OK so we have quite a bit to update everyone on, so I better get to it! First the medical, then the fun stuff.
We had Greyson go see the neurologist a little while ago. He was seeing one from before he left the hospital till maybe his second birthday (can’t remember exactly, probably shows on this blog somewhere!). Anyway we quit seeing him because he really wasn’t saying much (every visit he would ask what I thought, then say Greyson seems a little behind and encourage us to read to and interact with Greyson, which we work at all the time!). Anyway we felt his therapists were observing Greyson in the same type of ways and decided to make things easier on our family (and our budget) by not seeing him. Well we decided we should check in and with neurology again and see if they had anything else important to say. We found out that there was a different Dr. who came to silverdale so we signed up to see her.
Well she was very informative (spent almost two hours with us!) gave Greyson the official diagnosis of having Cerebal Palsy (Which means very little other than changing how we talk about Greysons motor issues. We have always been saying he has low muscle tone. Cerebral palsy (CP) is an umbrella term encompassing a group of non-progressive,[1][2] non-contagious motor conditions that cause physical disability in human development, chiefly in the various areas of body movement (At least according to Wikipedia!).
She also thought it would be a good idea to get an MRI on Greyson. The reasoning was that it would tell us areas of Greyson’s brain that were damaged or abnormal which could be helpful in Greyson’s therapy but most importantly it would provide a baseline of his brain. This is important because if his brain looks different and he were to suffer a head injury in the future, they would not know if things were from the injury or because of everything else that has happened to him.
I was hoping to wait till we see the Dr. again and get more information, but we can’t get in to see her till July so here is the basics of what they found. Greyson’s brain looked far better than she was expecting. He shows no damaged areas and the only “abnormal” aspects to it is that his frontal lobes are smaller than they should be and a couple “ducts” are larger than they should be. This is no doubt a result of developing outside of the womb. This “explains” his delays to some degree but also shows that there is no reason to believe that he will not continue to develop in all areas as his brain continues to grow and develop.
They ran some other blood tests to check for some other things but we haven’t received the results yet. We are continuing to press on knowing that the words of Jeremiah 29:11 are true for Greyson. God knows the plans He has for Greyson, plans to prosper him and not to harm him. Plans to give Greyson hope and an AMAZING future (amazing is my own addition, but it is certainly in line with the scriptures!).
OK so on to Easter. We took Greyson to our Easterpalooza party that our church threw for our community. It was CRAZY! We are unsure of exact numbers but confident we saw over 1000 people! Greyson went down the giant slide (22 feet!), got his hand painted (didn’t let them do his face) hunted easter eggs, and just had a great time. He had a great time.
Then on Sunday we gave him his easter basket. He got a chocolate bunny (see picture and video below) and bubbles (see final video). You really need to spend some time with him soon if you haven’t. He is doing all kinds of new things and really turnning into quite the ham.
Have I mentioned he gets excited with bubbles these days?