I was reminded yesterday why I don't post about Liam's progress: I am always afraid it will be contradicted the next day and that is exactly what happened. Liam's SLP brought him out after his session and was trying to talk to me about Liam's session. She had asked Liam what we did on vacation and he said something about the forest and alligators; she wanted to know if we went to a zoo or something. I haven't blogged yet about our trip to Homer, Alaska, but I assure you in Alaska there are no alligators and on the Homer spit (about 4 miles long and 1.5 miles wide and surrounded by water), there is no forest. In the middle of this frustrating conversation where I realized Liam STILL cannnot convey a simple answer to "what did you do last week on vacation?" a cell phone rang in the waiting room.
To be polite, the woman whose phone rang went into the entryway so as not to disturb me and the SLP. Her 2 year old followed her and took with him a toy from the waiting room. Liam knows the rules are that toys stay in the waiting room (he sometimes wants to take the toys home). Instead of telling me or the SLP that he was upset, he simply started crying and screaming. We couldn't figure out why he was upset for a couple minutes. In the meantime, Ben freaked out because Liam was crying and I was holding him. Now, Liam was partially crying because Ben's crying was upset him and he could not calm himself down about the fact the toy had been in the entryway.
The woman and her son came back into the waiting room, looking confused as to why Liam was so upset. This only upset Liam more, and he started pacing around the room, circling the toddler, and rushing up to him, getting in his personal space, all while screaming at the top of his lungs and flapping his arms. It was one of the those moments where I see Liam as how he appears to other people, especially as his behavior was so characteristically autistic. I have seen that behavior several times from older, lower-functioning teen-agers in that same waiting room. I could see the worry on the mom's face as she didn't know Liam and she didn't know if he'd hurt her little boy (who was smaller than Ben). Liam was staying in between her and her son. Bless her, as she didn't interfere and trusted me and the SLP that we would control Liam. I was confident he wouldn't hurt the little boy, but I would have been just as worried in her place. Liam was clearly out of control. I kept trying to get him in a bear hug to calm him but he would scream louder and wiggle from my grasp and go back to rushing up on the little boy. Finally, the little boy gave Liam the toy, and eventually through lots of quiet talking, Liam calmed down. He didn't want the toy; he just didn't want it in the entryway.
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3 comments:
Well, as I'm sure you already know-- sometimes it seems like for every step forward, there are 2 or even 3 steps back. Kate was always much less cooperative during ST when she wasn't feeling great. Was it yesterday that Liam started the day off with not feeling well? I, too, know that feeling of watching your child from the eyes of others and it is very disconcerting. (See my blog about this very same topic). I hope that one day you will come east to visit and we can get these monkeys together. I think they would have great fun!
Hugs Michelle. I want to give you a real life hug. It has to be so hard, but you are so strong. Such the perfect mother for him, you reacted exactly the way he needs you too. So I know it's hard. I struggle with things like that too, but I think the world thinks how perfect of a mother you are for him. And if they aren't, well screw them.
Kelly, yes, the day of the meltdown was the day before he came down with my chest cold, so he very well could have been feeling under the weather.
Erin, thank you. :-)
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