Wired

Henry used to be a fairly low-key, easy-going child. He still is, sometimes.

But right before his evening bath is not one of those times.

He gets really squirrelly, and he runs around the house screeching and laughing and the bath, alas, doesn't calm him. Afterward he races into his bedroom, naked and giggling, and flops onto the bed, arms flailing and feet kicking while Jon or I try to apply pajamas (it's like trying to put pants on an octopus) and by this point I am so weary of this outburst that I want to scream STOP and throw him into bed and leave the room before I do something stupid.

Why this explosion of energy every evening, and why the Saturday morning slump (lying on the floor, eyes glazed, tuned out) the last couple times we've brought him to his speech camp? That happened this morning, and it was difficult to see him so disconnected and unresponsive to his therapist's every request.

Part of it was the way she was trying to connect with him: she was asking far too many questions, a litany of "What's this?" and "What's this?" and "Henry, what's this?" That kind of thing may work with a typical child, but it doesn't work with Henry. As soon as he senses you are trying to elicit a particular response, he will shut you out. I remember quite a few tearful attempts at trying to elicit speech from Henry in just this way.

What does work? E.g., you point at a picture of a duck and instead of asking "What's this?", you say, "Look, I see a (pause)..." and Henry will fill in "duck!" I suggested this technique to S. at speech camp today, and I think she understood what I meant. The other children in the group had phonology issues, not developmental or neurological issues, so the techniques are different, and the therapists are actually therapists-in-training (grad students) and are learning along with the children. It was a good experience, overall, but today was rough.

Maybe Henry is a night person (like Jon) and not a morning person (like me). Which gives me the idea of doing more "work" with him at night when he's the most wired -- take advantage of that energy and playfulness. Either that or slip him a mickey with his evening cup of milk.