Serious Time...

Funny Girl!

We have had a lot on our mind lately... Are you ready to hear this?

1) Scottish Rite may not be the best fit for Audrey. I emailed Dr. Lund about a month ago to ask for his thoughts on the removal of Audrey's extra toes. He confirmed what I was worried about and told me that removing Audrey's strongest toe (the 1st big toe) would not only create difficulties in learning to walk but it would cause her to develop calluses under her big toe and toes 2-5 would develop hammertoe in about 20 years causing her to have pain and future surgeries to correct them. Dr. Lund also told us that she should not even be considered for ATTT surgery until she's 3.5 or older because some children's feet can improve after they've walked on them for a couple of years. And, he said he doesn't feel like Audrey would even be a candidate in 2 years... Hearing this was a big blow because we were so hopeful for Scottish Rite. So many people have benefited from their doctors and services, we hoped we'd be that fortunate. Shawn and I have toyed with the idea of pushing back to Scottish Rite and suggesting we find a different solution for Audrey - one that Dr. Lund would do... but I feel staying under Dr. Lund's care would be best for Audrey. He's not afraid to voice his concerns with his approach to her treatment and if something's not working, he helps us find different solutions. So, that's where we're at with her feet...

2) Audrey had a CT scan and her 6 month follow-up post Shunt surgery with her Neurosurgeon, Dr. Price. She cried the entire time they were scanning her because she hated being taped and bundled up to the table. She had an MRI scan on her ears mid-March at Children's and Dr. Price used that scan to compare with her most recent CT Scan. Results were good! Ventricles are slightly smaller, still enlarged but they've gone down!!! Her head circumference was 49cm and when she charted it, the dot was only about a millimeter away from the top line of the curve. Dr. Price said she may never be on the curve - heck Shawn and I aren't on the curve (we follow our own drum) - but Audrey looks great!!

3) Audrey has a follow-up ABR tomorrow morning. She will be having a clinical ABR rather than a sedated ABR. I'm hoping she cooperates with the audiologist and allows her to put the ear things in her ears... If she doesn't we will have to schedule a sedated ABR. I pray that God will help her stay calm tomorrow morning because having her go under general anestethia causes me serious anxiety. I get really upset watching them put that mask over her face and then having to watch her try to understand what's going on as she wakes up. Let's also pray that her hearing has improved since January. Her ENT said that sometimes ABR's done after ear tube surgery aren't always accurate because there could be tissue swelling from the incision or possibly fluid behind her ear... We shall see tomorrow. If the hearing loss has not changed, then she will require hearing aids. Her hearing specialist that has started working with her said that they like to see babies in hearing aids by 12 months. She said this will help Audrey with her language development and hopefully will help us meet our goals sooner than 6 months.

The Three of us have each caught an upper respiratory infection. It started with Audrey a couple of weeks ago when she had a slight ear infection in her right ear (even with tubes) and an upper respiratory infection. She was given an antibiotic for the ear infection and then a 3 day oral steroid to stop her cough followed by a week of breathing treatments. It then came to me on her birthday but I overlooked my symptoms because we had so much to do for her birthday party. Her party came and gone, along with my voice. I finally hit a brick wall and stayed home from work last Tuesday. I went to the doctor and she gave me a zpack and some POTENT cough syrup. I took one dose of cough syrup at 2pm on Tuesday and slept until 6:30 pm, woke up to spend see Audrey until she went to bed. Once I put her shoes back on and said goodnight, I was out again until 6am the next morning. It probably would have been in my best interest to stay home from work another day, but I had some loose ends I needed to tie up so I went in... but, that's when Shawn contracted this little infection that lived in our household for over 2 weeks. He stayed home from work last Wednesday and Thursday. I came home from work on Wednesday to find our house CLEAN! Who cleans when they are sick? I told him to stay in bed all day long so he would get better, but he didn't. On Thursday, he did it again!!! When Audrey and I got home from her CT Scan, he was not at the house... he was at Blockbuster getting a movie because he was bored. But, I'm happy to say the Hannon household is upper respiratory infection free and it wasn't Swine Flu!!!

Audrey went swimming yesterday for the 2nd time ever!! We hope to spend a lot of weekends at Nana and Papa's enjoying great food and relaxing in the pool this summer! Enjoy these incredible photos of her swimming!