Pic and a vid!

http://s250.photobucket.com/albums/gg245/recoveringbrady/?action=view&current=MVI_0410.flv

Dr.Kaplan

We had our visit with Dr.Kaplan last Thursday. It was an awesome visit that left us feeling extremely hopeful and optimistic.

We explained to Dr.Kaplan that Brady had sugery to repair his strabismus (lazy eye) when he was 18 months old and how he changed so much after. You could tell that Dr.K was annoyed that the doctor decided to operate on Brady so young. He also explained to us why Brady changed so much. We assaulted Brady's vision when the operation was performed. When Brady woke up we had changed his visual perception so much that it caused him to overcompensate for the damage done. See, the surgery only results in a possible cosmetic correction. We thought it was going to fix Brady's eye and return him to binocular vision. Not only did the surgery not restore his binocular vision it also did not align the eye for cosmetic effect either. Instead it skewed our little boys view of the world and put him in an alternate world in which he was put on permanent defense mode. Brady only sees two-dimensionally. He also cannot seem to process two different inputs at the same time such as visual and auditory. When Brady appears to be *watching* TV, he actually isn't. Dr.Kaplan pointed out that Brady is avisual choosing to hear the video rather than watch it. At times when Brady wants to try and watch it he will cover his ears so that he can process the visual images. No wonder Brady has difficulty in therapy and in life. How many times have we insisted on eye contact when trying to get him to speak. Can you see now how much more difficult this would make it for him to speak? Can you imagine how hard his ABA program must have been for him trying to hear the prompts while looking at the cards?

The initial exam was difficult. Brady was not tolerant of any of the glasses or disruptive lenses. When we would put them on him he would quickly look around showing us that he saw things differently. He then immediately ripped them off. When we put them on and held his arms to walk him around the room he would buckle his legs and cry. Dr.Kaplan explained that Brady had learned to compensate so well for his visual defects that opening up to change was scary for him. He said that we may have to wait on the prism glasses and take home only the disruptive lenses. I was so disappointed. I knew Brady had lots of problems with his vision and I was eager to help him. So they sent us to lunch after Dr.Kaplan showed me how many vision issues I have myself.

During lunch I asked (read begged) Brady to please wear the glasses when we go back. I explained to him how important they were. If only the kid loved money or toys the way typical children do, I would have bribed him. So we went back and by golly he wore those darned disruptive lenses. Dr.Kaplan smiled looking so pleased. He knew all along Brady was going to give in. Dr.Kaplan has been doing this for 30 years and when he makes a prognosis it's one you feel like you can lean on. He told us that in 3 months Brady will be a much different child. He said in 6 months he'll be talking. Did you read that? He said "TALKING". I started tearing up. You could just feel that he truly felt it. Do you know what it's like to have something so amazing said to you? Do you know how scary and awesome it feels to know that you may very well get what you've been hoping and praying and begging for so long? It actually made me feel nauseous.

So we ordered him the cutest frames ever. Of course Brady is so stinking cute he can even make the disruptive lenses look good and here's the proof. I mean come on, how cute is this kid?!

Checking out the toys

It's weird posting here because sometimes I think no one really reads it and I'm kind of talking to myself. That's something I do often. I just don't typically put it into print.

Anyhow being here in Lynchburg with the three kiddos by myself is wearing me out. I joke you not when I say I have to vaccuum like 6 times a day. I change an equal amount of poopy diapers. Not just standard poopy diapers, cloth poopy diapers. HBOT is going well. Brady's eye contact is great! His receptive lanuage seems to have improved as well. I told him to take off his jacket the other day and by golly he did it. He's even responding well to "sit down and take off your shoes". Today we went to a store that sold books and toys. I loaded Sadie and Brady up in the double stroller. Typically Brady is content to sit in the stroller but today it was different. He climbed out of the stroller and was investigating the toys. He walked up and touched some of them. He also put his mouth on the wheels of some of the cars. He just couldn't resist. He even seemed like he actually wanted one of the toys, a school bus that was also a shape sorter. I worry so much about lead tainted toys though. He lost interest so I put the overpriced toy back. But the fact that he was looking was great.

Deep thinking......

Unexpected benefits from HBOT.

Brady's diet has always been narrow. But the last 6 months or so it's been really bad. He was down to three things and lived mainly off of potato chips.

Since we've starting HBOT he's eating 3 new foods. That's double! First he walked me to a box of Nilla Wafers. Hasn't had those in nearly 2 years. So I gave him some enzymes and he chowed down. Then it was popcorn. And now he's eating his soy yogurt again. YAY!

I'll admit that I used to spoon feed it to him. But yesterday he fed himself. Take a look.

http://s250.photobucket.com/albums/gg245/recoveringbrady/?action=view&current=MVI_0201.flv