Jam is currently 4.75 years old.
Yesterday afternoon, towards the close of a stunningly sunny weekend, we were winding down with a happy little iPad game to help mentally 'regulate' when Jam started crying over a trash can.
Yes, a trash can.
Actually, it was an image of a trash can and it was on the sticker reward page of his iPad game. The idea that his hard-earned electronic stickers might ever, even accidentally, end up in the electronic trash can was overwhelming to him in that moment.
A bit crazy? Yes. A bit unexpected? No.
Did I mention the stunningly sunny sun? We're heading into what I call the 'Season of Scrambled SPD Brains' around here. When the sky goes cloudless and the sun comes out for more than two days here in Seattle, my kid's brain gets all scrambled. He becomes uncharacteristically whiny, cranky, needy, extra sensitive, short-tempered and uncooperative. He'll make crazy requests and hold very incoherent conversations, sometimes with himself. And we see a bit of backslide in any recent progress.
Fortunately, by now, we've gone through this enough to know what to expect and how to handle it.
Jam's first year of sun in Seattle didn't matter. He had just been born and five weeks early so we pretty much cocooned up in the house, missing the summer season. The following summer, I thought it was the heat that made him all crazy and cranky so I limited his time in the sun and he settled out.
The summer when he was two it was a mild summer and not that hot. Yet he was still having crazy days. And on sunny winter days, same thing. I finally had an epiphany that after he spent 20 minutes in direct sunlight, regardless of heat, he would later get extra sensitive and extra crazy, his thoughts scattered and slightly manic. So, as beautiful as it was out, we began to limit our time in the sun.
Which was kind of hard because our occupational therapist assigned us the task of going to the playground every day for motor and social skills practice. So we just went early in the morning before anyone got to the park or late in the afternoon after everybody went home. Not so great for the social skills practice part. But, hey, at least we got to play in the shade!
Last year, I forgot all about the SPD/sun glitch until Jam had been 'scrambled' for about two weeks. I thought he was just going through some crazy developmental jag until I was re-reading one of my older Jam journals. Ooops!
As usual, he settled out a few days after I adjusted our time in the sun. But just so I didn't forget for this year, I wrote it on the calendar an entire year in advance- "Beware the SPD Scrambled Brains of June!"
And so now I'm prepared. We hung a tarp over the back deck so there's an outdoor play space that's shielded from the sun. We even managed to make it look shabby-chic and only a bit shanty. And we use the neighbor's shady front yard to play in since it's attached to ours and they like having kids in their yard since theirs are grown and gone. Plus they have a great big leafy maple tree to play under.
We'll also see where Jam is on wearing hats and sunglasses and sunblock this year. In the past, he has been really inflexible about having anything on his head or on his face which I totally understand because I hate it all, as well. But you never know- this may be our year for some progress on that front!
Some of the other things we do are morning trips to the playground, indoor sports classes only and most playdates are in the afternoon when the backyard is most shady. We'll just continue to limit how long we can be out in the direct sun. Which isn't a bad idea for sunblock-refusing, fair-skinned children who burn like butter anyway...
As for the poor crying child and the trash can, well... I tried all the usual tricks. Distraction, logic, bribery with popsicles. Nothing worked. Of course. All he needed was to be held until he cried it all out. And then, after all that, with the sun going down, he wanted his popsicle. Of course.
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A little over a week and a half ago, I posted an update here.
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