Hip Hip Hop, You Don't Stop

Easter has come and gone and we are still in a chocolate coma here at the Northrop house. Wyatt had a very nice day visiting with relatives on boths sides of the family! while I wait for all the pictures to come rolling in (we have to rely on family because we seem to have misplaced the charger for our camera) here are few super cute pictures from the beautiful day:

(for some reason i cannot get them organized, so you'll have to suffer through the pictures, out of order!!)

Some Great News (for now... :)

we just returned from The Children's Institute where Wyatt is going for feeding and speech therapy. they decided that he does NOT need to get a G-tube for now because of his AWESOME weight gain! almost 2 pounds over the last month. this should probably be credited to both his enormous appetite and my anal retentive practice of adding calories to everything he puts in his mouth. flax seed oil has been awesome for this. i add about half a tablespoon to each serving of solids and even tried it in his bottle for awhile. he's been eating everything we put in front of him too - i am just so happy and i wanted to share the news!

Breathing Eas(ier)

with the recent spike in temperatures and a healthy dose of sunshine, the Northrops (or Thropvengos, as Ben lovingly calls us) have had some very good days. we feel relieved and thankful for many things, in no particular order:

Friends:

Family:

and medicine that works. it is no coincidence that once Wyatt restarted the medication that we use to manage his movement disorder, we got our baby back! he is taking naps again (never as long as i'd like of course, but, hey) and cooing, smiling and enjoying eating solids. we were able to take him for a few nice walks in the past few weeks(in the bjorn! Ben is such a proud daddy when he wears it!), to visit with the Esser's, the Jones' and the Beanner's, and most importantly, our lovey little boy is continuing to do things that make us proud! check him out:

We also took a trip to the Laurel Mountains to visit with Grandma and Grandpa Giovengo. Wyatt loved, loved, loved the serenity of the quiet cabin in the woods. He seemed to just fall into a trance as he gazed around at the trees and listened for birds. Here are a few cute pictures:

a friendly game of Risk, that lasted 6 hours and spanned 2 days!!

gazing out the window:

loving his Valentine's giraffe:

napping in style:

and finally getting ready for some green beer!

We are ok

we really are. i mean it.

if it sounds like i am trying to talk myself into believing that, you might be right. but i today, i think we are ok.

it's Wednesday and i should be at work, but Wyatt has a fever and so couldn't stay at daycare today. i had to go pick him up and for some reason that really scared me. there are so many things about him that scare me. he coughs, i'm scared, he vomits, i'm terrified! he won't nap he won't eat, i'm crabby and afraid. what if he never naps? what if he is always this fussy???

well, we will finally be going to back to the medicine that initially helped him, but that wasn't covered by insurance. now it is. now that we tried 3 others that had nasty side effects. poor baby.

seriously though, we are ok. we've been to a few doctor appointments and an evaluation at the Children's institute this week. it was pretty cool and i think it will help us out a lot.

i'll quit talking now and let you see what you came for:

a visit with GREAT grandparents:

a visit with Anna IN PITTSBURGH!!!:

an attempted family photo:

an attack on Aunt Goo/Sue:

And So It Begins....

Tuesdays. I hate Tuesdays. Everything bad that has ever happened to me or someone I care about happened on a Tuesday. I will give it to you, there are some nice things about it. I stay home with Wyatt on Tuesdays and I teach yoga on Tuesdays. And let's not forget, the Mentalist is on Tuesdays. But seriously, that's about it. Case in point: my mom died on a Tuesday. A week later Wyatt was hospitalized, on a Tuesday. And this past Tuesday proved to be right up there with those terrible Tuesdays. In fact, I'm not even going to respect the day by capitalizing it and will now refer to it by the diminutive abbreviation: tues.

I received a call from Wyatt's neurologist in the early afternoon. She was calling to confirm results from Dr. Dobyns in Chicago. It seems that Wyatt's MRI's from last September indicate that he does in fact have PCH Type 2. Pontocerebellar Hypoplasia. (I'll let you look it up, but let me preface the Google with: it's rare, and not so good) It's hard to describe how I felt right at that moment, and how I feel now. But I do know that it will be an ongoing process. Ben says he feels like we are constantly taking one step forward and two steps back. We have a great day, a great hour, and feel optimistic, like we can really see our lives turning out ok. And then a day like tues. knocks you back, kicks the wind out of you and then stomps on your heart so hard you feel like you may never recover. And it didn't even end there.

Wyatt had a terrible night tues. night. He cried and fussed for close to 6 hours and we decided that a trip to the ER was probably in his best interest. Well, note to self, a trip to the ER with Wyatt will almost always be met with confused residents, stinging comments from tired nurses and general perplexity that will add hours on to an otherwise routine trip. As if a trip to the ER is ever routine. He continued to fuss and cry with a 102 fever for another 5 hours and after an enema, 4 x-rays, bloodwork, a spinal tap and 11 hours in that hellish place, they concluded it was a stomach virus and constipation and sent us home with a Rx for Miralax. I was happy that the little love slept all day and even most of the night. He is hoarse from all the crying, generally worn out and a little dehydrated, but other than that, seems to be ok.

So it just felt like we went from thinking that we might just be ok on Monday to the world crashing in on tues. Wednesday and Thursday have been better. But since we can't skip tues. for the rest of the year, I'm sure we will have more and more challenges down the road. Wyatt has been a joy over these past 6 months and I'm certain he will continue to light our lives. He is such a beautiful little soul and I love him so very much. And Ben is the most patient and doting father and little boy could ever have. This is probably why it hurts so much...

I guess I wanted to say, that I'm not writing this to get a bunch of messages of support, or even as a way to meet other families, although those are nice results too. I'm mainly writing to tell you that if you ever want to get me something, DO NOT get me days of the week underwear. I'll just toss them out in fear of accidentally wearing the tues. pair on Friday and ruining THAT day too.

A Week of Firsts!

it's been a good week here in the Northrop house. Wyatt is now 6 months old! he has been such a joy. most of the time...Wyatt has been quite busy. let's start with Sunday:

it was Wyatt's first rock concert! we went to WYEP's Alternative Souper Bowl on Sunday afternoon. both Ben and I were a bit nervous, but excited to see Brewer's Row, as we haven't been to a show since before I was pregnant! we were so happy to find out that Wyatt loves the band as much as we do! he was so entranced by the lights and the sounds...then he started to sing along! it was great to see him kicking is feet and bouncing around. i wish we would have thought to bring a camera! check out the Brewer's Row website and see how it's impossible to sit still when they are playing! later, Wyatt made it abundantly clear that he is NOT a sports fan. he cried through the ENTIRE Super Bowl!!

second, Wyatt has been loving his fruits and veggies. case in point:

the applesauce is a big hit. he absolutely loves to eat solid foods and i'm a bit fearful that he is starting to hate his bottle....thought still a little guy, Wyatt is growing steadily and we are happy to feed him as much as he can handle!

and finally, Wyatt and I went to our first Mommy and Me yoga class and Schoolhouse. it was an interesting experience, fun fun never the less. Wyatt wasn't too happy at first, but then the quiet room of little babes became louder and louder and it seemed the noise put Wyatt to sleep. the louder the room, the sounder the slept. he didn't up until we got home! i think we'll try it again soon...

Wyatt Speaks!

Hey everyone, Wyatt here. I've taken over posting duties for the blog today because my mommy claims she is too busy. In fact she wanted me to tell you that she's sorry that she hasn't posted for almost a month now, but she just can't find the time. I don't believe her of course. But I guess teaching all that yoga and working on her research study and pretending to train for the Pgh marathon is taking up a lot of time! And let's not forget me!!! I am coming up on my 6 month birthday, making life at our house ever changing, always interesting and so much fun!! By the way, am I my father's son or what (see above!)??!!

In January so much happened! I spent my first night at Grandma and Grandpa Northrop's house without Mommy and Daddy! I had a great time and Mom and Dad said that they did nothing but sleep. Apparently, that is called fun these days. I also visited with my Great Grandparents and Cousins. Mommy said she can't find those pictures right now but will post them as soon as she does.

We visited with a bunch of crazy ladies that my mom calls "girls team". They seem nice, but all they like to do is hug and kiss me and pinch my cheeks. Luckily, Ethan and our daddies were there to distract them or I never would have gotten any sleep!

Last week was very exciting. It started out with a visit from my Grandpere and Grandmere Giovengo. They are back in the states for a few months and came from DC just to see me! I had such fun and now I miss them a ton. I will be seeing a lot of them in March though when they come to Pgh for a whole month!

That same weekend, the super Steelers won the AFC championship and now they are going to the Super Bowl! I was so excited. You may not have been able to tell, because I slept through a lot of the game, but, trust me, I was excited.



And then (there's more?!?!) Inauguration Day was great too! I dressed up for the occasion. Mommy and I watched all the festivities and she did not let me sleep through the big speech. Now I can say I witnessed history!
Let's not forget all the fun visits with my Uncle Ben and Aunt Sue! You can see that they are just like my mommy and love to dress me up in crazy hats and take my picture with giant trees!!


Some cool things that I've decided to do to impress my parents:
- I've started talking (hence the witty title). I've started to find my voice and am really goo-ing a lot now!
- My head control is getting very good. I love to sit on Mommy's lap and try to hold my head and torso up!
- I'm getting so much better visually, watching my parents from all over the room.
- I love to smile and play very early in the morning. And I think my parents are getting better at waking up at 6am on the weekends!
- And perhaps, most notable, I've started solids. I think I like that sticky stuff that they started with, but I really wish they'd hurry up and give me something with some flavor! I asked for cotton candy, the blue kind, but I don't think they'll go for it.





Like Mommy mentioned before, I have a lot of challenges that my parents and the great team of doctors at Childrens' are still sorting out. But I'm working hard, with therapists and on my own, and am making progress. I am giving the phrase "baby steps" a whole new meaning!

So anyway, hopefully my mommy will write again soon, before I turn 1! Uh oh. Here she comes. Gotta go. Pretend I'm sleeping! ;)