Now that we’re getting close to the end of the school year, I anticipate receiving the calls I usually get in late spring from parents who are planning ahead and trying to squeeze in neurofeedback training for their student over the summer, before school starts again in the fall. This makes it a good time to explain the timing of how I practice neurofeedback.
The usual format is twice weekly training sessions that start with whatever number of minutes the trainee can tolerate and work up to an hour-long session that includes about 40 minutes of brain training. This is because with once a week sessions, it often takes too long to start seeing results, and with more sessions, it gets difficult to schedule them into busy lives. For those who I think would benefit from jump-starting their success and who can manage it, I suggest three sessions a week for the first several weeks, then scale back into twice weekly sessions. Regardless of how the training regime is customized, however, a regular training program includes days that are not back-to-back, so that the results of training can be spread out better.
Some people don’t like this evenly spaced program and want a more intense training program. Fortunately, it IS possible to accelerate results if one is in a hurry or has a deadline to meet. For example, I have on more than one occasion conducted 90-minute training sessions twice a day, five days in a row, for two or three weeks. I also know trainers who have had people fly in from out-of-state to conduct accelerated training programs like this—generally because no trainers are available in their geographic area. Condensed training programs are often quite tiring for the trainee, and it requires clearing one’s schedule to the point of perhaps taking a vacation from work to do training, but it has been effective in my experience and satisfying for the person who needs to get it done asap.
The flip side of this is the person who is seeking to do fewer sessions than the norm. Often, this is someone who has read claims online that a full course of neurofeedback can be conducted in six or eight sessions and is therefore suspicious of anyone who conducts more sessions. I will not agree to work with someone fewer than 20 sessions. This is because although I have in the past had trainees who achieved their results and had them stick in as few as 25 sessions, their rapid success has not been the norm. Often, someone who achieves results rapidly is someone who is integrating multiple self-improvement or healing modalities at once. The last person who finished in 25 sessions was someone who was simultaneously switching to a clean eating diet and receiving both acupuncture and chiropractic care at the same time as doing neurofeedback. It was a lot of work for that person, but in the end it was a cost saving and speedy way to get to a point of living better and feeling better. Such individuals are my favorite clients, but they are uncommon.
If you’re interested in getting started with neurofeedback, give me a call, and we can discuss what timing works best for you and your situation.