You’re Making Me Stinky!

One if the interesting things about having a child who has had a sudden decline in vision is how other senses take a larger role in her perception of the world.    She complains about sound, smells, feelings of things and tastes of things when it suits her—and since she’s a four-year-old, it suits her a lot.

Now there’s a lot to be said about that four-year-old component, don’t get me wrong and don’t overthink this, because trust me, we’ve spent a lot of time doing just that.    It’s so easy to blame the vision impairment for everything.  She’s cranky?  It must be because she’s having a hard time seeing. She’s angry?  It’s probably because of the stress of all the drops and the doctors.   But that’s not entirely true.    We know this because of one simple fact: she has a brother. 

Her brother, eleven months her elder, had some of the same behaviors and reactions—and he sees just fine.   He’s not had any traumatic injury, other than being told he can’t do or have something he wants.    

We try and check ourselves and our logic when we notice behaviors and evaluate if it’s related to the overall eye situation or if it’s just plain old four-year-old drama.    There are some things that do stand out though because her other senses are taking a more forceful role in her life.   I think we’re seeing it most in her sense of smell. 

She talks about how things smell.   The other day she asked me if I could smell something.   I told her I didn’t smell pizza but did she?   She said yes, she definitely did.   When I told her she had a great sense of smell she told me, “see, I told you I’m more smelly than Lucy” (our dog).   

The best though is when things “smell yucky” which happens a lot.   Usually this means she just doesn’t want that particular thing, even if it’s candy on top of ice cream, served in a chocolate bowl with a peppermint spoon.    Sometimes though she really has an issue with how things smell.    

For the last three days the thing my daughter’s had issues with is me.   You know how kids use some phrase like, “OW, YOU’RE HURTING ME!” and when it gets results they use it again and again in the hopes it will continue to get results?   Kids don’t catch on as quickly as adults do and even as adults we don’t always catch on for a while, but this was has had me laughing.   What my daughters been telling me is. “you’re making me stinky!”. 

I swear, I showered.   I’ve definitely showered in the past three days, but my daughter is still of the opinion I’m making her stinky.   Tonight she wanted my husband to put her to bed but because she was pitching such a fit I told her I was going to sit by her bed until she calmed down and if she did, then daddy would come and give her a hug goodnight.    She tried to get out of the bed once and I stopped her by putting my arm out.   My arm touched her shirt and—wait for it—now her shirt was stinky.  My arm made her shirt smell stink and therefore she had to take the shirt off.  

The shirt is off and she’s now asleep topless.   

The Big Boy Update:  My son was eating a strawberry popsicle outside.   He very authoritatively told his friends outside, “fruit flies are going to eat this because it’s made of strawberries.”  My husband yelled down from the deck, “fruit flies are going to eat your shirt because you just used it as a napkin.”

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter’s new word is ‘stinky'.   Before stinky it was ‘yucky'.   I wonder what the next negative word will be when she wears out ‘stinky’?