Holy cow. It has been way, way too long.
Sorry for the long absence.
So just to bring everything up to speed, here's what happened. I was working at a job that is about two hours from my house. I pretty much only was home for six hours a day. Last June, I quit my job due to daycare being crazy expensive. Since then, my son has been seeing a physical therapist, a nutritionist, and Early Intervention. Turns out my son has low muscle tone, and developmental delays. We have also had ear infections, flus, vomiting viruses and many other sicknesses.
I don't plan on taking such a long absence again.
I actually want to jump right into things.
So I want to change the focus of the blog a teeny, tiny bit. I want to start sharing what its like having a child with developmental delays and talk about his therapy as we go through this. I still want to talk about other parent things, and pop culture things, but I really need an outlet to discuss what is going on.
What prompted all of this was at his 3 month checkup he could not hold his head up very high. He could hold it up, but not high. At his six month checkup he wasn't rolling and he had a hard time sitting up. We had an Early Intervention evaluation, and he scored pretty high so no services were sought. At eight months, he could not hold his own bottle, and he wasn't crawling. The pediatrician sent us back to Early Intervention. At 10 months he could finally hold his own bottle. After several months of hard work, at 15 months he started to crawl. I cried. He laughed and looked at me like I was nuts and crawled like a pro for the rest of the day. Shortly after this, he started Physical Therapy. After much more hard work, at 21 months, he stood up and walked. And walked and walked. I was speechless. Now we approaching the two year mark and he is not talking so we are going to start speech therapy shortly. We have seen a neurologist who also recommended Occupational Therapy.
It is very frustrating because I never know what is working, and what is not. I never know what is getting through to him, and what is just frustrating him. He would scream like he was being tortured when I was trying to get him in the crawling position, but when he was ready, he just took off. The walking was the same. He would sometimes walk if I held his hand or hands, but he would scream and cry. I thought for a while he was in physical pain because of this. I would not take him on long walks either, just from the living room to the changing table or from the living room to the high chair. Then, one day at my mother's house, he stopped playing with his toys, stood up, and walked the length of her house.
Another specific challenge I would like to share is the transition to sippy cups. This was another stage that would make me weep. We owned a great variety of sippy cups to help ease the transition. We also did not even attempt to transition until crawling started. When you first gave him the cup, he would scream. This evolved to screaming and then throwing the cup. This is how we lost our first sippy cup. RIP Munchkin sippy cup. Eventually, he would raise the cup to his mouth, but would let the liquid within pour down his face and chest requiring a complete outfit change. Finally at 21 months, we somehow put it all together. He drank from the cup! This is where frustrating comes in. I know its hard to transition,but having a kid with developmental delays means we don't like change. It takes hard work to see progress and its normally many months in coming.
I will continue to talk about this ongoing. If you have any questions, feel free to comment below. Or if you are going through the same thing, or went through the same thing, I would like to hear about it, if you want to share.
To change topics...........I recently saw Frozen.
Just a quick rant, I do not boycott or dislike Disney. I do however feel that they were on the right track with Old Yeller and Bambi. Sometimes bad things happen. This is life. I really like fairy tales and The Little Mermaid, though sad actually has a point. You can't force people to like you and don't change who you are to achieve that end. I have not seen the animated Disney version, but I hear it does not end with Ariel becoming sea foam. The Hunchback of Notre Dame is a very dark gothic novel that explores love, lust, desire, envy, and greed. It has a very touching ending after a thrilling climax. Once again, I have not seen the animated version, but I hear that Esmeralda and the Hunchback are not found with skeletons entwined in the catacombs years later. I have not seen an animated Disney movie in a very long time but I heard Frozen was the one to watch.
I like how this is not a typical "one day my prince will come story". Of course its there and its actually sad to me how "ordinary" Anna needs a husband that badly. Being ordinary is extraordinary! There is nothing like the adventures one can have on one's own, especially at 18. I like how its about family relationships, reminiscent of Pixar's Brave.
However, it felt rushed. It is not a short movie, but I felt that the story was almost forced. The musical numbers are not spread out, they are mushed together in the first half of the story. I felt it would have been a lot more enjoyable if it had focused more on animation and story.
While I am reviewing things, I would like to briefly review Ready Player One by Ernest Cline and The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield.
Ready Player One is like if someone scooped up all of pop culture from the late 70's to the early 90's and made a video game out of it, and then played that video game in a dystopian future. Literally that is the what the book is. I highly recommend this book to everyone everywhere.
The Thirteenth Tale is a wonderful story crafted by a master storyteller. The protagonist works in her father's bookstore and is asked to write the truth about a reclusive author. The book takes place in England but does not specify the year or decade in which it takes place. This gives the book a very timeless feel. This book I recommend to people who enjoy stories. It is a ghost story without a ghost. It is a love story between twins. I loved this book.
Before I go for the day...........I wanted to share a recipe.
My son is a toddler and I try very hard to make him eat nutritious foods. I am a SAHM now and I really don't want every lunch to be peanut butter.
In an effort to shake things up a bit, yesterday I opened up a can of black beans, sauteed a quarter of a yellow onion, cut up four celery stalks, diced a tomato, added some frozen chicken stock (recipe and tips coming soon), added powdered garlic, and tossed in some cheddar cheese and heated it all up on the stove. I squeezed fresh lime over the soup and my son was laughing and smiling while eating it. It was cheap and easy to make.
I promise it won't take two years for me to write again because this is fun :) I hope to be back early next week.
