Up on her own!

Not only did Rachel get up on her own, she actually came out of her room on her own! She hasn't done that for years. It's so good to see her making choices and acting on them. She wanted to keep looking at books in her room, so I let her play for awhile. She had several small stacks of books on the foot of her bed, doing more sorting than actually looking at them. When I had her come in to eat breakfast, her mood fell apart.

Me: "Sit down. Let me get you some breakfast."
Rachel: "I don't want to. I'm not here."
Me: "So where did you go?"
Rachel: "I'm gone. Someone killed me."

Where on earth did that come from? I really think she equates "killed" to "gone," but it's not a word that is used that often around here, so I'm not sure where she picked it up. She started crying, and I finally got her calmed down a little so she could eat. I encouraged her to take a bite and she glared at me and bit her finger as hard as she could. Then she said "I don't like my finger." I so wish I could communicate better with her. I think if we could she wouldn't get so frustrated and angry. She cried a bit more, then ate her breakfast and has been okay since then, just playing with her books in her room. I wondered if she just didn't want to eat yet, but she'd been awake for an hour or more by the time she ate, and when I went in to get her she came readily enough. It's a little frustrating, to say the least.

Yesterday she spent most of the afternoon playing with some pop beads. She puts them together and pulls them apart, which is a really good exercise for her fingers, but most of the time she just puts them in piles. She sorts them by color or shape or size. That's probably good for her, too. She had kind of outgrown that for awhile and had moved on to more complicated play, but now that seems to be about as difficult as she's willing/able to achieve. It was good to see her play.

The guys are getting the Christmas lights up today, which is one of her favorite things. Hopefully the day will get better.