Gianna Marie: 15 Month Update

Gianna had her 15 month pediatrician appointment today. Other than the usual tears from the vaccinations, all went well. I remember that the kids' appointments that included shots used to be upsetting to me to see them cry and be hurt. After everything that G's been through, it now seems like such a minor thing! Here's an update on her development and therapies.

The ophthalmologist was pleased with the results of her eye surgery. Her right eye still drifts in somewhat, but is much improved from before. She still needs to wear her glasses, both because she's far sighted and to help support the eye muscles that were corrected with the surgery. It may be coincidental, but it seems like her development has really blossomed since having the surgery - I'm so glad we made the decision to do it!!
Both the neurologist and neurosurgeon seemed surprised and happy with her progress. The main things from their perspectives that we have to be aware of are the potential for seizures and problems with her shunt. So far so good, but these are issues that remain possibilities throughout her life.
G has physical therapy every week. This is an area where we've seen tremendous growth over the past couple of months. I remember when we set her therapy goal to be able to crawl 10 feet, and it seemed like an enormous task that she may really never realistically achieve with her low muscle tone and balance problems. Here she is crawling all over the place on Christmas Eve (unfortunately, to the usual kid-magnet - the electrical outlet...). So incredibly proud of her in achieving this goal!!!

Her PT told me today that she will need to wear splints on her feet to be able to stand correctly and hopefully learn to walk. She curls her feet in really tightly all the time which apparently helps her to feel like her joints are getting the compressions that a baby would normally get when standing/walking. The problem is that she curls them in so tight that it is impeding her ability to stand correctly and she rolls her ankles in. (I'm probably not explaining all that the right way, but that's my interpretation!)
GiGi has speech/feeding therapy every 2 weeks. I gave an update on her feeding recently, but she is working on speech sounds and recognizing words also. She says "Da Da" and points to everything and says (in her own baby-talk way) "What's that!?", and (my absolute favorite) she calls her brothers "This!" and "That!". She waves hi and bye and does the signs for "more" and "all done" (which is really useful when feeding her!). I've gotten the boys and her cousins to watch the baby sign language videos with me so that they can help teach them to her. G's developmental interventionist showed me some iTunes Apps that teach baby signs, and she loves to watch them and touch the screen, but isn't repeating yet.
In addition to the physical, speech and feeding therapy, G has a Developmental Interventionist that works with her weekly (she's been with her since she was only 8 weeks old!), a weekly appointment with an Occupational Therapist (to work on fine motor skills, strengthening muscles, and adaptive skills), and receives visually impaired preschool services several times throughout the year. She is so blessed to be surrounded by an absolutely amazing array of women who are experts in their therapeutic disciplines. Not to mention that they are an incredible support for me and Matt also! They are so encouraging and motivating to all of us.

I think G looks so big sitting in her rocking chair!

And here in the big rocking chair squishing her brothers ("This" and "That")!