I hope you had a great Memorial Day. Thank you to everyone who serves to keep our country safe and free.
I am so excited with Buddy's progress. He is sitting up and standing well enough that I let him stop using his special bath seat, which he had to lay down in. I was afraid that he would fall over before, but now he is doing so well I let him try just sitting in the water. He was so good. He sat very still and didn't even start to fall over. Also, he can stand up with my support to make rinsing easier. I was beginning to wonder if he would ever get to this point, but he is doing so well.
He still isn't really crawling, although he tries. On Saturday, he reached out and held on to me while "walking" his knees up to me so that he was kneeling in front of me! For a little boy who was having trouble before, he certainly is making up for lost time! On Saturday, he also started getting up on his knees in his crib so that he can turn on his mobile himself. Such a smart little boy!
Since part of the point of this blog is to be informative, I wanted to explain why the sitting up and moving around is such a big deal. At first, all I knew was that his pediatrician was not pleased with his level of physical development, but she said it might have something to do with his vision and not to be too concerned about it until after his early steps evaluation. I thought, what does sitting up have to do with vision? I mean, really, that seemed like just using his disability as an excuse for everything. Our interventionist from the Division of Blind Services was the one who really explained it. Normally, a baby hears a noise and turns to see what caused the noise. Babies with poor vision turn and see nothing. So, they learn to listen very carefully. If you're moving around, you don't hear as well. Buddy learned to be very still when he heard a noise so that he could hear it clearly. This is great for hearing, but he was missing a key part of his development that way. All of the turning his head to look at things would have strengthened his core muscles so that he could hold himself up and move around, but he didn't move, and so his muscles were weak. We didn't know any of this, and we didn't know we had to make him move. His vision improved to the point that he could see more of the things around him and he wanted to get to them, so he was moving more. We also started making him do more of the work to hold himself up when we carried him, and he has just taken off.
We are amazed every day by the new things he does.
Monday, May 27, 2013
Monday, May 20, 2013
No Big Deal
Hi, Everyone!
Buddy has come so far in the past month. Can you believe he is 6 1/2 months old? It's hard to believe that he used to be the baby that barely interacted with his surroundings.
Buddy is actually sick at the moment, which is scary for his parents (and of course miserable for him), but his eyes are doing really well. He won't wear his sunglasses, but he loves being outside. He got to stick his feet in the grass for the first time. I think he liked it. He still loves hard rock, but we are sneaking in a bit of classical without him complaining about it. His grandparents got him a "glow seahorse," which is like the glowworms that everyone had when I was growing up. His interventionist suggested it, and he loves it. It plays classical music, and the stomach lights up. It is really one of his favorites.
He can sit up, but he doesn't want to. Not wanting to sit up is a lot less scary to me than not being able to. He scoots and rolls all over the place.
For his six month birthday, he got to eat some bananas. He loves bananas. He does not like green beans and carrots. :( I would rather have bananas than green beans and carrots, too, but at some point, he will have to learn to eat them anyway. He has also figured out how to hold his bottle, which took awhile, but he finally got it!
He likes to lick everything. On Mother's day, Daddy put him down in front of the couch, standing up, holding on to the couch. Buddy decided that he had to lick my knee (I'm sure it was very important for his nutritional needs) and it was too far away for him to reach. He actually took two steps holding on to the couch to get to me. We were so proud of him.
He does get up on his hands and knees, but he doesn't know how to coordinate all of his limbs for movement yet.
The best part is that he does seem to be seeing things that are farther away than before. He recognizes things in his environment and likes to play.
We know that there are still challenges ahead, but for the moment, all of the good things that are happening make the problems seem like NO BIG DEAL.
Have a great day!
Buddy has come so far in the past month. Can you believe he is 6 1/2 months old? It's hard to believe that he used to be the baby that barely interacted with his surroundings.
Buddy is actually sick at the moment, which is scary for his parents (and of course miserable for him), but his eyes are doing really well. He won't wear his sunglasses, but he loves being outside. He got to stick his feet in the grass for the first time. I think he liked it. He still loves hard rock, but we are sneaking in a bit of classical without him complaining about it. His grandparents got him a "glow seahorse," which is like the glowworms that everyone had when I was growing up. His interventionist suggested it, and he loves it. It plays classical music, and the stomach lights up. It is really one of his favorites.
He can sit up, but he doesn't want to. Not wanting to sit up is a lot less scary to me than not being able to. He scoots and rolls all over the place.
For his six month birthday, he got to eat some bananas. He loves bananas. He does not like green beans and carrots. :( I would rather have bananas than green beans and carrots, too, but at some point, he will have to learn to eat them anyway. He has also figured out how to hold his bottle, which took awhile, but he finally got it!
He likes to lick everything. On Mother's day, Daddy put him down in front of the couch, standing up, holding on to the couch. Buddy decided that he had to lick my knee (I'm sure it was very important for his nutritional needs) and it was too far away for him to reach. He actually took two steps holding on to the couch to get to me. We were so proud of him.
He does get up on his hands and knees, but he doesn't know how to coordinate all of his limbs for movement yet.
The best part is that he does seem to be seeing things that are farther away than before. He recognizes things in his environment and likes to play.
We know that there are still challenges ahead, but for the moment, all of the good things that are happening make the problems seem like NO BIG DEAL.
Have a great day!
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