I'm soo sorry!

I'm doing a quick update with a few pictures or my mother and sisters will disown me.

The past two weeks have been so exciting! It's as if Sydney became so much more independent and active and curious overnight! She's interacting more with us and she definitely is at the stage where she knows the difference between the people who live with her and a stranger. If she doesn't know you, she's not going to respond to you until she feels comfortable. She also has a bit of separation anxiety now and always needs to know that we're close by. She's much more aware these days.

We did another therapy session last week and everyone was completely stunned by how much she has improved since we resumed her reflux medication. She sits unassisted and is actually happy about it! She laughs and plays and it's very clear that she is not in discomfort anymore. Of course, now that sitting is fun, she has no interest in lying down and tries her best to sit up even during diaper changes. She's also much more vocal and spends her days shrieking, squealing, laughing and blowing spit bubbles. The spit bubble thing is only fun when someone else is holding her.

These pictures were taken at therapy last week. I used my phone so the quality isn't the best.






These were taken when she had that cold a few weeks ago.

Well, it's official...

my child HATES therapy. No, seriously. She HATES it. I know, I know...hate is such a strong word but she really HATES it.

I think I may have mentioned before how she's always happy and never really cries. I mean, she'll definitely let you know when she's not happy but it's really more like complaining or whining than actual crying. She usually never gets worked up enough to even produce tears, even when she's getting vaccinated. She doesn't cry when she needs to be changed, or when she's hungry or when you put her down. She gets very excited when she knows she's about to be fed but again, no crying. When she goes to bed for the night, there's no fussing and the few times she's awakened before morning there's been no crying. Everyone who's visited or doctors who have seen her have all said how pleasant and good natured she is. Well goodness gracious, why did no one tell us how very spoiled we were?? I laugh now at the times I've ever said she was hysterical.

She wasn't much of a fan of therapy from her first appointment but it was still more whining than crying. She cried through the second appointment but still nothing a kiss from Mommy couldn't fix. We had our third set of appointments yesterday. She was Little Miss Sunshine in the car on the way there and was smiling with the receptionist when we arrived. Then we get inside and the very second she realized what was going on, she started screaming. I mean, big crocodile tears and crying so hard she was shaking and heaving. It was a fit, the likes of which I never knew she had in her! It was even more distressing because the physical therapist doesn't do anything to her that we don't do at home. I make her sit, reach for her toys, roll over and over on the floor and she does all that there too.

She stopped crying when that appointment was over but as soon as we went into our room for occupational therapy and they put her in a high chair, the water works started again. My friends always get a little misty when they mention having to take their kids in for vaccines and now I can relate because I was about 5 seconds away from crying myself. The worst part was when she would look at me like, "Mom, why are you allowing this?" and reach her body toward me. B has a theory that she just doesn't like being told what to do. I don't know anyone like that.

Then, after trying everything else I remembered that there's a song that always gets her to relax. I've used it in the early days when we were introducing solids when she wanted no part of sitting and sometimes when she's having trouble falling asleep. I would like to take this opportunity to thank my mother for making me watch The Sound of Music so many years ago because Do Re Mi is now an integral part of my life. I started singing and the child stopped crying that very second. It was so shocking that the other therapists all came to watch. I had to sing that song for the remaining 15 minutes of the appointment and whenever I stopped she started crying again.

I'm only sorry that I didn't think about blessing them all with my awesome voice earlier.

Almost back to her old self

Baby Girl is doing much better today! She was not very happy yesterday and was a little whiny and clingy but who can blame her? She sounded awful. This morning she woke up full of smiles and giggles and is improving. She's still congested but nowhere near as bad as yesterday or the day before.

We skipped our PT appointment this morning and rescheduled for next week so there's nothing new to report there.

I'm trying to be more consistent with updates so look for some pictures this weekend.

This thing ROCKS!!!!

On the recommendation of one of her doctors, we bought this humidifier just before Sydney was discharged from the hospital. It was still pretty cold and dry when she came home and it seemed to help a bit. When we moved back to Florida we didn't use it much because we figured no place is more humid than Florida while completely ignoring how much the a/c can suck the moisture from a room.

We got it set up and running about an hour before we put Sydney to bed last night and added the liquid Vicks to the medicine cup. When I first put her down she had one coughing fit but it has been 11.5 hours and I haven't heard a peep from her since. Not even her usual night noises! No coughing, no struggling to breathe! Nothing! I dare say this is the best sleep she has ever gotten. I checked on her several times throughout the night and she was completely comfortable and relaxed and I could feel the difference in the room. I am amazed that this was the child who was coughing like crazy and breathing through 1/2 a nostril only 24 hours ago!

A week of firsts

Last week was all about Sydney doing a few things for the first time.

On Sunday (July 27) she went to church for the very first time and she was a perfect angel throughout the whole service. She was quite fascinated with the singing and the lights and didn't even think about napping until about 10 minutes before the service was over.

Then, on Monday she graduated to her High Chair and we think she likes it a little more than her Bumbo seat.

Look at the big girl!





Then she moved to Stage 2 chunky food mid week and she's tolerated them just fine. No gagging whatsoever. That's a pretty big deal around these parts.

Last week was also the first time she peed on Mommy during a diaper change but we won't get into the details of that.

On Saturday, she met Aunt Rita for the first time. Aunt Rita always keeps in touch with us and now her primary goal is to get us to move to Tampa where she lives.

Occupational Therapy Evaluation

Sydney had her first meeting with OT last Wednesday and she was actually very happy with her. We talked at length about her gag reflex but the therapist wasn't very worried about it especially since she's not having any major feeding or eating issues. She has also gotten better with the hand sucking and will only spit up now if we allow her to suck them for prolonged periods. In the beginning, she would gag and puke almost as soon as her hands hit her mouth. The therapist even tried to make her gag (so we could see exactly where the sensitivity in her mouth is) and the child refused to! The one time in her life I wanted her to attempt to puke and she gave us nothing. She's a stubborn one, that kid. Eventually she discussed some ways to help her practice gag suppression and we'll see how much she improves at the next visit.

She also tested her motor skills and hand eye coordination and she said she scored an A+ overall. She's still advanced for her adjusted age but still behind for her real age. That's not a concern at all since no one really expected her to even be functioning at her adjusted age considering that she was a 26 weeker.

The only issue she had was shared with the Physical Therapist (whom we say earlier that day) and it related to her obvious discomfort while sitting. She also agreed that it was most likely due to reflux and not a true indication of weakness in her trunk. In fact, if we can distract her enough she'll sit up just fine until the novelty of the activity wears off. She still burps a lot while sitting and recently started displaying more minor symptoms. The suggestion was to get her back on her reflux medicine (before she starts associating sitting with pain) and once her discomfort is eased, they are both convinced that she will tolerate sitting for longer periods. I spoke to her pediatrician about it today and he agreed, so we're going to see what happens.

Just yesterday she really got herself in a crawl position and actually managed to move herself a few feet just fine! My baby is growing up so fast and it's amazing to see.

We see PT again on Wednesday and OT again next week.

Maybe if I updated more often...

I wouldn't be faced with the task of having to do three posts in one day.

This is just a quick post to say that Miss Thang has a head cold and is congested but happy and energetic as though nothing is wrong with her. She started coughing yesterday and it turned to major stuffiness that interfered with her breathing in the middle of the night. Thankfully, we already had 9 month well baby visit scheduled for this morning so we took care of everything then.

She doesn't have a bacterial infection (Praise the Lord) or an ear infection or bronchitis or croup or RSV and those were the things I was most concerned about. She has had her fair share of coughing fits today and she's still congested but the doc says she has nothing that requires major medication.

The recommended treatment: Saline spray to loosen the mucus, pedialyte to replace electrolytes since she's not eating much and the humidier with liquid vicks during the night. She also told me to use Vicks baby rub on her neck, chest and back and to rub some on her feet and cover with socks. I know that works for coughing since I have some girlfriends who already swear by it. The doctor said that if she couldn't actually hear how stuffy she was she wouldn't believe she was sick because she was chatting and playing with/banging her feet for the entire appointment. Right now, she's pounding me and chatting loudly.

I have two more posts with pictures coming this evening.