Inside a Dysregulated Child’s Brain (Real QEEG Scan)

Why Behavior Alone Misses the Brain 0:00

Before that pill, I want you to pause and I wanted to think because what if the problem isn't your kids actual behavior, but that nobody is actually looking at what's happening inside their brain. I'm going to show you what most parents are never shown and why guessing is based on behavior alone and how it really keeps not just families stuck, but professionals stuck because they are like behavior DSM four, which is a diagnostic and statistical manual diagnosis. Because guess what? That's pharma influenced because that happens to line up with pharmer.

So this guessing cycle, why do parents always end up here? So behavior shows up, right? In adults, adults try to help and they're often get stuck in this reactivity cycle with their kids. I mean, who doesn't have that? And you're looking for help, but labels are assigned, they are based on symptoms not actually looking at the brain. And we're going to do some brain maps today, not systems. Kids get grouped together because they look similar on the outside. I mean, how many people I know have a freaking grocery cart of diagnoses?

Please shout out if that's the case. But internally, their brains could be doing completely different things. I see this every day. And if you haven't heard me talk, 50% of the people come to me have the wrong diagnosis. I would say that's a conservative estimate. That's why parents feel like this whiplash. They try and they try, and nothing seems to stick. And one child improves with structure, another kid explodes. One child calms with stimulation. Another kid escalates. And even within the same family, these same strategies don't always stick.

Here's why. Because we're getting opposite outcomes because the missing lens is the brain state. What is happening? Behavior is just a reflection of nervous system regulation, how the brain is regulating, and what a brain map shows us is the level of activation. Is it over activation, is it under activation?

Overstimulated Brains and Sympathetic Overdrive 2:25

It's telling us flexibility in the And it can tell us recovery speed, their stress response patterns, and there are two patterns that show up again and again. And I talk a lot about this in my book in terms of behavior and what it means and that's overstimulated brains. under stimulated brains. There's a lot of diagnoses that fall under that and it's reflected in the activity of the structures themselves or brain communication. You all know I love to talk about brain communications because we're only thinking about the brain in terms of that structure.

What if your child isn't too much or not enough, but their brain is simply out of balance? And that's so much of what these tools that I do, neurofeedback, biofeed back, it's really about getting the brain back into balance. And if you want to learn more about what your brain, where your child's brain is and isn't doing, we've actually updated our solution matcher to make it a nervous system pattern reader. And you can go to drrosanne.com forward slash. help, and that's going to match you to the right solution to where you're at.

So let's talk about overstimulated brains. And we're going talk it. That's when everything is too loud, right? Too active, too irritating, everything too much. This is what we see on brain maps. We see patterns stuck in sympathetic dominance. Excessive high-frequency activity, poor calming, The difficulty between the regions often is just stuck on difficulty shutting off because it's just in this activated state. You're seeing excessive stress responses. Really that brain is either on or sometimes completely off when it is overstimulated for a long time, and this is how it shows up in real life.

We see the explosions, we see anger, high levels of anxiety in a reactive, avoidant way, panic, constant worry, OCD loops, you see rigidity, a lot of reassurance seeking, understimulation, rage, violence, irritability, emotional volatility, trouble sleeping, especially staying awake. I'm sorry, waking up in the middle of the night because you'll have a real stress response, hyper focusing on stress or mistakes they made or things you said to them or perceived threats. There's a wide variety of what you see and parents are told that they're choosing to act this way.

They're just Oppositional, oppositional defiant, you need stronger boundaries. They're too sensitive. But really, the truth is the brain isn't choosing chaos. It's overwhelmed and it can't power down. I mean, that is what an overstimulated brain looks like. And please know that even though these are the two most common brain patterns, you can have a mix of both in different regions. And let me show you what a brain will look like when it is overstimulated. So this is an overstimated brain. This is brain communication that is stuck on it's very obvious red is high and the brain is literally locked in communication you will see this in now this is just one part of a brain map only looking at communication we're going to talk about structures to But what you will see this in this, this is somebody who's definitely having panic attacks, you can see that in OCD, and you see in that type of depression that's very angry.

You can also see the opposite. This is part of a piece of other things that we're looking at. And just as a reminder what a brain map is, I have other episodes and things on brain maps, but we are measuring the surface electrical activity of the brain, and it is telling us what areas are overworking and underworking. Essentially, i'm a pattern reader. We know what parts of And if this area is too low or this areas too high, it cannot work. It cannot receive information. it can not communicate with other areas or maybe it's over communicating.

And then the brain communication routes tell us a lot. Again, they're not talked about enough for us to make sense out of it.

Understimulated Brains and Low Activation 7:10

I want to show you this is an overactive brain. in a very, this is in the Delta region. This is the part that's supposed to help us with sleeping. So they actually have a crazy amount of slow wave activity that is causing them to disconnect and shut down. And absolutely inflammation is a part of that. So, as we talk more about it, I'll show you some more. So when we have an under-stimulated brain, what do you think of? You think about ADHD, you're thinking of learning problems. This is somebody that is not engaging enough, that's not processing, and it's a brain that goes in and out of sympathetic dominance.

And as we have that, we're seeing low activation, particularly in the frontal regions. You also can see, like in that brain map that was the front, you can an excessive amount of slow wave activity. So these are kids that have poor communicators, between attention and executive functioning issues. They really struggle with those regions in the brain that help us, like executive function, to get started and really make sense out of information in a way that's fluid instead of being like, what did you just say?

Or can you repeat that? The brain is seeking input to wake itself up. It has poor initiation and follow through, and it's gonna show up in the real world like people say lazy or unmotivated or can't start tasks or cant finish anything, even when they're capable. And you will see this, now kids can hyper-focus and we get confused by that, but you'll even see that when there is a clinical problem that is beyond just straight dysregulation. You will this in all areas. These kids zone out, daydream, they slow process.

They avoid schoolwork. They look bored, they hate boredom. Maybe they're apathetic and when demands increase, we see more. And parents are told these kinds of things. So they are not trying, They need more consequences, especially from relatives. they just need to push through. You're not putting enough boundaries.They say all this stuff like that. You know, don't hang out with those people. The brain doesn't have enough activation to engage and pressure creates shutdown, not effort. And I think you all know that when you have these kinds of kids and what happens in these brains is that these kids often get labeled as anxious, OCD, mood disorder.

Under-stimulated brains, really, we are seeing learning disorders, low motivation, those kinds of things. Sensory processing can be between, right? And kids can swing between over and under stimulation, and you'll see it in their sleep, you will see in in diet, how frequently they get ill, whether they have pans or pandas or not. You really start to see that nervous system brain state connection to every day. Their environment is huge for them. Is this the right school setting for them? Do they have the world's toughest teacher this year?

Are they being homeschooled? What is happening? Today, I had two people talk to me about bullying. Their kids are refusing to go to school. Of course, they're refusing to go to school. They need help. These are the things that our kids who are uniquely wired that some of the thing that they face. So why does regulation first change everything? Let me show you some understimulated brain patterns. so that you can make sense about it. So this is a brain that is, let me show you an understimulated. This is brain has some areas of under stimulation and some area that have overstimulation.

But this actually as we talked about being an overdrive, this has actually under stimulated brain because they have too much delta. And in this person's case, they were zoning out constantly. And you can see it on a brain map. It just doesn't power up. There's not enough gas, there's no enough juice. And depending on where that is on the brain, you're going to see very specific behaviors. So if there is not gas in the areas that help you with emotional reactivity, You're either going to be flat or you're going overreact.

So you listen as well as look at what happens in the brain map. But it's hard to deny what is happening in your brain when you actually see it, which is why I love brain maps. We start to see things calm down, overstimulated brains learn to settle. Now, these things don't just happen overnight. This is chipping away, chippin away and not just regulating the nervous system, but teaching the person how to manage. We never want to avoid problems. We want to help our kids learn how to be stress layers and problem solvers.

This is the direction that is we're going in and that we are bubble wrapping our kid and man they don't know how do things. I mean man. So under stimulated brains will learn to how be more engaging. And once balance returns, focus will improve, emotions kind of soften, behavior becomes more flexible instead of rigid.

Regulation First: Why Skills Work After Calm 12:40

And this is agnostic of a clinical issue. This is across the board. Clinical issues and neurodivergence is just part of who we are, but we have to always regulate first. None of those issues are going to resolve. darn thing. Let me get this from the rooftop. This is why I've named regulation first in regulation-first parenting, because we're doing things out of order. Skill teaching starts to work after regulation. Therapy sticks, parenting strategies actually land. I think that's one of the things that is most perplexing to parents when you have multiple kids and you say, why does Joey get it, but Amy doesn't?

And my question always is, is how regulated is Amy? And Joey's regulated. So Joey is absorbing because he's regulating. Let's have a dig, dig. A moment in that you can't expect learning. You can expect strong problem solving using those coping skills until they're regulated, That's where we have to put our elbow grease. And brain maps are a great way to tell us what's happening and remove the, oh, is it ODD? Oh, it is OCD? Is it this? It is that? Because that does matter too. But regardless, we need to regulate first.

So after having worked with thousands of kids and families, you know, kids who are labeled as fear and treatment resistant and people tell me they need to be in it. You know, a center, you know of residential treatment center and living there. I see kids getting manageable. IC grades improving IC flexibility increasing and then those behaviors softening and parents stop escalating because they understand the brain state. Remember the A and comms is avoiding personalization and the L is looking for root causes, we have to really start to understand our kids and not really personalize those behaviors.

It becomes a lot easier when you're both regulating, but that doesn't happen overnight. There's no magic wand, there's not pill for that. But that's how we start accelerating progress. We start really seeing changes and start targeting the behaviors, not just fixing kids. Like, don't come to me if you want me to fix your kid because I'm not going to take you. Kids aren't broken. You're not broken, we're just doing the wrong things. So we have to meet the brain where it is at so that it can regulate those signs of over and under stimulation.

Start helping us to understand. Your child doesn't need another label. Because that is what people look for. And I get it. You want to what I call is a bucket of understanding. What we need is that path. That is part of the book. It's going to be real simple. Kids don't need that label. They need to have a regulated nervous system so they can connect, they think, and they learn. How about they love themselves? Because kids today are struggling. And it's painful for me to watch when I really thought after three decades, I thought we would be in a better place with so many of these things.

The good news is you all are looking for something else. And I think that is so important. Because you're realizing what you are doing isn't working and I'm glad that you here and you listening and please share this with other people because people are drowning. I just came from a group to business mastermind. They're talking serious people, doing really incredibly well, have lots of means, and everybody wanted to talk to me about their kids. And they wanted talk me to about, well is it this and is that and I'm doing the right thing.

These are very enlightened people who are not immobilized by fear and they were ready to take action and do different things. They really start understanding as business owners, we are really focusing on regulating ourselves. And what's more important than regulating ourselves first, we have to have an oxygen mask on. But these issues affect everybody, regardless of class and wealth. And that's why regulation first is so important because it's so accessible. to everybody, okay? And our solution matcher, you can go to drrosanne.com, forward slash help, and that solution matching can help you to take the path.

So it's really about, if you're unsure of what is going on with your child, are they under-stimulated, or are over- stimulated? Or they're shifting in between. You don't have to guess. The solution-matcher will take you, will help identify the brain patterns underneath, and the behavior and show you where to start. When it comes to brain maps, what I do want to show is I want you to see what's possible when you regulate. Yes, this is a brain map of somebody who has done our program. Before, red is high, green is good.

Brain Maps, Progress, and Hope 18:05

Keep it simple. This is somebody who did recessions or neurofeedback, did some PMF, changed their diet, really focused on things at home. And that's the kind of change that they got. You can get results and you can change your brain in as little as 10 minutes a day. this is also somebody very, very active, had some low levels of activity who started to normalize. Green is good, yellow and red are bad. and they started to normalize. Why do I show you these things? I showed you things because I really want you to understand that every little thing that you do, every moment that your take your child's cup and you fill it back up with regulation, calm moments, adds money in the bank.

And instead of us always again looking for the magic wand, it's those little moments that make a huge difference. When you're talking about extremes, self-harm, cutting, suicidal ideation, those are just places people get stuck. And it's because they're so activated. Now, in their brain, you are going to see those two patterns, extreme activation where they're in fight, flight, or freeze and they can't get out, they are in a sympathetic dominant state, where potentially, there are completely out of gas and there shut down and things like cutting provide relief.

I know that sounds bizarre to people, but there is neurotransmitters get released when you exhibit certain behaviors, good and bad. So again, it doesn't really, yes, that matters to you and it matters in your home how extreme it is, school refusal, aggression, self-harm, extreme OCD. I can't believe how much people live with OCT. O.C.D. is not going to go away until you decide to put that little sucker down. And let me tell you, you can get it down, ERP is the way these extreme behaviors will stay there until and then create capacity in the nervous system to actually learn, pay attention, feel comfortable enough to implement what you may or may not know.

You may need to be taught and it works. It works every time. time when you put these pieces into place. Again, no magic wand. It's a chipping. it's adding back to that cup. So the nervous system has capacity for learning. I'm the purveyor of hope and I do believe that everybody can do this work. You got to want to do that work and you got believe and as Philomena would say, you gotta get off your coolie and You can't just be like, well, maybe I am doing this today and maybe i'm doing that today.

That's just not the way it works. It requires consistency. Does not require perfection. I require 80%. Good job. Okay. 80 is a B. We forget how good some of these, these B's are. And I say that with love and joking, but I certainly know how serious these things are for people and how hard it is in their everyday life. But I want you to know shipping away matters. Money in the bank. Remember that. Is it ever too late to start? Heck no. You can be 50 and it's not too late to start. I have people in their 70s and 80s.

As I'm facing retiring from clinical care, not retiring for work, I spend more time with kids because there aren't a lot of providers that are willing to do this work with But a 17 year old, an 18 year, the 25 year-old, never too late. But we have to regulate first. And so people feel like it's too. Kids themselves will tell me they feel that it is too, because they've done all these other things that spin the wheels and nothing seems to stick. That's because we're doing things out of order. We must regulate.

First, The problem is people are thinking that's medication and medication Has a lot I don't believe medication is the first line of defense. I'm never gonna shame anybody But when we do medication first, we are making a huge mistake That is not going to serve us and it comes with a lotta side effects it can worsen problems and then it sends people down like a rabbit hole of of shame a fear of not worry and When we regulate through many ways. Yes, I do neurocephalic. I have my own PEMF device, but I breath work every day.

Do grounding. Lots of things for my gut microbiome. Nutrition is a way to help you regulate. You must create that capacity. We cannot biologically learn and fight, flight or freeze. So when you have a 17-year-old who's not moving the dial, they are in fight, flight, or freeze. They have lot of stuff behind it. Most mental health issues don't just show up overnight. If they show overnight, you've to worry about them being victimized, traumatized in some way, Or they have an infectious or toxin trigger with a clinical issue like pans and pandas.

We would be deeply concerned that something traumatic has happened to them. And we should never ignore that because mental health issues don't turn on overnight unless those things have happened. That's just not the way biology works. Don't ever give up and really find a way to regulate.