Bright Minds at LNC

10/31/2025

10/04/2025

🔸October is ADHD Awareness Month🔸
Being a mom to a neurodivergent boy is a love story mixed with challenges most people will never see. It’s holding your child through meltdowns that don’t make sense to anyone else, answering judgmental stares in the grocery store with a smile you don’t really feel, and fighting battles at school to make sure your child is seen, heard, and supported.

It’s the quiet tears after a hard day, the guilt that creeps in when you wonder if you did enough, and the exhaustion of constantly explaining your child to a world that doesn’t always want to understand him.

But it’s also the pride that swells when he finally masters something he’s been working so hard on, the laughter that bubbles up when his imagination runs wild, and the awe of watching him thrive in his own unique way.

There are hardships, yes. Ones that only another mom walking this same path could truly know. But there’s also a love so fierce it makes every fight worth it.

To my ADHD boy: the world may not always make space for you, but I will. I’ll always be your biggest advocate, your safe place, and the one who knows just how extraordinary you are.

And this ADHD Awareness Month, I share our story not just for you, but for every child who deserves to be understood, celebrated, and loved exactly as they are.

10/02/2025

10/02/2025

By overreacting to your child's small mistakes,
you are not just teaching them to fear your anger.
You are teaching them that lying is a necessary
and intelligent survival skill in their own home.

A glass of juice spills. A crayon mark appears on the wall.
A small, clumsy, perfectly normal childlike mistake occurs.
Your reaction is a level 10, when the mistake was a level 2.
Your anger is not about the juice; it's about your own stress.

Your child, in that moment, learns a simple, powerful equation:
Mistake + Truth = Loud Noises and Unpredictable Anger.
They quickly deduce that to make themselves safe,
they must remove the "Truth" part of that equation.

The hard reality is this:
Lying, in this context, is not a moral failure on their part.
It is a logical and intelligent adaptation
to an environment you have accidentally made unsafe for the truth.

This is how you create a person who hides their problems.
An adult who is terrified to admit a mistake at work or in a relationship.
They learn that a carefully constructed lie is always safer
than the messy, unpredictable fallout of telling the truth.

Match your reaction to the mistake, not to your own stress level.
When a small mistake happens, meet it with a small, calm reaction.
Create a home where the truth is always safe to land,
even when it is clumsy, inconvenient, and messy.

Author: Arsalan Moin

09/27/2025

Neuroscience has officially proven that a father’s roughhousing style of play is actually crucial for a child’s brain and development. Those games of “chase”, wrestling or tossing your child into the air are actually improving your child’s cognitive flexibility, emotional regulation and social intelligence.

The physical exertion and excitement of roughhousing triggers the release of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). This protein acts like a “Miracle-Gro” for the brain, stimulating neuron growth in areas responsible for memory, logic and language.

A 2022 study on father-child rough-and-tumble play found that the frequency and quality of this interaction were positively linked to a child’s working memory. Working memory is a key component of executive function and is crucial for academic success.

By exposing children to unpredictable scenarios in a safe environment, roughhousing “rewires” their brains. This increases the connections between neurons in the cerebral cortex, improving a child’s ability to cope with unexpected obstacles and developing resilience.

Roughhousing with a larger, stronger adult also requires a child to learn self control. They learn to modulate their physical strength and how to respond appropriately when things get too rough. Dads can teach this by holding back their own strength and showing the child what is and is not okay.

The intense but joyful emotions involved in rough play provide a safe “training ground” for the child’s nervous system. They can experience high-arousal states and then practice calming down, which helps balance their stress response system. The fun and laughter help relieve anxiety and stress.

Also, during roughhousing, children learn to read and respond to social cues like facial expressions and body language. They learn to take turns, negotiate, and understand when another’s persons fun has turned into discomfort. This builds empathy and social competence.

Children who regularly engage in high-quality, safe roughhousing with their fathers tend to be less physically aggressive with peers by learning to distinguish between playful, cooperative contact and real aggression.

PMID: 35883947, 19431190

09/23/2025

Studies have revealed that learning to play an instrument as an adult can reduce your risk of dementia by a whopping 64%!

Learning music increases the brain’s ability to form new neural connections and reorganize existing ones, a property known as plasticity. It has been shown to increase gray matter volume in areas linked to high-level cognitive function.

The complex demands of playing an instrument improve various cognitive abilities, including memory, processing speed, verbal fluency, and attention.

Learning to play an instrument also develops cognitive reserve which refers to the brain’s ability to tolerate and compensate for changes caused by aging or disease. Engaging in music enriches this reserve allowing the brain to remain functional for longer despite potential brain changes.

Playing an instrument also engages a unique combination of sensory and motor systems. This multisensory, multicoordinate activity effectively exercises multiple brain regions simultaneously.

Music practice can also help reduce stress, anxiety and depression, which are all associated with increased dementia risk.

By keeping the brain actively engaged through the above mechanisms, learning to play an instrument is an incredible holistic way to significantly reduce your dementia risk!

PMID: 25544932