It was a hard hard pregnancy. He was an infertility baby. I nearly lost him in the 1st trimester. I had very severe gestational diabetes and horrid emesis all pregnancy long. So, when he finally popped out after a natural birth (VBAC), it was a delight to see his shock of black hair and big brown eyes gazing at me. He stayed awake for 14 hours after his birth!!! We were both buzzed!!:^)
His infancy was interesting. He never slept a lot, but he was a calm baby with a very gentle demeanor. I **know** he smiled before we even left the hospital. He laughed at 3 weeks. It was a strange sound that I could only identify at as a laugh because it was coupled with some slapstickish humor his older brother would be doing for him and a huge grin. I think he didn't have good muscle control of his throat to really laugh so it sounded like a choke until he learned to verbalize with it a couple of weeks later. He rolled over at about 5 weeks. He seemed to be humming when he was about 5 months old, but literally sang the Barney Song (gads I should have played Pavroti8) when he was 8.5 months. Happy birthday. Jesus Loves Me. Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. ABC (same music, I know) and Jingle Bells were added before his bday. He also started talking during that time. Learned to walk a week before his bday and was relatively normal in physical milestones. He could identify lots of things in books...dogs, bottles, boys, girls, fruits, vegies...you know the "First word dictionary".
Around 15 months he had his shots got sick and suddenly regressed. He stopped singing, looking at people, talking and laughing. His pediatrician had always been delighted with his precocity and was dismayed to see the regression. So he immediately connected us to ECSE and they got in his face with 3 times a week speech therapy and 2 times a week social play therapy and teaching me how to keep him involved and force eye contact. We would call his name and he wouldn't look at us. He took one of those popcorn popper toys everywhere with him. It sooooooooooooooooooooo looked like autism. He would also vocalize long phrases that the speech therapist said had inflection, intonation and pattern that sounded like paragraphs, but the words were nonsense.
Then at 22 months, he turned back on in the proverbial paragraphs. One day he literally just said, "Momma can I hab sum jus. Can I feed duh guhs (goose...they lived in our yards). From that moment on he was "ON" verbally. The things he would say were just amazing. He was under two when he said while chasing the geese, "Momma duh guhs loves duh guhs. Duh guhs loves duh bwead. Momma duh guhs dunt love duh Mite." (we do call him The Mite as a nickname cuz he was a tiny guy).
He was also a very quiet and observant toddler. He would hide behind the door at church nursery when the other kids would cry because the sound AND emotion overwhelmed him. He would wait to see how to do something before trying it. He seemed to have a good sense of where we were when we'd drive in the car. It is hard to explain, but like we went to a restaurant far away from our house (about 20 miles) one time. Then about 2 months later (he'd just turned two) we were driving to a store near that place, but not visibly so -- like a few blocks from there but where we had passed by on that first time -- and he asked to go to that restaurant. he'd never been there since the first time nor in the vicinity since then. It was weird.
But the strange thing was he never seemed to regain his hands after the shots. He had stopped using the pincer grasp and never regained it. He stopped waving bye-bye and never resumed. He would hold them very strange at a close proximity to his ribs with them slightly twisted inward...kinda curled at the wrist. When he was scared, like when the vacuum cleaner was on (hated IT), he'd pull his hands into that position.
We moved to another state (where we are now) when he was 2 and they refused qualify him for ECSE, even though he had been receiving it already in the first state. They based their refusal on his "talking skills" being too high. We've been begging for help since then. 6 years!:^(
He didn't potty train until nearly 4. He didn't climb steps on his feet until about that time. He to this day cannot eat with utensils very well. He didn't ride a bike until 7.5, but that was with TREMENDOUS efforts on the part of his OT and US. Same thing for tying his shoes. Even with bike riding he has NO clue about traffic and I won't allow him to ride on the street without me right there on my bike beside him. He also has a difficult time crossing streets...well, he just dashes with no thought ot traffic. He still can't ice skate, roller blade or play baseball or dribble a ball. He still does that strange little thing with his hands when he is tired, cold or very frightened.
I think one thing I did right was put him in karate, even though it has been painstaking for him. I think that has minimized some of the devastation of dyspraxia, especially in his feet.
Oh and he has a horrible time with crossing over his body. So, for example when he has to change directions in his karate form or reach across his body to throw a strike, he loses his place and can't restart from the same point.
He is better now with sound and light, but for along time he would cover his head with his lovey when we were out in the sun and when we went to noisy places he'd cover his ears and look down. Firecrackers were a horror for him. He'd literally put his head inside my shirt and plug his ears. I'd shelter him with my arms as best I could, but he would be terrified. Those are not so pronounced now.
Of course, his writing is pitifully slow, messy and a horror for him. His art work is so sad. He wrote in his journal at school, when asked what he wanted to learn in reading, "to riitg and dra gud piturs for my stores." That made me so sad.
I thought he started reading at around 3, but he wouldn't do it out loud. He'd look at a book for awhile then would answer questions I'd ask about it. But with the outloud not happening, I couldn't say for sure. i've discovered this summer that he has a lot of difficulty with reading outloud, as do I. I actually get voice strain from reading outloud and will get a sore throat. Apparently he does too.
Oh! He has a very sophisticated, sarcastic wit. He also is very dry when he spews it out. For example, when he was six I bought him a pony that clicked and popped when you pressed on his back -- it was from out chiropractor. Mite loved him and named him Whiplash the Chiropractic Pony. I laughed and asked him why he named him that he said, "You know Whiplash is what a chiropractor treats and whiplash is what you do to a horse to get him going faster, isn't that funny?"
This summer I have discovered more about who he is and I feel so sad about who I have missed. His vocabulary and verbal comprehension is FANTASTIC. I didn't know that. I've totally changed how I talk to him. I use my adult, college educated vocabulary with him and HE UNDERSTANDS AND RESPONDS!!! I miss the little kid I thought he was though. I'm a strange bird, I guess. So, I have given birth to a strange chick!!!
He also has a phenomenal memory. We travel a lot abroad as my husband's family is spread all over the world. Mite remembers all of it, even the trip we took when he was two. Like after 2 years we went back to a place where we had visited when he was two and he remembered, where the toy box was and where the key was hidden at the house we had visited. He remembers the food we ate at a hotel in Hong Kong 3 years ago. He remembers strange little details about things we've done and he remembers people very well.
Now if only he could remember those motor movements for lettering and to keep his desk clean:^)
He is also very musical. He has a beautiful singing voice and has joined a boys choir. Apparently he can detect a single note out of several played and can identify note patterns in several different songs. Apparently those are unusual skills. We're lining up piano lessons for him. He can remember entire, complicated, songs after hearing them only a couple times...sometimes only once. I'm thinking about putting letter drawing to music to see if that helps it STICK.
He's also a great little kid....very well mannered and pleasant to be around. I think that is why I missed these things. His older brother, while a great kid now, was a real live wire in his early years and Mite's easy going nature made it easy to focus on the older kid and let Mite fend for himself. Now the older guy is settled, but I do notice he hogs the conversation a LOT.
What else should I share? Have I missed something?
That's pretty much it in a nutshell.
