It’s hard to believe that in 36 hours our little baby boy
will be two years old. Not a baby
anymore! While this birthday isn’t
bringing the anxiety that the last one did, I still feel this rise of mixed
emotions when I think about it. It’s
hard to celebrate how far he’s come without thinking about or comparing it to
other almost two year olds.
But celebrate we will – Clara insisted we have a party, so we invited family, therapists and a few close friends to join us for
dinner. Clara wanted to know what the
party’s theme was. I was thinking a good
theme was “Connor’s 2!”, but she had a whole other list of ideas. We finally agreed on “dogs” as the theme
since Connor loves our dogs so much. I
bought paper plates, napkins and such with dogs on them and thought we were
good to go. Clara then asked what games
we were going to play. I explained
probably not any since it was mostly adults and Connor really didn’t know how
to play any games yet. She looked at me
and said “Well without games it’s just dinner.”
Touché. So now we’re planning
games, dog themed games. We’ll see how
much gets done before either I run out of steam or Saturday night rolls
around. She just wants him to have the
happiest birthday party possible. Hard
to argue with that.
 |
| Getting fitted for his positioning chair at CHOP |
The big news of the last week is that we have received
Connor’s stander and positioning chair!
He’s taken to them both very well, having playtime daily in both. He stood in his stander for an hour the first
night we had it!
We had checkups with the GI doctor and the feeding team this
month, too. The GI thought Connor looked great and wouldn't need to come back for four
months. The feeding team visit went
really well, too. Our Early Intervention
speech therapist came with to the appointment so everyone could meet and make
decisions together. It was great to have
her with Connor and I! The feeding team,
too, was impressed with how Connor was doing.
They urged us to continue to try to move him towards thicker purees in
the hopes of introducing soft solids he can chew soon. He had gained several ounces since our last
visit six weeks ago. To my surprise they
said they didn't think he had to come back!
So we’re done with the CHOP feeding team, but will continue to work with
Early Intervention therapists and maybe now a nutritionist just to be sure Connor’s
making progress like he should.
 |
| Playing in his new stander! |
And perhaps my favorite moment of hope and progress came
tonight as we were playing before bed.
As we have for almost a year, we started playing the game “So Big”. I asked “How big is Connor?” and he RAISED
HIS LITTLE HANDS UP! I was so thrilled I
almost forgot to say “sooooo big!” We
did it over and over. He smiled and I
could tell he was proud of himself.
Brent and I both got teary eyed – we’d been teaching this simple little
game for more than a year with very little evidence Connor was actually absorbing
what we wanted him to do. But he had
been. And for some reason, today was the
day his brain decided to tell his arms to raise up. It was beautiful. It was one of the moments where you let
yourself think “If he can learn to do this then he can learn to do…”
Prayers and well wishes are appreciated for continued
progress with feeding, for the sore on his right hand to heal so he can start
to wear his splint again, for Connor’s second birthday to be filled with joy and
for our friends whose pending adoption of two boys goes before the court
tonight in Ethiopia.
