Recently, I have had occasion to sit back and marvel at how far my daughter has come in the past year or so. A year ago, if you told me that she would be regularly eating school dinners, I would have raised an eyebrow. If you told me that she would – on a semi regular basis – be eating dinner at home that actually had some vegetables in it, such as a mashed potato and sweetcorn, I would have laughed hysterically. Had you then gone on to tell me that she would also be eating some sort of protein such as chicken nuggets, fish fingers, or sausages… I would have asked if there was a history of insanity in your family.
The truth is, she is now – with reasonable reliability – eating at least one good meal a day. Is it enough? Probably not. Would I like her to eat better? Show me a mother who wouldn’t. But compared to where she was 12 months ago, I’m dancing a jig.
She has also made other sorts of progress – she can take herself off to the toilet without being supervised all the time at home. She can – with sufficient threats – be trusted to take herself off to the toilets in ‘safe’ locations, such as her grandparents house or the gym, without getting “lost” on the return journey.
Most importantly, she is starting to report when she has been injured. This child didn’t tell anyone when she had fractured her arm, and frequently came home from school or clubs with egg-sized bruises that she couldn’t account for. But, for the first time, this week she told me that she had hurt her ankle at school. I took that as a win, I asked if she told anyone at the school when she had done it and she said she had! Even better!
She had told her 7 year old non-verbal best friend that she had hurt herself copying him, and then they had both continued to play.
I said progress – not perfection.
Raising the Modern Fae 