Sunday, November 22, 2009

October...the month of germs!!

October brought us back into what I was hoping would be a month of a regular schedule to get us back on track with school and therapy...well it wasn't to be that way at all!!! Michael started us out with getting sick with the flu (pretty darn sure it was H1N1 since that what was going around). Poor kid was a mess!! He had a croupy cough, fever off and on for a week, barely ate (he still wanted his instant carnation breakfast though!!!), and slept a lot!! Then Sofia had a fever for a couple of days, but never had it quite as bad as her brother. I also had a low grade fever and overall felt exhausted, but not sure how much of it was from being sick or from being pregnant taking care of two sick kids while Tom was busy working a lot and also was gone back to Florida for more future job related matters. Then as we all seemed to be getting better, Michael came down with an upper respiratory infection that he passed along to the rest of us...lots of congestion, snotty noses, sore throats, etc. Luckily both kids were pretty good for Halloween so we could get out and do some trick or treating. Michael wanted to be Luke Skywalker this year, so we appropriately had Sofia be Princess Leia!!! Sofia wasn't to happy to be in her costume...it was tough to keep the "hair" on!!




Michael was finally healthy at Halloween time, but Sofia seemed to follow-up her cold with a stomach bug and fever (puked all over herself in the car, not a pretty sight) and what we think was an ear infection...she became so irritable and inconsolable for several days!!! It put a big dent into the therapy schedule and made me completely exhausted!! When she is upset or hurts she doesn't have a way to properly communicate it, so she tends to things like throw herself backwards with no regard for what she may hit her head on. She had a hard time falling asleep that required driving her around in the car and I brought out the new baby's swing...she was a bit big for it, but it did the trick!!! Typically Sofia is a happy child with no problems sleeping, so it was quite a change. Fortunately some antibiotics did the trick and she was more cooperative just in time for Tom to head out of town once again to a conference for a week in Miami.

Even with the illness that traveled among us, Sofia had another great month developmentally!! We started out the month with a follow-up appointment with the Developmental physicians...Sofia was on her game that day and showed some of her true colors and skills!! So the physician was happy with her progress and just how much we are doing for her in terms of therapy. No new discussion of an official diagnosis on their end...and no tears for me during this appointment!!

We also had a follow-up appointment with Rehab Medicine this month...nothing new to report from them either. They just reconfirmed that the hip x-ray taken after her last appt was normal. They feel her current sure step foot orthotics are the most appropriate for her. Of course they noted just how flexible she is (which is felt to be from her hypotonia) and that is part of what requires the extra support needed in her feet and hips during therapy until she can build her tone and strength in her muscles. There was talk about getting Sofia a gait trainer (a walker with built in seat/hip/torso support). This was a discussion I already had with her aquatic therapy therapist and that she has some we can borrow to try out. Sofia was feeling great for this appt as well, and spent about a third of it trying to escape by army crawling out into the hallway!! At least she was showing off some of her skills!!

This month we also saw Sofia improve upon her gross motors skills by continuing to pull up to stand on her own at the couch, a little bit of cruising on the couch if you helped her with some foot movement, and short little stretches of real crawling on her hands and knees!! Her feeding skills have grown by leaps and bounds during Sept and Oct...lots of new foods and lots of feeding herself different finger foods. The girl who once hated sweets now loves them... marshmallows have become quite the motivational tool during therapy and she loves when I bring out the pudding!! She has learned to sign "eat" and I think in part it is because she is starting to enjoy food!! She gets very vocal (which means screaming at me) when I am taking to long to prepare her food!! And she can really pack away the food when she wants!! She eats much more than her brother at times, yet she still stays so skinny!!

We were able to get outside and do some apple picking at the beginning of the month (or maybe it was the end of Sept...I don't remember for sure)...but it was a beautiful day and Michael loved walking around the apple orchard!!



Keep on reading the other posts!!

Natalie

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