It's All Good

So, Mikey is fine.  He had a fever last night, so I gave him Tylenol and it went away instantly.  He told me that his legs and ears hurt, but felt much better within a few hours. I sent him to school today and all is well.

Carter and I have been working hard to practice his rolling today.  I'm setting a goal to have him rolling by Christmas.  With some hard work I think we can get there.  Sitting up should follow soon after.  His trunk strength is still a little weak, but we're working on it.  I noticed today that he's actually gotten two new teeth.  One on top and one on the bottom.  The second one on the bottom is so close to popping through.  It certainly explains all the drooling lately.

Tomorrow I'm going to post an article that was written about Michael and Carter.  It was published in the company newsletter recently.  How exciting is that?!

More Teeth

Carter hasn't been quite himself the last few days, but I finally figured out why.  He got himself another tooth!  This one is on the bottom right and the one next to it is ready to break through.  He started physical therapy today and did great!  I'm really excited to get the ball rolling with it. 

Jovie had a great time at her dance Halloween party today.  Lucky girl gets to dress up in her costume three times this week!

Mikey fell asleep at 4:00 this afternoon and pretty much slept until an hour ago.  He has a small fever, so we're praying that it doesn't get any worse. We knew that we couldn't completely prevent illness in our house, but are hoping that we can contain it without it spreading to Carter.  Wish us luck!

Sleep Study

Our busy week has finally ended...wahoo!!  The house is eerily quiet since the two older kids went to "Boo at the Zoo" with the grandparents, and Carter is napping.  The sleep study went well.  It felt a little weird sleeping in a room where the intercom was constantly on and the camera as well.  Carter slept through the night and seemed to sleep pretty comfortably.  We won't find out the results until November 5th.  His hearing aid has also been ordered, so now all we do is wait for November 3rd to come.  I'm so excited for it that it seems like that day is forever away.  We don't have much planned for this week.  Mostly just Halloween parties for the two older kids.  I'll post pics of their costumes soon. Also, Carter will start physical therapy on Monday.

Hearing Aid

We've had a couple of busy days .  Yesterday, Carter had a repeat of his hearing test.  We found out that he has no hearing in the right side (which is no surprise), and still a moderate hearing loss on the left.  We did find out that the BAHA hearing aid actually would work very well for him. We decided to not go with the actual BAHA, but a similar product that is literally about 5 times cheaper but works just as well. It's called a bone conduction hearing aid.  The problem with the traditional hearing aid is that it didn't seem to fit in his tiny ear very well.  This bone conduction hearing aid is a little device that will sit behind his left ear.  It is connected to a small microphone that will pick up the sound which will vibrate the little device and make Carter hear.  Obviously this is the very basic explanation of it because quite honestly I don't really get how it works.  The really cool thing about it is that it will give him normal hearing in the left ear and a mild hearing loss in the right even though he'll only wear it on one side.  Again, I really don't get how it works but it does so that's all that matters. The only negative (and honestly... it doesn't matter), is that he'll have to wear a headband to keep it on.  Here's a link that shows an example: Head Band .  Hopefully Carter will look a little happier with it on then that model.  So...to all of you sewing/crafting friends out there, you need to help me come up with some cute ideas for the little guy.  The band that he's getting is denim which could be cute except that it has white stripes on it too. That's just a little too much for me. We're already thinking that some hats would work.  Now, he won't have to wear the headband forever.  Just until he's five when he'll get a BAHA surgically implanted.  That's probably about the time that he'll get his prosthetic ear as well. Did I mention that he's getting his hearing aid on November 3rd?!  Yeah!!

We also had a visit with Opthalmology today.  It was just to check his right eye to be sure that it wasn't being compromised from being open all of the time.  The doc said that it looked wonderful.  He also said that he thinks it's a great idea to have the eyelid weight put in during his next surgery.  Hooray for that too!

I'm so happy to say that today was our last appointment at the children's hospital until January.  Keep your fingers crossed that we can keep Carter healthy through the Winter. We do have a sleep study tomorrow, but that's at the doc's office.  He has his follow-up for that on November 5th when we'll find out what the plan is for Carter's O2 needs. Then we are done until January...unless the doc wants another follow up after that. 

Carter's been such a stud lately.  He's smiling at EVERYTHING.  He's so aware of his surroundings and munching on his hands.  I love watching him grow.  It's exciting to think about what it will be like after he gets his hearing aid.  Here's a few pics that show off his little smile.  This kid cracks me up!

Kid Pic

Not much new going on here.  We're just enjoying our week off from appointments.  Jovie was supposed to go to the Pumpkin Patch today with her class, but it got postponed until Friday.  Mikey's still enjoying Kindergarten and learning lots of new stuff every day.  Carter has become Mister Personality and is smiling at EVERYTHING.  He's also started to be very aware of his surroundings and is starting to somewhat bat at objects.  It's really exciting to see him grow.  He has an Opthalmology appt next week, also the second ABR and sleep study.  It will be a busy week, but it feels as though his appointments are starting to wind down a little (knock on wood).

Pumpkin Patch

We took the kids to the pumpkin patch today.  Carter came too, but fell asleep in the car on the way there so we didn't want to bug him.  I really wanted to get a pic of all of them together, but I'll just have to try and get some at home.

Mikey's first choice of pumpkin was a huge one that wouldn't even stand up.  That kid always goes for size and definitely not for shape or looks.  We talked him into a smaller one.  Jovie, on the other hand, will pick the smallest pumpkin that is practically impossible to carve.  It's funny to see how our kids have such different personalities.

Carter had an appointment with his Pediatrician yesterday.  Everything went well and was uneventful.  I think that the ped is finally on Team Carter.  He told me that he was shocked by how well Carter is doing and by how far he has come.  He said that he truly believed that Carter would surprise a lot of people in his life. We've always believed that, but it was cool to hear it from someone else.

We tried out some rice cereal today.  He took about a teaspoon which I thought was really good.  His goal is to get up to at least a tablespoon by February, so if he can keep it up we're on our way there!  I snapped this pic this afternoon.  I just love those cheeks!  He looks a lot like Mikey in this picture.  Actually, this was Mikey's outfit but he outgrew it when he was 3.5 months.  The pants still fall off of Carter all.the.time.

Dysphagia

Today was Carter's appointment with the Dysphagia clinic.  It was to discuss his feeding with a physician, feeding therapist, and dietician.  All three of those ladies thought that Carter was a Rock Star!  He now weighs 11 lbs 3 oz which if his birth weight were an average weight, he would be in the 97th percentile.  Yay for Carter!  They watched him feed from the bottle and Carter decided to show off for them and took 90 ccs.  The feeding therapist gave him the clearance to start on solids in a couple of weeks. The dietician told us to slowly increase how much he gets during his G tube feeding at night to maintain his weight gain.  We go back in four months, and will hopefully get a plan in place to get rid of the G tube permanently.  Tomorrow is his appointment with the pediatrician and his hearing specialist.  Our little guy had one busy week!

ABR

Carter had his hearing test today.  He was supposed to be asleep for this test, but of course refused to cooperate, so they started out trying to do it while he was awake.  Since everything took a long time with him being awake, we were only able to do the left ear.  We found out that his hearing hasn't changed much since the last test meaning that the fluid in his ear wasn't a factor in his hearing loss.  The Audiologist tried a version of the BAHA on him, and we found that Carter's type of hearing loss wouldn't be helped by it so it's out the window.  Basically, the plan is to try the test again in two weeks when we can do the right ear as well and then get him fitted for a hearing aid.  Michael and I are ready to get him into one so we can see what kind of progress he'll make once he can start to hear a little better. 

Tomorrow is an appointment with the Dysphagia clinic.  It is a team of doctors including a dietician and feeding specialist to help Carter progress even further with his feeding.  It all seems a little overwhelming to me, so I'll be glad to have this one over with.