Posts filed under 'Milestones'
It’s really good to be home. Per expectations, the doctor gave Tara and Noah their final checkup and cleared us all to go home by mid-morning. By lunchtime we were back at home, where Granny and Anna had just finished making “Welcome home!” signs for Noah and “pinkalicious” cupcakes for the “big sister party” we’d planned for Ms. Rose.
Everyone’s doing well. Noah’s still spending the vast majority of his time sleeping (as is only right and good!). Anna is as enthusiastic about her baby brother as you could expect an almost-three-year-old to be (“he’s a real baby!”). Max greeted the newcomer with reasonable interest and has spent most of the afternoon upstairs hanging out with all of us (compare to Anna’s arrival, when he hid in the basement for about a week). And Granny’s been a superstar, handling most of the cooking and cleaning.
We’re off to bed soon. We’ll see how our first night all together goes — here’s hoping we manage to get a little more sleep than we did at the hospital.
But it’s good to be home.
Note: I just posted the day’s photos on our Flickr site, including a pretty cool video of Anna singing a rousing rendition of “baa baa black sheep, havin’ you da wolf” for her baby brother.
January 17th, 2009
Anna met her little brother today. She seemed very proud about her new status as big sister, happily presenting wee Noah with his first stuffed animal (a black bear she’s named “Fred”).
We’ve posted a bunch of photos on the Flickr site, so take a look.
It’s been a long day. Noah’s doing great — sleeping mostly, but also doing a generally good job of breast feeding. We’ve had lots of family in the room today visiting, which made for a busy day. (Frankly, I’m exhausted).
Very probably heading home tomorrow, which Ms. Anna is extremely excited about. She’s missing her momma, and wants to have her baby brother home “right now”.
Off to try and catch a few winks now. Thanks to everyone for the well wishes!
January 16th, 2009
Noah Jackson Enssle was born today at 4:45PM, weighing in at 9 lbs. and 3 oz., and 21.3 inches long.
Mother and baby are doing great!
Welcome to our family, little man!
We all love you very much.
January 15th, 2009
We’re at the hospital now! Tara called me around 11:00AM this morning saying she’d gone into labor and was having her sister Josie drive her to the hospital. I dashed out of the office, into the car, and made it to the hospital in about 5 minutes (it’s a 12 minute drive).
Everything’s going well, but now it’s just a waiting game. Tara’s having regular contractions, but no real action so far.
We’ll try to keep everyone updated!
January 15th, 2009
Anna’s jumping!
It ain’t no long jump, and it ain’t no high jump, but both feet leave the ground simultaneously. We’re extremely excited. Jumping has been a major goal for all of us for at least the past six months, and it’s great to see her doing so well in the gross motor realm.
Heck, the girl’s doing great generally. The twos are terrible and wonderful all at the same time. Sure, lots of boundary-testing, plenty of wailing and whining when she doesn’t think she’s getting her way, but most of the time she’s a total charmer. Talking up a storm, with an ever-increasing vocabulary, longer and longer sentences, and she’s discovered the power of “why?”. She’s as social as ever, except when she announces she “wants to be shy”, which I never complain too much about because it usually means she “hides”, snuggly-fashion, in Daddy’s arms for the first 10 minutes until she warms up to a new social situation.
The next big deal is trying to get her to actually run, but I’d be willing to bet there’s some correlation between developing enough confidence to let both feet leave the ground in a jump and moving faster than just a quick walk.
Meanwhile: We’re both doing well, just trying to keep up with it all.
September 12th, 2008
Yes, we’re pregnant! Sorry if this is the first you’re hearing about it, but it’s been a crazy summer, okay? We know it’s a boy, due sometime in late January. It’s not surprising, but this pregnancy has been flying by. (Easy for me to say, no? But Tara’s fortunately over the worst of the nausea by this point). The panel’s green, all signs are good, and we’re starting to try and come up with names. For his part, the little guy is apparently pretty busy and moves around in the hottub a lot more than Ms. Anna did. People tell us that’s a boy thing?
Anna’s starting to get a little excited about being a big sister. She’s very excited to meet her new baby sister — er, brother (she alternates between the two…), but also clearly a little confused by the whole affair. Here’s to hoping she’ll treat her little brother better than she’s been treating poor Max of late (“No Max!” is a common refrain).
September 12th, 2008
Rowan Michael Benjamin Steadman was born very late last night, weighing in at 7 lbs. 13 oz. Mom and baby are doing well.
Congratulations and much love to Melinda, Dean, Madie, Lily, and all the rest of the Steadman clan!
We can’t wait to meet the little man!
July 19th, 2008
There’s been a lot going on since we last posted, and I’m happy to report most all of it’s good news!
March opened with a change in the lineup here on Team Anna. Tara’s mom flew out from Kansas on Saturday (3/2) so that she could pinch hit for me while I flew back to Colorado for a week of face time at work. Poor Debbie was sick as a dog when she arrived, but fortunately it turned out it wasn’t anything a whole bunch of medication (procured from a local urgent care) couldn’t fix in a couple of days.
Tara and her mom had a pretty good time of things during the week I was away. Anna made good progress in her therapy and in other ways as well. She’s suddenly able to count to 5 most of the time (sometimes higher?), and has a pretty decent grasp on her ABCs for somebody who’s not even two yet! She’s talking up a storm — still mostly two word sentences, but wow, the vocabulary is impressive. Meanwhile: Her therapists were very happy with her progress, and she’s now used to the (crazy busy) routine, which means she’s sleeping and eating well. She’s mostly healthy, too, which is new and different for everyone.
Lots of work and a bit of the stomach flu kept me pretty busy for the week I was away. It was good to see my folks and Max on Thursday evening, and I managed to make a bit of money at the poker game on Friday. But I felt anxious the whole week and wanted to get back “home” to Birmingham. (It’s very hard to be away from Anna and Tara for that long — I have no idea how parents who travel regularly do it).
Granny Debbie made a fantastic Dora the Explorer cake for Anna’s early birthday (pictures to follow?), which we all enjoyed on the evening I returned. Then Sunday morning (3/9) it was back to the airport to drop off Debbie, who’s apparently deep in the throes of Anna withdrawl as I write this. (Thanks so much for visiting and for all your help!)
So that brings us to this week, our last week of therapy. Anna got her cast off yesterday, which was pretty mind-blowing for everyone involved. Anna was frankly a little bit confused, and kept acting like she was expecting us to put the cast back on. It made us both happy to let her know that the cast is gone (at least for a while). And it was great to finally give the girl a real bath with plenty of bubbles, no rush, and no smelly cast to put back on afterwards!
We were thinking of taking her out to someplace fun like Chuck E. Cheese’s or McDonald’s to celebrate. But the combination of three weeks of not being able to use her right hand plus a bunch of new books and toys from her early birthday celebration this past weekend meant that Anna was really much more in favor of sitting at home and playing in relative peace and quiet. And who could blame her?
Everyone was expecting today to be a really tough therapy day. Anna’s historically really bad about using her left hand after she gets her cast taken off, and the therapists were ready for a major battle. But the girl continues to surprise, and she’s been unbelievably good about using both her hands or even just her left hand when we ask her to. (That’s the new therapy focus: bi-manual exercises). There’ve even been a couple of moments when she’ll use her left hand for a task without even thinking about it! In general, though, today was a great therapy day, and the therapists are really happy with what they’re seeing.
Friday’s our last day of therapy. We’ll have a few solid hours of therapy in the morning, and then we’ll relocate to the clinic at UAB for Anna’s “exit interview”. Saturday we’ll try to pack, clean up, and hopefully get outside to do something fun since the Ides of March is Anna’s official birthday. Sunday we’ll need to be out of our apartment by noon, and grab lunch somewhere on the way to the airport. Tara and Anna fly back to Denver in the afternoon, and after getting them on the plane I’ll start the long drive back home (ETA: Tuesday).
It’s hard to believe we’ve made it this far, and that we were able to survive three full weeks of 24/7 casting and intensive therapy. But we’d do it all again in a heartbeat. The gains have been impressive, and on the whole the last three weeks have been enormously positive for Anna on many different levels. She’s able to turn her hand over much further than she was able to before (even with Botox), she’s able to isolate her pointer and thumb, use a fork independently to stab food, and sit cross-legged. Her core strength and strength in her left hand and arm have improved dramatically. And almost as importantly, she’s really done a truly fantastic job listening and learning to follow directions — a very large challenge for someone so little — and with tolerating all the long hours of therapy.
We’re so very proud of our girl!
March 12th, 2008
A long, challenging day today, but things have gone amazingly well so far.
We had Anna’s initial evaluation and casting at 8:30AM at the UAB ACQUIRE program this morning. Anna did us very, very proud. All the doctors and therapists there were extremely impressed with how well she’s doing. Anna “passed” almost every evaluation they threw at her. It doesn’t mean she doesn’t have a ton to learn, but it does mean that she’s made some very significant progress in the last year and a half since her initial diagnosis, and it reflects well upon all the therapy we’ve put her through so far. This is truly a tribute to Tara for putting in so many long hours in doctors’ offices, hospitals, and therapy with Anna, and to the dear little girl herself for learning to endure and prosper despite it all.
During the therapy Anna was fitted for her new full arm cast. Tara had tried to prepare me for this ordeal, warning that based on past experience with her two previous castings “she’s going to scream bloody murder for as long as it takes”. Well, the good folks at ACQUIRE added a single, simple variable to the equation of putting a hard cast on an almost-two-year-old that made all the difference in the world: A Sesame Street video. Lulled into near unconsciousness by the psychedelic antics of that little red monster Elmo and his muppet friends, Anna hardly put up a fight and the new cast was on her arm in almost no time.
We’re very impressed with Anna’s new therapists as well. They clearly know what the heck they’re doing. Obviously they’ve got the casting and occupational/physical therapy parts down pat. But equally impressive is their understanding of the developmental psychology of the kids. Frankly, knowing what exercises to get the girl to do is only half the battle. The other half is figuring out a way to get her to want to do the exercises in the first place. So almost all the “therapy” consists of games, games, and more games, guided by a firm hand. (That bit is important too. I’ve already been ejected from the therapy sessions three times because I’m clearly the “softy”, and Anna tries to use me as a “safety net” when she’s upset with what the therapists are trying to get her to do — which, despite being a “game”, is rarely anything easy). Perhaps the most important thing is that Anna seems to really get along with her therapists, and they’re growing fond of her too.
After the morning session where we had the initial evaluation and the casting we went home for a quick lunch and to put Anna down for a nap. (The poor kid is still fighting a cold, which means she’s twice as exhausted as she normally would be, and it was a brutal morning for her even without a cold). Then our therapists showed up at our apartment with a truckload (literally) of “toys” and other therapy gear. They spent the rest of the afternoon “playing” with Anna, and they’ll be here at 7:00AM tomorrow morning right after Anna wakes up to continue the program. The goal is at least 6 hours every day (excluding naps) of one-on-one (actually, two on one since we’ve got an intern working with our primary therapist) therapy, 5-6 days per week for the next four weeks.
Overall we’re extremely happy with how everything’s played out so far. The main thing is that our therapy team really seems to “get it”. It’s not uncommon for folks to look at how “well” Anna’s doing and ask why we’re pushing her so hard. Today was a bit of confirmation from folks who really study this stuff that all our pushing has been necessary, that all the hard work has helped make an enormous difference in Anna’s capabilities, and that yes indeed there is a bunch more hard work to come.
But for the moment, we’ll allow ourselves to indulge in a feeling of accomplishment. When we asked what we needed to work on this evening our therapists recommended we just take it easy tonight, “let Anna do whatever she wants, and have her favorite food for dinner.” So we took a short walk together, and tried to relax over some pizza and a glass of wine/apple juice. It was over a year ago since we signed up to come on this adventure. It’s been a long year, and a long trip, and it’s a little hard to believe we’ve made it here after all. We’re happy to know that we’ve been doing well by our little girl, and to be in the company of folks who are experts in helping take her therapy to the next level. We now know this is a marathon and not a sprint, and that progress is measured in feet rather than miles, but today at least it feels like we’re on the right path and headed in the right direction.
I’ll sign off tonight by remembering out loud that the real star of the show today, in every way, was dear little Anna. So strong, so smart, so charismatic, and so very patient. She truly made us proud to be her parents.
Sleep well, and dream sweet dreams, little one. Tomorrow is another day, and another set of challenges. But we’re here for you always. We love you.
February 18th, 2008
In the past week Anna has:
- had her eyes checked (everything looks good there)
- visited the new Children’s hospital
- met with the rehab doc who said she looked “just great”
- had her botox injections delayed until she’s seen next week by her OT down at Children’s
- had her hips x-rayed to determine if there is any problems with her hip development (everything looks good)
- tripped over a bronze bunny sculpture at Children’s and injured her left hand
- made a trip to urgent care on same day as trip to Children’s
- had hand/wrist/arm x-rayed 4 times to determine if anything was broken or torn (probably just a sprain)
- had her picture taken with Henry in their pumpkin costumes (not such a fun experience for anyone!)
- re-injured her hand
- played in the park a couple of times
- made another trip to urgent care to determine if she has another ear infection (unfortunately, she does)
- been re-weighed and measured: 27.2 lbs, and 35 inches long (big girl!)
- visited Oma, who returned home today after a 9-day stay in the hospital during which she had emergency abdominal surgery
That’s it, in a nutshell.
I’ve got new photos…I just need to post them. I can’t wait for Thanksgiving.
October 28th, 2007
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