I have been telling you of the adventures that the wee one and I had between somewhere in Virginia and Brooklyn, where we ended up. But none of this happened in a vacuum and, though I live to have a life like an ABBA song or moments like I'm in The Sound of Music, the real deal is not as glamourous. First of all, driving is very exhausting. The adrenalin that came about from hearing the news of my aunt and the wee one and then rushing out to Virginia kept me going for a while, but when I lay down for the night, I was done! All this time though, my phone kept ringing - it was the police, then the medical folk, then someone from social services (about the wee one), then friends of my aunt, then family. What it was, was never ending. I was getting questions I could not answer, requests for information I was hazy about, and advice, some of which was helpful and a lot of which I had no intention of following.
On Wednesday morning, when the wee one awoke in Virginia (in a home that was unknown to him) I picked him up and gave him a hug and then I continued to hold him as I chatted with the aunt from Virginia we were staying with. As we chatted, I noticed a squeaking sound coming from the wee one. I looked at him, curiously, as I tried to figure out what was going on.
"He's grinding his teeth," my aunt said.
"What?" It was the sound of nails on a blackboard, how could this be coming from this little person?
"Yes, he has been grinding them since we picked him up."
The sound was so painful to hear. Still not quite believing it, I put my fingers against his cheeks and I could feel his teeth moving away. A trick from my yoga class, for relaxing a clenched jaw, came to me. "Wee One?" He looked at me. "Open your mouth like this." He opened his mouth wide for me. "Okay, we need to keep doing this, alright?" He looked at me but, for a bit, the grinding stopped. It became a thing we did often. Whenever we came across people he did not know, the grinding would begin. I would just say his name and open my mouth; he would follow suit and the grinding would cease. This was the biggest indicator of the level of stress that he was under - most of the time he was quiet and obedient. If he didn't grind his teeth, you could almost con yourself into believing that he was unaffected by everything that was going on.
To keep up with the phone calls and the various things that I needed to do, I found the notebook above. I put everyone's phone number in it, even the ones I knew by heart. Under duress, the brain goes absolutely blank and in moments that are already panicked, trying to recall it all often results in more blank brain. The cycle would go thus - the phone would ring and it would be, say, the hospital with an update on my aunt and questions about future plans. I would take notes and tell them what I could. Then, with the receiver still warm, the phone would ring again and it would be family with questions - Ask her this or ask them that. I would tell them what I knew, remind them that my aunt was very ill and we needed to do what we could without stressing her out any more than she probably was already. We had a woman who was sick and needed to get better and we had a mother who was worried about her son and feeling terrible for not being there for him. It was our job to make sure that she knew that she had people and all she needed to focus on was recovering. Also, we had a hospital that took their patient's right to privacy very seriously and wished to keep me informed without violating that right. I can't say this enough times - all the people from Virginia were incredibly understanding, helpful and friendly. When I felt overwhelmed, they had calming words of advice. When I felt useless, they let me know that I was doing okay. When I was afraid of the outcome of all of this, they assured me that everything would be okay. To leave my aunt behind in a strange place, alone, was a hugely difficult thing for me to do. And my feelings were nothing compared to what I imagine she must have felt. She was sick, and alone and had no idea what was going on and when and how it would all end. And through it all there was the wee one.
Everything that was going on had him fleeing into a shell of quiet. He did not speak much most of the time - driving back to Brooklyn, it took a few hours before he was relaxed, smiling and reading route signs. But his teeth grinding was a painful indicator and at other times, he would look really angry. It's funny, but you could almost actually see the dark clouds above his head when a wave of anger came over him. I couldn't blame him, for he was taking everything incredibly well. I was impressed that he very rarely showed anger and mostly that anger came in missiles being thrown at people he believed I was going to leave him with. Boy does he have a great arm! Perhaps a future in baseball awaits him. All of that said, the ride back to Brooklyn involved no tantrums, only a little teeth grinding and a whole lot of adorable big eyes and chipmunk cheeks! You take one look at that face and you just have to hug him!
1 comment:
A brave wee one :-)
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