The sweet sound of teeth grinding

Mornings are always tough. She sleeps in her own room with gates up at her door so that she doesn't get out of her room and go down the stairs at night. If I don't hear any noises my mind always goes to the worst place. This morning I went through my ritual: I wonder if during the night she has had a seizure and has aspirated and is dead. I get up, check on her and see that she is alright; she is still sleeping peacefully. I crawl back into bed and wait for her to get up.
A while later I finally hear her playing with one of her toys. It's the kind of toy that if you push on it it makes a frog-like noise. She really enjoys that one. I listen for a while with a good feeling inside. She is happy in her room. I can hear her hitting her floor, jumping around on her knees and playing with her toys. I know when she's ready to come out of her room when I hear her grinding her teeth.
She never was a teeth grinder before but since her illness she does it a lot. When she first came home from the hospital we would know she was sleeping when she wasn't grinding her teeth. It's gotten better. She grinds them much less and usually because something is bothering her. We were at the store yesterday looking for shoes for her and she was walking around with me grinding her teeth, (she had a seizure and was upset about it). A woman looking in the aisle we were passing stopped what she was doing and just stared at my daughter. She had heard the grinding and wanted to see where the noise was coming from. She didn't say anything she just looked at my daughter and made a face like she just eaten a really bad hard boiled egg. Then she went back to doing her shopping.
For me the grinding is like the gentle rocking of a rocking chair or like the cricket's song on a warm summer evening. Really it's my daughter communicating. I love that she can communicate. She may not have words but she sure does have a way to let me know that something is going on.