On Monday, we took Henry over to Cuyler’s new office for an OT evaluation. Selah is unfortunately still very sick and therefore won’t be continuing therapy with us. Henry liked the office. It had been awhile since we’d seen Cuyler, and she marveled at how big Henry is getting. We sat down at a little kids table. She pulled out various objects for Henry to play with. Each object was designed to test some aspect of fine motor/cognitive skills.
The tests are, of course, imperfect measures of ability, but they give therapists a sense of whether or not there is something to be concerned about. Henry was asked to do some things that Jeff and I have never shown or offered him, but it certainly gave us some ideas of things that we should be doing in the future. The first part of the test dealt with grasping objects. His grasping skills are quite good on both sides, especially when it comes to cheerios. The second part of the test was visual-cognitive skills. He tested at the 14 month level on grasping, and the 12 month level on visual-cognitive skills (which includes problem solving). When she averaged everything together, he was in the 50th percentile for his fine motor skills.
Jeff and I didn’t feel like the test items really captured what Henry can do on the problem solving front. A lot people who have been around him have commented on what a good problem solver he is (a description made independently from both of his PTs w/o prompting). The test was pretty short. One of the questions was whether he could take his socks off by himself. Alas, we had to say that we’d never seen him do so because he rarely wears socks (it is summer after all and we live in the desert), so he got a zero on that item. In any event, Cuyler thinks that Henry is doing well and doesn’t need weekly OT therapy at this time. She wants us to buy him toys that are well beyond his adjusted age in order to challenge him. His adjusted age is 13.25 months. So we should probably be looking at toys that are for 15 months old or older. We are suspending weekly OT sessions and will be coming back for monitoring in 3 months.
Henry was so cute tottering around the playroom, while Cuyler scored his results and talked to us about activities that we could do with him. He had a lot of fun on a large mat in front of a large mirror. He kept admiring himself in the mirror. He crawled on the mat, went up to the mirror, and kissed the handsome devil in the mirror several times. He’d then crawl backward, but became enticed once again by the cutie pie in the mirror and went back to the mirror to kiss his image. The kid has good taste. The child in the mirror was indeed the most gorgeous baby I've ever seen.
Cuyler’s office was about 5 minutes from my parents’ house. We dropped Henry off, had some lunch, and then Jeff dropped me off at school as I had class. Jeff went shopping, picked Henry up, and then swung by school to get me. Henry said hello to our friend Dana in the parking lot. Henry was tired and went to bed relatively early.
On Tuesday, Jeff woke up early to get ready for his business trip to Philly. Henry played with Alicia and Karina in the morning. I had to awaken Henry early from his nap, so that I could take Jeff to the airport. Then, Henry and I went out to lunch with my friend Carolyn and her 6 month old daughter Adelyn. Henry was very smiley with people in the restaurant. He kept trying to take my fork and knife. Henry doesn’t like to be told that he can’t have something. When lunch arrived, I cut up some chicken tender for him. He grabbed a very large piece that I was surprised fit in his mouth, instead of reaching for the small pieces. I watched him closely. After a couple minutes, I said to him, “Henry, that was an awfully big piece. If you want to spit it out, that’s OK. Go ahead and spit…” Before I finished the sentence, a large amount of spray emanated from his mouth onto my face. The bulk of the chicken remained in his mouth. Carolyn busted up laughing. I had no idea that he really knew what spit meant. I, of course, was thinking “spit out” not “spit spray your mommy in the face.”
As I wiped chicken spray from my face, I said, “Honey, that was very fine spitting, but maybe you could…” Again, spray shot out from his mouth. NOTE TO SELF: Avoid using the word “spit.”
Henry was pretty good throughout the lunch. But he is a handful. It was fun to see Carolyn and Adelyn. Henry started taking apart the sugar basket on the table toward the end of the meal, which was our time to say Adios. Henry said goodbye to the waitress and one of her co-workers. He says “bye” with a bit of a Southern drawl.
He went over to Grandma and Grandpa’s house in the afternoon. I had planned to spend the afternoon with him but my computer bugged out and removed the formatting form some important Excel files, which I had to straighten out.
When Henry got home, he was a live wire. I could tell that he was sleepy but he was fighting it all the way. And he wanted Dada. He finally got to sleep around 11PM.
On Wednesday, I began my attempts to get Henry out of bed. He was a bear in hibernation. He didn’t want to get up. It took me about 20 minutes are so to get him out of bed and dressed.
Grandpa picked up Henry at 7:30AM. Alicia and Karina went over to my parents’ house to meet up with Henry. Henry talked to Jeff on the phone in the afternoon. In the evening, Grandpa reported that Henry threw up his dinner. He’s been throwing up a meal or two each week. We haven’t figured out the trigger. When I arrived, Henry was alert as usual. He ate some banana bread. When we got home, he was still hungry, so he had a cereal bar and some Lil Crunchies. He took a bath. Then, we settled in for the night. It took awhile for him to settle down, but not as long as the night before. And again, he wanted his Dada.
This morning, Henry woke up around 6:15AM. Again, wanting Dada. I explained that Dada was in Philly this week on business. He had a bottle, and we walked the dogs together. My, oh my, my son is heavy. Jeff usually does the Henry carrying on our walks. Henry was pleased to see Grandpa this morning, who picked him up and took him to his place for the day.
Henry threw up his breakfast. Not a great start to the day. Grandma reported that Henry and Karina are playing nicely together. After Alicia and Karina left, Grandma said that Henry was a handful. He was rather moody. Grandma discovered that tooth 7 is coming in on the bottom.
In the evening, Grandma, Grandpa, Henry, and I went to Swenson's. Unfortunately, the toy train was broken, which for Henry is the best part of the restaurant. Henry was indeed a handful. He grabbed everything on the table. Wouldn't sit in his high chair. Didn't want to eat. Sigh. He feel asleep on the way home.
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