Bizarre Behaviors

It's 1:32am and I can't get myself back to sleep. Faith woke up again in one of her crying fit. Not sure what's wrong. When she is like this, we can't get her to tell us what's bothering her. I think she is teething and I should have given her some Tylenol before bed.

I had her in our bed tonight. She started having a running nose at the playdate today, but she didn't have a temperature, so I'm figuring she's teething. She didn't look so good and she was congested so I figured it's just easier to have her sleep with her from the beginning versus waking me up at three when she wanders into our room. She has been wandering in around three for the last few days. Actually she has been coming in every day since we have been back from Disneyland. It's our post traveling adjustment time, plus Auntie is here. Faith is so sensitive to noise when she is sleeping and although Auntie is not loud, she still wakes up when she hears the slightest noise from downstairs.

She just sat up crying and I asked her what was bothering her, but she continued to cry. So I got up and held her to try to calm her down. I was successful at first, but then I told her that I had to go pee and that I would set her down for just a second. This just got her so upset and she starting crying louder. I decided to take her to the bathroom with me because I had to pee badly. I sat her on the stool as she continued crying. She lost her pacifier for a second and cried louder until I finally finished and scoped her up to walk her around. We used to do this a lot when she was a baby. I was successful in calming her down, but now instead of peacefully sleeping, I'm up writing this post. I figured writing my feelings down will calm me down enough to get me back to sleep. My therapist says that writing in a journal is just as good as going to therapy. Let's see if she is right.

Faith has been acting bizarre lately. I think it's a combination of teething and having Auntie around. She loves her Auntie and I'm so glad that Auntie came home to visit from Japan. She is here for two weeks and will be leaving on Sunday. I'm sure it's going to be rough for Faith then. It's so cute how she follows her Auntie around and hangs on every word that Auntie says. She idolize her and it's so cute to see their interaction. Faith doesn't get attach too many people so it's wonderful to see her attach to someone else beside myself. However because she is so attach, she wouldn't even eat when Auntie is around. She runs around like crazy and acts really silly. It's like she is putting on a show for Auntie. Also when Auntie's friends come around, she is even more intense.

The other night, she had three grown adults playing ring around the Rosie's and spinning around on the floor. It was the funniest sight. It was great for my husband and I to watch because she rarely acts like this in front of other people besides us. After calming from our laughing fit, my husband made a comment that made me reflect. He said, "it's great to watch her, but makes me realize how exhausting it is to take care of her." She does require a lot of our energy and we go out of our way to out of our way to entertain her.

All this adult interaction is making her forget how to play with kids her age. During the last two playdates, she has been really withdrawn. I think it's just been so overwhelming for her. Instead of playing with the other kids, she just wants her binky and lay with her head on my lap. At yesterdays playdate, she wanted to just watch tv while her friends were all playing. I used to fight this behavior, but now I let her do it because I know she needs to. I used to feel embarrassed that she wouldn't play with everyone else, but I'm get better at accept her for her. I'm not going to push her if she's not ready. That doesn't mean that I wouldn't continue to encourage her to play, but it helps not to feel ashamed and making her feel bad for it as well.

It's going to be interesting to see how she is when Auntie leaves back to Japan. It will be a future post.