Retraining my Brain Waves . . .

During my elementary years, particularly 3rd through 5th, my teachers seriously impacted how I viewed myself. For years I struggled with feelings of inadequacy with the deep-seated lie that I was actually dumb and stupid. Over the years through God’s grace I have found healing and restoration from a destroyed self-esteem. But there was one more piece to the puzzle – something I hadn’t considered – how those childhood years affected my ability to learn.

You see, I love to learn, but reading a book meant going back to read what I had just read, conversation with a friend meant asking questions that had already been answered, listening to a lecture found me leaving class with my head spinning, studying for an exam meant many laborious hours. The question wasn’t how long I stuck with something, because I was diligent to persevere through whatever. The question was how much I absorbed and retained from that book, conversation, lecture, or review.

It all came about while I was working on finishing a college degree last year. Studying for an exam or writing a paper triggered the same panic and anxiousness I had struggled with throughout all my school years. Brad Oostindie, a pediataric psychologist in my church, introduced me to the idea of retraining my brain waves. I had no idea what that meant, but I was willing to give it a try. After my initial testing to see how my brain waves were working during focus, it was discovered that my brain would work really hard to focus (at an anxiety level), but then give up and jump over to a zoned out state even while I tried to remain focused. I couldn’t believe how well Brad’s description fit what I experienced every time I read a book, studied for an exam, etc. No wonder I was having trouble - jumping from anxiety to zoned out - a pattern, Brad says, that I probably developed as a grade schooler. I just always thought that was how it worked for me. I always figured I had some sort of learning disability that I would never be able to overcome, of course, proving my teachers correct.

After 32 half-hour sessions of neurofeedback*, the therapy Brad’s practice, Ready to Focus, provides, I have retrained my brain waves to function at the healthy ideal levels my brain was made to function all along. Experientially, I could tell I was improving, but the real clincher was when I saw the before and after graphs that showed my improvement.

I am both amazed and grateful that God would bring healing down to the very core of my brain waves - my God-given cognitive potential. My brain waves are fixed and I am a bona fide student and learner without the panic and anxiety I experienced for so many years!

*Neurofeedback is also helping ADHD children, some even to the point of getting off medication. It is a noninvasive procedure of attaching three electrodes to the scalp and each ear lobe to measure brain activity while in focus. Check out the links above to learn more.