What I Wished For

You know that old saying, "Be careful what you wish for because you just might get it," Well I stated in my last post that I couldn't wait for February to get here so that we could meet with the developmental pediatrician at the Riley Clinic. Well, late yesterday afternoon we got a call from the clinic to say that there was a cancellation and would we like to come in early. Of course! Early, however, meant tomorrow! Yikes! My paperwork wasn't all filled out. I hadn't compiled a collection of videos of Hannah displaying the behaviors of concern. I didn't have any videos of her at school. AND worst of all, I had NO videos of a serious meltdown. I know, I know, I should have been compiling these all along and there should be plenty of videos if the behavior is abundant enough. . . . but you see I don't want to video Hannah doing stuff just to video tape her and I certainly can't command meltdowns on cue. Who wants to sit and tape their child having a meltdown anyway? Besides, there are much more important things to do during a meltdown like making sure she's safe, others are safe, and seeing if she might be coming out of it. So, we will be going in tomorrow sans meltdown video and with a crude assortment of videos I was able to dredge up that highlight some of the behaviors we worry about and I hope that my descriptions of the rest will be sufficient for now.

As for other updates, Hannah was being quite a stinker the other day at the dinner table and was playing around with her food instead of eating and then shoving entire chicken nuggets in her mouth and screeching. I warned, threatened, even came close to bribing her to chew her food and not to talk with her mouth full because she could choke. And then it happened. The screeching abruptly ceased, her eyes popped wide open and her mouth moved noiselessly. My heart stopped for the briefest of seconds, but before I could even jump from my seat she turned red faced and began to cough. The nugget shot out across the table and Hannah stared at me unphased as if nothing had happened and continued her babble while I sat unable to breathe, think, or speak. Once I recovered I of course lectured her about talking with her mouth full and how she had just choked on her food and that would not have happened if she had waited to talk until she was done chewing. All the while I'm lecturing, Hannah has begun to eat finally and is repeatedly assuring me that "When I'm done with my chicken I will talk," even as she is currently chewing and talking at the same time. We battled the entire rest of the meal over this. Not once did she stop talking and chewing, nor did she stop informing me that she would talk once she was done eating! UGH!

Hannah has become really interested in coloring inside the lines lately and is quite perfectionistic about it. She will carefully move her crayon back and forth to fill in all the white space, but still lacks some of the control to be completely precise. When she moves her hand just a little too far or too fast and the color shoots outside of the lines she will say, "Uh oh, uh oh, uh oh, uh oh" over and over again until I am able to reassure her that it really is ok. This type of perfectionism seems to be everywhere these days. If she gets stuck while saying the Lord's Prayer she will become really upset after trying once or twice to get past a tricky spot and say, "I don't know the words, I don't know the words, I can't say it." It doesn't matter that no one told her to say it, that she was just reciting it on her own in her car seat. If she can't remember it then the world might just as well be ending. The same thing happens with her phone number. We hadn't practiced it for months and then the other day she randomly decided she was going to say it and starting reciting the numbers over and over, but kept getting stuck at the same part. She eventually became so angry that she started hitting herself in the head!

Hannah has been quite interested in stoplights for the past month or so. She can be quite the little backseat driver too! It doesn't matter if the other cars ahead of us aren't moving yet, green means go and we should be going! She'd fit right in in NY City! She knows that green means go and red means stop and what the turn arrows mean. This week she asked for the first time about the yellow light. I briefly explained it to her and then she was on to another subject. Tonight we were driving home from therapy and it was already dark out. We came up a hill and there was a sign with a yellow flashing light cautioning that there was a stoplight just over the top of the hill. Hannah called to me from the backseat, "What's that yellow light mean, Mommy?" I told her it was a warning about the stoplight coming up. She said, "Does it mean slow down." I had to think about it a bit and then decided that yes it did mean slow down. So, I rephrased my answer and said that yellow lights mean slow down or warning. Then she saw a car ahead of us turn on it's turn signal. It flashed bright yellow. She asked, "What does that yellow light mean, Mommy? Does it mean slow down or warning?" She'd caught me again. "That light means that the car is going to turn right. It's called a turn signal." She still needed clarifying, "A turn signal means slow down or does it mean warning?" I said, "I guess it means both. It means warning, I'm about to turn. You should slow down so that you don't hit me." Like lightning she was on to the next question, she'd seen brake lights go on. "Do those red lights on the car mean stop?" "They tell us that that car is stopping and we might have to stop too so that we don't hit them," I said. The car then let off it's brakes and started to speed up. "Where are the car's green go lights?" she inquired. That did it, I was stumped. How can you refute such logic? If cars have red stop lights and yellow slow lights, why then DON'T they have green go lights too? She waited patiently for me to answer as I stalled trying to think of a decent response. Thankfully an interesting song came on the radio and I was saved the embarrassment of being out thunk by a toddler. Why hadn't I ever stopped to consider why cars don't have green go lights. Sometimes her ability to reason so adult like astounds me. It makes the tantrums and normal illogical moments of toddlerhood that occasionally sneak into my days seem so out of place. Can you believe she only turned 2 1/2 years old today?!? Seriously what little 2 1/2 year old girl even gives a hoot about the similarities and differences between traffic lights and vehicle lights? Only my little girl, only my little girl. I'm so proud of her. Happy Half Birthday Hannah!

When 2 Year Olds Dress Themselves

Here's the outfit Hannah insisted on wearing the other day. I managed to get if off of her when it was time to go out and run some errands, but she was pretty adamant about wearing it around the house all day. Notice that the colors "match" as Hannah logically pointed out to me. They also are "like the American Flag" which she also informed me about.

You gotta love the ruffles on the butt of the ladybug swimsuit though. How cute is that? Oddly enough, I had a similar swimsuit as a child although it didn't have cool lady bugs on it and I wasn't nearly as cute in it. Wanna see?

Routines

Hannah has always been one to love routines. I love them too so I can totally understand where she comes from, but sometimes her love of routines can cause her undue stress. For example, one of her current most endearing routines is the final segment of her bedtime routine. After being tucked in and kissed good night Hannah MUST say and the adult putting her to bed MUST repeat (or hysterics are involved) the following sequence as sort of a call and response as we are walking out the door.

H: I love you

M or D: I love you

H: Sweet dreams

M or D: Sweet dreams

H: Bye

M or D: Bye

H: Goodnight

M or D: Goodnight

This sequence used to be repeated over and over again multiple times until it was timed just perfectly to slip out the door and lock it before she could start it again. There were times I must have said it 10 times through or more. If we stopped in the middle or tried to tell her we weren't going to say it anymore OR if we didn't hear her start the sequence again as we were shutting the door then she would scream hysterically something to the order of "I need sweet dreams Mommy." or whatever portion we failed to repeat. Ignoring the hysterics were no use and one just had to suck it up and go back in there and finish up the sequence. At first I thought she was using it as a stalling technique since she is a MASTER at stalling, especially before bedtime, but as time went on I realized that it was a comfort routine for her that helped her settle down to sleep. Still there came a point where comfort or not, eventually I could take it no longer. I sat her down about an hour prior to nap time one day and told her we were only going to say I love you, sweet dreams, bye, goodnight one time and then we were going to leave. I reminded her of this fact as we were getting ready for her nap and then again just as the sequence was about to start. After the end of the sequence that nap she asked, "One time?" and I replied, "Just one time." and that was the end of that. She lay down and went to sleep. I congratulated myself for my brilliance and wondered why I hadn't done this sooner, after all Hannah is a smart girl and can often be reasoned with if she's not already on the path towards a meltdown. At bedtime that same night I reminded Hannah about the new one time rule and then went on about her bedtime routine. When we got to the final goodnight she again questioned, "One time?" Again I answered, "Just one time." Just as I was about to shut the door she said, "All done?" and I replied, "All done," and quickly shut the door. From that day on, "one time?" and "all done" became added to the nightly goodnight sequence, but so far the cycle has stopped there. Hopefully I have not replaced one monster with another that will cause this sequence to grow in length continually instead of merely repeating itself, but right now we are holding steady. So, I choose to continue to think my one time rule was brilliant and can fully enjoy a sweet goodnight exchange with my daughter.

Speaking of comfort, Hannah has been having a lot of anxiety lately and has been really leaning heavily on any sort of comfort she can find and has developed some new "techniques" I'll call them to bring herself comfort. The first one is sleeping with the light on. Every night or nap time we turn out her light after her story. She then lays down for us to sing her a song. After the song she says, "I can turn the light on if I want to?" She waits until we are done with her routine and we are out of the room and then she gets out of bed and turns her light back on. I don't think she's scared of the dark. She could be, but she hasn't verbalized any fear about the darkness or monsters or anything. So, I just think it's a comfort thing. She likes her light on and it's comforting for her to have control over turning it on. Another comfort thing she's developed is constantly asking questions she already knows the answer to to get reassurance. For example, lately she's been a bit shy about big dogs. I'm not sure what sparked this hesitation, but it's there. Whenever we are going somewhere where she knows there will be a dog she says where she wants the dog to be in the form of a question. Here's an example, "Finn will be in the barn?" or "Sidney will be outside?" She knows that most likely those dogs WON'T be where she says they will be and seems to just be looking for reassurance that she needs to prepare herself for the dog and that she'll be ok.

I don't think I posted earlier on Hannah's Halloween experience. This year we were invited to go trick or treating with some friends of ours. Last year we didn't take Hannah trick or treating. She just dressed up in her costume and helped pass out candy. We also went this year to the Halloween open house that the gym where Hannah has gymnastics at had. They had several obstacle courses set up for the kids and the gym was all decorated for Halloween. It was a blast and Hannah didn't want to leave to go trick or treating when it was time to go! I was worried about how she would do trick or treating. I thought the other kids in costume might scare her or going up and talking to all those strangers would freak her out, but she did great! She was a little shy, but by the end of the night she was boldly walking up to houses alone and saying trick or treat and even remembering to say thank you! I was so proud of my little girl!

The Terrible Twos

OH MY GOSH! Where are the aliens that snatched my daughter?!?! The past few weeks have been especially rough in our house. Hannah is fully ensconced in the terrible twos and I'm about ready for a nervous breakdown. To make matters worse, Kyle leaves for a week long business trip on Monday. Pray for me that the aliens will return my daughter quickly!

Toddlers are defiant. They are independent. They push the limits. They have tantrums. Hannah apparently knows what is expected of her because she has been displaying all of these behaviors in massive quantities the past few weeks. Yesterday and today were the worst. I have basically spent 48 hours of continuous tantrum/sensory meltdown. It has been absolutely insane. Hannah will be defiant and get in trouble. Then she'll have a tantrum because she is in trouble. Then the tantrum escalates and gets so out of hand that she basically throws herself into sensory overload. At this point the discipline has ceased to be effective AND it is no longer possible to reason with her or even bring her out of the meltdown. This morning, what started as basic toddler defiance-refusing to get dressed because she wanted to play instead- ended up in a 45 minute meltdown that seriously altered the fun outing we had planned for the day and eventually spawned several more tantrums turned meltdowns as the morning drew on.

Not only am I having a rough time of all of this, but Hannah is suffering too. She's so anxiety stricken that she's gnawed her thumbs and sides of her hands raw. I had just got the bad spots on her thumbs cleared up and now in the space of only 2 days one of them is bleeding again and she has teeth marks all over the other hand. I've been redirecting her as much as possible, but they are her hands and I'm not with her every single minute. Usually this chewing is reserved for socially stressful situations, but lately we've been seeing it at home too. This worries me.

I took Hannah to the doctor on Wednesday for a check on how she's doing with therapy and to take a look at her feet. His response to her feet was, "Holy Cow! She over pronates like crazy." He agreed with us that she runs funny-that's a technical term by the way :) He said it's possible that she "could" grow out of it since she's still developing, but that it's unlikely. He said he recommended that we take her to a pediatric orthopedic specialist to determine if it's severe enough to need treatment with orthotics or braces at her age to prevent future problems as she grows and matures or if we can just wait and see what happens. He didn't feel he was qualified to make that call. He was also concerned about some of her anxiety and her lack of progress in dealing with others emotions. He's referring us to a developmental pediatrician at the Riley Developmental Clinic (for those of you out of state, it's the state's premier children's hospital) for a consultation and some testing. Apparently it takes FOREVER to get an appointment. We don't have our date yet, but I'm sure it will be at least several months before we get in. If they can help then it'll be worth the wait though.

She's Only Two

She's only two (or one, or 10 months, or 6 months, or whatever age Hannah happens to be now or in the future). I know people mean well. I know they want me to not worry about Hannah. I know they think there really isn't anything to worry about. . . . . BUT those words drive me crazy. They drive me crazy because although I know most people mean well, I also know that they just don't get it, get what it's like to parent a child with Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD) and Hyperlexia, and many of them have no desire to even try to get it. If they did, they would never say, "Don't worry. She's only two. She'll grow out of it." October is SPD Awareness month and many of the blogs I frequent of families raising kids with SPD and/or hyperlexia have chosen to write a bit on their personal experiences with SPD. I decided to rip off their idea and speak candidly and bluntly about what a day in the life of the Spontaks looks like. Some days are better than the day I will describe and others are much much more difficult, but this is fairly typical of what we do on a daily basis.

7:00am I let Hannah out of her room. She's been reading books to herself for probably an hour or so already and I can't justify making her stay in her room any longer! We choose clothes to wear and head to the bathroom where the fun begins. She goes potty and then it's time to brush her hair and teeth and wash her face. Hannah immediately chomps down on the toothbrush and refuses to let go of it or she sucks all the toothpaste off the brush. I get in a few brushes somehow in between her refusals to open her mouth and let me put the toothbrush in and her holding the toothbrush hostage between her teeth. When it's time to rinse her mouth out Hannah holds the water in her mouth and refuses to spit it out. She then tries to jump off her stool (she's a huge sensory seeker!) and ends up spitting water all over her clothes or the floor. Meltdowns occur if her clothes get wet (wet clothes are a no no) or a tantrum occurs if the water goes all over the floor and then she slips and falls on the wet linoleum! If I'm lucky we get through this stage with no major sensory meltdowns or toddler temper tantrums, but that usually doesn't happen. Next we move on to washing her face. Hannah HATES to have her face washed although she has learned to tolerate it. We usually get through this ok, but it puts her on edge. Next comes brushing her hair. If we make it through the brushing and putting in the ponytail without a major meltdown the morning is a success. Feeding the dogs and cats is next on her list of must dos for the morning. She absolutely cannot resist splashing in the dog and cat waters and then promptly sticking her hand inside the food and swishing it around so that bits of gritty pet food dust stick all over her fingers. Playing in the pet food is almost an obsession for her. She gets so much needed sensory input from it that she just can't resist how it feels. We try to replace this undesirable outlet with more acceptable ones such as rice and bean play, but the pull for immediate sensory gratification is strong in the morning and I usually lose that battle. Next comes breakfast. By this point Hannah needs to do some heavy work or get some proprioceptive input, but she is also starving. I must make a judgement call as to which type of need I'm going to fulfill first and risk either a sensory meltdown or toddler tantrum because the other need goes unmet. It's a Catch 22 really and I almost never win. Usually we have at least one meltdown or tantrum during this phase of the morning. If I choose sensory first then I try to get Hannah to either jump on her trampoline or bounce her on her exercise ball. Then I smoosh her with the ball while she lays on the floor and round the early morning portion of the sensory diet off with some vigorous swinging between mommy's legs. Now on to breakfast. Hannah eats her breakfast and then at some point during the meal decides she's going to hold milk in her mouth and refuse to swallow. This is a result of her oral sensory needs and it drives me nuts! It's so dangerous because she often times ends up choking and sputtering once the food or drink does go down as she tries to do something else like jump off her chair. What starts out as a sensory issue usually turns into an obedience/power struggle as I try to make her swallow. She almost always ends up in time out (thus beginning the discipline ladder) from these struggles.

We progress through the discipline ladder and hopefully we don't make it to a reminder (AKA a spanking), but often times it goes that far or farther. Once we are able to move on from that and finish breakfast (preferably without any further food or drink holding and no more discipline) we start our day. 3 days out of the week we have places to head right away. Tuesdays and Thursdays it's preschool and on Wednesdays it's gymnastics. Right before leaving we do a sensory tune up in preparation for being in a group of kids. This is a HUGE challenge for Hannah and the reason we even found out that she had sensory problems to begin with. We usually either play play dough or with some dried rice or beans for 10 minutes or so and then top it off with some heavy work/vestibular stimulation in the form of crashing onto a bean bag, jumping on the trampoline (or a bed) or Hannah's personal favorite-swinging on her swing set. Now that Hannah's sensory diet is firmly in place we have really been able to reduce Hannah's social anxieties and she is able to function almost like a neurotypical peer (albeit a very shy one, but still fairly age appropriate behavior). We've found that if we do an activity off of her sensory diet about 15 minutes before we ask her to do something stressful such as interact with other kids or be in a loud crowded place she can cope pretty well. We've also found that her sensory activity seems to have a therapeutic life of about 1 hour, 1 1/2 hours if we are lucky, before she needs something else off of her diet to keep her functioning well in a stressful situation. On the way to Hannah's social engagements she chews on her chewy toy to relax and satisfy her oral stimulation needs and hopefully reduce the tendency she has to chew on clothing, hair, or whatever she can get her hands on when she gets nervous. At both gymnastics and preschool she does very well as far as not having sensory meltdowns since both places are chock full of activities that play right into her sensory deficits. Still, being in those situations are still stressful for her and it really shows once she nears the end of the class or immediately after they are over. She is typically so exhausted from "keeping it together" that the slightest thing can send her into either a meltdown or toddler tantrum. Something as simple as having difficulty getting her sock on can push her right over the edge. Normally she can handle a mild level of frustration fairly well, but not immediately after a social encounter.

Next it's home we go for lunch. On Thursdays Hannah's friend Addie comes over for a few hours (I pick them both up from preschool) to play. Hannah interacts quite well with Addie and the two of them will actually play together, but Addie sometimes has trouble respecting Hannah's need for space and this can cause lots of hurt feelings and frequent meltdowns when they play right after preschool and Hannah is already on edge. I pick the girls up from school and instruct them to hold hands as we head into the parking lot. This is not something Hannah enjoys (Addie would hold Hannah's hand all day if she'd let her!), but I can't have them going in opposite directions in a crowded parking lot full of parents picking up toddlers and I need one hand free to carry all of their paraphernalia. After much cajoling, Hannah eventually agrees to hold Addie's hand and we make out way out of the building. At some point along our very short walk Addie squeezes too tightly on Hannah's hand or pulls her arm and Hannah throws herself to the ground screaming. Addie, the sweet thing she is, tries to comfort her by patting her arm or trying to hug her or getting up in her face to ask, "Hannah, what's wrong." This only makes the situation worse as there is an increase in physical contact and a personal space breach. I pick Hannah up and either squeeze her tightly and rock her vigorously back and forth or swing her between my legs until she is able to calm down and then we continue along our way. Things run fairly smoothly until lunch is served. Hannah insists on either taking too big of bites of her food or shoving bite after bite into her mouth until her cheeks are puffed up like a chipmunk and there is too much in her mouth to swallow or even to chew. Thus begins the mealtime battle only with the added dimension of another 2 year old watching and who needs watched! After we survive lunch, the girls typically go outside to play if it's nice. I swing Hannah and often Addie too on the swings or the hammock for 15-20 minutes and then force Hannah to go off and play with Addie by herself. Hannah's getting better and better at this and the girls usually do just fine as long as I keep a close eye on them to prevent anything that I know could possibly trigger a meltdown for Hannah. With two 2-year-olds running around like crazy someone is destined to fall down, bump their head, or mildly hurt themselves in some other way. If that someone is Addie (or me) then we experience one of the oddest parts about Hannah's sensory problems. For some reason (we have been told by her DT that this is common in kids with sensory problems) Hannah has a hard time processing and dealing with the strong negative emotions of others. So, if Addie falls down and starts to cry then Hannah will run screaming like a samurai warrior towards me (and just recently Addie unfortunately) with her arm flailing and her feet kicking and attempt to pummel me while sobbing hysterically. Now I have two crying children, one who might be hurt and another who is totally freaking out and attempting to hit and/or kick both me and the "patient." In the midst of this chaos I have to determine if the "patient" is ok while fending off blows from Hannah/shielding the patient from said blows, comfort the patient, and attempt to calm Hannah down. Typically I just have to let her go until I can get Addie (or whoever else is crying) taken care of and then I can attend to Hannah. Really the only thing that works to stop this kind of rampage is to grab Hannah, pin her arms to her sides, squeeze her tightly and either rock her back and forth hard or pat her back firmly until she exhausts herself and relaxes whimpering on our shoulder. :( I'd say this scenario plays itself out at least once if not more times each play date. Luckily Addie is an extremely forgiving child and loves Hannah dearly so even if Addie inadvertently takes the brunt of Hannah's rampage the two of them can continue playing once Hannah has had the appropriate amount of time to recover and done some extra sensory activities. 1:00 (or 2:00 if it's a Thursday) is nap time. Naptime is a struggle in our house and no one looks forward to it, but it's a necessity and so we persevere. Naptime routine consists of potty time, prayers, 3 books, and a song. I turn on her white noise, then Hannah must be covered with multiple heavy blankets (we are working on getting a weighted blanket to try to solve this particular problem) and tucked in so tightly she can barely move. If all goes well and she is exhausted enough she might go to sleep. It seems like we have runs where we might have several days or even a week of good naps, but they are not the norm. Each time we get our hopes up that maybe, just maybe we've found the magic solution we are sadly mistaken! Normally Hannah begins to scream as soon as the door is closed that she wants to snuggle in her chair (she has a rocking chair in her room). She is immediately bawling and banging on the door. As heartless as I feel, I simply wait and listen to be sure she doesn't hurt herself. Next I hear Hannah getting her books out and taking them over to her chair. She then sits in her chair and reads to herself to calm down, while rocking herself to sleep. This process usually lasts about a half hour to an hour although often she never does fall asleep. For those of you reading this and thinking, "Boy, does she need to do some sleep training on that kid." I assure you that we have read every book and tried every method of sleep training out there over the past two years, all to no avail. Hannah simply has sleep issues that go beyond the realm of typically toddlers and a typical solution just will not work. We've learned that sleep difficulties are often typical in kids with SPD and we have a few new things that we can try now that will hopefully be able to help Hannah. We're planning on starting with the weighted blanket as soon as my mom finishes making it and if that doesn't help then we'll try other more drastic measures such as a moving bed or even a vibrating mattress pad. While on vacation Hannah slept extremely well-much better than she does at home which is not the norm when we are in an unfamiliar place. We believe it was because of the movement of the ship which makes me think that we may eventually have to end up going to some sort of movement in her bed, but time will tell. Hopefully this new blanket will be just the ticket. If Hannah does indeed sleep, she does not wake up well most days. Sometimes she is even crankier than when she went to bed which tells me that even though she did sleep, she did not sleep well. This is something I relate well too since I never awake rested even after a full night of sleep. Once she is awake I have another difficult call to make. Do I do a sensory activity, take her to the bathroom, or get her a snack. Another Catch 22. She needs to go to the bathroom after holding it from her nap, BUT she is also hungry which makes her crabby just like a typical toddler, AND the effects of her last sensory activity have long since worn off which leaves us vulnerable to problems on the toilet-usually in the form of the sensory seeking behavior of hitting or kicking me. No choice produces good results. If I pick snack first we get sensory seeking behavior in the form of hitting or hording food in her mouth and possibly an accident because she hasn't peed in a long time which freaks her out because she hates the feeling of being wet. If I pick a sensory activity she often does not want ot comply because she's crabby from hunger and ends up being defiant which lands her in a time out which then results in an accident and more freak outs from wet pants. If I choose toileting first then there are the above mentioned problems from being hungry and the sensory seeking behavior. Usually I pick going to the potty first so I don't have to do more laundry and clean up a mess. We get through the post nap routine and then start up with more sensory activities: finger painting, bouncing on her hop ball, playing with shaving cream, etc. The rest of the afternoon I try to fit in free play, chores (I save anything with heavy work like laundry that Hannah can do for when she can help me to try to do double duty with my time), story time, studying her bible verses, and the "academic" activities that Hannah craves such as practicing writing, reading, and adding. Often it seems like there is not enough time in the day to do anything other than heavy work and other sensory activities and manage meltdowns.

At 5:00pm we eat dinner. By this time Hannah is pretty much done for. She's tired (mentally and physically), hungry, and just plain frustrated at the world. The hours between 4 and 7pm are her typical witching hour which I've heard is pretty typical for a toddler. Dinner is usually a repeat of either breakfast or lunch, but at least Kyle is usually here to help me and give me a break if it's been an especially hard day. From dinner on the rest of the night is mostly spent in survival mode--for me anyway. Hannah will often respond better to Kyle during this period since she hasn't seen him all day (although not always) so he tries to play with her some if he can to give me a bit of a break. We'd love to do something fun as family after dinner, but usually that doesn't work out well for us because Hannah is too strung out to handle it and the activity often ends badly.

Every other night is bath night. Despite not liking wet clothes, Hannah LOVES baths. She gets so much stimulation from splashing in the water (as long as it doesn't get in her eyes), and feeling the bubble bath, but I've grown to dread bath time because it often turns into a battle. Lately it's been over drinking the bath water/holding it in her mouth or licking the soap/shampoo. After bath comes a massage which Hannah also loves, but these too can become battles because Hannah really loves to feel the lotion which I am ok with, but then she attempts to lick it off of her hand which I am NOT ok with. After those two battles the rest of the bed time routine consisting of jammies, snack, teeth brushing, prayers, books and song go about as well as you could imagine. We usually close her door somewhere between 7 and 7:30pm and pray that she doesn't scream (or at least not very long).

Don't get me wrong, my days aren't awful. My little girl is a joy to be around. I love her very much and we have a lot of fun together. I can't even begin to imagine not being home with her every day. BUT they are exhausting and take A LOT of planning. The amount of work and thought that has to go into just leaving the house for a short errand is crazy, but the benefits definitely out weigh the hassles. Not every day is like the one I described. Some days are great and I begin to wonder if maybe just maybe she's outgrowing her difficulties (even though I know she isn't). Other days are much much worse. Some days consist of one long meltdown. You just never know what you are going to get, but with therapy we are finding that we have more and more of the good days than the bad and that the bads are less bad than they used to be.

One thing that I think others don't also get that I wish they did is that the effort that goes into helping Hannah succeed and making it so that the untrained eye doesn't notice much of a difference between Hannah and other two year olds is staggering. But it is worth it. If we work hard enough when no one is looking then it can appear that we aren't doing anything at all and that in itself is reward enough.

If you are curious to learn more about SPD, here are links to several of the blogs that I follow that have posted about SPD reccently. These moms are so much more knowledgable about SPD than I am and are much further into the trenches with it than we are yet. I go to them when I have questions or just need to feel like there are others out there struggling with the same issues we do since I haven't met anyone face to face who has a child who struggles with the same issues that Hannah does. They are good reads. Enjoy!

http://goodfountain.wordpress.com/

http://ourlittletongginator.blogspot.com/2008/10/spd-and-adopted-child.html

http://pancakesgoneawry.blogspot.com/2008/10/sensory-processing-disorder.html Start with the October 3rd post and read to the current one. She's written lots of good posts.

http://threechannels.com/?p=387

PS. I've finally posted some pics of Hannah from our vacation from back in the beginning of September. For those of you who are wondering, yes that really is a macaw in Hannah's stroller. It gave us quite a fright when it walked up to us as we were showering off the ocean salt at an outdoor shower and then climbed right up into the stroller! We had no idea what to do! Clearly they didn't go over the protocol for removing a wild tropical bird from your stroller on the cruise ship excursion talk! We learned later (long after it had tired of the stroller and moved on voluntarily) that it was the resort pet and was known to have an odd affinity for strollers.

The Power of the Sensory Diet

In my last post I mentioned that I was having some pretty bad back pain. Well, it ended up being because my SI joint (sacro-illio joint AKA my pelvis) was out of whack. It's something that often happens to pregnant women (no I am not pregnant), but can happen for other reasons as well. I ended up seeing a physical therapist who put the joint back into place and taught me some exercises to help keep it there. Alas my joint decided not to cooperate and came out several times in the two weeks leading up to our vacation. Eventually the PT taught Kyle how to tell it was out (as if I couldn't tell by the pain!) and what side to treat and then how to put the joint back in place. I managed to have a great vacation with my joint firmly in place the entire time thanks to Kyle putting it back into place the night before we left for our cruise. Ok, so this really does relate to Hannah's sensory diet. It's just taking me awhile to get there. Anyway, it's extremely painful so I didn't do a whole lot the weeks leading up to our vacation and I had tons to do the last few days before we left. The plan was to take Hannah over to Evelyn's house the Friday before we left and Kyle and I would finish any last minute stuff we had to do. Well, there was A LOT of last minute stuff to do and I spent that entire day doing stuff and Hannah's sensory diet was left unmet (that's putting it nicely). We did pretty much NOTHING off of her diet. I warned Sarah that her sensory needs hadn't been met when I dropped her off at their house that afternoon and I knew that things might be a little rough, but I guess I had forgotten what life was like BEFORE the sensory diet entered our lives. I just didn't realize exactly how much it was helping Hannah. Now we know. We have definite confirmation that therapy is working and a HUGE incentive to keep up with the program. Poor Sarah, Jason, and Evelyn (and Hannah too) paid the price for us learning that lesson. Hannah had several serious meltdowns (not your typical toddler tantrum, but a sensory meltdown) where neither Sarah nor Jason could even touch or speak to her for a long period of time. Sarah, being the wonderful friend that she is, had listened closely to all my jabbering about Hannah's therapy and the techniques we were learning to bring her out of and head off meltdown so she fortunately knew the right things to do and was able to bring Hannah out of it and fend off another meltdown for significant periods of time throughout the night. I shudder to think if this had been preschool, Sunday school, or just some random babysitter. My little girl was treated with compassion and respect and given the tools she needed to recover instead of disciplined for something she could not control. Another thing we learned from this ordeal is that Hannah is beginning to realize when she is uncomfortable (often before she's too far along the meltdown ladder) and starting to self regulate. This is WONDERFUL news and the entire point of therapy. The goal is that by the time she reaches elementary school she will be able to keep her self regulated by doing items off her sensory diet independently while she is at school both before and while she is noticing that she is getting overwhelmed. Maybe, just maybe, this will be a reachable goal.

Also at therapy we found out that Hannah has very flat feet and over pronates. Her DT has recommended that she be evaluated by a physical therapist to see if we need to take her to a podiatrist. This is apparently part of the reason why Hannah runs so funny. Hannah's therapist also recommended that Hannah get a weighted blanket to help with her sleep issues. Mom is attempting to make one for her since they are very expensive to buy and not nearly as expensive to buy the stuff to make one. Hopefully she will be successful. If not, we'll just have to buy one because we are willing to do whatever it takes to get Hannah's sleep problems straightened out since they've been such a struggle for a very long time.

Preschool seems to be going well. Hannah knows pretty much all the kids in her class now. She has shown some parallel play at times, well at least she has gone over and played at the same activity table as another child which is a big step for her. Some days Hannah doesn't want to talk about school at all and answers every question we ask her about what she did with "I don't know." Then on other days I get the play by play version of all the preschool drama. She tells me who hit who, who cried, who missed their mommy, who spilled their juice, who got in trouble and why, etc. It's pretty interesting to hear what all goes on in those two and a half hours and to see exactly what all she notices.

Lately Hannah's been expanding on her "connection making" quite a bit. She is no longer satisfied to simply turn an I, H, N, or 9 around and tell me what other letter or number it looks like. Now she finds approximations of letters and numbers in the environment. Pavement markings look like an A, the geese flying made a V, the telephone pole is a T, her sandwich with several bites out of it looks like an R, the window is an H and an 8. She also likes to connect what things sound similar or look similar. For example, she was playing in a clothes basket and lost her balance and fell over. The basket feel on her back while she landed on her knees. She looked at me and said, "I look kinda like a turtle." We've never pretended to be a turtle or used laundry baskets in any other way other than as laundry baskets so she came up with that totally on her own. All of her observations are nearly always preceded by the words, "It's kinda like . . ." I'm growing to love the sound of that phrase because I'm always curious to see what she has discovered.

Hannah has two new games that she really loves to play. The first one is Memory. She was given a miniature set of Memory cards while we were on the cruise ship from the youth program and when we got home I taught her to play it. I'm not sure why I was surprised that she caught on so quickly or that she was good at it, but I was. Except for the fact that she tries to help the other person find their matches too when she knows where it is, she has a firm grip on the rules of the game and is most definitely better than I am. It's a bit humbling to be beaten by a two year old when you aren't trying to let them win! Her other new favorite game is hide and seek. While she LOVES this game, she doesn't have a clue how to play it. She peeks when I hide and always hides in the same place when she hides and once I finish counting and say, "ready or not, here I come!" she comes running straight at me from her hiding place! It's pretty fun to play with her though because she almost never tires of it.

Hannah continues to love riding horses. Over Labor Day she finally rode the horses at my parent's house for the first time. While riding Julie, the pony, the dogs were being obnoxious and bothering poor Julie. She began to canter to get away from them. Hannah was not really sure what to think about cantering at the time and wanted to get off, but after the fact she continues to tell me about how she galloped on Julie! Going along with her first time cantering a horse, Hannah also got her first kiss several weeks ago. We were at the mall play place doing one of Hannah's therapy sessions and when Kimberly (Hannah's therapist) arrived we pointed over to Hannah who was hiding on a bookshelf instead of playing. Kimberly went over to try to coax her out and while she was over there another little boy who was the same age as Hannah came over and started mimicking Hannah because he wanted to play with her. At one point he leaned across the divide of the shelves and kissed Hannah on the forehead! Kyle and I both missed it! I was bummed. I would have loved to have seen Hannah's face when some person (particularly a kid) she didn't know kissed her.

Academically, Hannah has been hard at work. Lately she's been obsessed with spelling words. If she knows how to spell them, she will do the honors, but mostly she thinks of a word and then asks me to spell it over and over. Going along with the spelling is wanting to also write those words. She can write many letters independently now so she asks me to spell words and then she writes them down letter by letter. If she doesn't know how to write a particular letter in a word she asks me to spell then usually I can coach her on how to do it by just verbally telling her the order of the strokes. The letters S, G, and Z remain sources of frustration for her even with coaching. One day I thought I might introduce Hannah's birthday, address, and phone number to her just for fun. She of course memorized her birthday that same day (I think I've already told you that), but has been working on her address and phone number ever since. She finally had a breakthrough this week and has since said her address completely from memory and independently multiple times. I feel safe saying that she has now mastered it. Now, she won't always give it on command-not because she doesn't know it, but because she likes having the power of refusing to do something, but I at least like that she knows it in case she were to ever get lost. The phone number is still a work in progress, but that's ok. If she has her name and address I figure that is all that is really important at this stage in the game. Another thing she has really gotten into lately is cutting and pasting. She's working hard to fine tune her scissor skills which are a huge source of frustration for her at the moment. She is totally into doing "projects" as she calls them which is basically coloring something, cutting it out, and gluing it onto something else. She's been so obsessive about it the past week that I am quickly running out of age and skill appropriate ideas sine I'm not crafty at all. So, if anyone has any good ideas for toddler cut and paste projects then please pass them along to me because I could really use the help!

Even though Hannah has not been interacting very much with the kids in her preschool class or gymnastics, or random kids on the playground, we have seen gigantic improvements in her interaction with the two kids that she spends the most time with-Evelyn and Addie. Hannah has actually been consistently playing WITH these girls. Not just parallel play, but real honest to goodness play! Hannah has even been the one to initiate some of this play although usually it is one of the other girls. Kyle and I have been amazed at the improvement we've seen. We really hope that this will eventually generalize to other kids, but at the moment we are simply thrilled that she is actually interacting in an age appropriate manner with her close friends.

Two Years Old

Happy Birthday Hannah! I can't believe it, but my baby is two years old. Where in the world did the time go? This past year has brought so many joys and challenges that I can hardly believe we managed to fit it all into one year! As promised, I have many more updates for you all. I'll start with Hannah's party since that is the title of this post. We had the party at the gym where Hannah takes gymnastics class and it was wonderful. Hannah was relaxed and totally in her element. She had a blast and was a good hostess as well. Little did we know that by having the party at the gym we were picking the best possible location/activity to set Hannah up for success with all of those people (more about that in just a sec). Hannah of course was spoiled rotten by all the gifts, love, and attention she received. She still hasn't stopped talking about some of her favorite things from the party. After the official party was over several people went out for a late lunch/early dinner and just sat around and chatted. Hannah did a great job of spreading the love around and visited each table for an extended amount of time with no fuss at all. It was a great day! Thanks to all who were able to come and share Hannah's special day. Those who couldn't make it, we missed you.

Ok, back to what I was saying about our venue choice for the party. As I mentioned in my last post, Hannah started seeing a developmental therapist for her social issues. On her first visit the therapist did some additional testing on Hannah and determined that sensory integration problems were at the root of Hannah's social difficulties. We had never even considered that Hannah had sensory issues. The tests showed that Hannah had oral and tactile defensiveness, low threshold, low registration, and sensation avoiding. Unless you are an OT this probably means nothing to you. Even after the research I've done it's hard for me to understand fully, but what it basically boils down to is that because Hannah is concentrating so much on these sensory issues she has little energy or tolerance to deal with socially challenging situations. The therapist is creating what is called a sensory diet for Hannah to help her meet some of these unmet sensory needs she has and to desensitize her to some of the stimuli she is defensive to. Contrary to what it sounds like, a sensory diet is not food at all. It's a list of specific activities designed to provide certain sensory needs throughout the day. Hannah's personalized sensory diet is not complete, but the therapist gave us a list of activities to try out and use on our own and we are already seeing amazing results. Today Hannah played with a 4 year old boy in the crowded playplace at the mall for almost 20 minutes! She was interacting with him, having conversations with him, displaying parallel play, and even initiating play. This has NEVER happened before. The other day the same thing happened with Evelyn. Hannah played very well with Evelyn and even shared a VERY cramped space inside her toy car. Hannah was even the one that initiated that arrangement! Apparently many of the activities involved in gymnastics and tumbling meet Hannah's specific needs which explains why we have always noticed that she was much more tolerant of other kids while in her gymnastics class. I was always puzzled by this given how chaotic the environment is, but seeing the results of her preliminary sensory diet makes me a believer. Hannah will continue with gymnastics for as long as she remains interested and we can afford it. We are so pleased so far with Hannah's therapy and are SO hopeful that things are going to continue going well.

Potty training is going quite well. Hannah has had 3 days of being dry all day-including her nap. Now these weren't 3 days in a row dry, but it's still a really good start. She's also getting a lot better about telling us when she has to go potty before she actually has an accident. She's definitely not 100 % in that area since there are many many things she would rather be doing than sitting on the toilet, but it's progress none the less. The other day I was in a store that had a play area for kids. I was standing just behind a rack so that she couldn't see me, but I could hear her. She stopped playing, called for me and when I came to get her she said, "I need to poop. Then play again?" She was willing to stop playing and go to the bathroom as long as I reassured her that she could go back to playing as soon as she was done. I was so proud of her!

Hannah had another overnight at Mamaw and Papaw's house a few weeks ago and she had a blast. I think she wore them out, but they seemed like they did ok. She was totally pumped to go stay so that she could feed the horses. That girl REALLY likes feeding the horses. Speaking of horses, Hannah also went to visit Aunt Heather and ride Harley. Hannah LOVED riding Harley and even got to trot all by herself. Harley was such a good boy doing pony rides for everyone. Hannah really liked visiting Heather and even made Heather take her to the bathroom and hold her once when she got hurt. Heather may not be a kid fan, but Hannah's sure latched onto her.

One of Hannah's newest skills that we aren't especially pleased with is opening doors. She can now get into and out of pretty much any room that doesn't have a baby proofed handle. Consequently, we now have to lock her into her bedroom at night and for naps. This DOES NOT make her happy, but we can't have her just wandering the house by herself at night. Speaking of getting out of her room, the other day Kyle forgot to lock her door when he put her to bed. The next morning we were awakened by Hannah coming into our room and grabbing Kyle. We didn't even hear her open her door or ours! She has also learned how to open bi fold closet doors. Several times I have come into her room after naps to find all of her dresser drawers emptied and the clothes hid around the room, diaper packages opened and the diapers mangled and strewn about, and the trash can emptied and scattered around the room. One day she even found the wipes container and pulled every single wipe out and wadded them up and threw them around the room! UGH!

Hannah has been playing a lot lately with her new play dough and sidewalk chalk. She gets quite a kick out of them both. They are hours of cheap fun. Fortunately these are both activities that the therapist recommended as part of her sensory diet so it's nice to not have to try to squeeze in all totally new things. Jumping is another skill that Hannah is working on perfecting and she is getting quite brave about it. She regularly attempts (and sometimes succeeds if I'm not careful) to jump off of our deck from the top step or to jump off of chairs and the couches. The therapist told us that jumping on a trampoline was also a recommended activity so we used one of her birthday gift cards to buy her an indoor mini trampoline with handles for her to hold onto. It just came in the mail yesterday so we haven't had a ton of time to play on it yet, but so far it's been a hit.

I've mentioned before that Hannah has been naming things lately. Well, she has this cabbage patch doll that she got for Christmas. It's wearing a green and red sleeper and reindeer antlers. It's a baby girl and I forget it's real name, but Hannah has officially christened it Phil. One of our friends who Hannah loves is named Phil so really he should consider it an honor, but it's pretty funny to think of a big macho guy sharing a name with a green and red cabbage patch doll wearing reindeer antlers!