If you let it creep in

Three weeks prior to Christmas Zack got his usual bout of winter cold/nose blockage. Compared to previous years he has had it quite easy. He missed quite a bit of school but then I don't think he was too bothered and lets face it, isn't the last week of school before Christmas just where you bring in Operation or Buckeroo?

Trouble is Zack's cold goes something like this. Cold, nose blockage, can't sleep, sleeps, wakes up snorting, back to sleep, snorting and so it goes on and on and on. This time it's gone on for about six weeks. Plan is to now contact ENT to see if there is anything we can do. Not sure if there is but surely it can't be right that it continues for several weeks.

Last night Zack decided to stay awake in bed until 1.30am. Yep, we happened to have friends over. He knew that. Why should he lie upstairs in his bed listening to the gossip downstairs? Several rounds of chat from me to him about the fact it was late, go to sleep and it's bedtime, made no difference. Coming downstairs in a blanket helped. He went to sleep within five minutes after he tried to suss out who was in his living room.

Christmas and birthdays are tricky times. Magnified now that Scarlett is growing up, it's lovely to see the excitement in her keeness to rip open her presents, well, just rip paper really. And although Zack does like his present opening it's hard to know what to buy a little boy with such complex needs. He did do very well though. He got a fab dragon that roars and moves with only a touch of a button, a pimped up noise producing flashing light car, plenty of noisy sensory toys and a TV for his bedroom. And whilst he obviously takes pleasure in these toys it's not to the extent that his sister does. If you let it creep in, that emotion that you feel in watching the ever increasing difference between the two siblings is a bit like an underlying sadness that just simmers beneath your foundations. You know it's there but you keep it buried, underneath the concrete. Sometimes, like at Christmas it knocks and you have to acknowledge it if only for a while, then it goes and you can carry on focusing on the present.

I guess what I am trying to say is, and I think other parents of children with special needs will understand, is that there are certain times of the year that make you look and sometimes wish that the circumstances were different. But for me this glimpse is brief and then I go back to see the totally fantastic individual he is and I think he is the only Zack I would want to have in my life. Not a normal ordinary little boy but my extraordinary miracle.

Here's our Christmas. We had a good time. Hope you did.

Ooooooooh the presents

Yes me and daddy are in us onesies

Ben 10 woohoooo

Dog on a stick

You're not that funny Zack

Loving my sister

I is going to eat all the food.

Nice gravy jug