Who might THAT little person/bed-hog be sleeping in our bed??
In two weeks, Ayla decided to change her sleeping habits.
Currently, she refuses to fall asleep unless she is in our bed, snuggled between us. If not, she will remain awake and play inside her crib for hours. Literally....hours. Eventually, she'll fall asleep from pure exhaustion between 1- 1:30am (bedtime is 9pm).
Normally, this would not be an issue- just let her play until she falls asleep, right? However, Ayla eats on a slow drip during the night and we cannot hook her up to her night feeds until she falls asleep. Otherwise, she unhooks herself from the feeding pump and milk then pumps over her, the blankets and the bed. We've found it easier to hook her up to her night feeds once she is asleep. Oh, and she also rips the velcro tabs off her diaper and removes said diaper during the night. So there's the issue of putting her diaper back to rights once asleep.
She's a night owl. A funny one at that!
The solution? Her therapists suggested 'pressure toys' and 'weighted' blankets. The reason Peanut likes to sleep in our bed is because she is a Sensory Seeker. Snuggling with us allows her to "calm" her body which provides an environment where she can relax and then fall asleep.
We eagerly took this advice and applied.
Alas, it did not work for the Bean. She threw the weighted blanket off, tossed the pressure toys from her crib and remained awake into the wee hours of the morning hollering and playing. Interesting. Options are:
1) Letting her play in her crib until falling asleep = we stay awake until she falls asleep so we can hook her up to night feed and fix her diaper
2) Bring her into bed with us during bedtime = we ALL get some sleep
We opted for Option 2. Once asleep, Ayla is carried back into her crib. Aaah, sleep...is good!
Helping Ryan bake cookies. Bean can climb into her Kitchen Helper, but not out. So she'll stand there and holler until rescued.
Ayla enjoys kicking and playing with the exercise ball. She'll say, "Keeck ball".
This is great exercise to help strengthen her mobility and build stability in her walk. It was suggested that Ayla see a Mobility Specialist as she has issues with depth perception and balance.
We took Ayla out "shopping" for the FIRST time (yes, it felt kinda weird but we had a blast).
Bean especially enjoyed the various textures and stopped to touch everything. She went a little crazy in the drapery department feeling all the various curtain textures.
Notice the "busy"'/blurry feet. She was constantly in motion, going from one display to the next.
This pink curtain had sparkles which Peanut kept coming back to scratch and feel.
The sales clerk thought she was just adorable. Of course!
The picture below is one of the reasons she needs to see a Mobility Specialist. When there is a change in the texture or height in the flooring, Ayla will stop, get onto her hands and knees and crawl. She steps over shadows, cannot climb stairs and stumbles and falls often.
We forget how much Ayla's vision is limited because her activity is "normal" for us and we're accustomed to seeing that behaviour. Yet we realize it's not normal when pointed out by therapists...those are 'aha' moments for us. Because really, the beauty is that we don't know what's "normal" for her.
During a recent session of speech therapy, Ayla stilled, looked up at the ceiling while her eyes began rapidly chattering and performing circles. The therapist was concerned she might be having a seizure and asked if that was a normal thing for her to do. Yep- it is. She does that several times a day and we hardly notice it. Like her gagging and retching; it sounds scary to others but it's the 'norm' for the Bean.
Eh, what's 'normal' anyway?
