Raising a Highly Sensitive Child.

Today was tiring. Hunter has an ear infection and his fever fluctuated between 101-103F today. He puked at 3am and again 3 times during the day. I set him up with shows on a laptop upstairs and a bottle of coconut water. He sat quietly and watched, saying it hurt too much to lay down and that was what was causing him to throw up. Smart. So he sat up, surrounded by pillows. I came to check on him every 30 minutes. The kid I babysit was in the basement, also set up with shows since he also seemed low energy and didn’t want to do much. I was grateful because that gave me more time to be attentive to Hunter. I spent all day until 2pm running up and down four flights of stairs to check on the two boys.

Between running to check on the two boys I cleaned the kitchen, prepped food, and read a little bit.

The book I just borrowed from the library was recommended to me by a couple of friends after Izzy’s first parent-teacher interview. We sat down and the teacher asks me, “Have you noticed that Izzy is highly sensitive?” Uh, Yah. Yah, I have. Have I figured out what works for her? Nope, sure haven’t.

When I told my mom Izzy was being noticed as highly sensitive in nature my mom laughed at me and said, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Sounds like someone we know- you!”

Thinking back I do remember being especially empathetic, questioned all life events and world tragedies more deeply than my peers, hated large family gatherings, and was overly sensitive to bright lights and loud sounds. For example, I could not stand Star War’s Chewie as he always sounded too loud to me and always seemed very distressed, which made me anxious. I could understand C-3P0 (3P-Creepio as I called him) much better. I got where he was coming from, always worrying about the future and ducking loud noises. He made sense to me. Izzy has obviously inherited this trait of seeing and feeling the “more” in everything.

One talk around Izzy about the possibility of tornadoes had her anxious and miserable for months, wondering about the “what-ifs” of the situation.

Then, the book came back in to my mind! I asked my friends what it was again and got it from the library:

HSP Book

This book has me nodding yes every second paragraph! This woman is a blessing. I wish I had found this book when Isabella was born. I have tried every other parenting book style to no or little success. I am barely past the beginning of the book where she defines what a HSP or Highly Sensitive Person (or Highly Sensitive Child in this case!) is and already I am finding it useful.

Many of my parenting instincts were correct, by the way the book is going so far, and that makes me happy. The feeling of failing or frustration when I didn’t know what to do is also normal. This is also a relief. I can’t wait to finish the book and tell you what worked or didn’t work with Isabella. Our parenting is going to take a shift. It will also be crucial for Josh to read it as he is a non-sensitive stuck in a house of highly sensitives! Poor guy.

Have a good weekend everyone, “see” you tomorrow.

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