It must be said that our Andy has never been a very secure kid. He has always been easily spooked. He has been our "nightmare" kid (in more ways than one, sorry for the joke, but it's true). He has always been our OCD kid (even as a small baby, he had one specific corner of his blanket that had to be in his hand at night - it had the pointiest corner). He has always worried and worried over things that are just plain silly. He still, to this day, has trouble being in a different part of the house than me or Kevin ("Dad, can you come with me to get my socks?"). We work with him, trying to build up his confidence that "Yes, you can!!!" But we recognized a long time ago that he isn't faking this; there is a genuine (although not severe) OCD nature programmed into his DNA (gee, wonder where that came from). Thus, we figured out that when you want to "change" Andy, it must be done over time and slowly.
It does work. He is now capable of playing across the street at Jackson's house without me being there. He is also now capable of watching tv in one room of the house while Paul and I play elsewhere. He can usually go to the bathroom on his own these days, unless it is dark and Rachel's occupying the front bathroom and he has to go to the back one. After a year and a half of walking him into the gym for school, he finally said I could just drop him off in the back carpool line.
The biggest thing we've figured out is that with Andy, knowledge is everything. As long as he knows ahead of time which car he will be riding in for a field trip that I cannot attend, he's fine. If his teachers were to switch that up at the last minute, ooh, that might get a bit touchy.
I realize that this doesn't work with all OCD kiddos and people. Goodness knows I've tried to work Kevin out of some of his OCD bits (like, oh, I don't know, asking me every blasted time I get him a soda if it's diet even though I've known him now for 10 years and I've never, ever, ever ever, ever served him anything but diet). Mostly though, I accept Kevin's weird little bits and just mess with him now and then.
I mess with Andy too. But in Andy's case, I think it helps. Like sometimes, just to throw a kink into his day that he'll have to deal with, I'll pack 2 strawberry NutriGrain bars for lunch rather than 2 blueberry ones. He likes blueberry best. Much better than strawberry. But his lunch everyday for the past 2 years has been 1 drink and 2 NutriGrain bars. Every school day. No joke (ask the lunch people, I'm that mom that only sends NutriGrain bars in her kid's lunch). Blueberry if he had his way every day. But sometimes, I throw in those strawberry ones, just to mess with him. Shake up his world so that he learns that life isn't always going to be predictible and perfect.
OKAY. So my point in blogging tonight was to share a little Andyism. Paul is asleep in the living room and isn't coming to bed with Andy right off because we need to give him another breathing treatment and we'll do that in a while.
"Okay, so Mom. You're going to stay in here with me until Paul goes to bed?"
"Yes, Andy, I will stay here until you fall asleep and then I will go get Paul's medicine and then get him to bed." See how I worded this differently? "And when I go to Paul, your dad will be in bed in our room."
"So Dad's going to sleep in here with me until Paul comes to bed?"
"No. Dad will be in his bed, either asleep or watching tv. Right next to your room here."
"Who's going to be with Paul?"
"Me, Andy. Dad is with him now. Now go to sleep."
And then, because I'm working on his whole OCD bit and knowledge is key, I throw in, "Andy, you do know that your dad and I will always be in this house. If we aren't sitting here when you wake up, it's because we're either in our room or the living room with Paul. But we would never just leave you." Doesn't that sound nice and reassuring?
"But you did leave once."
"When?" I'm somewhat perplexed and I'm sure I sounded it. Because when has Andy ever run into our room in the middle of the night to find us not there?
"When I woke up that one time and Poppa and Granny were here."
Ohhhhhhh. Yeah. That night I went into premature labor and the grandparents came over here in the wee hours of the morning. Oh yeah. Like over 2 years ago. The kid hasn't forgiven nor forgotten.
It doesn't matter that we at least thought of his welfare when we arranged for a live human body to be in the house AND that that human body was a grandparent that he knew. We could have left him alone.
We might as well have. Mr. Sharpie reigns supreme.
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