Saturday 25 February 2012

18 Months Already

We had a far-less dramatic doctor interaction this week: Nic's 18 month check-up. As expected (based on the fact that he just saw the hematologist a few weeks ago), Nic is currently not showing any sickle signs, and his growth continues on the same track it has always been on: average. He is smack in the 50th percentile for height and weight. The check-up was quick and easy. I learned to check his spleen for sickle swelling (yee-haw), he got a shot, both kids got suckers, and we were on our way.

I was able to speak to the doctor regarding her opinion of where we should go for Nic's ER/hospitalization in the future, and she confirmed our suspicions that the hospital closest to us is not the place we should be taking him. This gives us something to think about as we consider where we should settle if Jeff gets hired on at the lab permanently.

Other interesting things that Nic has been up to include climbing everything in sight, learning how to turn on our microwave, toaster oven, and breadmaker (none of which are on the floor), becoming a rather tough wrestling opponent, dancing, "singing," playing ball, and running, running running. He loves to read, and we are in the lovely "over and over and over" again stage.

Nic's sign language is getting quite good, and he is making many more sounds. I like his speech therapist, and he is making some progress, although he frequently refuses to perform for her. It is very frustrating to me that he won't say a single word to her, and often won't even make sounds, when I know he will do them for me as soon as she is gone. I'm a little worried she is going to think I'm making up his words. His favorites are Momma, Daddy, and cheese. We also get an occasional choo choo or train, animal sounds like "moo," "baa," and "rawr," he has a sound he will make "ra, ra" for raisins and (yes, this is embarrassing but the therapist asked me to make some poor parenting decisions in order to get him to make sounds) he says cheeto fairly well. It's "cheeeeee-toooow." It's basically the word he is most enthusiastic about. He does not like to talk unless there is food in it for him, and then he becomes much more enthusiastic. Right now the biggest issue with him refusing to talk to the therapist is that it hampers her ability to discern whether he has a language issue or a speech issue. His receptive language is really good, so I think it is possible that he is having trouble on the word-formation end of things. We'll see.

And now, for some recent pictures of our growing boy:



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