Smush

Frantically, her eyes dart around the room. 

The tears are welling up, and she's beginning to panic.

Every muscle in her little body is wound as tightly as it can go.

Her eyes lock on mine, and she rockets across the room into my lap.

She grabs the back of my neck as hard as she can with her little fingers and wrenches my head toward hers.

She pushes her chin into mine so hard that I have to fight tears from welling up in my eyes, too.

And then, out of nowhere, her little arms start to relax.  I can feel my face again, and I can see that her eyes no longer hold the expression of a caged animal being led to slaughter.

I don't think I'll ever be able to fully understand her sensory issues, how they work or how things seem to her.  Nothing in the living room seems overwhelming to me in the slightest, and I wrack my brain trying to figure out what caused this meltdown.

I try to tell her again and again that it's not okay to smush other people's faces, that it hurts.  But deep down inside, I'm torn.  In the grand scheme of things, what's a little pain when it helps her to get over something that is bothering her?  Isn't this just her way of telling me not to do something?  That it hurts?