More Doctors, More Evals, and a Break

Looking at my month you can see it is very full of evaluations for Acroboy, and Doctors appointments for the kids and myself. We had the usual orthodontist visits, immunization visits for Acroboy, and a visit for Princess Ballerina to the dermatologist to look at the birthmark on her forehead. I also had my checkup for the baby and things still look good.

It turns out the birthmark on Princess Ballerina's forehead is a very light Port Wine stain. It will not fade anymore than it has.  We were told we could take her to a pediatric dermatologist and have it removed with a laser treatment if we wanted. We could also do it when she is older. DH and I talked about it, and we think if it becomes a self-esteem issue later on we'll do it, but for now we'll let things be.

I did find a way to bring up her birthmark to Princess Ballerina and speak with her about how she feels about it. She said, "If I didn't have my birthmark, I wouldn't look like me."

You rock girl, you rock.

Acroboy has had speech evaluations and a psychologist observe him at music time. She observed for about 15- 20 minutes. After spending several hours at our evaluations at our favorite autism medical center, and even with the speech therapist, let's just say I'm skeptical about how full a picture she got of Acroboy after just 20 minutes.

Our Cub Scout Blue & Gold Banquet is coming up, and it will be my last one for a while. Last month was our last Pinewood Derby until Acroboy turns eight and joins cub scouts.

Lastly, in a couple of weeks I get to join DH at a conference in Orlando. I have a good friend who lives in the area, and the plan is to hang out with her during the day while DH is in his meetings. It will be a last getaway before this baby gets here. I'm looking forward to it. We may even hit up Disney. Disney World without kids? I haven't done that in ages. If we go, I think I'll see all those shows my kids have no patience to sit through (like Beauty and the Beast).

My friend's grown daughter is coming with her husband (for one night) and their little girl to stay with my kids (the rest of the time).

I'm looking forward to a brief, but welcome break.

We're Tickled Pink

I can't believe it. I don't think I'll really believe it until she is born. Yes, SHE!!

Wow! I seriously thought we were getting another boy with how sick I was. The ultrasound was today and they said it's a girl. Still, my friend Lori had three ultrasounds where they said, "Girl" and it ended up being a boy (he was really good at hiding). I'm cautiously optimistic it will be a girl. Princess Ballerina is really hoping she'll get a sister and not be outnumbered.

In other exciting news, I've just had my first visit to the ER for stitches for one of my children. Given the number of boys I have with ADHD, I find it a minor miracle I've been a mother for 13 years and never had to get stitches for anyone until now.

Basically Lawboy (C3) scared Acroboy (C5) and he jumped up into a half wall topped by wood--thereby splitting open the skin above his eye.

It was one of the grossest things I've ever seen.
Acroboy also had to get his first vaccine.

We had been putting off getting Acroboy vaccinated until we knew for certain he was on the autism spectrum. We just didn't know if our family was one of those ones for whom vaccines are the trigger. I know that is a somewhat controversial stance, but it was the one we felt we had to take with our kids. I can't deny the bad feeling I had the day I got Firstborn's MMR. I brushed it off as first-time mom nerves, but what if I hadn't vaccinated? Would we have any different results? We thought it would be safer to wait and see on his brother. Acroboy has had two evaluations now, and I think it is safe to say in our case vaccines are not the trigger. We plan on using a delayed schedule with vaccines spread apart so we know if he has a reaction to any given vaccine.

I've heard too many stories of moms who have seen changes in their kids after vaccines to ignore them. I also have seen the damage polio did to my grandfather. My stance is this: A lot of vaccines can serve a good purpose. I also think we do too much too fast. We give the same dosage of vaccine to a tiny baby as we give to an adult. Anyone else see a problem with that? I also think we ought to follow a slower schedule and spread the vaccines out a little.

That's all I'm going to say on the subject for now.