Children are always funny. They have their own little things that they do, we don't really know where they get it from and in their innocence it is just amazing.
Terri, like any other child, has her quirks.
The only difference is she is sixteen, and has had the same little quirks her entire life.
So far I have spent a lot of time delving into the syndrome, the negatives on both Terri and our family as a whole. What I want to do now is give people who have never met Terri, an idea of what she is really like to be around. How, no matter what, you can't stay mad at her, you can't stay sad and she just blows you away day after day.
Not to blow Terri's trumpet - but she is quite possibly the funniest child I have ever met. For someone who has special needs and learning difficulties, her sense of humour is wicked and she has an evil cackle to match.
I'm not sure how to do this without entirely going off on tangents all the time, so I am going to name and number her oddest traits. Ones that aren't a trait of her syndrome but are just plain Terri.
1.
Terri and her bedtime routine
Getting Terri to bed with all her bits and bobs in a mission on its own. She becomes fixated on taking certain objects to bed, even though she doesn't interact or bother with them through the day. So realistically she is just being a pain and making us carry stuff up and down the stairs twice a day. These objects can't just stay in the cot, they must come downstairs during the day (to sit being untouched) to then be re-carried upstairs once she goes to bed. Some of the items include: Teddies (about 5), pillows, blankets, two pairs of socks, and at one point a charity wrist band wrapped around a random piece of plastic. You will often go to check on her in bed to see her snuggling into a pair of socks, or she will sleep with them in her hands. She sleeps with tissues under her pillow like a little old lady, and guzzles on juice out of a Tommy Tippee through the night.
She will change her bedding about twice a week, screaming that she wants the "lellow" bedding and then choosing the bright pink. She is obsessed with her bedding matching her pyjamas. She wont wear socks that don't match her pyjamas either.
In a way she has her own little OCD tendencies.
2.
Speech. Her own little vocab.
When Terri was younger speech was limited for almost the first third of her life. She didn't really communicate other than through hand gestures and single words. As a family we could understand what she wanted, but often others couldn't understand.
When she started attending special needs school and attending chat club this is when she began developing her single words into sentences. So much so, that prior to her having to stop going to school, she was kicked out of chat club for chatting too much...
Below I will pop some words along side their Terri alternative (Terri's version is in italics):
Excited - Upsighted
Music - Dance
Angry - Gravy
Full of feed - I'm cooked
As well as her having many alternatives for everyday words, she also has a very standard set of sayings that she will say all day, everyday until she is blue in the face.
I don't like 10 minutes (or however long you've given her to stop doing what she is doing)
Me and you Jody, me and you (every time we do anything together)
You at work in the morning (she knows we are, she just says it to piss us off)
For someone who went from knowing around 10 words max, her speech is amazing. Most people still struggle to understand her, but she has a voice like she's just sucked on a helium balloon so it can't be helped.
3.
Kissing, anything and everything.
I can't really complain about this one, because sometimes she is just so loving it is amazing. But she will literally kiss anything. At least once a day the dog will end up with its tongue in her mouth because she likes to snuggle and kiss them.
She will sneak up behind you if you are sat down and kiss your shoulder. When I am lying on the couch she has often kissed my feet (i get told off as if i am making her kiss my feet). And the funniest, I had just had a shower was putting my pyjamas bottoms on and she kissed the top of my leg, near enough my bum cheek. She found it hilarious.
It's funny because I/we have learnt what compassion is and in our mind have words to explain it, we all have our own definitions of love and what it feels like. I often wonder what Terri is thinking/means when we tell her we love her and vice versa.
4.
Her hobbies include...
Considering she has built up a large selection of toys, over her sixteen years not necessarily moving up an age group, she doesn't really seem to be entertained by toys anymore. She will play with her baby dolls still - but when I play I mean shove a feeding tube into their mouths and pump water through a syringe until they are soaked through. Most of her time she spends opening up packets of plasters, separating them into different groups and having them in different plastic tubs - she will sort her plasters at least once a day. If you offer to get her anything from the shop, she will ask you for a pack of plasters.
Once her plasters are sorted she will rearrange and sort her pH sticks. We use them to test the pH level of the liquid in her tube - testing stomach acid etc. Terri on the other hand arranges them into different tubs and makes sure they are all facing the same way up.
So basically, she has hundreds if not thousands £s worth of toys and she would rather play with a £1 pack of plasters and something that a nurse provides to you.
I feel like I have went in quite deep to some of her biggest quirks and there are literally so many more... but we will leave her with some mystery. She likes to surprise people.
She is literally, no word of a lie, the cutest, most amazing, pain in the arse you will ever witness in your whole entire life.
She is exactly what a little sister should be
loving but also your worst nightmare.
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