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October 17, 2011 · 11:47 pm

Forward and Back

I have a lot to learn about sensory issues, but what I know so far is (1) confidence plays a huge role in achieving success (2) sometimes success requires you to take a few steps back before moving forward.

Saying, “If I eat these strawberries, my eyes will hurt,” or sitting in my lap during a birthday party instead of playing basketball because the noise in the gymnasium is too loud are examples of the backward steps.

Some of the fear and anxiety Dylan feels is because of nervous system confusion.  For example, doing a forward roll sends his vestibular system into a tail spin.  Yes, I just used vestibular in a sentence.  Smart Mama!  A lot of his problems, though, simply have to do with having low muscle tone, and it explains why that t-ball class was so frustrating for him – and the rest of us – last year.

On Friday, I took the boys to a park after school with some friends.  While we were there, Dylan asked me to push him on the baby swing.  It was one of those situations that, before the sensory diagnosis, would have frustrated me to no end.  Why didn’t he want to sit in the big kid swing like his friends?

Truthfully, Dylan hadn’t been near a swing – a baby or big kid one – in a long time.  Somewhere along the way, he decided avoidance was the easiest and least scary solution to the problem, so it was a good thing he wanted to swing at all.

After a few minutes on the baby swing, he did something surprising.  He asked me to push him on a big kid swing, one that was far away from where his friends were playing.  I gladly obliged and a few pushes later, he started pumping his legs forward and back.   It was difficult for him – I could see the strain in his feet when he tried to straighten his legs – but he kept at it.  I sat down on the grass (in awe) and quietly repeated, “Forward and back.  Forward and back.  Forward and back.”

Exciting stuff, right?  Well, it got even better.  After about ten minutes of “practicing,” he told me he wanted to play on the swings with his friends.  And he did just that, confidently pumping his legs forward and back on the big kid swing with a huge smile on his face.  Let me tell you, I was a Proud Mama!  Something big happened in the park that sunny Friday afternoon. Dylan believed in himself and took a colossally gigantically enormously huge step FORWARD.

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Filed under Proud Mama, sensory processing disorder, Smart Mama, Uncategorized

September 16, 2011 · 5:05 pm

Blah Day

Today is a blah day.

I didn’t win the CBS Miami Most Valuable Blogger Awards.  Blah.  It’s okay.  I didn’t really expect to win, but it would have been fun and it would have made today a lot less blah. 

Regardless of the results, whether you voted once, twice or everyday, thank you!  I have to give a special shout out to my mom. I think she wanted me to win the award more than I did.  She’s a reference librarian, and during the voting period, she voted for me every day from her computer at home as well as from every computer in the library where she works, which was sometimes as many as twenty times a day.  She definitely outed herself as a Crazy Mama, but that’s exactly what a mother’s love is.  Crazy.  I hope I’m as much of a Crazy Mama to my boys as she has always been to me.

Okay, more blah.  I took Riley to the dentist this morning for another check of his front teeth.  His gums look healthy, but the right tooth is still mobile and starting to get discolored in the back.  A second x-ray also revealed a change in the left tooth upinside the gums.  Our dentist is taking a conservative approach, so we’re on permanent watch and will head backfor another check in a few weeks. 

And some more.  Dylan woke up this morning with a headache and a severe case of the grumps.    Mike noticed that his pupils were extremely dilated, too.  Of course I googled “toddler and headache and dilated pupils,” which was not a very good idea. (This is an example of Crazy Mama in a bad way.)   After reading about all kinds of pediatric brain tumors and neurological disorders, I stepped away from the computer and had another cup of coffee (a glass of Pino Grigio at breakfast would have been inappropriate).  Instead of hightailing it to the Mayo Clinic, I gave him some ibuprofen.  He stayed home from school and I’m keeping an eye on him.  So far Ihaven’t noticed any neurological problems.  In fact, he’s demonstrating an impressively high level of balanceand coordination with the Xbox remote, the DVD player and his cheddar bunnies.

Finally, I’m making meat loaf for dinner.  Sounds blah, doesn’t it?  Actually, it’s a turkey meatloaf recipe with sun dried tomatoes and feta cheese from Giada DeLaurentiis, so I’m hopeful it’s not going to be blah at all.  

If I can take the blah out of meatloaf, maybe I can take the blah out of this day.  I didn’t win the blogger award, but I did get some new traffic to my blog as a result of being listed on the CBS Miami Web site.  Riley’s teeth are loose, but they’re still in his mouth!  And Dylan may not be feeling well, but one of the games he’s busy playing is the LeapFrog “Letter Factory.”  He’s as excited aboutlearning his letters and sounds as he is about buying “Cars 2” on Blue-ray onNovember 1st.  And that’s not “b” for blah at all.  

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