While A. and I were waiting for C., we discussed my son's weekend. Friday we went to the park with a friend and her daughter who is roughly six month older than my son. He engaged in some parallel play but was far more interested in the wood chips on the ground than the little girl. We did try the slide, but he wanted to lay down, not sit so I went down with him. He was laughing his head off. We tried the swings but it got bad fast so we stopped that. Saturday he went to the park with my husband while I scanned 173 old photos for a family tree project. He just wanted to walk around mostly. Sunday, we went to the park as a family. He loved the slide, but the swing he is now deathly afraid of.
When C. arrived, we discussed my son's history with A. My son walked around, picking up a toy, looked at it, tossed it, repeatedly. We have the Fisher Price Stride to Ride Puppy and my son played with that and one of those wooden activity cubes. He also played with this A's help.
(image from ebay)
A. read him The Very Hungry Caterpillar about four times. My son loves turning pages and after each reading he would just sit and turn the pages.
C. and I discussed my son's sleeping habits. C. suggested giving him milk before bed as opposed to at supper which I meant to try last night, but fell asleep my self and messed up his night time routine. (I have been not feeling well at all for the last two weeks.) C. also suggested writing down my son's schedule and scheduling in two snacks a day.
We also discussed the sensory issues my son has. I discussed the terror inducing swing experience of this weekend. C. suggested taking my son to the park and having him help me push and empty swing to get used to how it works. She also said taking a toy and putting it in the swing and showing him nothing bad happened to it. She also suggested us sitting together on a regular swing and slowly working up to swinging together. We also discussed bath time. My son shrieks in terror while having a bath. I am not using hyperbole. It is not the whiny cry kids use when they don't like something, it is full on blood curling shrieking and howling. He clutches at you when you try to bath him and he tries to angle every part of his body out of the water. She asked what temperature bath he gets and if we adjust it. We have tried everything from freezing to lukewarm baths. She asked if we adjust the depth of the water. We have tried from a tiny puddle up to enough to float boats around the tub in an effort to make him play in the bath. It didn't work. She suggested not filling the tub prior putting him the water. She said put him in an empty tub and then put the faucet on. She also suggested showering with him, or turning the shower on when he is taking a bath. I will try all her suggestions and write about how things go.
We also discussed me playing hand over hand with him, which I already do. We discussed our weekend with his cousins and she suggested I play with the kids to try to engage my son. I told her I did that. I got on the floor and played with the toys with the kids to show my son how much fun it was, but he walked away. I told her we do hand over hand play with all his toys but when he is done playing with something, he is done. I showed her a sensory box we have:
She likes this because everything has a different texture. She suggested mixing up what is in it. Adding tissues and scarves for example. I am going to do this several times a week. I will add/subtract items. On her way out she saw this puzzle in a stack of toys I want to get rid of
All in all this was a great visit, I think working with C. is going to help us a lot.
