Friday, May 14th, 2021

Day 14 - FREEDOM!

Socks can be so constraining...

and exhausting!

Declan constantly bites and pulls off his socks (which remain on only to spare us the hassle of needing to replace his NG tube every other day) to gain access to his hands.

Which is one of the sad elements of caring for our little 6 month old. 

We would love to keep his hands free to play and explore, grab and pull, working on all of his fine motor skills that a 6 month old should be working on, but instead, we limit his access to use his fingers to prevent him from removing the only lifeline he has to provide him with the nutrition he desperately needs. 

Today was a different day. 

During his supervised sock-hand-less playtime I thought to myself, "You know what? Let's let this go for a while." 

Even though we keep his hands occupied by socks, we always try to make an effort every day to give him the playtime he also needs as a growing, developing baby. His gross motor control of his lower extremities may already be delayed, so we shouldn't limit his fine motor development.

Declan loved every minute he was free to use his tiny hands.

And who could blame him?

While it is easy to succumb to the pressures we may put on ourselves to think "I can't handle this" and keep the socks on, Declan knows what he is capable of.

While it is easy for others to place socks on our hands and tell us "No, you can't handle this", we must take a page out of Declan's book, and bite those socks right off of our hands!

Because for the near 24 hours he was sock free, there was not one moment of concern that he would remove his NG tube (either accidentally, or intentionally).

As parents, it is easy to try and limit our children to prevent them from getting hurt, or experiencing an inconvenience, but when we take off the socks - we can finally see what they are truly meant to do. 

Explore the world with their own hands.