The "who is this child" conundrum

Sometimes Daddy P and I look at Baby Kate and wonder who she is. These past few weeks she has been becoming increasing sensitive to, well, everything. For two nights we had given her Tylenol before bed to help her sleep due to teething (and waking every hour screaming without it). Last night she decided to make up a sign for Tylenol. And she used it, again and again, since we weren't giving her any. Caught in the dilemma of trusting she knows it's effect and wants it for pain relief and not giving it to her because we thought she just wanted it for the syrupy sweetness, we were at a loss as to what to do. We didn't give it to her. She screamed and thrashed, so we brought her out of her room after 30 minutes because she was incessantly signing "bottle." Well, apparently, "bottle" now means "dropper" from the Tylenol container. We returned her to her room, without the medicine, and tried again.

This led to an hour screaming, kicking, throwing fest as she made her anger and frustration clearly known (a sight that is becoming very familiar as I am realizing that she has an even low frustration tolerance than I do...). As I sat next to her crib last night, singing to her as she screamed and thrashed around, I tried desperately to analyze the whole situation. Is it her teeth? Has she figured out that Tylenol takes the pain away? Is it the taste and she is just being stubborn and wanting what she wants? Is it something totally different? Her dad is hypersensitive to texture on his skin. Maybe she is reacting to a stray tag in her p.j.s or something literally rubbing her the wrong way? Holding her provided her no comfort but she seemed equally upset in her crib. It was killing me to leave her there, but I channeled my weekend of yoga and chanting and just sat and chanted next to her, hoping to calm us both.

Exhausted from the emotion and screaming, I slinked out of the room as she lay in sleep, still taking gagged sobbing breaths, wondering what the "right" thing was to do.

This morning Miss Kate threw a similar tantrum (screaming, kicking, scratching, and pinching herself) because I changed her diaper. I mean, really? A diaper? I just look at her sometimes and wonder if this is really who she is, or just a stage she's going through. But as the weeks go on I am realizing we have a child that is going to struggle with emotional self-control in big ways, and who is very very sensitive. At times this sensitivity is delightful. She is so emotionally attuned to other people it's remarkable. She notices everything in her environment, and picks up language amazingly quickly. Unfortunately, the flip side is that she is so quick to absorb her environment, I think she has a hard time shutting it out when she needs to. As a baby if I just held her very tightly I could help her calm down. She would trash, but then submit to my hold and let go and sleep. Now she pushes and scratches her way out of my arms when she's upset with me and then cannot calm herself down very successfully on her own either.

How I'm wishing I had more early childhood training in my psychology program... Self-soothing tips, anyone?

In the meantime, we are going to try to re-cast bedtime and her bedroom as a happy, quiet, soothing place, instead of the place of struggle and sadness that it has become...