Busy Day

Yesterday was Brady's very last day of preschool, so I lined up a sitter for Henry so that I could spend some one-on-one with my rising Kindergartner! We went out to lunch, then to the mall play area, then to the post office and bank (b/c they are near the mall), then to Target, then to pick up Henry. We also happened to have a birthday party to go to for two of the boys' cousins. So, we got home at 4:30 and had to wrap presents, eat dinner, and  head back out by 5:30. Stayed at the party to almost 8. Both boys are usually in bed by then.

For the most part, I enjoyed the afternoon with Brady, but it was exhausting. He did pretty well with all the stimulation, but by the ride home that night, he literally could not stop talking. He even ran out of things to say and started singing a nonsense song.

I have to say that I'm grateful to know how to help him with overstimulating situations. After lunch, we went and played at the play area. I let him jump off the equipment as long as no one was close enough to get hurt, I let him skip down the mall, I let him climb the pole at the post office, and touch everything we walked past at Target. I really never thought I'd actually encourage my kid to do most of these things in public, but I can see such a difference when I let him do them. He used to start spinning, running and hiding, crashing into me, falling on the floor, and trying to pull me down by the end (or at the beginning) of a shopping trip. So, to me, skipping down the aisle w/in a reasonable distance from me and touching every item on the shelf is much more acceptable behavior. I really think we're both figuring out how to get the input he needs in a decently appropriate way.

Oh, and giving him my sunglasses when we forgot his rather than trying to get him to walk out into the daylight w/out protection. He looked pretty funny, but I was so glad I had something to give him b/c he was refusing to step out of the shade w/out them.

Before we went back out to the birthday party, I convinced him to let me do joint compressions and it's amazing how calm he gets while I do those. I almost thought he was going to fall asleep. At the party he did pretty well, but had a hard time sitting through the present opening. He was banging his head into his dad's chest and pushing on his brother with his feet. But once he could get  up and moving again, he played pretty nicely. We did have a few hugs are were too tight for the little girls, but I was proud of him for not taking a running and leaping start into the hug, which he has been known to do.

What's up with the chewing??

I guess this just shows how crazy this SPD thing can be!

Brady asked me this morning for water in a straw cup, kind of strange for him. I gave it to him, and he drank a little, but then proceeded to chew on the straw. I told him he couldn't chew on the straw b/c it'll break. He understood that, but kept asking what he could chew on. After school, I found him chewing/sucking on a finger. Then, later he was eating yogurt and kept twirling the spoon around in his mouth and chewing on it.

So I went online and ordered him some chew sticks to have around.

The weird thing is that he hasn't chewed on anything like this in over a year! I remember back when we were first figuring all this out, he was chewing on his fingers alot. But he hasn't done it since we started OT, so it was a surprise this morning.  I was always glad that he didn't chew on things, so  I hope this phase will go quickly because it's just gross. I'm guessing it'll stop by the time the chew sticks arrive.

It's really crazy how their little sensory systems can change things up so much from day to day.

W sitting and Toe Walking

Will he ever stop doing these things?

I didn't realize that W sitting was really a problem until his OT told us to discourage it on our very first visit. I recently did some online research and it really explained how Brady's constant W sitting was caused by balance problems, and also made his problems worse. I've been scrapbooking pictures from 2008 lately, the year he turned 3, and in every single picture that he was sitting in, he was W sitting. When we first started trying to get him to stop, he really had a hard time sitting any other way. It's funny that a position that I figured was just a preference was actually hurting his development of balance and he was doing it because he wasn't stable enough to sit any other way. But now, over a year after starting to work with him on it, it's still his default sitting position, although he'll go easily to another position when reminded. Will he ever get out of this habit?

Our other issue that hasn't gotten much better is the toe walking. It's almost like he can't think if he's not on his toes. The harder he's trying to get out what he's trying to say, the more he wanders around on his toes. When he should be standing still, he's actually up on his toes kind of teetering around. It's mostly when he's barefoot, so hopefully he doesn't do it too much at school. I'm worried that kids are going to start making fun of him because he's getting a bit big for it.

I just can't help wondering how much longer I'm going to have to constantly be saying things like, "We don't sit like that," "legs", "fix your legs", "watch how you're sitting," and "heels down."