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.