The Terrible Twos
When Ethan was 2, we had our little girl Sienna. This is when I found the so called terrible twos really hit the hardest. I would be up with Sienna through the night, who was not the best sleeper to begin with, sometimes being up for 4 hours at one time. And Ethan would wake at 5am full of energy and ready to start the day. He was starving from the get go, and he would cry and get angry if I did not get up right away to feed him. I often found myself half asleep quickly making his favorite breakfast, cow’s milk on top of Weet-Bix and dusted with white sugar. At this stage, Ethan became increasingly sick. He would be awake through the night with a constant cough, and he was full of mucous and would cough so much he was often sick. He was eventually diagnosed with childhood asthma, which I was advised he would grow out of. He was given antibiotics in case of infection and steroids to open his airways. I wish someone had suggested to me then that the milk could be making mucous adding to the situation, but instead he was filled with puffers and ventilators that never seemed to do any good. Taking him to the supermarket was nerve-wracking, and it soon seemed he was affected by the bright supermarket lights. They made him hyperactive or agitated. And he had to be eating luncheon or he would end up crying. I would race around the supermarket getting my shopping done in the time it took Ethan to eat 5 slices of processed luncheon meat. I would also bribe him at the supermarket to be good with strawberry milk each week too. I bought it in a large 2 liter container, and he loved it. At age 3, we moved from Bulls to Wanganui for Jeremy’s career. As we didn’t have family to help with Ethan on a weekly basis, he was enrolled at a very popular daycare, so I could have 2 mornings a week to get some jobs done. The first few weeks were awful. He would be screaming so much as I tried to leave, and the teacher would be holding onto him, and I could see his legs kicking as I left the gate. I was worried he would end up hurting the teacher he was kicking so much. This was scary because he was not a little boy who would ever want to hurt anyone. I would end up crying all the way home, wondering what I was doing wrong. All the other children were playing happily, why not Ethan? After a while, he began to settle, and he would look forward to waving to me at the gate once I was in my car. However, he would be so angry when I picked him up. He would walk with me to the car, and once he climbed in he would begin screaming and kicking in his car seat. He sometimes did this all the way home, and I remember one day Jeremy had the day off, and I left Sienna at home with him as I went to get Ethan. Ethan was so out of control on the way home, once I pulled up the driveway, and I opened up the door of the car. He was still kicking and screaming as I undid his safety belt … he was flapping his arms and legs around so much I could not grab hold of him, and he slid out of the car and onto the gravel driveway. I was staring down at him in shock as he continued to thrash around on the ground. He was so out of control that his legs were becoming raw from the gravel. I grabbed hold of him still thrashing and got him inside. I finally got him to his room where all I could do was shut the door. Nothing would snap him out of it until he was ready.
Looking back, I can now see that he was experiencing sensory overload, too much information going in, and he didn’t know how to process it. He kept it all in when outside the house and let it out when home. I can see now kindergarten was part of the nightmare, and I should not have taken him there. As he got worse, I thought he needed to go more so that we could at least have a break from each other. I didn’t know any better of course. Everyone else’s children went to daycare, and they loved it, coped well, and therefore I must be doing something wrong at home.
Ethan turned 3 and began kindergarten. I would take Sienna in for visits, and she would never stay still. She was off as she could walk from 13 months. She was into the paints and loved to be among all the children. I could have left her much easier, but Ethan was different. He cried and screamed when I left. He soon bonded with a teacher at the kindergarten. She was kind and nurturing, just what Ethan needed from a caregiver. He would talk about his teacher at home, and this made it easier to leave him most days knowing that he had someone looking out for him. He would follow her around and hold her hand, and gradually she was able to get him settled into activities. He would still have rather been at home with me, and he was very difficult to get to kindergarten, but the teachers assured me that once I was gone, he was happy. Once Sienna was a little older, I was able to return to some relief teaching at Ethan’s kindergarten, and this allowed me to see him playing happily. He usually played alone and was very quiet. He would chat nonstop until we reached the gate and then not a word from then. He would not say hello as he was greeted at the door or answer any questions from the teachers. He was really lucky to attend this kindergarten; it had a great team of teachers that were passionate about early childhood. As he settled from 4 years onwards, he made a good friend, Jack. They were very different to each other. I think Ethan really liked that Jack was funny, and Ethan could follow Jack around when he wanted to, but Jack was also social, so when Ethan had had enough, he could do his own thing knowing that Jack would easily find someone else to play with. When they played, they chased a lot, it was more running around being loud boys that they enjoyed together. I had always thought Ethan would be drawn to quieter boys, but he didn’t make any efforts to befriend anyone, so he struggled to make friendships.
School Days
As Ethan finishes his kindergarten years and school becomes a reality, his behavior becomes even worse. At his before school assessment, along with another dose of vaccinations at the doctor’s office, I voiced my concerns about his behavior. I also filled out a detailed description of my concerns about his regular tantrums and anxiety. As I didn’t get any feedback from the doctor about my concerns, I figured that I was just overreacting, and it would all even itself out soon. Things were pretty stressful with Ethan from this point onwards. It broke my heart as a mother that there were very few nice moments, and I felt like I was always trying to just keep Ethan happy. Ethan’s behavior had become gradually worse since he turned 18 months, and because it was gradual, it wasn’t like we noticed an immediate change one day. It just became part of our lives. Something we had accepted for now and hoped he would grow out of as he reached school age. Everything now revolved around keeping Ethan happy, because if he was happy, we were happy. We walked on egg shells most of the time. “Don’t upset Ethan,” became my mantra. I spent most of my time keeping fun loving, cuddly Sienna away from Ethan. He wouldn’t play with his sister at all and didn’t like to be touched or cuddled by anyone. Sometimes just having Sienna in the room would tip him over the edge. He would begin yelling at her to get away and to stop looking at him or to stop talking to him. I could see this confused Sienna, and it’s one of the reasons Ethan spent so many hours in his