By Lee Horine
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June 17, 2025
When your child is struggling with communication, emotional regulation, learning, digestion, sensory issues it can feel overwhelming to know where to begin. The world of therapies and interventions is vast and often confusing. But there is one place that almost no one is looking, yet it holds the key to everything else: The autonomic nervous system (ANS). The ANS: The Operating System of Your Child’s Brain. The ANS controls everything that happens automatically in the body: heart rate, digestion, immune responses, sleep cycles, stress responses, and more. It also creates the foundation for brain development. Think of it like the soil in which the brain grows. If the soil isn’t regulated, balanced, and coherent, no matter how many seeds you plant , speech therapy, OT, ABA, dietary changes the results won’t be what they could be. Before higher functions like attention, language, social behavior, or academic learning can flourish, the nervous system has to feel safe. Why This Matters for Autism and Neurodevelopmental Challenges Kids on the autism spectrum or with sensory processing issues, anxiety, or developmental delays often have a nervous system stuck in protection mode. Their ANS is running in a constant state of survival, and this creates chaos downstream: Digestion becomes impaired, leading to food sensitivities or gut issues. Sleep becomes shallow or disrupted. Emotional regulation becomes difficult or impossible. Sensory input becomes overwhelming. Social interaction becomes stressful instead of inviting. In other words, what looks like "behavior" is often a nervous system adaptation. So What Do We Do? At Divine Spark Family Wellness, we don’t start by trying to change the child. We start by restoring balance to the nervous system. This is not about forcing change; it’s about inviting the body back into safety, flow, and connection. We use gentle, targeted input to help the nervous system unwind stored stress and move out of chronic protection mode. As coherence is restored, the body begins to heal. And what follows is often profound: Kids begin to make more eye contact, speak more fluidly, or connect emotionally for the first time. Sleep improves. Digestion and immune resilience get stronger. Therapies become more effective because the brain is finally able to integrate new information. We’ve seen it too many times to ignore: when the nervous system finds safety, everything else starts to change. Why the ANS Must Come First You can have the best specialists, therapists, supplements, or diets in the world, but if the nervous system is still stuck in fight-or-flight, you’re building on a shaky foundation. This is why our focus is not to chase symptoms but to go straight to the root. To restore regulation, not suppress behavior. To bring the body out of survival and into safety, so that your child can grow, connect, and thrive. You Are Not Alone. If your child is struggling and you feel like no one is seeing the whole picture, we want you to know: we see it. We see your child. We see the brilliance behind the behavior. And we know that transformation is possible when we work with the nervous system, not against it. If you’re ready to go deeper, to work from the ground up instead of the surface down, we’re here. Let’s begin at the foundation. Because every child deserves to feel safe in their body. And when they do, everything changes. -Dr. Lee Horine