Colin entered this world 8 days late. I did an induction during his delivery which only lasted 4 hours from start of the Petocin to the end of his delivery. I know there is lots of people who say it's better to wait for nature to take it's course with delivery. However, I've had 2 prior deliveries that didn't need an induction with those being quick natural deliveries. Colin, however, my body I believe, was responding to the pregnancy in a different way. My blood pressure increased to prehypertension stage and questionable Preclampsia at the end of the pregnancy [this was greater earlier on with Braetens pregnancy, which is my 4th and very last son]. I had additional issues and if other pregnant or expectant mothers are wondering what those were feel free to message me to ask.
Oh, the main huge issue was for weeks I had early intense braxton hicks and bleeding for close to 10 weeks long. I also had my placenta low laying but early on they didn't want to call it placenta previa. Something was just different and I forced myself to follow the intuitions of bed rest..despite 2 toddlers running all over the place! Hindsight, there is a huge miscarriage rate in Stickler Syndrome pregnancies or those with Stickler Syndrome. It is listed under infertility Dr's list in terms of being a cause of infertility of inability to conceived. I have had no problem conceiving as I always did at those prevented awkward times in life. Such as Colin was technically most likely conceived 7 days after I was laid off from a job just as I was moved since they were filing bankruptcy. It was a complete double whammy! As soon as everything started to go downhill we started to get rejected from local family support because of our lack of successes.
I then took an anti depressant which I've never taken one during a pregnancy despite my first pregnancy was during a domestic violence situation. It is called Zoloft. I asked constantly each visit with the Dr if this would have any influence over my growing child as he always simply responded with "I have yet to have other patients with defects of their kids who have taken this med" In hindsight, I might not of needed it and seriously always objected against it but chose it after the influential words a certain family member mentioned to me about her with hers. Pregnant and impressionable with all that was going on, I took it. I did stop taking it towards the end of the pregnancy after Zoloft birth defect commercials were popping on TV in my 3rd trimester. Mind over matter, as I've always said for years. I was able to push through and use courage to stay off of anti depressants and never gone back on them.
Fast forwarding back to my delivery. It was beautiful. Once he was delivered he immediately grabbed my right pointer finger and we had the most amazing bonding experience that was like the best fireworks in the world. Nothing could top that amazing experience. Nothing that would even be close to describe it to!
However, once the pediatrician came to examine our child before we were released there was some concerns. First of all, he didn't pass one of his ear tests. We had to repeat it 3 times and finally the last one came back with just enough to pass. They said some times it's because of fluids or such in their ear that need to work their way out. Next, he commented on his shriveled skin most likely because he was late and also thinking that his club foot appearance also was meaning that he was late so his body would work it's way back to normal and if it's not by a month or so then we'd discuss the situation once again. We ended up discussing it with him during that follow up visit and he said it would correct itself out by first bowing the legs rather inward..I don't know if this makes sense. But think of where your knees buckle. There would be a calcium build up on his legs to counteract that bowing in his legs and then over time it would then correct itself. However, it appears this appearance he has with his feet and legs is highly common with Stickler Syndrome patients. It's where the bottom portion of the legs bow outwards.
For example, check out this image to the top left side specifically with the girl. That is the perfect example of what is going on with him right now. Source of this image
We were also having constant concerns about his vision where in direct sunligh this eyes would just be wide open. I have a video of it that I should download from a broken old hand camera and post on here. I waved my hands in front of his face and he wouldn't blind an eye. His eyes would be wide open and as a baby it would happen at the most random place and times. I even had a lady at a local grocery store ask me if he was blind. Flabbergasted, of course I said no. We've had concerns..but blind? **please** yup, turns out NOW [almost 4 years later!!!!] after years of being talked out of referrals, recommendations, and lazy paper referrals from our pediatrician and us parents of multiple kids needing them to be punctual on paperwork and helping us out between all of life's other chaos we have answers.
My strong suggestion to other parents if they're in our shoes..keep searching with other pediatricians even if times are hard. Call and leave a message with different doctors to see what their advice is and see if you want to see them. Look around. Don't settle. I most likely settled out of a busy life and of course my mothers intuition was just screaming so I'd still ask and ask around. Not even local eye dr's could figure it out or even get an accurate eye exam due to his light sensitivity so we'd leave unfulfilled. Talk about how frustrating, and utterly exhausting! Something was going on. We had people ask us all the time. But what do you tell them when you don't even have answers either?! I'd love to pull an answer out of my pocket and make them stop constantly asking..but I couldn't. I wanted that magical answer to! Thus, we gave people the fuel to speak of us as if we were 'lazy' 'not looking hard enough' or further. It honestly was frustrating because I would of loved to answer them and knew that majority were already mentioning how we need to try harder. Yup, thanks..we already know that! Have we stopped trying to find that answer? No. The concerns honestly didn't feel like 'support' because they weren't positive. Randomly though, we'd get those random positive reinforced questions.
During Colins baby days up to a year old he was pretty good at most milestones. Actually above average as he started to speak far earlier than the Dr said he would. He had full sentences by the time he was 12 months and could point and say what was upper case and lower case letters by the time he was 16 months old [my other kids never did this until they were in pre-k!! Not even my last son speaks in as many words as Colin did at that age.] simply by me repetitively pointing them to him on a leapfrog ABC spinning ball toy about 1" from his face and repeating 10 times the letter, twice daily if not more. We had our educational books that we read together which was counting up to 10 and I'd additionally use fingers or his toes to repetitively count up to 10 or more. He'd watch our big screen LCD around 3' from the large 47" screen to watch Nick Jr all the day. Moose & Zee taught him so much with repetitiveness as well. He was able to repeat all that they did, and tell me what show was coming up next all the time. Mind you, this was before he was even 2 year of age and as early as 12 months.
I strongly believe that my son is extremely intelligent. Most moms boast about even a glimpse, but I'm not just saying this. He is the age of 3 now and he can count items past 20. He can tell you by a quick glance that there is 4 of them with out the need to point at each item. This is something not even my 6 year old Kindergartner can't still do with out counting one at a time. My oldest couldn't do that until he was in 1st grade. He also notices when there used to be 10, and now there is 4 so there is 6 missing. Abnormal for his age? Yes. I strongly love this gifted ability within in him. This is what comforts me about his survival abilities as an adult some day with vision problems such as going completely blind.
He did show an abnormal dislike for food and given the Dr's questionable responses to my already bizarre sounding symptoms of my kids I decided not to mention to him that he wasn't eat cereal and baby food well. My intuition told me this would open a completely sour can of worms as lots of Drs grovel over large vs. smaller babies. Colin has always been around 30-50% on the scale after 6 months of age. Baby cereal and specially pea's would make him gag and throw up a little. After around 10 attempts of each, I'd stop using them both further.
I was breastfeeding him and a very passionate and compassionate Breastfeeding advocate or lactivist is how you say it[Emma, whom I've donated milk to her sisters adopted baby with this current pregnancy] came into my Facebook world discussing the huge developmental benefits of breastfeeding beyond one year which expanded my reasoning and focus on parenting as an attachment parenting. The basic principal is that by your child getting their needs met it'd actually make them more independent and less dependent upon you vs. typical detachment parenting in attempts to 'make your child independent and not depend upon you at all!' which in relativity, this little child in any animal culture needs a mother and is intended to be guided far longer that most animals lifespans. Additionally, it explained the level of 'comfort' it'd offer your children into where they're less fussy, more focused on other levels of life they might not be otherwise. Following your mothers intuition, and listening to it rather than listening to what society thinks you should force your child into doing.
Coming from both sides of these spectrum's, I highly suggest attachment parenting. Once you read the info it's really a no-brainer. Of course, I always love to think outside of the box. But results have indisputably paid off. He was able to fall asleep during naps or night within minutes of a feed with no extra crying it out methods or such. Peaceful. For us both. Mostly just dependent for nourishment and a reminded that I was still physically there and present in order to regulate his own body system [example: cosleeping was just added to one of the top ways to decrease SIDS! Make sure you have the right cosleeping environment and no drinking or such] we had friends commenting on how well behaved he was, loveable, and more.
I breastfed him until 2 1/2 years old where at that point I became pregnant with Braeten and my body stopped producing to prepare for the new pregnancy. I really think this has helped his IQ, his sense of self, plus not to mention I'd additionally also put my forehead to his since I could tell he was comforted by this [turns out he can only see 1" away since he's Legally Blind since birth! No wonder he was needing my 'eye' to look at. As studies say your heart and his heart skip a beat and your brain releases happy hormones when you lock eyes with your baby. Not just them but you to.] I'd also lightly rub his eyes and on the bridge of his nose which would make him fall quickly asleep during nursing. Again, mothers intuition!
We constantly all the time had random people comment on his constantly running nose and his messy face because of it. There was no time to stay on top of it. It runs all day, non stop. Ever since he was a baby his nose would run ALL THE TIME. Turns out, this is because he has a high arch in the roof of his mouth. He was extremely articulate about his words during his speech until around 2.5 years of age and gradually between that age and 3 years got worse. He started to regress in his speech where L's he'd normally pronounced would turn into very obvious w's, and g's would be d's, and such. Even more now it's gotten worse than it was 2 or 3 years of age. He still speaks well just don't pronounce his letters well any more.
I will write a second blog to follow up with the additional details boiled down to a simple [ha!] blog post soon. My head is full right now after siphoning all these details out into one blog post.
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