Like most parents, I continue to fall into the trap of obsessing over what my child is not doing, when I need to celebrate more in what Penny is doing. I so wish she could talk to me, is saying "mama" too much to ask?
Don't get me wrong, I love to listen to her beautiful babble. It is wonderful that she vocalizes as much as she does. And she understands a lot. Sometimes I really feel she is saying things but I don't understand her. Like "what's this!" I really think she says that, but it is very high pitched and jumbled I might be making that up. She certainly has a very respectable vocabulary for a 2 year old. (New 2yo at that!) She says dog, duck, all done, dada. And she has at least two dozen signs that she uses consistently.
I love that she is so social. She is never shy around strangers!
One of the things that I have been noticing a lot lately is her ability in fine motor skills. She has been building megablock towers since about Christmas time. Although she does yell at the blocks a lot to get them to cooperate :) She is good at putting tiny pasta or Cherrios in a narrow necked bottle. (Such as a water bottle or empy trial size shampoo bottle) She even amazed the OT last week when she held the bubble wand on her own and showed everyone she could put the wand into the bottle on her own and then proceeded to blow bubbles. I love watching her tiny fingers pick up blueberries and eat them. Her mouth has been blue a lot from this new experience.
Also she is so strong. She will think nothing of picking up the entire bag of megablocks or her farm house or doll house and walk around the house with it. Looking for a suitable place to camp out.
Our new adventure is the terrible twos. I remember that three was much much worse with Nathaniel. Maybe with girls it is two? She has been having temper tantrums more often lately. I know, I should let herself dive down the stairs in an effort to keep her happy. :)
I guess the bottom line here is that of course I think she is wonderful no matter what milestone she has reached yet. I just want her to stay happy and healthy!
Showing posts with label physical therapy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label physical therapy. Show all posts
Monday, July 13, 2009
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
An example of May 2010?
My calendar was marked today with an 8:00 am visit by Penny's PT and OT, Yvette and Linda respectively. We generally have them come together because we can only fit so many appointments in the week. At 8:07 I began to get a little nervous. Did I have the time right? Was today supposed to be a 9:15 visit with Scott. "Oh man! Now I am going into work late for no reason," I thought to myself. At 8:09 (and my clock does run a little fast), I picked up the phone to call Yvette, when I saw Linda walking up toward my door.
After we exchanged greetings I asked if Yvette was just running a little late, and Linda gave me this bewildered look. Linda then explained that she had been informed that morning that Penny was doing so well in the physical development department that she was discharged from Yvette's case load. Well, I didn't want to take this out on Linda since this was certainly not her doing, but I had to hold back the tears. You may recall from a previous post that Yvette is very important to me. Not to mention that this came as a huge surprise. I began to wonder what was going on because I know that my approval is needed to change Penny's plan. Then I thought, well maybe Scott was aware and in agreement to this and he forgot to tell me. He is always forgetting things. I attended Penny's OT in a confused (and a bit angry) state. I was upset that I never got to say goodbye; but on a more important note, I didn't agree that Penny lost that service. She is only 2. Don't I get another year out of the birth to 3 services.
At 9 am, Scott emerged from the bedroom and came down the stairs. Immediately I asked about his last visit with Yvette and if it was mentioned that her services would be reduced. Scott thought about this for a moment and then explained that they might have agreed to reduce her visits to one time a month rather than two since Penny is doing so well, but he was pretty sure he didn't dismiss Yvette's visits all together. Linda was still there at this time and admitted she could have heard wrong this morning too. . . but she didn't sound very convincing. I asked her to have Yvette call us if she met up with her.
At 9:00 am I should have been on my way out the door, but this really upset me and I was serious when I said I was holding back the tears. At 9:15 I finally got the gumption to get out the door when the phone rang. Marni was on the other line when I answered to explain that Linda just called her. No less then fifteen emphatic "No"s later, she told me that services are not cut without written documentation and a review meeting so that everyone has an opportunity to consider any changes. I kind of figured this, and I said as much to Marni, but I also explained that if Scott agreed to once a month, I am on board with that. I was just really confused and concerned if the services were just cut all together. She assured me that no, it doesn't work that way and we have a our annual review on June 16 anyway so we can address any changes to her plan at that time and have it all in writing. Hopefully, we will be meeting with Yvette sometime this month. I mean, the girl is good, but she isn't walking up and down stairs yet, so I know she will still benefit from PT at this stage in her life.
So, even though alls well that ends well is where I should be at right now, I wonder; how am I going to handle May of next year when her B23 services end?
After we exchanged greetings I asked if Yvette was just running a little late, and Linda gave me this bewildered look. Linda then explained that she had been informed that morning that Penny was doing so well in the physical development department that she was discharged from Yvette's case load. Well, I didn't want to take this out on Linda since this was certainly not her doing, but I had to hold back the tears. You may recall from a previous post that Yvette is very important to me. Not to mention that this came as a huge surprise. I began to wonder what was going on because I know that my approval is needed to change Penny's plan. Then I thought, well maybe Scott was aware and in agreement to this and he forgot to tell me. He is always forgetting things. I attended Penny's OT in a confused (and a bit angry) state. I was upset that I never got to say goodbye; but on a more important note, I didn't agree that Penny lost that service. She is only 2. Don't I get another year out of the birth to 3 services.
At 9 am, Scott emerged from the bedroom and came down the stairs. Immediately I asked about his last visit with Yvette and if it was mentioned that her services would be reduced. Scott thought about this for a moment and then explained that they might have agreed to reduce her visits to one time a month rather than two since Penny is doing so well, but he was pretty sure he didn't dismiss Yvette's visits all together. Linda was still there at this time and admitted she could have heard wrong this morning too. . . but she didn't sound very convincing. I asked her to have Yvette call us if she met up with her.
At 9:00 am I should have been on my way out the door, but this really upset me and I was serious when I said I was holding back the tears. At 9:15 I finally got the gumption to get out the door when the phone rang. Marni was on the other line when I answered to explain that Linda just called her. No less then fifteen emphatic "No"s later, she told me that services are not cut without written documentation and a review meeting so that everyone has an opportunity to consider any changes. I kind of figured this, and I said as much to Marni, but I also explained that if Scott agreed to once a month, I am on board with that. I was just really confused and concerned if the services were just cut all together. She assured me that no, it doesn't work that way and we have a our annual review on June 16 anyway so we can address any changes to her plan at that time and have it all in writing. Hopefully, we will be meeting with Yvette sometime this month. I mean, the girl is good, but she isn't walking up and down stairs yet, so I know she will still benefit from PT at this stage in her life.
So, even though alls well that ends well is where I should be at right now, I wonder; how am I going to handle May of next year when her B23 services end?
Monday, February 2, 2009
Go Therapy Go!
Speech therapies, physical therapies, occupational therapies, big therapies, little therapies, long therapies, and short therapies!
Penelope has been receiving services through the East Hartford Birth to Three since she was was 6 weeks old. I remember those first few months, my heart and my head pulled in so many different directions with this beautiful new life. I had my 5 year old to worry about, the pumping and the trying to nurse routine (is there anything more frustrating than feeding your child?), twice weekly visiting nurse pulse-ox checks (Hi Meghan I am so glad we met!!), once a week visits to the pediatrician, and not to mention the round the clock medications she was on after her heart surgery. Somewhere we managed to squeeze in those early visits from our special ed teacher and our service coordinator, Marni from Bto3. Quickly, we added the phyisical therapy visits as well. I remember when the PT on the hospital staff stopped in to see Penny before she left the hospital for the first time and she mentioned that the average age for a child with Down syndrome to begin to walk was 2 years old. For some reason I was really blown away by that. As I looked down to the bed at that floppy little 7 lb baby, only 7 days out of surgery, I thought to myself, "Wow! How do I know if I am up to this challenge? I will have to work with her and push her so much just do accomplish something so basic as walking?" I will never really know if that physical therapist noticed the water welling up in my eyes for probably the, oh, fiftieth time in those past thirteen days, but she put her hand out and said firmly, "But she will walk." And I believed her. . .
In the past eighteen months we have seen our Birth to 3 physical therapist, Dr. Yvette, regularly about two times a month. If we really wanted to we could augment that to once a week, but as any one who knows Penny will attest, she is doing just fine with the status quo. It took Penelope a bit to learn how to sit up on her own. If someone came by and sat her up, she could stay there on her own for awhile by the time she was ten months old; the really neat trick came at about fourteen months when she was able to put her self in the sitting position. By this time she had also perfected her military crawl and would demonstrate this by transversing our downstairs floor plan on her belly in under 90 seconds time. This school year has gone by so fast it is tough to say when she finally crawled on her hands and knees full time, but I would guess that came around Halloween time. Now we are on to more challenging exercises to entice little Miss Penny pants to walk.
And through all of these incredible milestones, Dr. Yvette has been there to give support to not just Penny but the whole family. After she leaves, I sometimes wonder who benefits more from the visit, myself or Penelope. We are so blessed to have such a warm-hearted, intelligent person on our team, who truly wants to be here to support Penny and her family. We often talk about what I want out of life; and she listens to me! Dr. Yvette always gives wonderful advice on things we can do with and for Penny, but she gives it with such neutrality that it never seems dictated or scripted, but absolutely from the heart, what she knows to be right for our family. We are about half-way through our services with Bto3 and already I am looking to the time when Dr. Yvette will no longer be Penelope's instructor. Thankfully, I know that we will be able to continue a relationship with her, otherwise, I would really be dreading Penny's third Birthday. During our last visit on Friday, Dr. Yvette worked with Penny to help her walk while she was only holding onto one hand and we also worked on her climbing skills to get up and down off the big chair. And then she worked on my esteem skills to get me up and off my ass to look for something more fulfulling then to continue looking for something else within Enterprise. We talked a lot about me going back to school to get a Masters of Education. I always kind of steered toward becoming a high school mathematics teacher, and now I want to do this more than ever! If only everyone had a Dr. Yvette for their household!
Penelope has been receiving services through the East Hartford Birth to Three since she was was 6 weeks old. I remember those first few months, my heart and my head pulled in so many different directions with this beautiful new life. I had my 5 year old to worry about, the pumping and the trying to nurse routine (is there anything more frustrating than feeding your child?), twice weekly visiting nurse pulse-ox checks (Hi Meghan I am so glad we met!!), once a week visits to the pediatrician, and not to mention the round the clock medications she was on after her heart surgery. Somewhere we managed to squeeze in those early visits from our special ed teacher and our service coordinator, Marni from Bto3. Quickly, we added the phyisical therapy visits as well. I remember when the PT on the hospital staff stopped in to see Penny before she left the hospital for the first time and she mentioned that the average age for a child with Down syndrome to begin to walk was 2 years old. For some reason I was really blown away by that. As I looked down to the bed at that floppy little 7 lb baby, only 7 days out of surgery, I thought to myself, "Wow! How do I know if I am up to this challenge? I will have to work with her and push her so much just do accomplish something so basic as walking?" I will never really know if that physical therapist noticed the water welling up in my eyes for probably the, oh, fiftieth time in those past thirteen days, but she put her hand out and said firmly, "But she will walk." And I believed her. . .
In the past eighteen months we have seen our Birth to 3 physical therapist, Dr. Yvette, regularly about two times a month. If we really wanted to we could augment that to once a week, but as any one who knows Penny will attest, she is doing just fine with the status quo. It took Penelope a bit to learn how to sit up on her own. If someone came by and sat her up, she could stay there on her own for awhile by the time she was ten months old; the really neat trick came at about fourteen months when she was able to put her self in the sitting position. By this time she had also perfected her military crawl and would demonstrate this by transversing our downstairs floor plan on her belly in under 90 seconds time. This school year has gone by so fast it is tough to say when she finally crawled on her hands and knees full time, but I would guess that came around Halloween time. Now we are on to more challenging exercises to entice little Miss Penny pants to walk.
And through all of these incredible milestones, Dr. Yvette has been there to give support to not just Penny but the whole family. After she leaves, I sometimes wonder who benefits more from the visit, myself or Penelope. We are so blessed to have such a warm-hearted, intelligent person on our team, who truly wants to be here to support Penny and her family. We often talk about what I want out of life; and she listens to me! Dr. Yvette always gives wonderful advice on things we can do with and for Penny, but she gives it with such neutrality that it never seems dictated or scripted, but absolutely from the heart, what she knows to be right for our family. We are about half-way through our services with Bto3 and already I am looking to the time when Dr. Yvette will no longer be Penelope's instructor. Thankfully, I know that we will be able to continue a relationship with her, otherwise, I would really be dreading Penny's third Birthday. During our last visit on Friday, Dr. Yvette worked with Penny to help her walk while she was only holding onto one hand and we also worked on her climbing skills to get up and down off the big chair. And then she worked on my esteem skills to get me up and off my ass to look for something more fulfulling then to continue looking for something else within Enterprise. We talked a lot about me going back to school to get a Masters of Education. I always kind of steered toward becoming a high school mathematics teacher, and now I want to do this more than ever! If only everyone had a Dr. Yvette for their household!
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