals.
2. What is your relations to someone with SPD? Do you have it? a child of yours? Do you treat SPD kids as a professional?
I have SPD. I was diagnosed at 3. One of the first in Idaho to be.
3. Share a little of your journey if you'd like.
Well, it's kinda odd. I started with extreme hyper sensitivity to noise and touch, and some to light and smell as well as the poor motor functions. Fine motor skills are okay most of the time, unless I'm worn out. As I grew older I hated school and the noise and nobody understood. The teachers flat out refused to read my file and to even try to understand, so my parents decided to homeschool me at the beginning of fourth grade. The meltdowns stopped entirely. Later when I turned 18 I went and got my GED and enrolled in college, thinking I wanted to go into graphic arts. I ran into some problems with my first advisor and switched to English Publishing. That didn't work, but more for academic reasons, as I didn't want to turn into a journalist. I found something else instead that I grew up with like an old friend. Music. Unforunately our college does not offer a music major, only a minor. Fortunately I love anything in the Fine Arts, so I switched to a straight English major, and in 2 years I'm transfering to get the last of the classes I need for my BA in music, and then onto my masters. After that I hope to teach at the college level. Durring the first two semesters however it was almost like something coming out of remission or unhinged. I started to have some problems again. Not meltdowns, but I would get shaky, the lights would get bright, and durring group discussions, the only ones I could hear where my teachers. Thankfully they've been very understanding, and a few of them have even admitted they had it, like one of the teachers that let me drop her class because she was hypno and kept the noise up, and I was hyper. And in a single semester I've learned how to cope with being close to the band, and even onstage with the choir, with some help of course. This doesn't do much for ambulances, firetrucks, and commercial fireworks. I still hold my ears at those. But it's a start.
4. Is there any immediate help you need?
Not at the moment. Both of my academic advisors where willing to read the paperwork I handed them. The dean of students understood it too. The disability center... Sort of. But that was okay. I learned how to explain in pretty quickly. I am wondering though, can a person shift back and forth from hyper to hypno? Like sometimes instead of flinching from to loud of a noise to wanting something louder? I have some hypno in touch to go along with the hyper. Like I can burn myself and not feel it, but touch me and you get the insane death glare? That's one thing I'm not quite following or understanding as I get older. But I know burning the scalp is a bad thing.
5. SPD doesn't run your life! What are you or your child's gifts? Interests?
Fine arts: Music, drawing, sketching, architecture, literature, writing, languages... Comics, cartoons, films, Syfy....
6. What do you like to do in your spare time? Any hobbies or interests?
At the current moment I'm an alto in our choir, I play guitar and some piano, which I'm taking next semester, and I hope to pick up woodwinds. I also write, a lot. And draw as well as try and learn different languages. Current pursuits there include, but not limited to: German, Italian, and maybe French. I had a German uncle that spoke 5 languages. From the look of his face and the stories, he also had SPD. Like my dad and my grandmother, and my great grandmother.... Come to find out this has been going on for a long time. Apparently on both sides of the family. Go figure, right? Anyway, thanks for having me here!

I can switch between Hyposensitive and Hypersensitive. I am most often Hypersensitive. I switch probably due to an Ion Channel Disorder I have.

Light touches are evil and heavy touches are divine.

Sometimes I when I have a paralysis attack I can barely feel any touch. Other times the pain is indescribable.

Welcome to the forums!

I've changed the font color on your post to make it more readable. It was almost blended into the background for most people.

Hi there Musicwolf7. Welcome to the forum.

Reading your story is, I must say, fairly fascinating. I'm really glad you were able to find out about SPD at such a young age, when it was very rare to find anyone diagnosed with it. I, too, was diagnosed very early - at 18 months old in 1989. However, it sounds as though you grew up knowing about the disorder and how it impacted you, whereas mine was sort of forgotten and ignored for a long time (and I grew up not knowing anything about it). I'm really glad to hear your mom fought for you and was even able to homeschool. Public schools are just awful, aren't they? LOL

Your major sounds exciting. I'm not sure if you specified though, what instruments do you play? For me, it was strictly trombone. I have severe SPD that goes across the whole spectrum, so anything with strings, a lot of valves or keys, or a small mouthpiece confused me and would have been too hard for me to learn, I think. I haven't played since high school, but it was disappointing because I wanted to play on through college.

As for your question, yes, it is quite common to switch back and forth between hyper and hypo sensitivities. It's my personal belief that a majority of people with SPD experience symptoms and diagnosable issues through multiple ends of the spectrum, especially when it comes to modulation.

Also, SPD is odd in that it's not necessarily true that you always experience touch as necessarily more intense than other people. It's that you experience certain kinds of touch more intensely. For most people, it's the light touch, the gentle brushing or stroking, that is the most irritating, or the unexpected touch. Meanwhile, intense touch sensations where there is a lot of pressure or burning may not be registered at all. It's definitely a dysfunction in the way sensations are processed, so I never find it exactly accurate to say people with SPD just experience things louder or hotter. We experience all kinds of things differently, and they can at times be very hard to connect with one and other. It often doesn't seem to make sense, lol.

Anyhow, welcome again, and I hope you enjoy your time on the site.

(06-22-2012, 04:04 AM)beck7422 Wrote: [ -> ]I can switch between Hyposensitive and Hypersensitive. I am most often Hypersensitive. I switch probably due to an Ion Channel Disorder I have.

Light touches are evil and heavy touches are divine.

Sometimes I when I have a paralysis attack I can barely feel any touch. Other times the pain is indescribable.

Hi, sorry about the pain. That's something I haven't experianced and I haven't heard of an Ion Channel Disorder until now. But I know what you mean about the light touches. I hate those too.

---

(06-22-2012, 09:29 AM)heatherv112506 Wrote: [ -> ]Welcome to the forums!

Thanks! Good to be here!

(06-22-2012, 11:10 AM)Dan Wrote: [ -> ]I've changed the font color on your post to make it more readable. It was almost blended into the background for most people.

Hi there Musicwolf7. Welcome to the forum.

Reading your story is, I must say, fairly fascinating. I'm really glad you were able to find out about SPD at such a young age, when it was very rare to find anyone diagnosed with it. I, too, was diagnosed very early - at 18 months old in 1989. However, it sounds as though you grew up knowing about the disorder and how it impacted you, whereas mine was sort of forgotten and ignored for a long time (and I grew up not knowing anything about it). I'm really glad to hear your mom fought for you and was even able to homeschool. Public schools are just awful, aren't they? LOL

Your major sounds exciting. I'm not sure if you specified though, what instruments do you play? For me, it was strictly trombone. I have severe SPD that goes across the whole spectrum, so anything with strings, a lot of valves or keys, or a small mouthpiece confused me and would have been too hard for me to learn, I think. I haven't played since high school, but it was disappointing because I wanted to play on through college.

As for your question, yes, it is quite common to switch back and forth between hyper and hypo sensitivities. It's my personal belief that a majority of people with SPD experience symptoms and diagnosable issues through multiple ends of the spectrum, especially when it comes to modulation.

Also, SPD is odd in that it's not necessarily true that you always experience touch as necessarily more intense than other people. It's that you experience certain kinds of touch more intensely. For most people, it's the light touch, the gentle brushing or stroking, that is the most irritating, or the unexpected touch. Meanwhile, intense touch sensations where there is a lot of pressure or burning may not be registered at all. It's definitely a dysfunction in the way sensations are processed, so I never find it exactly accurate to say people with SPD just experience things louder or hotter. We experience all kinds of things differently, and they can at times be very hard to connect with one and other. It often doesn't seem to make sense, lol.

Anyhow, welcome again, and I hope you enjoy your time on the site.

Thanks, sorry though, kind of a bummer you didn't know more about yours sooner. My parents did because my dad had it I think, and my other relatives. Plus they knew something was wrong when I wasn't quite the same as my other sisters and brother. Public schools are awful. I was shocked to find out college was completely different.
What do I play? Umm, at the moment I play guitar both 6 and 12 string and some piano, but I hope to pick up woodwinds too. Probably saxophone and flute. My grandfather was the No. 1 Trombonist in his company in the military. And I think you'd be surprised. I have trouble with the wrong teacher, but the teachers at the college I'm at really seem to understand and they come up with different ideas on how to teach me which I can use to teach later too. A lot of it is hands on training in applied classes instead of trying to learn it out of a book, and it really helps. Sometimes it just takes the right teacher. Even with the SPD it seems like your hands start to learn where the notes on the instrument are even if you mess up a lot or have trouble finding them. Things with a lot of strings or valves do take longer to learn and seem really complicated at first, but if you get a patient teacher they show you things one or two steps at a time, and some teachers even know how to contour things to a specific learning style so that it becomes second nature. The college I'm at has found out that there's not 1 type of intelligence, but rather, 8. (VAK system. It's online. Not all teachers agree, but a lot of them realize people learn differently and remember things in different ways. The VAK thing is kind of a cool way of thinking about it). If you still wanted to play, you might check it out just to see. Try finding a teacher who's got our disorder or one who understands it. I know it's really hard too but I found one by sheer luck. Just a thought if you're still interested in playing and learning music. Nothings impossible!
And okay, thank you very much. I was wondering because I didn't experiance a lot of symptoms while I was being homeschooled, and then things started resurfacing last year when I started college. I hate the light touch too, and I jump when I don't know someone's behind me and they touch my shoulder or something, but if someone grabs my arm, it doesn't bother me. I agree, most of the time none of it makes sense.
But that's okay.
Thank you, and thanks for having me here!
P.S. Sorry about the font. I had no idea. I switched the forum settings to the dark on my account so I could see it better. I have an easier time with darker things then bright. I'll keep it in the aqua/robin's egg blue color now.