(December 2011)
I unfortunately haven't done an update on Andrew in awhile, I guess that is what happens when a little sister is born. First let me say that Andrew is now 28 months old, weighs 32 pounds, and is # inches tall. He is still the spitting image of his dad and I swear I gave birth to a doppelganger!
Andrew has been through alot in his short life and so far he is coming through the other side with flying colors. His speech therapy is going well, he had his 6 month review and had met or exceeded ALL of his objectives. He has about 50 words in his vocabulary and has started using some two word sentences. Some of his favorite words are:
Momma, daddy, deeda (Jacob), bi (vi for violet), baby, hi, bye bye, NO!, MINE!, me, toast, baba (bottle), green (all colors are green), go, outside, upstairs, car, ball, there, cookie, juice, doo (scoby doo), help, nini (night night). To name a few. Not too shabby considering in May he didn't have a single word and wasn't even babbling!!!!
His next hurdle we have had to face are his feet. He has low muscle tone in his mouth which contributed to his speech delay and alot of times children will also have low tone with other areas. At first his therapist and I didn't think he had any other problems. He met all other physical milestones and was exceeding most if not all of them. One day he didn't have socks on and his speech therapist asked if he had always had crooked toes. He had, and we had already taken him to a podiatrist but hadn't gotten anything except "oh he's young he will grow out of it, probably ill fitting shoes". We got a referral to another podiatrist and have been approved for orthopedics for his toes and his inward turned feet. So it turns out that even though his milestones were not affected that he did in fact have low tone in his feet which caused his feet to turn slightly inward and his toes to grow crooked because of it. But this will fix the problem with no long term effects.
The final hurdle my little guy has faced is food allergies. Andrew had never been a good eater except when he was nursed. Since starting food he became pickier and pickier as he grew. Of course some of that could be his age, but it had gotten pretty bad lately. Since his dad had just gotten diagnosed with food allergies and I was getting concerned about the slight eczema on his tummy, the dark rings under his eyes, and the (sorry TMI) numerous dirty diapers a day I bit the bullet and got his blood drawn for testing. Well it is a good thing I did because he is allergic to dairy (not just lactose but ALL DAIRY), cane sugar, celery, grapes, sunflower (including oil), and garlic. We have eliminated ALL of these things by replacing them with substitutes and I am baking homemade bread, canning jelly, and making and freezing all sorts of foods for him. He is still a picky eater but his appetite has gone through the roof and even if he only eats 5 different foods he eats large quantities of them now which is great. The best part to all of this is that his personality has dramatically changed. What we didn't know was that he must have been in a fog with all of the toxins from eating foods he was allergic too. Unfortunately the things he is allergic too is in EVERYTHING. Try finding any bread/cracker product or even simple chips that don't have either sugar or sunflower oil in them! Ugh!
He has turned into a very loving boy and is very affectionate, before he would give occasional hugs and kisses now he just gives them freely and also smiles more. He just walks around smiling now which is awesome. We saw a jump in his vocabulary after he was off his foods as well. He is just sooooo damn cute I just want to squeeze and squish him! I just love my little fighter, and am sure he is going to continue beating his hurdles!
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