Your child’s meltdowns may be clues to their sensory needs
Andrej Lišakov / Unsplash
What if, instead of asking “How do I stop this behavior?” we asked, “What is this behavior trying to tell me?” A pediatric OT breaks it all down.
Table of Contents
Meltdowns are an inevitable part of raising kids, and they can seemingly come out of nowhere—we all know the running joke about a toddler crying because of a peeled banana. But for kids with sensory processing differences, big emotions and disruptive behaviors can sometimes be breadcrumbs pointing to an underlying need.
In her new book “The Sensory Code“, pediatric occupational therapist Laura Petix helps parents become “sensory detectives,” connecting the dots between their child’s nervous system and patterns in their behavior.
For Petix, the work is personal, too. As a neurodivergent parent raising a neurodivergent child with sensory differences, she brings firsthand experience to the strategies she shares with families. And one of the most important places to start, she says, is recognizing that your child’s sensory profile probably doesn’t fit neatly into a single box.
Get specific about sensory triggers
You’ve most likely heard the terms “sensory seeker” and “sensory avoider,” but Petix says those labels can oversimplify what’s actually going on. A child might crave one kind of sensory input and be completely overwhelmed by another.
“It’s very common for kids to have a mixed threshold,” she says. “Maybe your child can’t sit still, loves to move, but also can’t tolerate loud sounds.”
A child can even have seemingly opposite responses within the same sensory system. Petix points to her daughter’s relationship with touch as a perfect example. “[She] loves cuddling and hugs and being super close, like, so much so that it’s overstimulating to me,” Petix says. “It soothes and regulates her.” Yet as much as her daughter craves that physical closeness, sticky or wet sensations and certain types of clothing can have the opposite effect.
In other words, understanding your child’s sensory profile isn’t necessarily about figuring out which “type” of sensory kid you have. It’s about getting curious about their individual patterns.
Look for patterns in what they seek—and what they avoid
Start by paying attention to what your child consistently gravitates toward and what they resist.
Maybe they’re constantly in motion—running, pacing or climbing on furniture when everyone else is sitting. They may love jumping and crashing, wrestling, spinning, tight hugs and squeezes, or even chewing on pencils and biting their nails.
On the flip side, they might have big reactions to noise, feel overwhelmed by crowds, loathe certain types of clothing, avoid “gross” textures, be sensitive to touch or have an especially hard time with transitions.
And parents may relate to that feeling of sensory overload more than we realize.
Petix points to how sound and touch—two common sensory stressors—can quietly accumulate throughout the day. “Think about how you feel ‘touched out’ or completely overwhelmed by the end of the day when your kids have been climbing and calling your name 100 times all day long,” she says. “Suddenly, you want to crawl out of your skin and scream at your kids to leave you alone.”
Now imagine experiencing your own version of that buildup during a traditional school day: blaring PA announcements, ringing bells, screaming kids at recess, crowded lunch tables and hours spent surrounded by other bodies. By the time a child walks through the front door, their proverbial sensory cup may already be overflowing. Suddenly, that after-school meltdown doesn’t seem quite so out of nowhere.
Let their behavior guide your response
Once you start recognizing those patterns, you can use them to figure out what might help in the moment. And you don’t necessarily need to know the clinical name for the sensory input your child is seeking.
Petix recommends watching what their body is already doing.
If a dysregulated child is wringing their shirt, ripping things, crashing into furniture or stomping, try offering a safe way to channel that same impulse: cardboard boxes to tear apart, a stress ball to squeeze, aluminum cans to stomp or even ice cubes to throw against the pavement—one of Petix’s favorite quick resets.
The opposite can be true, too. A child who curls up, hides under a blanket or retreats from the action may be telling you they need less input. A quiet, dimly lit corner may be more helpful than another activity meant to distract or cheer them up.
There are exceptions, of course. If bedtime is approaching and your child suddenly has the zoomies, following their impulse to run wild may not help you get any closer to lights-out. They may still need sensory input, Petix explains, but in a more controlled way that helps their nervous system begin to wind down.
The point isn’t to correctly decode every behavior on the first try. It’s to start noticing what your child’s body may already be communicating.
The end goal? Self-awareness and self-advocacy
Understanding your child’s sensory profile isn’t about engineering a childhood free from discomfort—or keeping them in a perfectly regulated state at all times. The bigger goal is helping them build enough self-awareness that, eventually, they can recognize and advocate for what they need themselves.
Petix’s go-to questions for building that awareness are refreshingly simple. Instead of asking a dysregulated child the broad—and sometimes impossible to answer—question How are you feeling?, she recommends asking:
What are you noticing?
What do you need?
Parents can also give kids simple language to describe what’s happening inside their bodies:
My sensory cup is full.
This is too much for my brain.
I need quiet.
Over time, the hope is that kids begin connecting the dots for themselves. The child who once melted down when the classroom got too loud may eventually recognize the feeling earlier and say, I need a quiet space. The kid who struggled to sit still may realize that moving their body before homework helps them focus.
Because cracking your child’s sensory code isn’t really about cracking a code at all. It’s about knowing the child in front of you—the things that overwhelm them, the things that ground them and the signals their body sends along the way. And, eventually, helping them know themselves just as well.
Related articles
