My Highly Sensitive Child

A few weeks ago, my friends and I were together for a play date. It was a small group (4 two year olds and 2 babies) and the kids have been playing together for about 2 years now. All was going well until the adult conversation turned to the subjects of preschool and potty training. Both subjects came with a lot of anxiety and I could sense Z getting more and more tense as we spoke. It was a difficult situation for me, these were topics that I needed support with, yet the conversation was stressing my child out.

At lunch time, we went up to the kitchen and Z would not leave my lap. He ate his strawberries and refused to sit anywhere other than my lap. One of the babies was eating his lunch and started to cry for more food. Z began to shake and quietly whispered in my ear, "Can we go home?". I was proud of him for recognizing a stressful situation and for using his words instead of tears. Unfortunately I was waiting for my salad to be delivered and whispered back that we would leave when it arrived. I asked if he wanted to go out on the porch where it was quiet....he quickly agreed. This worked until the other kids followed him out and then he came back inside. Once the baby started to cry again, Z could not hold his tears in anymore....he was a mess.

Luckily my salad arrived and I was able to leave with him. I had tried to console him in the other room but it was no use. I left feeling miserable....why is this always happening?

My friend K, emailed me later that day and told me not to worry about what happened at playgroup. She reassured me that Z is just sensitive, much like her daughter and then she recommended that I read "the highly sensitive child" by Dr. Elaine N. Aron. I have known K and her daughter for 2 1/2 years now and I have seen her daughter get overwhelmed in certain situations and need to leave. I knew that she and Z were similar in that way and that is why we requested that they be in the same preschool class. What I didn't know is that K now has strategies at hand to help her deal with her daughter's sensitivity. Having already done a lot of research on Sensory Issues and having very little luck with fitting Z into one of the many categories (he does mildly fit into the Auditory Dysfunction category) I was up for anything. S and I took the test online and Z answered true to 15 out of the 23 statements. We thought that getting the book might be a good idea, so we ordered it and picked up K's copy to hold us over until it arrived.

This book has been a godsend for S and I and has helped us to understand what Z goes through on a daily basis. The book is full of strategies on how to better raise him to be a happy and confident child. There is nothing wrong with my him, in fact research says that 15-20% of the world's population are "Highly Sensitive People". He just needs to learn ways to cope with the things that make him anxious, nervous and shy and celebrate all of the wonderful things that being sensitive has to offer. We feel that we now have a tool that will allow us to better parent him (this includes a list of strategies on how to prepare him for his first day of school on Wednesday).

What is amazing about this book is that I too identify with so much of it myself (I guess sensitive people give birth to sensitive children). It has helped me to reflect upon my own childhood and the situations which brought me so much stress and anxiety. I might just have to go out and buy the Highly Sensitive person to see if it can help me better handle my adult life :) If you are going through similar issues with your child, I highly recommend you check out the website.

Another interesting tidbit is that "Highly Sensitive Children" are usually delayed when it comes to potty training....mom that explains why I had so many issues :)

Preschool Anxiety

Last night we had our Parent Orientation for Z's school. S and I went together and I was sick to my stomach the entire ride over. The entire school was there and so the session started off as a big group. We then broke into smaller groups and we got to meet Z's teachers and the other parents of his class. I was holding up okay until the teacher started talking about that first morning and how important it is to prep them for the good-bye.

"I will come down with you, help you hang up your things, watch you pick a choice activity and then give you two kisses and one hug....then mommy will leave for awhile and come back after school is done".

This was what she suggested we say to our little three year olds and at this I started to tear up. I was able to keep it together (fanning myself in the hot auditorium) but didn't realize how hard of a transition this was really going to be for ME. She then told us that even if our child was not fully potty trained that they must come to school in underwear, not pull-ups. This statement caused my heart to start beating out of my chest, I could feel the sweating forming and my blood pressure climbing. My little Z was going to have to deal with the anxiety of starting school at the same time he was going to have to worry about using the potty??? Was that fair to him??? The poor baby inside of me must have been wondering what was going out in the big bad world...why was mommy freaking out??

All of the pregnancy hormones raging through my body and the worry over this big transition for Z were now mixed with the huge anxiety over potty training!!! What were we going to do?? What can be done in a week??? I cried the whole way home, cried with my sister when I got home and then cried with S for about an hour and a half over the situation. The poor guy tried to calm me down (for the baby's sake) but I was too worked up to listen to his good sense.

"Put Z in underwear tomorrow, make it clear that when he goes to preschool he wears underwear."

This was his advice, I knew it made sense but Z had never been out of the house in underwear...was he ready? Was I ready???

This morning I woke Z up for his Open House at the school. I told him that Daddy and I had been to his school the night before and that we met his teachers and saw his classroom and everything looked wonderful. He looked at me and said, "I don't want to go to preschool". Then he crawled into a ball on the floor. I explained all of the wonderful things in his classroom and how his teachers couldn't wait to meet him and he looked up at me with big doe eyes and said, "Will Mama stay with me or is she going to leave like Llama Llama? Mama stay with me?" That damn book!!! I told him that today I would stay but when he started school next week, I would be leaving for a little while. I gave him a big hug and fought back the tears as I continued to pump him up about preschool.

So we drove to school in undies (with 4 back up pairs and two extra pairs of pants in my bag). We went straight to the bathroom to use the potty where Z giggled nervously. I helped him develop a potty routine for this new bathroom and showed him that the toilet was not loud (thank goodness!!!). We then walked into his new classroom to find his hook. He found it right away, met one of his teachers and then took off for the science center. His eyes were wide as he took in all that his new classroom had to offer. He played with the blocks, make a great house, climbed a bridge and really enjoyed his time there. He dragged me around from one activity to another, not letting me out of his site, but he was happy! At one point he looked up at me and said, "Preschool is great!". I took him to the potty once during the 45 minute open house and then again at the end.....he did better and better each time. I was sooooo PROUD of him!!!

At the end of the Open House we went out to the playground with all of the other children. Z had his first run in with a boy who would not share and quietly (and sadly) stepped away from the situation. It broke my heart but I realized at that moment that I can't always protect him and stand up for him. He is growing up and there are some things that he is going to have to learn to do himself. As a tear rolled down my cheek, I watched him sadly move onto the playground. Within minutes he had forgotten the situation and was enjoying the slide. My little boy was growing up before my very eyes.

We don't officially start school for another week but today's experience was good for both of us. Z got to experience all of the fun that preschool will offer him and he had a really great time. I gained a little more confidence in his potty training abilities and know that in time he will master this very difficult skill. It was a growing day for both of us and though I am still anxious about next week (and know I will be crying like a baby when I drop him off), I know that he will be okay (and so will I).

Life is Just Too Noisy for Z

For the past year, Z has had an issue with loud noises. If there is a loud noise that startles him, he melts into a ball of tears. This is always very embarrassing because there is no reasoning with him until you remove him from the situation and he feels safe once again. The worst part...it is getting worse with time, not better!

Typical noises that scare Z into fits of tears are: his cousin G when she squawks, other loud children, dogs barking, my mother coughing and something he will hear a lot of very soon....babies crying! If Z is prepared for a noise, it doesn't seem to bother him. For example, if we hear a fire engine coming and then it zooms by our house blaring it's siren...no tears. If we tell Z that the public toilet is going to make a loud sound and he should cover his ears...no tears. But if he is caught off guard, it is all over!

Last weekend at the beach, Z was startled by the lifeguard's whistles (we never thought to prep him for that) and our beach trip was almost ruined. It took me 20 minutes to get him to recover and I had to force him back on the beach to show him all he was missing. He then went on to have the best time and you would have never known that he was the child who was clinging to me for dear life in fear of the loud whistles.

Now we have tried many different things to break him of this horrible trait. We have taught him some strategies to deal with loud noises such as; covering his ears when he hears a loud sound, walking away from loud sounds or asking his friends and cousin to "please be quiet". Every time a baby cries we brainstorm with him reasons the baby might be crying (tired, hungry etc.). We have tried to reason with him during his fits, we have talked about situations later on after he is calm and have even ignored the behavior many times (this is difficult to do in public)......nothing seems to work!

Come October, Z is going to be in for a rude awakening :) He is going to be the big brother to a huge source of noise. It would be nice to nip this in the bud now but I know that will not happen. So what do you think is going on here??? Is Z just an odd little ducking? Is it a phase (lasting over a year)? Or do you think there might be a medical reason??? We are so baffled by this behavior and any advice would be most welcome!