Playing

When does playing become not just playing?

I think when you have a child with special educational needs, as we do, and her amazing speech therapists, portage and physiotherapists give us exercises to help her progress which all revolve around incorporating them into play (so that she is motivated). Perhaps that’s when. I think if you add to that my attending talks about early intervention and ideas for aiding development. Me, who loves to make lists and collate all the ideas we’ve learned, including those from books I’ve read. But....wait!

The question should be, “when does playing become just playing?” I need to add this to my list! I got to the stage where I felt guilty when we weren’t learning through play, or if I wasn’t using Makaton, or if we spent an afternoon doing nothing, not doing exercises through play with her from my bag of “speech exercises”. I felt like I was taking time off. Don’t get me wrong - I am fun to hang around with for Coraline. I don’t drive her, far from it! Coraline still feels like it’s play but I am the one who feels “on” all the time when I have come to view “play” as a set of exercises for me to be following. I am a great believer in “just being”. I am not an avid doer or busy person by nature.

I think back to myself, pre-Coraline. I thought nothing of an afternoon watching Netflix on my laptop in bed. And when Coraline and I have an afternoon doing nothing, I realise that’s something to savour and not to feel guilty about. We should be doing nothing and loving it. It’s necessary. It’s childhood. It’s playtime! There will be other times that I am incorporating exercises through play too which is such an opportunity to help her develop, but not all the time. We all need to just “be”. I am so pleased we found our way back to realising that. I am a Libran after all. #dsawareness