The best thing about having a blog is that you can share news, updates, and what’s been going on in your corner of the world with anyone who wants to know. The worst thing about having a blog is that you have to keep sharing news, updates, and what’s been going on your corner of the world, no matter how busy your corner of the world may be. So, I’m sorry. I resolve to be better. I don’t want Charlie to look back on Chico and the Fam years from now and wonder what the hell happened after November 2010. ‘Cause a lot happened. Here are some highlights.
We went to our parents’ for Christmas, and Charlie (and everyone else within a fifty-mile radius) got sick, sick, sick. (Sorry, New York.) He decided food didn’t taste good anymore, so it was strawberry Pedialyte or nothing, and only out of teeny tiny little cups.
That totally blew his diet, but we got back on track about two weeks and five doctors’ visits later. That didn’t stop Chuck the Nut from getting four Christmasses and about four thousand presents. For those of you we were not able to thank in person due to all the cussin' snow, please accept our belated but heartfelt thank yous now. Please also accept our heartfelt you’re welcomes for not infecting you with our Christmas Plague.
We hit a bit of a rough patch in January when seizures seemed to go away for a while, then come back, then go away, then come back. The trouble with epilepsy is that treatments are often a trial-and-error sort of thing, which means you never really know what in the world is going to happen next. Given that we’d already tried many of the front-line medications and also the ketogenic diet, we decided it might be time to start thinking about neurosurgery. This was a much more difficult thing to wrap our brains around than I can even begin to explain. But somehow, we got there. And we scheduled a preliminary evaluation at Charlie's favorite hospital, where, alas, he got sick (again) and couldn’t be put under for all the associated procedures, so we didn’t really get anywhere at all. But we did get to see family and friends while we were in town. And we even got to stay a little bit later on account of all the snow (again).
So we may go further down the surgery path at some point in the near or distant future, but for now we believe his development is too good and his seizures are too infrequent to suffer all the risks. So we did the only other thing we could think of. We reduced his meds. Sounds counterintuitive, I know, but we just had a feeling. So we acted on it, and we liked what we saw.
Now we’re even reducing his diet (i.e., less fats and more carbs and proteins), and we’re liking that, too. He’s gaining weight (in a good way) and seems to have lots more energy and is working really hard on crawling—though he just learned how to go from crawling to sitting, which he is VERY proud of, and seems to want to do a A LOT. We’ll re-enroll him in Crawing 101 sometime soon, but right now we’re taking a little spring break, if you will, and enjoying just sitting around . . . then getting back up . . . then sitting around some more.
So we may go further down the surgery path at some point in the near or distant future, but for now we believe his development is too good and his seizures are too infrequent to suffer all the risks. So we did the only other thing we could think of. We reduced his meds. Sounds counterintuitive, I know, but we just had a feeling. So we acted on it, and we liked what we saw.
Now we’re even reducing his diet (i.e., less fats and more carbs and proteins), and we’re liking that, too. He’s gaining weight (in a good way) and seems to have lots more energy and is working really hard on crawling—though he just learned how to go from crawling to sitting, which he is VERY proud of, and seems to want to do a A LOT. We’ll re-enroll him in Crawing 101 sometime soon, but right now we’re taking a little spring break, if you will, and enjoying just sitting around . . . then getting back up . . . then sitting around some more.
Frankly, I’d just as soon work on walking. Or skip straight to running. For president. (Yes, I have great expectations. But I am his mother, aren't I?)
Here's what else is new:
Five teeth.
Something that kinda-sorta looks like waving goodbye.
A few almost-English-sounding words and phrases.
Oh, and a budding aptitude for the arts, including recent dabbling in classical piano, bongo drumming, and Russian folk dancing. I hope you enjoy this as much as we did.
