Freak out!

Basically it seems better described as heightened sensitivity which, in young children, means frequent overload. My mother initially thought it was just normal toddler paddying - that it is until she actually saw Sophia freak out one day. Sophia would react to somethings (and sometimes still does although not to the same degree) with total distress and it was almost as if she literally could not respond to you trying to soothe her. To touch her or try to talk to her further was to add to the over-stimulation, making it worse.

She would react badly to things like cutting her food up in front of her......in particular eggs. For some reason she just couldn't cope. You could cut up her food where she couldn't see it and give it to her but if you cut it up in front of her, she would start to 'wail' and go fetal on the floor. It was much more than crying but not quite screaming. And if you tried to pick her up and hold her - it would escalate into terror. Thrashing and screaming and trying to get away back into the fetal position.

We counteracted this with a patient re-education approach. I would stand there, without touching her and say, 'Get off the floor Sophia.' Every time it happened, I said the same thing, the same way. After about 3 weeks, she started to respond to it. The crying would lessen and she would start to get off the floor. That was the signal that it was okay to pick her up and comfort her. I must have looked liked the coldest bitch to some people - just standing there, not trying to pick her up and help her. But eventually, the time between me saying....'Get off the floor Sophia' and the time it took for her to respond, got shorter and shorter. And later on I could actually adjust it and say, ' I know you're upset but you need to get off the floor'.

She still gets upset with things like cracks in her food such as biscuits or ice creams (iced lollies) but each time, we've told her that we don't worry things like that.....and that it will still taste good. Now that she is able to express herself better, she will often say, 'it's all ruined' or 'everything's ruined,' which to her means no good any more - at all - ever. The response to that is, 'no its not - we'll see what we can do.' Working that way, we've encouraged her to rethink possibilities and it seems to be working well.

She was (and still is a bit) extremely sensitive to loud noise. Her reaction was to get extremely distressed and go fetal on the floor, then that lessened into clapping with her hands over her ears and trying to hide. Now its just standing there with her hands over her ears, while she tries to work out what the sound is. Most sounds that she knows, she will re-iterate with us what she thinks it is and we'll either verify or explain what the sound is and why she shouldn't be concerned.

Some people have suggested high-functioning autism and Aspergers and for a short while there, I was tempted to have her tested but there is a tendancy to label things early when perhaps it might be better to wait and see how things pan out. The medical profession have clear 'boxes' that they like to put people in which would be good except that very few people actually fit those boxes.

I was approached by a woman while we were camping who explained a very interesting idea to me. Sophia was very distressed at camping because we couldn't meet her 'morning ritual' requirements. She couldn't cope with such an abrupt set of changes and it wasn't surprising - most adults would probably have trouble too. This lady noticed that special kind of crying that Sophia was doing and she came over and offered to help. She told me about her daughter and a diagnosis that she was given when they were having similar issues. It wasn't so much of a diagnosis, she explained, more of  an explanation - one that made a lot of sense to me.

Apparently 15 percent of the population are born this way and its not an illness or a syndrome of any kind - their brains are simply wired differently. They are the children that people often call oversensitive. Basically it's related to the two types of response to danger - fight or flight. The kids who are more brawny in attitude (the rugby types) that run around bruising the crap out of themselves and other people (without meaning to specifically)...are more inclined to be the stand and fight kind of people. The flight kind of people are literally more sensitive - they pick up on danger signals so that they have the time to flee danger. These kids tend to be a bit more intelligent. In kids like Sophia, the sensitivities often run alongside in strength with their gifted capabilities. Because we can literally train her out of her initial reactions, I don't believe its any form of autism.

Its simply the way she is and that's ok.