Finally! We have self-soothing going on!

In the last two weeks I've noticed that Bright Eyes has become better and better at calming himself down - especially if I don't intervene.

On Sunday I spent a lot of the day completely miserable because I saw him get angry with someone, storm off and spend all of the morning in his bed. When I went in, he yelled at me and insulted me and told me to get lost. I started crying and felt morose for the next few hours. 

And then I realised. He had gotten upset, but he had taken himself away. He said, "I'm taking a break!" and took himself off to his room, where he climbed into bed under his weighted blanket. After putting up with my interruption, he eventually came out of his room about 45 minutes later and he was okay.

The same thing happened during the week. We went to a party and he was overstressed and began to fight with his brother. I yelled at them both to "Stop Talking!!!" in the car on the way home and when he came home he went outside. Again, I tried to intervene, but he didn't need me. He was managing by himself.

Today again, he fought with Max, so I separated them. (It's a complete waste of time to try to 'sort it out' - they both just get more and more stubborn, so I'm taking the defusing route and waiting until the anger dies down.) He came out after half an hour ready to play again.

So, amazingly, he is seeming to get that he needs to remove himself from the situation if he's too upset to cope, and he knows how to get himself back to equilibrium again after some time.

I'm also pleased about the weighted blanket, which I made myself about a month ago (cost: approx $60 - half for weighted plastic teddy bear filling beads, and half for a doona cover). I asked him after he'd calmed down, "why did you go under the blanket?" and he said, "It's the best one for me."