Noggin

Our baby needs a helmet.  Not because of the flying things in our home that I have written about before, but because he literally is the clumsiest child I know.  He hits his head constantly.  Sometimes it's his fault, sometimes its his brother's fault, sometimes its the puppy that knocks him over, and sometimes its some act of God that occurs that causes him to bump his noggin.

For instance tonight, I was trying to write another post when I had to stop five times to kiss the head of my baby.  I kid you not.  I stopped so many times that I couldn't even keep my train of thought and abandoned all hope for it.  He bumps his head so often that I now know by the type of cry and the actions afterwards how serious the matter is.  For instance, if he sits down, rubs his head and lets out a dying cat like cry, its only a minor bump and something will distract his pain momentarily.  No active kiss of reassurance from mommy needed.  If there is crying, with tears, active heading rubbing and the walking towards the kitchen for an ice cube, I know that a kiss is needed and we probably have a lump on our hands.  If however, a silent cry begins with no rubbing, its probably a massive bump, immediate attention is needed, with lots of mommy kisses and a bag of ice instead of one cube.  Yes, we have our system fully worked out. 

I shouldn't blame all of his bumps on his clumsiness because living with his older brother the baby has had sort of a thrown into the fire kind of up bringing.  Our aspie has no sense of being easy or gentle with his brother.  He is full on tackle, hit, punch, scratch, pinch, bite, and attack with his baby brother.  And although we try so hard to correct our aspie and try to stop situations before they happen, we are not perfect and there are times that the baby takes some hard hits. By the time our baby hit 14 months or so, he was walking really well and when his older brother would run towards him he would immediately sit down on the floor to avoid a bear hug tackle that was his brother's favorite way to "play" with him.  By 16 months, the baby was able to pick up the pace and move out of the way of his brother and come yelling for mommy if he touched a train that was not aspie approved, and by 18 months, he was starting to just try to out run him.

We knew that there would be a time though that baby would stand up to aspie and even maybe instigate it, and that day has come.  A few nights ago, my aspie was getting his nightly cuddle in the recliner with his daddy and the baby was playing at my feet.  The baby saw an opportunity that he must have been waiting for for a long time, he stopped playing ran over and hit his older brother on the head with his train as hard as he could.  Of course, our aspie yelled out and after dad calmed him down they went back to cuddling.  Baby thought that once was not enough so he went back over to hit his older brother again.  Ever hear the phase, do it once shame on you, do it twice, shame on me?  Well, older brother was ready, and hit him on the head with is cup the moment baby came over for the attack.  Train went flying, cup went flying, baby went into silent scream and a pack of ice was needed.  The whole time though hubs and I couldn't stop laughing.  Call it twisted humor if you will but it was one of the funniest things we had seen from the two of them in a while. 

Over the last couple of months we have really seen our Aspie and baby connect and bond.  They love each other so much and its so special to watch, but that doesn't mean that they will never stop getting into it.  And of course, baby is clumsy, brother is older, bigger, and for now a little wiser and therefore bumps on the coconut will be a plenty.  All I can do for now is keep the ice on hand and the kisses flowing.   

***Update!!!  Today in the mail we got two huge letters.  One stating that our son was approved for medical assistance (FINALLY!) and the other from Highmark stated that they re-evaluated our son's case and approved his therapy coverage for the next 24 treatments!!!  Thank you to everyone who helped us with suggestions and recommendations and for passing our story along!  It truly helped our son obtain the therapy and treatments he so needs!!  Thanks again!****