Monday, April 19, 2004

Growing pains

My son's a little bit what I call "loose" lately -- that is, not entirely in control of his behavior, more apt to slip into a sort of drunken, "what me worry" state that's remarkably resistant to discipline. We usually see this when he's stressed, but lately it's been taking less stress to get into that mess. And there could be a number of reasons, from more difficult work at school to conflicts with peers to excessive time spent with his 5-year-old cousin, but I think the real culprit is actually something hard to feel bad about: He's growing.

Every time I look at him these days, he looks a little taller. At his latest pediatrician appointment, this little boy who spent so much time hanging off the bottom of the growth charts was actually at the 50th percentile for weight for an 11-year-old, and creeping up along the 10th percentile for height. My little peanut boy! I've been waiting for that weight to start stretching out into height, and I think it's beginning to; not so long ago he could touch the tip of my nose with the top of his head, and now he's bumping the bridge.

This is joyous, because we're usually pretty short on normal development around here; disruptive, because a kid with sensory integration problems and motor planning issues does not deal smoothly with a realigning and distancing of his body parts; and scary, because soon he'll be taller than me, and how the heck am I going to handle him then when he gets loose and silly and drunk-seeming and unconcerned with propriety? The days when I could just tuck him under my arm and run are long, long gone.

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