The Other Sensation

So, this is a post about M. She is not the star of this blog, but she is no less important than her big brother, E.

Husband-face and I are beginning to wonder if she is 'gifted.' I use the inverted commas here because I am quite embarrassed that I may be wrong and she is just a bit of a smarty pants. I am conscious of sounding too boastful, but I don't think I am wrong in saying she is kind of remarkable.

She is about to turn 2. Her birthday is on the 17th of January. My pregnancy with her was mostly enjoyable. She was planned and we found ourselves staring in disbelief at a positive pregnancy test less than 2 weeks after we decided we would start trying for a second child.

She was an alert baby. She was the noisy baby on the ward, screaming her head off at just a few hours old. I laughed. I had to, or I would have burst in to tears! But oh my, how I loved her anyway. She cried a lot. She always wanted to bear weight on her legs from only a week or two old, and would scream if we didn't hold her up to do so. She screamed in the car. She screamed at night. She just.. Screamed! We medicated her for reflux to some relief, but then, we found out she had hip dysplasia and she was put in to a pavlik harness which greatly restricted her movement. She screamed louder and longer than ever before. She HATED that thing, as did we all. I fell in to quite a deep depression during that time. I loved her so much and she was so uncomfortable. She wanted desperately to sit up, to be able to move about and explore on her tummy, but she was only allowed this after 2 or so months in the harness, and even then, for only an hour or so a week. We were 'reassured' by the doctors that babies got used to the harness, but she never did. The day we were told we could take it off was a wonderful day! We were told, however, to expect her to reach physical milestones later than average. She had missed the average age to roll over, but took to that quite happily once she was free at around 6 months of age.

Next, she crawled, but not for long. She was still always happiest when she was bearing weight on her legs, and standing. She skipped cruising furniture entirely and went straight to walking at 9 months old. She was a happier, much more relaxed little person.

At over 12 months old, she was diagnosed with a tongue tie. I had questioned this several times when she was a newborn as we have always had difficulties breastfeeding. I was 'reassured' that her tongue was fine. We a still on the waiting list to have her tongue snipped, which must now be done under a general anaesthetic due to her age. Our estimated surgery date is July 2013, which will be 13 months after our consultation with the surgeon. We started to worry that her tonight tie was effecting her speech as she never seemed to say much. She seemed always to be happy, but quiet. She said 'Mum' and 'Dad' and a few other babbly bits and bobs. I started asking other Mothers I knew if I should be concerned. She clearly understood us, though. Before she turned one, she began nodding and shaking her head to indicate yes or no. Husband face and I were always very grateful that it was "so easy to figure out what she wanted." Her body language and the noises she made were always very easy for us to interpret. And then the language started. Like a rocket. Like a punch in the face.

At this age, it is typical for children to be starting to put two words together. It is called a "two word utterance", e.g. "Daddy drink", "Mummy ball." It should all be about nouns, and Proper nouns. Maybe one or two verbs.
But M has long surpassed that stage and perhaps even skipped it. I can't remember. She now speaks in complex and compound sentences, e.g. "I want to go for a swim, but I don't want to wear sunscreen!" She uses lots of wonderful adjectives, like 'horrible', 'ridiculous' and 'humongous!' She is like a language sponge. If we use a word once, she has added it to her lexicon and will start using it, too. We some times have to interpret for others what she is saying, however, but those who know her best can almost always understand her. She asks "why?" a lot, which is a language thing (practicing the give and take of conversation), but she is also curious. "What are you doing?" she asks. What happened? Why are you doing that? What is that for?
She sings. She sings Twinkle Twinkle and Humpty Dumpty. She sings "Dave likes to wear dirty underwear!", A sing-songy insult from the film, Alvin and the Chipmunks. She loves certain TV shows and will even watch the cartoons her older brother loves and are much different to Dora and Peppa Pig. She makes up her own songs. She sings "Wipe my bum cracker, bum cracker, bum cracker, bum!" when she has pooed. Her favourite shape is a triangle, though she cannot draw one, she knows most of her colours. Her favourite is pink. She says numbers, mostly out of order, but today she counted "8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15", counting her jumps on the trampoline. She shook my breast the other day before I fed her, and I asked what she was doing. She said she was making a milk shake, with a big silly chuckle at how funny she was.

Tonight, I pointed at about 12 icons on the laptop, all identical. All episodes of Ben and Holly's Little Kingdom, a favourite television program. I named the titles for her and pointed, "Daisy and Poppy", "The Egg" etc. She remembered over half of the titles and which icon corresponded with which episode.

So, perhaps she is gifted. Perhaps she is not. Either way, she is quite special, but also becoming increasingly bored with the monotony of home life. I have withdrawn her from day care and don't wish to send her until she is old enough to go to a Not For Profit preschool. With one child who struggles when life is not 100% predictable, and one who craves adventures and action and new ideas, I can see we may be in for a few more bumpy years.

Now, anybody want to take M for me for a few days? My brain is drained!