9 Months

Chase turned 9 months old on Thursday. It's hard to believe! He's getting bigger and stronger little by little. His legs are getting stronger and he's beginning to support more of his weight. He rolls around and kicks ALOT. His fine and gross motor skills are still delayed. He has physical therapy and a developmental specialist come out twice monthly to work with him. They are working on increasing his tummy time and arm strength, and strengthening his core (sounds like pilates), and also getting him to mimic our movements. I feel guilty because I wish I could work more with him during the week, but there isn't enough hours in the evening after work to accomplish much of anything. Nurse Cathy does work with him, but I'd rather it be me. I often get sad when I think of what most 9 month olds (or 7 month olds given his adjusted age) are doing and how far behind he is. But then I think of how far he's come and all he's been through, and that helps to put it in perspective. It's still tough though.
At Chase's last doctor appointment, he was 12lbs 3oz. We changed his formula which seems to be easier on his tummy. He still isn't taking as much by the bottle as we would like, but we're trying to be patient. The occupational therapist comes weekly to work with him, but it doesn't seem to have helped much yet. We wonder if he's just lazy sometimes and prefers getting fed through the tube. It is less work, and I guess it's only natural to take the path of least resistance. We've experimented twice now with cereal. He did okay, but he still isn't able to sit up on his own which makes it a bit more challenging.
Chase is definitely more hands-on now and grabs anything he can get. He likes pulling his trach and feeding tube, which has added another element of challenge. He also pulls out his right hearing aid all of the time now as well. It's a constant battle, but we're glad he has this skill down and that he knows those things aren't supposed to be there :) We did ask the doctor if she had a better idea of how long he might need the trach. No one knows for sure, but it sounds like it's going to be awhile.
Things with nurse Cathy are going a little better. We met with our case worker last week. She's going to try to work with the nursing agency to allow us a chance to try out a few other nurses. We're not ready to get rid of Cathy, we just want to see who else is out there and see if anyone else would be a better fit. We feel like Cathy takes fine care of Chase, we just want someone that's a better fit for us. It's been an ongoing decision back and forth as to what should we do, so we decided that we just need to explore our options.


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