Yes, in my world, there is always something new to worry about.
This week, (surprise!) it's Keegan. As I have mentioned in previous posts, Keegs suffers from frequent nosebleeds. This has kicked up a notch from frequent to almost daily. And these aren't your run-of-the-mill, stops-in-30-seconds-type nosebleeds either. More like 30 minutes later, and maybe we can take the Kleenex plugs out of your nose type. He will be sleeping, or watching t.v. or playing, and all of the sudden, it's the red sea. My carpet throughout the house looks like a crime scene. Last week, there was the unfortunate sneeze-and-cough during nosebleed session that turned my bathroom into a scene from The Shining (Tony's not here, Mrs. Torrence!)
That being said, I have taken him to the pediatrician regarding these before, back when they were weekly occurances. She said it was due to his allergies, and to put a humidifier in his room, use Rhinaris nasal lubricant, and she prescribed Flonase nasal spray. Well, turns out, Keegs is one of the small percentage of Flonase users that react to the spray by having, you guessed it, heavy nosebleeds. So that was out. So I've been doing everything we should be, including a daily allergy med, with no avail.
The scary part is, aside from the blood, is the way he looks after. He is white as a sheet. You can't see his lips; they blend right into his skin. And he is cold all of the time. He is always asking for blankets, or an extra sweater, even on days like yesterday, when it was 72F here, and we were all in T-shirts, and he wanted his jacket on and zipped.
So I have made him an appointment to revisit the issue. I did the paranoid mother thing and did a search engine on frequent nosebleeds in children and came up with two viable explanations, neither good, but one infinitely more acceptable than the other. First, that he is anaemic. The other, and horrifying one is leukemia based, and I refuse to even go there (even though there is two cases of leukemia family history on my husband's side...STOP IT! Shannon, please...).
Our appointment is on April 5, so I will keep you posted on any developments in this area.
I did have some lovely things to share, but I am burned out from the above. I will post again later to shed some optimism over this worry-weary blog.
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Enough, Already!
Kripes! Will this flu virus never leave our home? We had a minor reprieve over the March break, and now it's back again in full force, kicking ass and taking names. Ty, fever yesterday. Keegan, came home from school yesterday, white as a sheet, with a fever of 102.4. He is still sporting a fever today, and is home with me. Mark and I are suffering from major sore throats. I feel like I'm swallowing broken glass. And believe me, the congestion does not make the hubby-snoring issue any better. Ty was up 13, yes, 13!!!!! times last night. Can't breathe. So let's cry! Yeah, that will make the snot flow ease up!
A little sympathy and some cyber hugs would go down nicely (as would serious drugs and alcohol, but I DO have kids to look after...)...pray to the gods of Nyquil and Cold-EEZE that we recover soonest!
Cough.........wheeze............sniff.......................
PS. Phoenix is still standing tall. What a trooper. I told him that his antibodies have superpowers to prevent his contracting this illness. Mind over matter. Mind over matter.
A little sympathy and some cyber hugs would go down nicely (as would serious drugs and alcohol, but I DO have kids to look after...)...pray to the gods of Nyquil and Cold-EEZE that we recover soonest!
Cough.........wheeze............sniff.......................
PS. Phoenix is still standing tall. What a trooper. I told him that his antibodies have superpowers to prevent his contracting this illness. Mind over matter. Mind over matter.
Monday, March 19, 2007
Ooh, Baby!
Cake I made this weekend for a baby shower...'tis the season for cakes. Got 4 orders this week! Stay tuned for next week's feature: the electric guitar.Friday, March 09, 2007
And The Diagnosis Is...Umm...We're Not Sure
Today, Mark and I went to meet with Keegan's psychologist who did the psycho-educational testing with him over the last month and a half. The meeting was to discuss his results, and therefore, his forecasted diagnosis so to speak.
And the results were, well, ambiguous at best. Which, in a way, is kind of a good thing. Perhaps I should explain.
Basically, he was being tested to evaluate if he had a cognitive learning delay, and to explore whether or not he was in-line with an Asperger's profile.
Regarding the Asperger's, the answer is no. With the cognitive learning, half of his results were in the normal range, which was great to hear. This means that he does not have what is called a general or "global" delay. The other results were below average but not critically so. The problem is that since Keegan has expressive and responsive language delays, it sort of skews(sp?) his results a bit. It is difficult to determine whether he cannot perform the task because of a cognition problem, or because he does not understand the language presented to him in the deliverance of the instructions.
For example, Keegan has difficulty understanding linguistic concepts, like many, few, different, same. If you work with him for a long time, showing him examples, he will understand the concept, and be able to complete the task. But if you just say, show me the ones in this group that are different, he may not grasp the words "show me" or "different". So it appears that most of the delays that showed up during testing are language delay based.
To put in all in a nut shell, the hope is that as Keegan's language skills develop, so will his cognitive skills. His delays are LANGUAGE based, and not cognition based. Confused? Me too. But what it all comes down to is that this is something that with a lot of work, he can overcome. It will not impact him life-long. Of course, there is the risk that he may have an actual language DISORDER, which we won't know for about two more years, at which time he may have to be reassessed.
So what do I know? Not much. But it is a good thing, to us. Better to have the hope, than to have a label at this point. What is comes down to is that here we have a really bright kid, who has some walls up in his head that we have to take down brick by brick to open up his information highway.
And as Scoop, Muck, Dizzy, Roley and Lofty would say, "We're on the job!"
And the results were, well, ambiguous at best. Which, in a way, is kind of a good thing. Perhaps I should explain.
Basically, he was being tested to evaluate if he had a cognitive learning delay, and to explore whether or not he was in-line with an Asperger's profile.
Regarding the Asperger's, the answer is no. With the cognitive learning, half of his results were in the normal range, which was great to hear. This means that he does not have what is called a general or "global" delay. The other results were below average but not critically so. The problem is that since Keegan has expressive and responsive language delays, it sort of skews(sp?) his results a bit. It is difficult to determine whether he cannot perform the task because of a cognition problem, or because he does not understand the language presented to him in the deliverance of the instructions.
For example, Keegan has difficulty understanding linguistic concepts, like many, few, different, same. If you work with him for a long time, showing him examples, he will understand the concept, and be able to complete the task. But if you just say, show me the ones in this group that are different, he may not grasp the words "show me" or "different". So it appears that most of the delays that showed up during testing are language delay based.
To put in all in a nut shell, the hope is that as Keegan's language skills develop, so will his cognitive skills. His delays are LANGUAGE based, and not cognition based. Confused? Me too. But what it all comes down to is that this is something that with a lot of work, he can overcome. It will not impact him life-long. Of course, there is the risk that he may have an actual language DISORDER, which we won't know for about two more years, at which time he may have to be reassessed.
So what do I know? Not much. But it is a good thing, to us. Better to have the hope, than to have a label at this point. What is comes down to is that here we have a really bright kid, who has some walls up in his head that we have to take down brick by brick to open up his information highway.
And as Scoop, Muck, Dizzy, Roley and Lofty would say, "We're on the job!"
Monday, March 05, 2007
And We're Not Circus-Folk!
Strangest thing to hear yourself saying to your children at 7:50 am on a Monday morning:
"Will someone please take the sword out of your brother's mouth before he impales himself or something?"
Yeah. And we're not even circus folk!
************************************************************************************
Health status: Myself and hubby--we're okay. Knock on wood.
Phoenix: occasional cough, but okay.
Keegan: Hacking cough, but no fever
Ty: After 9 days, still coughing, runny nose and now and again fever.
Took Ty to the doctor's again yesterday, insisting that a child should NOT have a fever for a whole week. Chest clear. Ears fine. Throat okay. He's not sick.
Yeah, okay, come over at 2:00 am when he coughs so much he vomits and I have to change his pyjamas and all of his bedding, and tell me he's not sick. Bastards. Well, it's the flu, sunshine. It can take 4 days to 3 weeks to recover.
Ah, yes. That is EXACTLY what I wanted to hear. Sigh...and to top it off, next week is March break. I need a vacation THIS March, not next one! I keep waiting for Regis and Kelly to call my house for the Blizzard Blast Trivia A-Sno-Go, but it hasn't happened yet.
This Friday Mark and I are meeting with the psychologist that did the 5 week testing with Keegan to get his results. I will post the good (or not so good) results when I get them.
We have a leaky shower pipe and my toy room was flooded on the weekend. Eff.
Will someone please post with some GOOD news to cheer me up, on this miserably cold crappy Monday morning?
"Will someone please take the sword out of your brother's mouth before he impales himself or something?"
Yeah. And we're not even circus folk!
************************************************************************************
Health status: Myself and hubby--we're okay. Knock on wood.
Phoenix: occasional cough, but okay.
Keegan: Hacking cough, but no fever
Ty: After 9 days, still coughing, runny nose and now and again fever.
Took Ty to the doctor's again yesterday, insisting that a child should NOT have a fever for a whole week. Chest clear. Ears fine. Throat okay. He's not sick.
Yeah, okay, come over at 2:00 am when he coughs so much he vomits and I have to change his pyjamas and all of his bedding, and tell me he's not sick. Bastards. Well, it's the flu, sunshine. It can take 4 days to 3 weeks to recover.
Ah, yes. That is EXACTLY what I wanted to hear. Sigh...and to top it off, next week is March break. I need a vacation THIS March, not next one! I keep waiting for Regis and Kelly to call my house for the Blizzard Blast Trivia A-Sno-Go, but it hasn't happened yet.
This Friday Mark and I are meeting with the psychologist that did the 5 week testing with Keegan to get his results. I will post the good (or not so good) results when I get them.
We have a leaky shower pipe and my toy room was flooded on the weekend. Eff.
Will someone please post with some GOOD news to cheer me up, on this miserably cold crappy Monday morning?
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