We celebrated Christmas early on this past Saturday because I have to work 12 hour shifts on both Christmas and Christmas Eve. Unfortunately, Finn woke up that morning with a cough, a fever, a rash and runny nose. The last few Christmases and birthdays Finn hasn't really been interested at all in opening presents. I thought maybe this was the year, but I was wrong. He had no interest in unwrapping anything, he just wanted to run around. He did get excited when I opened his first present from his grandmother, which was a peek-a-boo Elmo. The kid loves Elmo, and he loves to play peek-a-boo - so it was a good choice by my mom. Then, I let him open his "something to read" next which included a cars book with a play mat and 12 toy car figurines. So he was definitely over opening gifts after that. He just wanted to play with his new cars! :)
I had to force him to open a third gift, which was a the Planes Fire and Rescue movie. He was saying, "No, No, No," when I was opening it, so assuming he was perhaps a little over stimulated, we stopped opening gifts for the day. I waited a couple of days, and tried again but he remained uninterested so I opened his last two gifts and placed them in his room. It was funny though, because immediately after saying his last "nooooo," he realized the DVD had an airplane on it, and he immediately put it in the DVD and pressed play. The kid is obsessed with airplanes, helicopters and cars.
So, yes, Christmas was a little anti-climatic, but it was a good lesson that I will need to temper my expectations for holidays and birthdays with this kid. His big presents were an art easel and a fort kit and then he got a few outfits, which of course he could care less about, because he currently hates clothes. We will open gifts with Colin's parents another day, due to Finn being sick on Saturday, which is probably just as well to split up the festivities into a couple of different days so Finn doesn't get completely overwhelmed.
Sunday at church was the first time I burst into tears in public in awhile. Finn did not do well. Which, he usually doesn't at church but now I was viewing his behaviors from a different lens and I felt completely awful and guilty that I had been so obliviously misreading the situation for who knows how long. He has always hated to go to sacrament. Many times he will scream when we enter. (He does the same thing when we pull into the parking lot at a grocery store). He does well at first, then progressively gets further and further into meltdown mode as the meeting progresses. When he gets to full on panic mode where he starts to hit his head, or me, and cry and pull my hair until one of us takes him into the hallway. At which point he immediately calms down, only to freak out when we try, once again, to enter the chapel. This whole time I thought he was just being a punk, and was bored and didn't want to sit through an hour long session of adult-speak. I would just bring a ton of toys, and snacks and try to keep him occupied as quietly as I can. Now I realize he has more likely been getting overstimulated and melts down because there are just way too many people, too much noise and too much stimuli in that one space. And, it sucks to know that my kid has been in pain, and I haven't been doing anything about it for goodness knows how long. Sucks. Sucks.
So now I have to figure out what to do about that. Do I sit in a closet by ourselves somewhere so I can listen while Finn hangs out in peace, or stay in the hallway with him? Do I try headphones, which I doubt he would keep on, and try to sit back in a corner somewhere? I have no idea what to do.
Luckily, I have the appointment with the specialist next week and I can try to get some advice.
I have noticed that if I stop Finn from pacing, put my face near his and tell him to look at me, and listen to me then I ask him to do something after successfully getting his attention he will actually follow a simple command about 30 percent of the time, which is a big improvement over the last few weeks, and gives me a lot of hope that he's still in there. He's just in his own world and I have to work harder to reach him. Most of the time, he will just fling his head back, look at the ceiling and wail that I am trying to make him look me in the eye, but sometimes he will actually will walk over to the book shelf and pick out a book for momma to read to him, which feels really, really nice.
I am seriously limiting his technology, which he hates, but is getting used, to so I can force him to interact with me. We are doing flashcards, shapes, vocabulary, story books, art projects and playing with toys as much as he will tolerate. I let him watch one movie a day, have the kindle for one hour a day, and let him watch one hour three times a day of YouTube videos. He is obsessed with watching videos of people opening up Easter eggs with tiny toys in them. At first, he had no interest in keeping the TV off all day to interact with me, but he's getting used to it, throwing less fits about it, and starting to enjoy the play time a bit more. We have been practicing sharing and taking turns this week.
I finished my second to last class for this semester today. I honestly took the pre-test first and only planned on studying what I didn't do well on. The pretest was so simple, I scheduled the actual test without studying much of anything, but was able to still get an A on the test without doing any of the course work! I am glad that worked out so now I only have a community health course to complete before I plan on quitting school temporarily so I can focus on Finn.
I feel like a bad mom for admitting it, but I am nervous now about bringing a new baby into our family. I feel like Finn needs me so much right now, and it's not fair that he's going to have to share me with this tiny human being that will be so dependent on me supplying her with her every need. I don't know how I would have handled Finn AND a baby this weekend, and my husband had to be at church for over 10 hours on Sunday doing his church calling, AND I will be healing from a C-section AND hopefully I am done with school by the time she comes. With all I've been though in life, I almost never get overwhelmed, but thinking about it all almost gets me there.
However, I do have faith in God's timing, and so I have to have faith that it will all work out like it is supposed to.
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