Measles and Milestones

Ten months old today!! Wow, time does fly. I was still telling people she's 9 months old and now its the end of April already. I took K for her measles injection on Monday. She was a real star. A bit of face pulling and almost crying but it was over in a wink. Her constipation has been causing her more problems than some silly little needle. Had to do some serious poop-pushing at the clinic ie. the sister helped me to help K to relieve herself a bit. I had to go and get some suppositories which helped a lot.

On Thursday last week I had to take her to the doctor as she had not drunk her milk for 2 days, though she was eating her solids and drinking tea. Yup, you guessed it, her tonsils have flared up again. More antibiotics which is what seems to have aggravated the constipation. Ok, enough about her toilet habits, I realise not everyone is as interested as me in how often K poops!!

I was looking at some developmental milestones in a book today and thought I would share how K fits in with them. These are just gross movement milestones. She has reached most of the 3 - 6 month milestones ie follows moving objects with eyes, brings both hands together, smiles in response to your smiles, lifts her head (still kinda wobbly though) and pushes herself up on her hands when on her tummy. She has not really achieved rolling over though or sitting without support. Lying on her back she does kick a lot and plays with her feet. Lately she rolls more to the side but never onto her tummy.

6 - 9 months: Baby should be able to hold head upright in sitting position(yes but still wobbly sometimes) and sit with minimal support(no, needs a fair amount of support but getting noticeably stronger).
Can keep head level when pulled to a sitting position (yes)
Stand on both feet with support (yes! she loves to stand and does so very well)
Feed herself with finger food (no, her mouth is quite sensitive and she is only just getting used to the 2nd level of Purity foods. The sister at the clinic says I need to try her on homemade and finger food so we will have to see what we can do this weekend - she has had cheese curls though)
Able to pass an object from one hand to the other (yes)
Recognises familiar voices and responds (yes, although sometimes she ignores you for a while, in her own world I think)

She has not reached any of the 9 - 12 month milestones yet. She has always had a problem with laughing in that she could not laugh without getting hiccups (apparently a form of reflux) but now she has figured out a laugh which just involves breathing out and is so adorable. She can go for much longer now without getting hiccups but usually they do eventually arrive. The trick is to stop making her laugh before the hiccups arrive! But it does not take much to make her laugh. Especially at her brother. Sometimes she just looks at him and laughs.

And lastly, she is still getting teeth nr 5 and 6 (on top) and all she wants to do is bite. I have to be really careful how I hold her or I end up with teeth marks on my arm or chest. And she is still too young to make her see that it is wrong. I try and give her something else to chew on but she likes material and tends to bite on her bibs and my clothing, which is how she ends up getting my skin between her teeth as well. All I can say is thank goodness I stopped breastfeeding!

And a picture...

Happy Valentine's day

Kendra seems to have gotten over her tonsillitis for the moment. Hopefully it will stay away. I have my doubts though. I think it is one of the things she is prone to and with her teething in full swing it will probably come back again. She wasn't very happy tonight but I think that was her tummy.

In terms of her development K is doing very well. When we went to the physio last week she was very happy with her improvement. Her legs especially have become much stronger. And if you hold her hands and pull her up, she first lifts her legs and then pulls from her side. She has also taken to straightening out so that she is standing when you do this. Still a little wobbly but standing nonetheless. We just have to work on getting her to flatten her feet as she likes to curl her toes inwards whenever anything touches under her feet. Another thing we have to work on is getting her to put weight on her arms. Like when she sits (with help) we have to put her arms to the front so that she can lean on them. Also have to get her to open her fingers when doing this but that is quite difficult as she prefers to clench her fists.

But she is holding things now and transferring from hand to hand which I am very pleased about. She will hold a rattle and move her arm around quite vigorously whenever she feels it in her hand. Knocking herself on the head a few times as well, so we give her the smaller rattles like the plastic keyrings, so she is less likely to knock herself out (kidding, just makes herself cry).

I am busy setting up a blog for the special needs group as well. We met last week and it was nice to see those that were there again after a long Christmas break. Every time I go I seem to learn something, whether it is some sort of treatment someone is using or the name of a good doctor or something. But I also leave feeling that there is so much I need to know and so much that these seasoned moms can teach me that 1 hour a month is just not enough. I am hoping that this special needs group blog will help with that as people can put all sorts of interesting things online. See link to this blog - KIDS(Kindness Inspired Dedicated Support).

Tonsils again!

Kendra has tonsillitis again. Took her to the doctor on Thursday with a bit of a temperature. She gave us a different antibiotic which Kendra seemed to like at first but lo and behold, after the second taste she decided she hates it. But I have tricked her, I now put about 50ml of her milk into a separate bottle and put the meds in that. Works like a bomb. This antibiotic upsets her tummy quite a bit so now she has the runs, which makes a bit of a change from constipation I suppose. She did not have a good night last night and is still not very happy today. A bit feverish. We tried to get a urine sample the other day so that we can test for bladder infection but those bags don't seem to work very well on her. No luck! Anyway we will see how she is later today. If she is still hot, I will have to contact the doctor again.

I have added a link to an article written by a mother of a Downs syndrome child called 'Welcome to Holland'. You must read it. Excellent way of looking at having a special needs child.