Another eye appointment and an awesome vacation!

We had Gemma's eye appointment with the pediatric ophthalmologist today.  It was a LONG day! We had to leave early because it takes 2 hours to get there and the appointment was at 850 in the morning. We get there and check in and the receptionist told us that our referral for them wasn't in and without it we would be charged $300. This was really annoying because I didn't even make the appointment! It was made for me and I got 3 days notice. While we were in North Carolina (more on that further down), our phones weren't working properly (we didn't have very good reception) and there was a packet I was supposed to pick up and bring with me but didn't get the message.

Anyways, we finally got all fixed after what felt like a million back and forth phone calls and about an hour. Poor boys. They were woken up early, forced to sit in their carseats for 2 hours and then cooped up in a waiting room for another before we finally got back. They were being CRAZY! We ended up being there for almost 5 hours. Oi! Add on the 2 hours drive home... those boys were nuts by the end! I must remember to not forget to change out the batteries in the leapsters again!

Sorry, tangent. Her eyes are doing well. They dilate well and the pupils are the same size, but she's favoring her right eye (the non ptosis eye) so her left eye is starting to drift slightly a bit. The pressure of her eyelid on her eye is also causing the shape to change which is an astigmatism. We also went over the surgery stuff. when they do the surgery, they hook the top of the lid to the eyebrow since the muscle is under developed and can't lift her lid on it's own. At this age, they would insert a metal rod which the body tends to reject and it would typically need to be redone a few more times before she as three. If we can wait until three the procedure is different...they can take a certain tissue (can't remember what the doc specifically said) from her thigh and insert that instead which usually isn't rejected, lasts longer and usually doesn't need to be redone. What they said is if they can keep her vision good, then we'll wait until three. We'll be going back every 3 months to check on the astigmatism to see if it's getting worse. 


For now, we're putting a patch on her right eye half an hour each day to force her to use her left eye and try to catch it back up and keep it from drifting. We'll go back in October to see how things are going. If the patching isn't helping, it will be bumped up to an entire hour a day and she'll possibly need glasses.

That's all for now... now on to the good stuff!!

We went on a week vacation to North carolina  to visit a dear friend of mine and Sabe's brother's family.  We left early in the morning on Thursday with a 6.5 hour drive ahead of us. We were expecting Gemma to not do well in the car and need a lot of stops, but were pleasantly surprised when she actually did really well. We got to my friend Candace's house 3 hours earlier than we were expecting! The boys absolutely loved  Candace and her family. We went to the pool and got the North Carolina zoo under our belts while we were with them. We had so much fun! 


We then left early Sunday with a 4.5 hour drive ahead of us to make it to Sabe's brother's house. They have a new baby that is only 2 weeks older than Gemma. It was fun having two babies in the house. It actually really worked out since Dorothy and I were both in sync with the baby stuff. Everybody understood when it was time for them to eat and everybody was on beat with it. It was great! 


The boys absolutely loved playing with their cousin Kahlan. She was so cute with the boys. I was worried she wouldn't want to play with them since they were so much younger, but she had a lot of fun with them as well! It was great to see cousins getting a long so well and to have my boys loved by family members since they've not gotten the same love from some of my siblings. The boys are still asking to go see them and keep begging to see the pics of our trip. 


We went to the beach while we were with them. Oh man did the boys love it. I wish we lived by the beach so we could go more often. The joy on their face was amazing and the speech coming from both of them about it has been even more so. 


It ended all too quickly and Thursday was upon us once again. We left early with a 10 hour drive ahead of us. Our trip home took us right through Columbia, South Carolina where there is a zoo and we just couldn't resist getting another zoo under our belts. Our plan was to drive the 5 hours to the zoo, spend a few hours at the zoo and then drive the other 5 hours home. The drive to the zoo went smoothly and while the zoo was little (and hot) it had some great animals and we had a lot of fun! We got there 2 hours ahead of schedule and ended up getting finished with the zoo earlier than expected because it was small. Gemma and Jamesen fell asleep so we hit the road and made a mad dash towards home, trying to get as far as we could before she woke up. 

We made it about 2.5 hours in before we had to stop for dinner.  We got back in the car and it was all down hill from there. "Instamad" from Gemma occurred. Her screaming upset Jamesen and so he was crying too. It was pretty crazy! And then the rain started. I had to slow way down because there wasn't much visibility. It was such a relief when we made it back home, let me tell you! Gary greeted us with tons of loves. She was so happy we were back! 


If you want to see pics from our trip, here's the album on facebook.

 

We had lots of fun! We've also found that our front yard is FULL of tiny itty bitty baby frogs! The boys love hunting them out!

 

Anyways, that's all for now. 

Eye appointments and evals

So we had Gemma's eye appointment this morning. It is in fact ptosis. Ptosis is a blanket term for anything that's not otherwise named that makes the eyelid droop. He said that her eye was swelling from excess "stuff" inbetween the two pieces of skin that make the eyelid (the one on the outside and the one that touches our eye). She's got too much stuff in there so it swells and when she gets upset or hot, it swells more because that "stuff" gets bigger. She'll need some corrective surgery, though it's supposed to be a small incision surgery that's pretty quick and easy.

Because she's so little, he's sending us to the children's hospital up in Atlanta. He wants us to wait a few months before we do the surgery because it's not "necessary" and  he doesn't like to put small babies under when it's not life threatening stuff. So I'm just waiting to hear back from them and we'll go from there.

We were supposed to have Jamesen's evaluation for occupational therapy today but... let's just say... it didn't go well. The lady we saw today works at  a place that helps a lot of different special needs and I'm actually quite surprised she didn't know how to approach  someone with Autism. Jamesen was really excited to go into the room. He jumped on the swing and she did 2 things that ruined everything. She picked him up off the swing and said "Hang on, let's do this really quick." not only that, she kept trying to talk to him and he just kept freaking out and it was all a lost cause. There was absolutely nothing I could do to stop it.

We've made a plan to approach it differently on Monday. Hopefully it works!! I hope he gets use to her quickly because she's supposed to be the one helping him with the therapy. I'm sure he'll get use to her eventually but for now he's not too thrilled with a new person.

I've been talking to a few teens with CAPD. I found their blogs and have emailed back and forth with two of them. They described hearing with APD as going to France and speaking to someone who's native language is French, but knows some English so they're trying to listen to broken English with a French accent. To understand, they have to pay a lot of attention to listening. At Marcus' age, that's like.. impossible, haha! It's really nice to hear from some kids that actually have this disorder to help me figure out ways that I can help him. I'm greatly encouraged by them! They're both amazing kids.

Also can I get a few prayers for me? I feel a bit foolish asking for it but I've been having a lot of spine pain recently. It started when I got pregnant with Gemma and has gotten pretty bad since having her. I found a lump on my spine at the base of my neck. I'm going to see a chiropractor tomorrow. Hopefully it's just my back being out and he can fix it with a snap (pun intended) but I'm sure he'll clue me in if something else is wrong. I've got so much on my plate with the kids, I really can't have something be wrong with me. Please give me some prayers that it's something easily fixed and not something that will make it hard to take care of my kids :(

Anyways, thanks for reading!

Central Auditory Processing Disorder (CAPD)

I'm finding myself crushed. I've thought Marcus has this for a few weeks now, but I'm more convinced than ever. I took a video of Marcus answering questions I was asking him and he had no idea what I was saying. It crushed me. I've been digging through CAPD stuff  and I found this:

Ladle Rat Rotten Hut: Little Red Riding Hood

This basically simulates how a person with CAPD hears.  I listened to the entire story 4 times. The first time, I just bawled. How can he live like this?? By the 4th time, I was understanding most of the story, as my brain got use to hearing it, knowing what the story is supposed to say. No freaking wonder he "doesn't listen" when I ask him to do something. Unless I physically show him what I mean, he has no idea what I'm saying!!

I'm so heartbroken right now but I'm even more determined to get him in to see an audiologist. I will fight tooth and nail if I have to. Please send some good thoughts and prayers our way that I can find a way to help Marcus.

Wednesday

Wednesday (the 9th) was a rough day.


We've been waiting on Jamesen's results of his autism test for over a month and Wednesday was the day we finally got them. He was confirmed to have Asperger's Syndrome. If you're interested, here's a low down of what Asperger's basically is: HERE

I knew he had it and had accepted it, so it wasn't too bad hearing it, but it still was kind of like a kick in the gut to have her confirm what I already knew. She did say, though, that with therapy, she would bet any amount of money that he would be able to kick the diagnosis by his teenage years and he would end up just being "shy". We're very hopeful and thankful for that!

The thing that made Wednesday really rough though, was Gemma. We've all been fighting off a nasty bug that's been going around. It really knocks you out and gives you an awful cough. The boys went through it and the cough only lasted a few days, but when Gemma got it, she started having a really hard time breathing, couldn't catch her breath, would have coughing fits that seemed to never end, etc. I called and the pedi managed to get me appointment that day. I left J's appointment, went and picked M up a little early from school and high tailed it to the hospital

The pedi came in and listened to her breathing and then said, "Hold on, I want Dr so and so to take a listen really quick". When she came back, she had 3 other Dr's with her, not one. One by one they listened to my baby girl with scowls on their faces. That was terrifying! They then told me they were going to run some tests on her, that she needed a breathing treatment and and xray and that I was going to be there for awhile.

Luckily, my amazing friend Amber was able to pick the boys up from me at the hospital and watch them because I have no idea how I would have kept them entertained and watched while I was doing all of that! Anyways, we gave her a breathing treatment, they took a listen with more scowls and then sent me off for the xray. When I got back, they told me that the tests for the flu and rsv came back negative and her xray was clear but that she needed another breathing treatment.

After the second breathing treatment, they listened with more scowls, told me they thought it might be whooping cough and would like to treat it as such because it can get bad fast in infants. The test hasn't come back to confirm, but sitting here on Friday I'm pretty sure it's not whooping cough. They told me that the two breathing treatments basically did nothing and  they were thinking of admitting her. They gave me a choice whether I wanted to or not because her oxygen levels had been 100% for most of the time she was being monitored. I chose to take her home after they assured me that they felt comfortable with me taking her, but gave me strict orders to bring her back immediately if anything changed and sent me home with a small buffet of meds.

She did pretty good through the night and we went for our follow up appointment on Thursday. They said she sounded and looked better, but that she was slightly dehydrated and were thinking of admitting her for that. They sent her home with me again after I promised I would push the nursing as much as I could.

Today, Friday, she's doing a lot better. She nursed almost all day yesterday so she was making up for lost calories and she's breathing a ton better. It was a really scary couple days, but we made it through! Now if only *I* could kick this thing because it seriously knocks you out!

Little boys and little sisters

Marcus and Jamesen adore Gemma.

 Marcus begs me to hold her constantly.

 She gets smothered if I don't watch those two boys like a hawk!

 She sure is loved by everyone around.

 The boys coming running in the morning when they wake up, ready to snuggle her.

 I was so afraid I was going to get PPD, but their attitudes towards her and their excitement that she has here is helping me make it through.

 She's such a blessing to us.

  We're so thankful to have her.

 My sweet G girl.

Introducing Miss Gemma Nichole!

She arrived fashionably late, but quicker than quick! It was extremely intense and crazy! If you want to read about it, you can do so here.

So far she's doing great. We got home today after a little more than 24 hours in the hospital. She's a bit jaundiced, but we expected it so we're just keeping an eye on her. She'll have her levels tested again tomorrow afternoon to make sure things are going down. She's nursing fantastically though, so I'm not too worried about it.

The boys just adore her. I'm excited that Jamesen is taking so well to her. He's not jealous at all, but wants to climb into my lap too and just stroke her face. It's so adorable! Marcus is constantly asking to hold her and wants to help change her diapers and such. They're being so cute with her and I feel so blessed at their reactions as it's a total 180 compared to Marcus' reaction when I brought Jamesen home.

Anyways, we're just hanging out and enjoying daddy's paternity leave at the moment. Missing Grandma terribly as she had to go home today (sad face). If you want to see more pics of Gemma, the link to my facebook album is here

Thanks for visiting! :)

Days away...

We're sitting just days away from my due date. I can't help but wonder what Gemma's going to be like. Is she going to be a typical child or are we going to have some developmental problems with her as well? If she IS a typical child, will I be able to handle it?

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. Jamesen has been passing Marcus up on some of things that Marcus can't do. When Marcus was two, he couldn't go and get his shoes when asked or grab a diaper/the wipes etc. Jamesen has been doing it lately and it's really putting into perspective how far behind Marcus is. Even now if I ask Marcus to get something, he has a hard time getting it. I have to point him to exactly where it is, he can't look for it himself. Jamesen has no problem hunting an item out on his own. It's really hard to watch Jamesen do these things that Marcus can't do and not get upset. Don't get me wrong, I'm so proud of Jamesen, but he really puts Marcus and his delays into perspective. It's hard to see your child be so far behind their peers of he same age.

I'm wondering if Gemma will be completely typical. I've got a friend who's got a little girl about 9 months younger than Jamesen that's completely typical. We spend a lot of time over there and sometimes it's really hard to see her just be herself because she just turned two and Marcus barely speaks better than she does. We don't spend all day every day with her though and for the most part, I can forget how far ahead of where Marcus was at that age she is. If Gemma is completely typical, I'll have that all day every day as a reminder. Not that I want her to NOT be typical, though. I'd rather her not have to struggle the way her brothers will have to to catch up. *sigh*

I really don't know why I'm worrying about this right now. I guess I'm just having a hard time since my hormones are so high and I'm so close to my due date. Maybe I'll feel better after she's here and I fall in love with her sweet face because as of now, she's just an idea to me, not a reality. Not until I see her and hold her will I really know life with her.

On top of all of that, the fact that I'm worrying about these things scares me. I had similar thoughts before I had Jamesen and I ended up having PPD really bad. I don't want to get that again. It was bad. At least I know what to look for now since I've already been through it and at least my boys have each other. I find some comfort in that. If I end up having PPD like I did before, at least they'll have each other to keep company and all that since I won't be very good with the whole social aspect during that time.

Anyways, if you got this far, thanks for reading. I just needed somewhere to write my feelings down.