Matthias and Hallie both came down with colds over the weekend, so we had to change our plans for yesterday. We had planned to attend a birthday party for my nephew, but didn’t want to spread germs, so we ended up staying home. Since we had expected to eat dinner at the party, we had to make back-up dinner plans on the fly. Greg ran out to grab cheeseburgers from MacDonald’s, and I stayed home with the kids. The older kids were all playing upstairs, and I sat down on the couch with Jonathan, Hallie, and Victoria. I noticed that Hallie’s little nose was so stuffy that she couldn’t even breathe, so I decided that I had to clean it out. I asked Victoria to bring me a wipe, and explained to Hallie what I was going to do. Hallie has made unbelievable progress with her trust since she came home three years ago, but she is still very sensitive about having any part of her face cleaned. For some reason that we will never understand, this triggers a deep panic in her. She will now tolerate having her face washed in the bathtub or wiped off after a meal, as long as we do it quickly and gently, but anything more than that is very, very upsetting to her.
She understood what I needed to do, and she really did try to stay calm. She just can’t. After a few seconds, the panic gripped her, and she began to scream and fight with all the strength in her little body. As soon as she started to scream, Jonathan began to panic. He doubled over the arm of the couch, and began to kick and wail. I just held Hallie down and tried to clean her face as quickly and calmly as possible. She dug her fingernails into my arms and left bloody scratches on both arms and my left hand. (Note to self – next time trim Hallie’s nails before cleaning her nose). As soon as I finished and told her “all done,” she stopped crying. She gave me a big hug, and rested her head on my shoulder. Then she saw the scratches on my arms, and began rubbing and kissing them. She was so upset that she had hurt me. That level of panic really is beyond her control. Once I was sure that she was calm, I put her down and began to comfort Jonathan. Once he saw that Hallie was okay, he calmed down pretty quickly. Then I looked over at Victoria. She was sitting next to a giant pile of wipes. For some reason, when I asked her to get me ONE wipe for Hallie’s nose, her little two-year-old brain decided that it would be helpful to continue pulling out wipes one at a time and stacking them on the floor. She had been doing that the entire time I was taking care of the other two. She looked up at me with absolute pride on her face for being such a big help. Goofy girl! We lost nearly an entire box of wipes! From now on, I am NOT going to try to clean Hallie’s nose unless Greg is here to take care of the other kids.