Haircuts

Its quickly becoming a bad word in our house. Last night the boys both desperately needed haircuts. Justin cuts their hair and he usually uses the razor. Tyler has never handle haricuts well. He is usually crying thru at least half of it and always has his hands on his head and squirming away. So last night Justin used scissors instead, thinking maybe the noise of the razor and the vibrations is what sets Tyler off.

We do Carter first, so Tyler can watch. Carter gets his sucker (that they only get during haircuts) and Justin starts. Carter does very well, saying cheese at the camera and playing with Tyler during the process. Tyler is enjoying watching it, helping pick up the hair, etc. There were a couple times when Carter would squirm, but no big deal at all. At the end Justin did a great job and Carter looks so much older.

Now its Tyler's turn. We have been prepping him and he eagerly climbs into the chair to get his sucker. We spray his hair and he laughs! Could this be a good sign? Unfortunately not. Justin takes on snip from the left ear and Tyler starts screaming. He is covering his head with his hands crying all done over and over. I start singing songs to distract him and Justin talks him thru it and goes to the next ear. Once again the squirming starts up again (the screaming never stopped) and Justin even accidentally nicks his ear. At this point we decide the haircut is over. Tyler has somewhat trimmed ears but that's about it.

We hate seeing Tyler act this way. We know its most likely probably because of the sensory stuff, but it seems like every haircut is getting worse. When I see how well Carter reacts to them compared to Tyler on the other extreme, it just makes me sad. After haircuts was bath time, and since Tyler was already upset the washing the hair part also did not go well (we had been seeing some improvements here). Hopefully the OT will have some suggestions, because my shaggy boy needs a haircut without being traumatized.