Proud

Noah has a lot of sensory sensitivities that have turned in to phobias and fears.

He is scared of public toilets, especially automatic flushers.

He is scared of movies because they are so loud. I took him to see Shrek Three last summer and he was so scared by a preview of The Transformers Movie that we had to leave. He is incredibly sensitive to violence and anything that shows shooting, yelling, fighting, etc. completely freaks him out.

He is terrified of thunder storms, which translates to fireworks as well. Last summer we were able to watch them from his bedroom window. As long as the window was closed he couldn't really hear them.

Well, let me tell you about this weekend. We have made a break through!

This weekend Noah went with us to watch fireworks and loved it! He started out with his hands over his ears as we were walking to them, even though they had not started yet. Once they started he kept his hands over his ears for a while, then only covered one ear, then eventually wasn't covering them at all. I was so proud of him! No more fear of fireworks!

Then Saturday we ran some errands and then ended up at the mall. About ten minutes after we got there he told us he had to pee. In the past when that happened we have had to go home. A few times we have taken him to the bathroom and he promised to try, but once there he has freaked out and wasn't able to even try, even if there were no automatic flushers.

Well, this time he did it! We kept talking up how proud we were that he had not been scared of the fireworks. I think he was proud of himself and that helped. And he pee'd like a champ!

And Sunday, we started talking about going to see Wall-E. At first he was all "no thank you," but I found a trailer for it on YouTube and showed it to him. He got excited and said "OK Daddy, lets go." And they went, and he loved it.

Three phobias tackled in one weekend! Woo hoo!! Noah you RAWK! We are so proud!