Talking – Mon 16th Feb 2015
By Jeannette | February 16, 2015
I’ve written before about how D can bottle emotions and fears up. Sometimes to an extent that she’s unable to think of anything else, or consider rationale behind what is causing her anxiety.
It feels like I almost need a metaphorical can opener to get to what’s worrying her quickly, it would save upset.
Her worries stemmed around three things, the first two tumbled out relatively quickly, the last one took a lot of gentle persuasion that it would be okay, that we could talk about it, that maybe I could help.
This is where I’m so, so grateful that D is verbal, her speech was very stilted for a good few years and, whilst she can get a bit muddled word-wise when stressed, she can (eventually) verbalise.
So, what was bothering our lovely D?
The first one was that she’d have to leave home. Poor love, I don’t know where that came from. Whilst I’d love for her to achieve some semblance of independent living, I’m also very aware just how unaware she is of potential hazards and dangers around the house and externally. However much I can emphasise that items can be hot/sharp etc, this tends to be forgotten when she’s either in a hurry or stressed.
Reassurance therefore that she will always have a room with us, whatever she decides to do when an adult.
The second one was that she could die. This stems from a child at her school telling her that they were born with a hole in their heart and were “very close to death”. She has experience of death within the extended family and pets, but her fear seemed to overtake all of that.
Again, reassurance and chat around how babies breathe inside the womb and once out.
The third took a long time to come out. There were tears, lots of them and very evasive body language. It was very clear that unless she managed to say what was wrong, there wasn’t any way she’d settle or relax.
It turned out to be something I didn’t expect and something that turned into quite a chat (from me anyway). She was worried about having a Caesarian.
Obviously this is a long way off (she’s only 10) and it’s something that she saw in an app (not graphically, just a game) in IT, that her and a classmate had to help Elsa have a baby.
It stuck with her big-time. Even though she has no idea about “stuff” and isn’t emotionally ready to know, she was scared, very scared.
We talked about how I hadn’t had Caesarians but if I had, then the doctors would have made sure it didn’t hurt. Then she was worried that she’d see it all happening. Poor D.
She was visibly and emotionally reassured in the end but it had obviously all been building up in her mind and it took a lot of persuasion for her to offload.
I’m so glad she did though. Very grateful that she could tell me.
I hope everyone’s day has gone well Jx
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