Several years ago I brought my youngest child in to the elementary school in the morning. He was maybe 4 years old. He hated going in there.
He did not do well with crowds or loud noises. Well, an elementary school hallway is both of those things.
Over the years, we’ve spent a lot of time working on this. He’s gotten way better with crowds the majority of the time. But he doesn’t always do well with noise. This is a tad ironic since the child can be quite loud himself!
Today this child had a field trip. He did pretty good for quite a while! The field trip ended in a museum where other schools were running around being loud . . much louder than our school. He did ok with the noise at first. But after a while it was starting to get to him.
He started shutting down, because he’d just had enough. Last year at a field trip I took him away from a group because he just wasn’t able to handle the crowd and the noise. Today was rough for him; but he made it! During the last 10-15 minutes of the noisy part he begged me to let him leave. I’ve seen his “enough” several times before. And he was close. But he hung in there and he made it thru the whole thing!!
Tonight I am thankful for how far this child has come! I know it’s not easy for him. And I know finding that calm spot to go to inside his head is very hard when the world is chaotic around him. But he’s learning and he’s growing. And sometimes I just sit there in amazement at the improvement!
Bug's Bright Side 