Doctors, Doctors, And MORE Doctors!

Woo! This week was a big one! Audrey had SEVERAL doctors appointments. The first was with Dr. Wilson at the Sleep Disorders Clinic. Not a whole lot of news there. Dr.Wilson was awesome! When you see as many medical professionals as we do you learn to appreciate a good doctor. Anyway, he took a VERY detailed account and history of Audrey's sleeping habits and watched my video. He agrees she needs a sleep study. I should here from his office by tomorrow to schedule that.

We also went back to her pediatrician for the weird rash on her cheeks. We still can't figure out what it is. Dr. Nielsen's out of guesses so she refereed us to a pediatric dermatologist who we will see on Monday.

Today we went to the Ophthalmologist. It went medium. Audrey has clogged tear ducts and will need surgery if they don't resolve on their own in the next three months. The procedure is low risk and has a pretty high success rate (85%) so we've got that going for us. He also said she has an astigmatism. She doesn't need glasses now but I have a feeling that she will in the next year or so. He also confirmed that the little white spots in Audrey's eyes are, as I suspected, Brushfield spots. Brushfield spots don't effect vision at all they are just a common characteristic of people with Down syndrome. Quite frankly, they are freaking beautiful. They look like tinny stars.

Tomorrow she has therapy at a new therapy center. Cross your fingers people. Mamma NEEDS this to go well.

In other happenings, we had a play date with one of Audrey's new besties, Kadie. I met Kadie's Mommy Jackie through our local DS support group. Kadie is about three month older than Audrey and I can already tell they're going to be friends. Look how Kadie helps get Audrey's boogers. Now that's friendship folks! Jackie got a pre-sale pass to a consignment sale in our area and invited me to go with. After the Moms did some damage to the ole check book (does anyone still use a checkbook anymore...) Audrey and I headed over to their house so the girls could get in some play time. It's so cool to watch these little ones interact with each other. Audrey was FASCINATED!

Baby Basics: Eating and Sleeping

Audrey started eating solids this month. I was SO NERVOUS. I was worried she wouldn't be able to do it. It's common for kids with Down syndrome to have feeding issues. Honestly, I just didn't even want to deal with it. I did a lot of research hoping that something I read would give me permission to wait but I found the opposite. Many experts I stumbled across warned that waiting too long could lead to aversions. That's the LAST thing I want to mess with. So Mom put on her big girl pants and bit the bullet. I did research on what types of food are good to start with and after some back and forth settles on avocados. Audrey was less than enthused with my choice. All my worries came back. All my self doubt about not being able to breast feed her came back to the surface. "Oh God" I though, "she's not going to be able to do this."

And then after a few days, it happened. She saw the spoon, opened her mouth, chewed, and swallowed! There I was sitting across from her at the dinning room table sobbing as she was smacking away on some sweet potatoes with a grin on her face. "Don't underestimate me Mom, I got this!" All my anxiety fell away as relief washed over me. All I could do was laugh and cry. Imagine what a mess I'll be when she learns to walk...

Audrey dominated sleeping through the night. Like a boss, she doesn't just "sleep though the night" she sleeps in her crib for a solid eleven hours. Her mom loves her for it. But....she sounds like Darth Vader. She's also pretty restless at times. She does this thing where she lifts both her legs up at a ninety degree angle and slams them back on to the mattress. Over, and over, and over, and over again. She doesn't wake up, just bags away. It's because of all of these things, that I took a video of her sleeping. I am worried she might have sleep apnea. I showed the video to her pediatrician and she shared my concerns. Audrey has an appointment with a sleep medicine doctor tomorrow so I guess we'll see. Hopefully it's just a case of a paranoid mommy.