Boredom and Stress/Cortisol Levels

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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24202238

I read about studies like this on an unrelated topic and it made me think of the number times we have had behavioral issues with boredom. (a lot)

It makes me think I really need to do a better job of dealing with this.

Increased cortisol? That's interesting...

Yeah, that interested me, too. If my son is reacting to boredom b/c it is chemically equivalent to stress, that explains a lot about some of the issues we are having. It is just very hard b/c society, in general, expects kids to suck it up when they are bored and if this is true, it explains the difficulties we have had. There are some connections to ADD that I have read about and my son definitely has some ADDish tendencies.

Can he learn any of the various forms of meditation? It really helped our daughter w/ anxiety learn her body's signals, what they meant and how she could choose to respond to them.

We have a book full of these that he (sometimes) likes to read right before bead, but if you ask him to do it when he is agitated, it just doesn't happen. I may need to suggest it earlier in the pre-meltdown phase, when I can catch it.

Another trick we fell into was a nightly "outside time" to look up at the night sky, feel the air, etc.. Eventually we ended up teaching her to use it to avoid *some* meltdowns, as well. After many years she is learning to recognize when one is building up and change her immediate, physical environment. The boredom - stress connection fits this quite good, as there are times when she is intellectually not bored but her body is understimulated. With the exception of auditory stimulus - she can be overstimulated there while understimmed elsewhere. It seems that sort of fully independent stimulus balancing need is almost a hallmark of sensory integration issues?