Sensory Processing Disorders

MaygenDL0ve

Good morning,

I was wondering if any of you have babies/kiddos that struggle with this?  How do you cope?  I was reading in Mothering Multiples about it, and I suspect one of my boys may have it to a degree.  As you might suspect in the pict, he is the one not smiling.  He gets really scared sometimes.  And about every other day, he has a major freak-out that BREAKS my heart.  His brother and I do our best to calm him down.  I've tried stripping him and wrapping him him my arms...  he grabs freaking TIGHTTLY at everything when he's like this.  Including his brother's hand, and his brother just looks at him and holds his hand  Once, the freak out started suddenly when he was on the activity mat.  When I picked him up to pull him out, he grabbed hold of the toys dangling from the mat and I ended up pulling the mat to me with him!!!  

The only thing that somewhat calms him is if I squeeze his arms, hands, legs and feet into a ball close to my chest and rock him in silence.  What is going on.....  Their next appointment is their 4-month checkup and shots.  WOuld you suggest taking him in sooner for evaluation, or just use comfort measures until I can speak to the pediatrician about it.   

Ruby_Tuesday

I wouldn't wait.  I know very little about sensory disorders, just what I have learned from friends who are dealing with it and from articles that I have read, but everything I've ever heard and seen stresses the importance of early intervention.  I don't know how early they mean and whether your son can be effectively evaluated now but why not find out.  It can't hurt.  It can only help.

ETA: Also FWIW the face your boy is making in the picture, not smiling and studing his hand is very much like what 2 of my boys do frequently.  The face and the hand studing seem pretty normal to me.  Hopfully the freak outs are just baby stuff also.  It very well could be.  Try not to worry too much.

kafunder

Ruby_Tuesday:

ETA: Also FWIW the face your boy is making in the picture, not smiling and studing his hand is very much like what 2 of my boys do frequently.  The face and the hand studing seem pretty normal to me.  Hopfully the freak outs are just baby stuff also.  It very well could be.  Try not to worry too much.

So sorry you're going through this. I hope it's nothing, and just wanted to add to what Ruby said. I often see DD making the face that yours is making in the photo. She loves to study her hands, and often has a frown on her face when she does it. I think it's normal, they're working hard to focus. As for the not smiling, neither of my babies smiled until about 3 months. Really, DS didn't start smiling a lot until 3.5 months. I was so worried about it, but now that seems crazy to me b/c DS can't stop smiling, as you can see in my siggy picture.

DS also had a lot of freakouts prior to 4 months. We had to do what we call "waterboarding" him to get him to calm down, where we'd bring him in the dark bathroom, run the faucet or tub AND the fan, put his head near the faucet so he could heard the running water, and hold him close on his side with his paci and sometimes swing him side to side. Only then would he stop crying (this is a combination of all the techniqes--suck, swing, side, swaddle, sound--in HBOTB). He still gets really freaked out like this sometimes, particularly during the witching hour, but it's definitely gone down since he turned 4 months. So, all this to say, that I'm hoping what you're going through is normal baby stuff.

mommyof4boys

I think as moms we can work ourselves into knowing something is "wrong" with our little ones.  Your guys are so small still.  Please enjoy them while they are young.  I have a child with a 16p11.2 duplication, autism, intellectual disabilities, and apraxia.  He has sensory issues BIG time and they weren't obvious at 3 and 4 months. 

MaygenDL0ve

I'm gonna try the waterboarding....... And I'm trying not to worry too much but it's hard when my lil baby seems to be in sheer panic mode and there is nothing I can do to help.  Really hope it stops soon.