Brycen's New Compression-Weighted Vest

A few weeks ago, one of the Occupational Therapists (thank you, Gia!) at the clinic began researching a compression-weighted vest for Brycen, feeling that it could benefit Brycen in many ways.  She presented me with some print-outs on reasonably priced vests she found and one was made by Fun and Function.  Later that day, I reached out to my online support group of other ASD parents and one of them (thank you, Lisa!!) found that the Fun and Function facebook page was doing a giveaway for a gift certificate at that time...and the amount of the certificate would cover almost the entire cost of the vest!  So, of course Mike and I entered the giveaway by following the directions on their wall...and we asked many of our FB friends to do the same in hopes that if one of them won, they would donate the gift certificate to Brycen.  We were so humbled by how many of our friends and family took the time to do this for Brycen...and not only did they enter, many actually posted to their own walls asking their friends to do the same!  Within a few hours, I saw posts from people I didn't even know flooding the Fun and Function facebook page in support of Brycen and his need for a compression-weighted vest! 

A few days after the giveaway was over, I received a text from a friend while I was grocery shopping (thank you, Jennifer!) telling me to get on Facebook and that I would be so excited.  After returning home and logging in, I found that we did not win the giveaway...BUT Fun and Function wanted to donate a vest to Brycen anyway in response to all of the traffic we sent to their FB page!!!  You can imagine the tears of joy that I had...the smiles that didn't stop...the immediate overwhelming feeling of gratitude for a company that did not know us but was so generous in contributing to Brycen's therapy needs! 

www.funandfunction.com

Less than a week later, the vest we chose was delivered!  We knew getting Brycen to just wear the vest would initially be a challenge.  Change is not easy for him...and of course the vest doesn't exactly look like his other clothing items.  Luckily, Brycen has some of the most wonderful people surrounding and cheering him on through every battle!  One of those fabulous people is his Speech and Language Pathologist at the clinic (thank you, Bridget!!).  Every single session, she devoted time to encouraging him to wear the vest...in addition to some of his other therapists at the clinic.  10 days later, she and Brycen conquered it!!!  She brought him out of the therapy room to "show off" for all the clinic employees...and he actually was smiling and seeming to love the feel of it.  He continued to wear it (loose, not compressed the first day) through the rest of his therapy, during some of his SCL time with Cari, and then at home before he got ready for bed.  We were ecstatic!!  But of course, looming in the back of my head was if we would have a hurdle this morning when getting dressed.  I laid out his vest next to his shirt and pants on the floor...and he surprised me with actually reaching for the vest with a smile!!  He even stood still (well, as still as Brycen can get!) so I could fully compress it around him!  He continued to wear it to Physical Therapy this morning and then onto school where he is at this moment.  Today we are just working on the compression part, but we will slowly add in some weights over the weekend for certain times so as not to push it or scare him away from it.

Now, many of you are probably wondering what exactly a compression-weighted vest is and how it can benefit Brycen!  Brycen experiences many sensory issues like so many children/adults with Autism.  Specifically it is called Sensory Processing Disorder.  Many people have SPD without having Autism.  One example I can think of is how some people don't like the feeling of tags in their shirts and they just can't concentrate with them rubbing against their skin...only SPD is more extreme and entails so many areas of all the senses.  With SPD, Brycen has a hard time regulating his behavior because of how overstimulated he can get whether it is from touch, smell, taste, noise level, etc.  His body can't process all of that sensory input...therefore he acts in certain ways to try to work through it on his own.  One of the examples for Brycen is "stimming"...specifically he will hum, flap his arms/hands, jump up and down, pace, etc.  Not that stimming is all bad as he stims when he is happy as well, but it's not a very healthy way to work through sensory overload so we want to give him other tools to work through it and regulate his body. 

The compression-weighted vest is two parts.  The compression part is like giving his core a deep hug which we have found Brycen responds favorably to when upset and can be worn all day long.  The weighted part is like helping him to reset and calm down and is only meant to use the weights added in the "pockets" for 20-30 minutes every couple hours.  I have attached a couple links that can explain this better below.  Our goal with using this sensory therapy with Brycen is to help with his concentration/attention span when needing to do "work" at school or other necessary daily living skills.  We also want to decrease his "stimming" as sometimes he will flap so hard he scratches his skin and causes bleeding.  We would also like to see a decrease in aggression though studies have not shown this yet with using the vest...it's just more of a goal we have with everything we do with him!  We are looking towards using the weighted portion of the vest before stressful events like doctor's and dentist's appointments, when going to a new community place that may be overstimulating, and hopefully before haircuts so they aren't so traumatic for all of us.  We will keep everybody updated on his progress with the vest through the blog!

Once again, this would not have been possible yet if it wasn't for the amazing generosity of Fun and Function!  If you are looking for various therapy tools, please check out their website at www.funandfunction.com and let's please return the support to them that they provided to us!!  They are affordable and have some awesome customer service!

http://funandfunction.com/?p=339
http://tips4specialkids.com/2011/09/27/compression-weighted-vests-for-deep-pressure/