'Hey, you, brother. I would like to taste your shirt.' :)The boys mostly enjoy each other and are getting to be pretty good at entertaining one another.
Early Intervention (the therapists that come see Drew) brought this Bumbo seat for Drew to help him use his hands more. He rarely tollerates it for even five minutes. When he wants out he lets his whole body go limp and his head hangs back and he just sits like that and cries until I come. This day he did pretty well. I think it's cuz he was on the table, so he could see more. Tyler is the one who really enjoys the seat. He plops in and puts the 'plate' on and is very content.
Tyler is still enjoying Barney, although his new pleasure is "Tractor" AKA Bob the Builder. I usually let him watch while I do the dishes or fix my hair to keep him out of trouble. Although Tyler didn't care about movies at all until a few months ago, Drew is always game for something interesting to look at and music makes it all the better. If I put Drew in his bouncer while Tyler is watching a movie, Tyler will slide his chair over to Drew and always wants to hold his hand. I've had to get after Tyler for sitting on Drew, because Tyler wants to share Drew's bouncer with him. This week he's started moving Drew's legs so that Drew ends up strattling Tyler. They both enjoy it, so why stop them?
Tyler frequently enjoys infant toys more than Drew.
Drew is really pretty tolerant of Tyler's love. As long as his arm isn't pinned, he gives it right back. Tyler loves it when Drew reaches out to touch him. Drew will swing his arm and touch Tyler, to which Tyler will look at me and announce whatever body part Drew got. "Drew a'face", "Drew a'hand."
Just wanted to get some shot's of the scars for Drew to look back on. This is the site where they went in for both of his surgeries. It's looking pretty good. It doesn't seem to be tender now. I always wondered if it hurt when we'd pick him up under the arms, because I know my C-section site hurt when the tissue was stretched from Ryan picking me up several months afterward. I was careful for a while, but he does pretty well now.
Ahh, these are the moments! Bringing Drew home was an adjustment in the noise level at our house for sure. Most of the time if one started crying, the other followed. The last month they have gotten better at tuning each other out and can even sleep through some length of the other crying. We moved Drew into a crib in Tyler's room a few weeks ago. The mattress is inclined and he sleeps in a 'tucker sling' to keep him from sliding down the bed. It took a few nights of getting used to, but it's nice now for Ryan and I to have our room to ourselves.
Drew still wakes up once in the night. It used to be about four and he's pushed it back to 5 or 5:30 now. Hooray for long streches of sleep!!
For the rest of July's news:
Drew has still been having his esophagus dilated every 10 days, about. We're going again Monday for #4. It's at 8 mm now. I've asked Dr. Barnhart how many more times we would have to do it, and his only reply has been, 'Several'. It's necessary, though, so we'll keep going until it's done.
Drew's kidney follow-up was last Monday. His right kidney is getting bigger, as it should, to compensate for the other. The left is shrinking, as it should, and will be gone by time he is 5-7 years old. We'll probably have yearly appointments until then.
I stopped giving Drew his erythromycin (antibiotic) a few weeks ago. I felt that it was important for him to have good bacteria in his body, and it was time to move on. He had been on that for the side effect of his stomach emptying faster. I really wanted to make sure he was still comfortable though. I searched and searched for natural helps, because the only other medical option I had was Reglan, which is not intended for long term use and Drew needs long term solutions. He did pretty well initially, but as the days went on he was starting to reflux more and more. Finally after praying and thinking about it, the idea came to start feeding him through the tube in his belly. I knew that his stomach only held a teaspoon when we left the hospital. I also had been told that mixing his formula with rice cereal would help it stay down better. So I started with just less than a teaspoon of rice and formula. Immediately I noticed that he was able to cough and yawn without gagging. That was amazing because usually coughing, yawning, and sometimes sneezing would send him into gagging spell. Any of you who have witnessed one spell know how hard they are on him, so it was amazing to see it stop.
After three hours the magic seemed to have worn off, but he had not thrown-up, so I did it again. Again magic. So now I feed him into his belly almost a teaspoon every three hours. He is so much happier!! And no more medication required. (He is still on prevacid, and will stay on that for a long time probably.)
Drew is now off his morphine and we're weaning ativan. The morphine wasn't so bad once I took it slow. The ativan is tougher on him to wean. He's been fairly irritable with this last decrease. I even tried to back off and give him a few extra days on the bigger dose, but when I went down again the fussiness came back. I hope it will just be a day or two, and then he'll settle down again.
Overall I'm really pleased with how Drew is doing. He is a very pleasant baby and cute as can be. He jabbers, "Da Da Da." now and is very good at blowing spit bubbles. He also laughs occassionally. And he's very close to rolling from back to front. He just needs more opportunity. It still irritates the reflux more than he'll handle to be flat on the floor too much, but he's getting better.
Tyler is learning so fast!! He climbs anything he wants now, and comprehends so much of what is going on around him. You never know until they can say it sometimes. We were in the car and turned on to Main Street today, and from the back seat I hear, "Get mail?" Yep, we were headed to get the mail. (The post office doesn't deliver mail down here.)
Ryan is working crazy hours most days to try and keep up with having one day off most weeks to go to Dr appointments with us. I think we're both more tired than we've ever been, but we're so happy to be together and have our little boys.
I was released as YW 2nd counselor last week and put in as the Beehive advisor. So now instead of doing the activities for the girls, I teach the Sunday lessons. I'm so glad that I can still be with them, but relieved that it won't be such a time requirement.
We see the Lord's hand blessing our lives continually still. I am more and more amazed at the power of prayer and the Priesthood.