Cuyler, Henry's occupational therapist, came at 1:15PM. Henry hasn't been tested on any of the developmental scales in awhile. I had asked Tara on Friday about getting an assessment of his fine motor skills. She talked to Cuyler about testing Henry. Cuyler gave Henry the Peabody test. She specifically focused on two dimensions: grasping skills and visual motor integration. At Henry's age, it is hard to get a sense of their cognitive abilities, but the visual motor integration captures cognitive skills to some extent. I held Henry while Cuyler showed him blocks and a piece of paper. She thought that his right side was a little weaker than his left (demonstrated by how long the infant holds onto the objects). I had always thought that his right side was stronger than the left. But it occurred to me that on Henry's bouncy seat, we have been hanging objects on the tucan, which is on his left side, so he has probably gotten a lot more left side stimulation over the last month. We then placed Henry on his back and did a series of grasping tasks. He was better at the tasks on his back, because he didn't have to worry about his trunk support. On the ground, his trunk was stationary, which makes the grasping tasks a lot easier. Cuyler noticed that he doesn't quite turn his head to the left to the same degree that he does to the right. It isn't a problem right now, but it is something to keep an eye on. The Peabody test is a test that uses the child's adjusted age. On the grasping skills, Henry rated in the 37th percentile. On the visual motor integration skills, he was in the 50th percentile. The combined result was that Henry is in the 42th percentile (z=-.20 for you stats buffs out there) on his fine motor skills. Jeff and I were thrilled at this news. When Henry was tested in October, he was 2.5 months old (adjusted), and he had the skills of a 1 month old. He is now in the normal range, which means that in a relatively short period of time, he has made huge amounts of progress. Leaps and bounds of it. Cuyler said that most preemies don't test in the normal range for their adjusted age until some time after 6 months old adjusted.
Grandpa came in the afternoon. Henry slept and played. Jeff and I took Henry out for a walk in the evening. A reference for nanny candidate three called Jeff back. It was a glowing reference. We still need to call one more of candidate two's references. It looks like we have a tough choice to make.In the evening, Henry made a huge mess of his rice cereal, somehow getting it behind his ear and in his eye lashes. We gave him a bath. He loves, loves, loves the water. He has great fun seeing how much water he can kick out of the baby tub onto the counter (the baby tub fits in our kitchen sink). He hasn't been the most diligent of eaters when it comes to his bottles (which he really needs for his caloric intake). He fell asleep after only eating 2/3 of his bottle (wasting a lot of breast milk, which we are running short on).
Henry got up at midnight and had a bottle. At 2AM, he started wailing as though he were pain. Turned out he just wanted another bottle. Jeff gave him 40 mls, while I pumped to get Henry more milk. By the time I had finished pumping, Henry was sacked out. We got up again at 6AM. Jeff fed Henry, while I again pumped. Henry and I went back to bed (Marley got kicked out of the bed to make room for Henry), and Jeff went to his computer to work. Henry and I got up at 8:30AM. Henry had a bottle. Had some rice cereal and pears. Spent time being cute.
Grammy came at 10AM. She's with Henry now. Henry was delighted to see her. He gave her a huge smile and reached his arms up to her. Then, he gave her a kiss. He doesn't quite have the pucker down yet...but he kind of gums the cheek like a kiss. Unfortunately for Grandma, he had rice cereal all over his face when he did this, but she didn't seem to mind.
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