Long Week

Well, David had the week off and we planned an impromptu vacation at the beach.  I found a great deal on a hotel and we went for 2 days.  I thought it would be great.  Amanda loved the beach last time we were there and so I thought it would be fun for her and it was the first day but for some reason the second day she was all upset and scared.  I think Jonathan may have freaked her out a little because he said he got pinched or bit by something.  I don't doubt he stepped on something but I don't think that he actually got bit there was no real mark.  Anyway after that Amanda was afraid to go in the water.  Jonathan had a great time after we got him a pair of water shoes.  I am glad he had a good time we even invested in a body board. and he had a blast playing in the waves.  Amanda didn't have much fun.  I wonder sometimes if we cater to her too much but I am trying not to do that so much.  It is hard because she can be so needy.  I tried to get her to go in the waves and she wanted to but every time a wave approached she got scared and ran screaming.  She wanted me to give her a piggy back ride in the water.  Amanda told me how far to go in and she seemed to have fun.  I tried not to push her and at one point David offered to take her back tot he room. She just wanted to go to get a drink. 

Getting Ready for School

Well I know it is early but because of Amanda's issues we have started school shopping early.  In part to catch some sales and in part because I didn't want to run into shortages if I found something.  Well we have Amanda's uniforms; something she will actually wear.  Yesterday was shoe shopping.. my dreaded activity.  The plan was to see if we could find a style of shoe Amanda would wear without all the fuss.  This trip was much better than the last one.. it would have to be because the last trip to the shoe store was what triggered the whole evaluation thing that got the SPD diagnosis.  Well both kids got shoes and Amanda actually wore her shoes out and we went to the play area and she had fun.  I was so happy to have found a pair of new play shoes and school shoes.
Jonathan was not happy he only got 1 pair of shoes.  We tried to explain to him that his shoes cost more than her two pair combined and he didn't need new play shoes.  But Jonathan decided to sulk for a while anyway.  He finally decided he had "punished" us enough and went and played all and all a good day.
Today, Amanda cried when she had to put her new shoes on.  She cried saying they hurt her feet.  I must admit I lost it.  Maybe I don't understand SPD yet but how can one pair of shoes be fine one day and hurt the next day.  She couldn't tell me where they hurt her.  I don't know if I can handle this, sometimes.  Anyway after my blow-up which I regret Amanda decided the shoes were fine.  I tried to talk to her and explain we could return the pair she hasn't worn if they hurt; that it was important that she had comfortable shoes for school.  But Amanda insists they are fine now.  I wonder sometimes if she just hates shoe shopping.  
I feel bad for Jonathan he is so easy going and so easy to shop for sometimes it seems like we focus on Amanda.  We can't eat certain places because she won't eat anything at one of his favorite restaurants.  Jonathan can be so good to his sister and then at times he seems to enjoy tormenting her. 
I was talking to a friend of mine and we decided that all kids should come with instruction books.  I buy a new car it comes with an instruction book but kids are all different and they don't have any instructions.  The so called experts give conflicting advise and it is more confusing than helpful at times.  In the past we didn't seem to have all these labels and I don't remember there being this many problems. 

Swimming lessons

Well the kids started swim lessons.  Amanda was very apprehensive.  She had had swim lessons 2 years ago and that didn't go so well.  Picture a 3 year old sitting on the diving board refusing to jump surrounded by life guards trying to convince her to jump and you might get the picture.  Also picture my 3 year old insisting she did not want to get dunked when they played ring around the rosie and the life guard dunking her anyway.  Well lets say my daughter reacted very badly and slapped the life guard.  I was not very proud and we didn't have her do swim lessons last year because of it.  It was a few weeks before she would enjoy going in Grandpa's pool. So last year Amanda sat out and JD continued with his swim lessons and Amanda sat out with me and waited.  This year when I went to sign JD up the person in charge assured us that they would let the teacher know that Amanda had a fear of putting her face in the water and they wouldn't dunk her until she was ready.  Amanda wanted to try again.  I was anxious for her to have a positive swim lesson experience so I signed her up and listened to her all weekend reminding me to remind the woman in charge that they said she didn't have to put her face in the Water. 
Today I must admit Amanda did great.  She even blew bubbles in the water.  She is fine if she doesn't put her eyes in the water.  I don't know if that is just her or part of the SPD.
You might think I have only 1 child that I worry about but that isn't true I have 2  children.  JD is my first born and a great kid.  I am his mom so I will just say it he is very smart and has a lot of talent.  He is at the point in his swimming lessons where he is actually learning to swim and he does so well.  He just needs to learn to float on his back to go to the next level.  I try not to push to hard because he pushes himself hard enough.  He tends to want to be perfect which means he sometimes gives up too soon when something is hard.  I did great with his swim lesson but something is bothering him.  He tends to keep things inside just like me and I don't know what it is yet.  I think part of it is his friend is in the next level up and he isn't.  I know he wants to move up.  JD also mentioned that he has to "breath" underwater.  I think he means that he has to go under to blow bubbles but he did that in level 1 swimming so I know he can but I think he is worried.  I want him to have fun.  He loved swim lessons in the past so I hope today was just a fluke.

Dance Recital and Diagnosis

We survived the testing but I wasn’t sure we were going to survive the waiting. I still didn’t know what was wrong with my little girl and I was even more unsure of myself than ever. I didn’t know how much to push her or where to back off. About this time it was also time for Amanda’s first dance recital. When I signed her up for dance class I never thought the recital would be a problem boy was I wrong. Amanda has always been a very extraverted child who could have guessed she would have major stage fright.


Amanda started protesting even before the dress rehearsal which is a full dress rehearsal on stage. I emailed the woman in charge and expressed my concern because I wasn’t sure she would get on stage and they said just take her put her in line and walk away she will be fine. But she wasn’t fine. I got her in hair make-up and costume. Not a small accomplishment because just the mention of combing Amanda’s hair brings her to tears, the seams on the tights bother her and she complained the bodice on the costume was too tight. They led her on stage and one of the teachers stood beside her. My daughter was crying by this time and protesting that she didn’t want to go on stage. I was sitting in the audience upset at my daughter’s distress, but not going on stage; I know if she could just do this she would be fine. Amanda on the other hand walked off stage crying as soon as the teacher walked away. They did the dance without her. I contacted the owner of the studio to find out if they even wanted me to bring her back. I was told to get her in costume and see if she would go on stage but not to push. She said that even if Amanda didn’t dance in the first performance she might do the second one once she saw what it was like. She even said I could walk down to the stage with her the night of the performance if that would help. To be honest I don’t know what will help at this point.

We finally received the psychologist report (I actually had to go pick it up) and it mentioned things like Sensory Processing Disorder, ADHD (which I honestly believe Amanda is too young to diagnosis this) and anxiety. We meet with the psychologist the next week to discuss this (the Monday after the recital so I am going into this still not understanding my daughter).

Day of the recital we got dressed and went. No family was in the audience because Amanda was still insisting that she didn’t want to dance. We climbed up to the balcony to wait our turn and Amanda had a small break down because she was afraid of heights something else I didn’t know about my daughter. She was fine after a little while. She just needed to get use to it. Anyway Amanda refused to go down with her class. One of the helper mom’s came up to try and convince her to go down and offered anything from the snack stand as a reward. Amanda still refused. The mom then looked at me and said can’t you get her to go down? I answered no. I saw a look similar to contempt on the other mom’s face. All I could think is she doesn’t know Amanda and I do and this was not a battle I felt I needed to fight. Short of dragging Amanda crying onto the stage she was not going to go and having my daughter dance on stage was just not that important to me. Amanda cried when the woman left and said she wished she could go on stage and I offered to go with her but she said no. I am sure I should have done something but I felt so helpless to help my daughter at that point. We decided to watch the rest of the recital. Which she enjoyed once the pressure was off.

The next day Amanda let me walk her down to the stage when it came time to perform. She still said she didn’t get on stage and I was told by the same mom that I was my daughter’s biggest problem. Maybe I am I don’t know but I still don’t think forcing my child on stage was the right thing. I tried to explain that we suspected Amanda had Sensory Processing Disorder and I couldn’t be sure what was causing her to be so afraid but honestly I was too upset to really discuss it. The diagnosis was new and I was still coping with the fact my daughter has a disorder. Monday can’t come soon enough.

Facing the issues/ Sensory Processing disorder??

One might ask why a person would call themselves and imperfect mom and make a confession to the whole world in the form of a blog. Well the reality is while we may not all confess to it I am willing to bet there are a lot of us struggling along. Sometimes the realization hits us in the face and we struggle with something that we just never imagined. I hit that point a few months ago when I had to finally admit my beautiful, vibrant 5 year old daughter may have "issues". At that point the confusion set in and I must admit the guilt. Heavenly Father had blessed me with this child and here I was sitting in a psychologist office to try and find out how I had messed her up so badly. I didn't think I was doing such a bad job but I must be because there we were. Kids don't come with instruction manuals unless you count the thousands of books that sometimes offer conflicting advice. The Pediatrician had suggested it when I called to discuss Amanda's issues.

Let me back step.. the call to the pediatrician had been preceded by the shoe incident. Trying to buy shoes for my daughter who really needed a new pair of shoes had been the straw/ camel thing. It was a half hour of tears where she complained all the shoes were too tight even when we tried on shoes that were 2 sizes to big. Finally we forced her to pick a pair that was 1 size bigger than she measured out with and had her wear them out of the store. I actually had to carry her out of the store because she was so upset about the shoes. It was another 1/2 hour of nearly hysterical crying at another store while my husband and son picked up a few things and I sat on the bench trying to calm her as she complained the shoes hurt. Finally she was distracted with a $ .50 from a machine. She seemed fine but I was frazzled and decided I needed to know if this was behavioral... I just needed to put my foot down or something else was going on. This was not the first issue like this. For a while she has been very fussy about what kind of clothes she would wear. Socks are an issue, toothpaste is an issue and there were other things going on.

So anyway we are at the psychologist office waiting to go inside so we can have an evaluation and I can find out just how bad a mother I am. I had talked to the school psychologist I work with and he was convinced that Amanda has an anxiety disorder. How can my 5 year old have anxiety when we have tried to provide a nice stable safe home for her? Her pediatrician said to look up tactile defensiveness on the internet. Her preschool calls her high spirited. At home we just accept that she is her own person, set limits, and accommodate some of her quirks.