We continued to do his pt on a daily basis and were seeing changes in his neck range of motion already. We scheduled a check up with a pediatric ophthalmologist to be sure the funny tilt was not being caused by a vision problem such as ptsosis (droopy eyelids) or something. He was checked for all problems and the only thing found was that he was farsighted. We were told that he might grow out of it by a year and to follow up then unless we see any other problems. When he got his band and had worn it about three days he started to rock his head back and forth. He did this on and off throughout one whole day, I was beginning to get really nervous. A million things went through my mind,” What is wrong? Is it squeezing his head?; I finally figured out that he had just discovered he had roundness on the band that allowed him to get off his flat spot. I just cried like a baby, it was so good to see him lying there with a silly smile on rolling his head back and forth. The next day was spent trying to get the rest of the body to follow and within two weeks of having his Doc Band, Dominick was rolling over in both directions. His PT was so impressed with him and the extra benefit that the band provided. Dominick was her first banded baby.
Our therapy sessions were beginning to pay off. We were seeing him moving more and finally doing the commando belly crawl. Oh no, he's on the move. He would go everywhere he could on his belly, but it was just a relief to see him do it. I still had some concerns about his legs, and back, but boy was he doing great. His June goal of being able to sit up assisted was replaced by sitting up on his own in April. He was now getting up on all fours and rocking, so we thought crawling was just around the corner. We began adding in different strengthening exercises and ones to promote his reaching and grabbing abilities. We used the big exercise ball everyday, this was his favorite. We thought up ways to make his exercises like play and ways to involve everybody. I bought a play corral so he would have more room to keep moving, and I could have a safe place for him to be. We continued this routine, me doing the daily therapy and Molly coming every two weeks to do deep tissue massage (a must for his back muscles) and check his progress. She would show me new exercise each time and we would incorporate them into our routine.
While this was going on we had our visit from the occupational therapist, Elizabeth. Elizabeth was so sweet and had an immediate rapport with Dominick. She sat and listened to me complain about not being able to get him to take any solid foods, despite the fact that I had been doing desensitizing therapy I learned online. Desensitizing therapy is a way to get the baby's mouth ready to work correctly to move from the front of their mouth to the back and also accept new textures. It is done with finger toothbrushes and gum massagers. Of course as it goes with a baby, tell someone that they aren't doing something and they will. Elizabeth sat Dom on her lap and did some desensitizing and playing with a spoon, she then took some fruit on his spoon and he ate it. I was embarrassed but also a little teary to see him eat. She said he was probably just ready by the time she got him and gave me some hints to keep him moving forward. I couldn't wait to show Daddy, well that was a joke. I tried to give him his cereal and he screamed bloody murder. Thinking we were all tired I figured I'd try again at breakfast. Well I tried every kind of cereal, rice, oatmeal, barley and all made him scream. I mixed it to every consistency and still he screamed. I sat down on the kitchen floor and just cried. How was I ever going to get this kid to eat. He was wanting to eat a bottle every hour and a half when going through his growth spurts and I was afraid that as he got bigger he would not be able to maintain weight gain. It took me some time to get over this set back, I felt like such a failure. I finally got smart or maybe just enough sleep one night, but I thought it must be texture. He ate the smooth stage one fruit that day, so I went to the store and bought just about every fruit and vegetable in stage one. I came home and picked the one thing that all my babies before had loved, sweet potatoes. He ate an entire jar and I called everyone in to see. So there we were the whole family sitting around a baby covered in sweet potatoes just marveling at the simple task of eating.
We tried to find ways to help Dominick deal with some of his other sensory issues either by desensitizing him to it or giving him a coping skill. He slowly began to tolerate the touch of different textures. We bought everything we saw that had interesting texture for him to feel and play with, including dog toys. Sounds funny but dog toys, I found usually have great texture variety. Dominick will now accept most new things but only after careful inspection and his trademark scratching. He will take his hand and scratch at what ever it is he is not sure of, so his whole hand doesn't have to come in contact with it. It is really not a big problem except when the new item is a spoonful of food or a person,lol. We hope he will eventually grow out of this, but we cannot take it away or replace it right now.
His pt was coming along and he was just going forward at an incredible speed. Molly came one day and I called to her to hurry, she had to see this. As she came in the front door she was greeted by a standing up Dominick. He had worked all weekend on trying to do it and had only done it twice before. Well he just took off from there. Everyday he was doing something more, he was soon holding on and taking steps. He was like a whole new baby. I continued his therapy and in May he had met or surpassed all of his goals. It was time for him to be released. Molly came and documented his progress and we talked about the maintenance therapy I would need to keep up with until he was walking really well all the time. We would still need the expertise of the occupational therapist so new goals were set for that. We were also questioning weather he was hearing well or not. He didn't seem to respond all the time and was a bit delayed in his speech.
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