Isla

Isla Rose

The littlest member of our family.

What's she been up to over the last 2 months?

Well at the end of last year a little girl in Bradley's class came up and said to me "Isla like things doesn't she? She likes things but she doesn't like people" the little girl's mother was absolutely mortified but I laughed. It's true! Isla does not like people. And not just unfamiliar people, she dislikes pretty much everyone.

And she's a fussy eater. But not with flavours. She will eat sweet, sour, spicy, savoury. She will eat all the flavours under the rainbow but ONLY if the texture was right. She's got a textures problem. She's 19 months old and still wants me to spoon feed her mashed foods. She point blank refuses to eat meat (chicken, fish, red meat, sausage she hates it all) and anything else with a different texture she's very fussy with.
Each day is a challenge to see what I can get her to eat, what texture she wants each day...

She also has this thing with textures in life in general: she always wants to wear shoes so her feet don't touch the grass/dirt/rocks/sand. She doesn't like getting messy hands. She hates having any food crumbs on her hands or face.
She loves being clean. Brushing her teeth, flossing her teeth, brushing her hair, washing her hands, putting dirty clothes in the basket, dirty nappies in the bin. She does it all.
A funny little side story is when we took Isla swimming. We spent ages in the pool and when we got out her hands were wrinkly from being in the water so long.
Isla noticed this for the first time and she HATES it! She whinged and tried to pull her fingers off. She pointed to the wrinkles and showed me and whinged. And then she found the wrinkles on her toes and she literally tried kicking her feet off to get rid of the wrinkles. Even now she notices the wrinkles after the bath or something and she gets fussy and obsessed with them.

She also doesn't talk much. 19 months old and she can only say 3 words 'mum' 'dad' and 'zac' by 18 months I think they are supposed to say 10-20 words.

A week ago we took her to the child health nurse for her 18 month vaccinations. I mentioned the above to the child health nurse and we have determined there is definitely a sensory problem that we need to get under control. Being around even 1 extra person makes Isla so fussy and out of sorts that she won't eat properly (even worse than normal) she's clingy, whingey etc...and that's just with one extra person! So clearly it doesn't take much for little one to get to the sensory overload point.

Unfortunately for us there has suddenly been a massive cutback in the health department in this town. Our speech therapist, occupational therapist and the visiting dietician have all been sent on their way. Unlucky for us those 3 people are the people we need right now.

I've filled out some paperwork and have a follow up appointment with the child health nurse this week. We are hoping that we might be able to do some activities at home that can help Isla out.
Unfortunately though there is only so far we can go by ourselves, if we don't start to see some big improvements over the next few weeks/months we may have to travel 5/6 hours to our nearest big towns to see some specialists. Fingers crossed we won't need to start making those trips. Hopefully we can help her out ourselves at home.

But in the meantime-boredom. Because it doesn't take much for Isla to go into sensory overload it means things like playgroup and kinder gym and even just play dates are hard for her.
We tried kinder gym last year and she mostly just sat on my lap and watched everyone.
We also tried crèche while I was doing an exercise class but leaving her alone with the crèche ladies was torture (for her and the carers) she screamed continuously the whole hour and even when I picked her up to bring her home it would take me a further 30 mins to calm her down. So we lasted a few weeks of that and gave it up. It wasn't fair on the carers or other children, so I exercise at home.

This year I've signed up for kinder gym again. We will go for the first couple weeks and see how she goes. But if it's too hard I won't go back next term.
The child health nurse said play dates with one other mummy/toddler are probably the best thing for her.

At home when it's just us Isla is the easiest most fun little toddler, she plays and doesn't whinge. She has fun and enjoys being by herself.
But I swear everyone else must think she's the clingiest annoying baby ever because when we go out she gets so unsettled.

Hopefully we can play some fun sensory games and get her improving with her separation anxiety and eating over the coming months because she's the cutest little kid and the world is a much more fun place when it's not so scary :-) :-)

Bradley

Bradley.

My little Mr. The middle child. Only boy. And Mr EasyGoing himself!

This year Bradley has started year 1, finally up in the big school with his sister.

Over the holidays he had a great time in Perth. He got to feed a giraffe at the zoo, went rock climbing, tried snorkelling and got his eyes tested for the first time.
I've worn glasses since I hit puberty. And Bradley's always squinting and seems very sensitive to the sun so I took him in with me.

He did awesome, he sat through the same eye tests that I take and aced (most of) them. The optometrist kept commenting on how smart Bradley was-he went through all the colourblind tests, reading the charts, everything.

AAAAAANND we've discovered Bradley does have a little vision problem. He's a teeny bit long sighted (opposite of me), but he has a DUST ALLERGY that is affecting him a little bit.

A dust allergy. And we live in the Pilbara! Dust is so fine and so common here everyone looks like they have a freaking sun tan from all the dust!
So how do we help this dust allergy? Well there were two options.
Option 1: medicated eye drops 6 times (!!) per day-meaning I would have to go to the school each day to put drops in his eyes.
Option 2: ice his eyes 3 times a day every day.

We took option 2. So every single day before school, after school and before bedtime he sits on the couch with a brand new packet of frozen peas that we've shaped nicely for him and he ice's his eyes!
As can be expected he doesn't much like it, it's cold and uncomfortable and he gets distracted and ends up with the peas in his lap instead of on his eye.
Oh and he also got a pair of really cool prescription sunglasses to help his sensitive little eyes 🙊🙈😎 he loves them!

Kaitlyn

My little Kaitlyn (or should I say big!) is still horse riding to help with her anxiety.
Meg is a very sweet, gentle and caring pony (very unlike the spoilt, cheeky ponies I'm used to!) and Kaitlyn just loves her.
Unfortunately her riding teacher is moving to Canada in a few weeks, so we only have about 3-4 lessons remaining.
As you can imagine Kaitlyn is upset. However I am absolutely devastated! Seeing your highly strung, stressed out, anxious child finally relaxed, in control and at ease is something very special. Words can't even describe it.

I hope that in time we will find another riding teacher or (hint hint hubby) get our own pony so Kaitlyn can continue this experience.




Today is the first day of year 2 for Kaitlyn. Thankfully on Friday the principal set up a meet and greet with Kaitlyn's new teachers. We went in, had a chat, had a look around and I got to tell the teachers a little bit about her anxiety and what to look out for.
Then the teacher gave Kaitlyn a big squeezy hug and she smiled, a great big smile of relief.
I left her feeling a bit nervous but looking good this morning in her new classroom.
I have a much better feeling about this year than last. I think 2016 schooling is going to be much more successful for kaitlyn. And I'm hoping to see some good progress.
At the end of last year I asked for kaitlyn to be tested. To rule out any learning disabilities. Hopefully once everyone is settled in Kaitlyn will begin her testing and maybe we will have some more answers. Or maybe we can just rule out difficulties, maybe we will know it's only her anxietystopping her...

Who knows, there's no harm in getting her checked.

So: that's where my biggest girl is at, at the moment.
Still dealing with her anxiety, still doing all we can to help her.

A Bad Day

My life is being completely consumed by Kaitlyn's anxiety at the moment.

Today I got a call from her teacher. He said Kaitlyn had thrown up in the toilets at lunch time.

I asked if she was ok, if she looked sick. He said apart from being hot from running around she seemed fine.

Every time something like this happens I get scared, I wonder if she actually did throw up, I wonder if she's sick or stressed, I wonder if she succeeded in MAKING herself vomit, I wonder what's happened during the day to make her like this, I think back to the morning and if anything she said or did hinted at not wanting to be at school.
I wonder if this is just a 'normal kid' having a 'normal sick day.' I wonder if there's anything I could have done to prevent this.

But most of all I wonder if there's anything I can do now to make it better.

I wish I could find a pattern or find a trigger for her anxiety. Apart from the unpredictable-ness of her dad's work I can't figure out what has changed in the last few months that's caused such drastic changes. And then I wonder if all of this is just because we don't know when her daddy's going to be home, or what time he finishes work.
But then, he's always had a job with slightly unpredictable hours. I'll admit it's more unpredictable at the moment but he's always had changing rosters and some long weeks and some short weeks.

Seeing your child going through so much suffering and her not knowing why/how to deal with it is heartbreaking.

She's sleeping now, mainly so she can't see me sitting on the bed crying about what to do for her.

Anxiety sucks!

Living With A Child With Anxiety

Unless you have been paying zero attention or you’re new to this blog you will all by now know that my 6 year old Kaitlyn suffers from anxiety.

You will also know, from my previous blog post, that she’s been a bit of an emotional mess lately.

 

It’s been a few weeks now and not much has gotten better.

In fact I would say they are worse. Her 7^th birthday is coming up and I’ve been trying to help her plan what she wants to do. For a kid that usually spends an entire year planning her party I was expecting huge ideas. But this year she just keeps telling me “I don’t want to do anything at all.” Its more the way she says it, she drops her face, her eyes go blank, her whole body seems to slump and she mumbles “I just don’t want anything at all then mum” its actually heartbreaking and I have no idea why she doesn’t want anything. I couldn’t even talk her into inviting a friend out for dinner. We are going to a nearby town for a couple nights for a bit of beach, exploring and fast food. She keeps telling us no she doesn’t want to. But we have told her we are doing it to celebrate her Dad’s birthday (which is the same day as Kaitlyn’s).

At school her teacher has been using sneaky tactics to check whether or not she’s been eating her food (however I think she has outsmarted him on more than one occasion). I also had a meeting with her teacher and the school principal to discuss what’s been going on.

I was pleasantly surprised to know that, although still quite behind for her age, she has made some quite good improvements this year. The difference between what she can do at school and what she does at home though is enormous. For homework at home I’m lucky if she will write a 3 word sentence. At school she’s writing longer, often descriptive sentences (not all the spelling is correct but nearly!)

Her teacher told me that first thing in the morning Kaitlyn comes in happy and is content to do her work, if she gets an answer incorrect or he questions what she’s done she is open to constructive criticism. However by the afternoon after lunch she falls apart, she gets lazy with her work and doesn’t like being corrected. She makes a mess of her work if she makes a mistake and has a short temper, not that she is ever rude she just loses her patience and falls apart with the slightest “oops you spelt that word wrong”  He did tell me he thinks its fatigue. And if Kaitlyn is sleeping as bad as I think she is I can understand the fatigue. No wonder come 4pm she refuses to do homework or does a real piss poor effort. She's exhausted. Physically and mentally drained, making it through a day is exhausting enough for Kaitlyn. Adding in extra activities or even fun things like after school sports is too much for her.

The principal was surprised to hear quite how bad things had been for Kaitlyn and has agreed to get the paperwork and referrals together to start getting some testing happening first thing back at school next year, she’s also offered for us to come into school before school officially goes back to have a sit down with whoever will be her new teacher to discuss Kaitlyn and try get Kaitlyn used to her new teacher. While talking with the principal we got onto the subject of Kaitlyn’s horse riding lessons last year and how amazing it was to see the improvements in Kaitlyn: building that relationship and confidence and trust with the horse and how good it was for her. The principal mentioned she knows someone with horses in town and would speak to her about any options that may be available to us-fingers crossed because I REALLY REALLY want this to happen.

Kaitlyn has been given a special sensory cushion and foot rest at school to try and help her sit properly and sit still as when she’s tired or anxious she has a tendency to wriggle around, sit on her legs, hang off the side of the chair etc. she loses focus too easily and it can be very distracting for the other kids.

 

Unfortunately Kaitlyn also still isn’t sleeping well, she is awake well past 8:30 most nights, keeping Bradley awake also, and is waking up the whole house at 5:30am. Everyone is exhausted and run down from lack of sleep.

You may not agree but in our house we have always (since Kaitlyn was a baby) had the rule that when you wake up you stay in bed until mum or dad come and get you. I find it keeps the kids from wandering around the house, getting up too early, bad habits of watching the tv first thing in the morning and safety, I always knew as toddlers they wouldn’t wake up and go running into the kitchen and climb up anything, also just a simple privacy thing. Hubby and I like the kids to know that we deserve our own time together (talking, watching tv, having a coffee and chat) without kids being around.

Kaitlyn however has become so bad with wandering the house, hiding behind doors and walls and listening into hubby and I having private conversations (because she wants to know what’s REALLY going on and listens to all sorts of adult conversations about life and work and her and the other kids and people we know etc..), going to the toilet up to 30 times a night (not even exaggerating) and basically being a pain and waking everyone up, that we made the decision to take the door handle off her door. So when the kids are in bed, that’s it. And for the last few months that’s worked perfectly fine with no dramas. Bradley happily sleeps all night and doesn’t get out of his room so it’s never been an issue with him. Thankfully we’ve been blessed with an amazing little boy that just takes it all in his stride and doesn’t complain.

The last few weeks Kaitlyn has been waking between 5-5:30am most mornings and because she can’t open the door and wander around she bangs on the wall, screams out “I need to go to the toilet” and cries and just generally anything noisy and attention seeking that will wake anyone up. Last week she even tried making herself vomit (a habit that she does when all else fails and her life is way out of control, possibly the thing that scares me the most about her. I dread the day she succeeds. Listening to your 6 year old daughter sitting in the bathroom head over the toilet bowl coughing and spluttering trying to make herself vomit is not how anyone pictures their life. It’s literally heartbreaking, and so damn scary-where did she even learn this from??!!) I don't even know why she feels like her life is so out of control at the moment, a few weeks ago things were difficult with hubby's work but that has slowed down lately and he's been home a fair bit.

So why don’t we just let her out?? Well sometimes we do, like this morning I got up opened the door told her to go toilet and straight back to bed. So she did. Less than 10 minutes later she was banging on the wall again “I need to poo.”

She doesn’t actually NEED anything, it’s just one of her things she does.

 

Living with Kaitlyn is very demanding, very exhausting, and very hard at times.

 

A few weeks ago we borrowed a weighted blanket off a friend to try and help Kaitlyn sleep at night. It worked AMAZING for the first few nights, but as Kaitlyn got used to having it, the desired effect wore off. And it’s the same with everything, something might work really well to keep her calm, eating well, sleeping well, keeping up in school, happy etc. but as soon as it becomes something she’s used to, it automatically stops working.

So we are CONSTANTLY looking for new strategies, new ways to deal, new ways to help her cope and to encourage her.

 

You can never truly understand how hard it is living with such a young child with anxiety until you have fully experienced it.

From the outside Kaitlyn seems like quite an average child. Others sometimes think she’s just naughty or rude (don’t get me wrong, sometimes she is naughty!). Hubby often gets frustrated when we see people that Kaitlyn knows out in public. Her school friends will see her and shout out and wave to her and Kaitlyn will often look the other way or whisper a very quiet hello-it seems as though she’s completely ignoring the person. It’s not intentional to be rude; she just doesn’t know how and doesn’t have the confidence to respond properly.

 

Today has been a particularly bad day after being woken so early. Isla was overtired and grumpy. Kaitlyn had meltdown after meltdown. Then she was rude and bossed everyone around (a sure sign she’s feeling anxious is when she starts trying to take control over everyone’s lives, telling us what to do, how to do it, trying to discipline her siblings etc. When she feels her life is out of control she tries to control everyone else). Hubby was home trying to sleep for night shift while everyone was arguing and having loud screaming meltdowns (myself included in that).

Having an anxious kid in the family is hard, I often feel sorry for Bradley and Isla. Kaitlyn takes up so much time and effort and attention that I sometimes feel as though the other 2 get left out. I try so hard to spend one on one time with the others but Kaitlyn can NOT play by herself, she’s always there, hanging around, trying to interrupt, trying to butt into your game, trying to listen in on your conversations (even when they have NOTHING to do with ANYTHING to do with her), trying to take over, trying to ask questions, trying anything she can to take my attention away from the others.

 

Some days it all just feels like a struggle. I feel like a failure, I feel too tired to function, I feed the kids junk takeaway because I don’t have the energy or time or just basically don’t want to fight over another meal to cook.

But then 7pm comes, the kids all go to bed and I sit back and realise how incredibly lucky I am to have 3 amazing children who are mostly healthy, mostly happy and are just my whole world. I love them all equally, and they all drive me insane equally.

 

And on those bad days the only thing that keeps me going, is knowing that even if it takes a week or it’s a month’s long “flare up” THIS TOO SHALL PASS. . .