Saturday, April 4, 2009

Blog catch up- 1st birthday, shots, MRI

What happens between 11:59pm and 12:00am the day your baby turns one? This is the question that I have been asking little miss Carly. Since turning one she has started doing all kinds of crazy things. First, she is doing much better with crawling and pulling herself up. We are very happy with the progress that she is making in physical therapy. Second, she is talking much more. She says, da boo (peek-a-boo), uh oh, mama, dada, and bebe (baby). Third, if I don't keep her diaper covered up she takes it off...in her crib...then pee's everywhere. Fourth, since when do the terrible two's start at one? She can throw a temper tantrum like she was a true little devil. But I love my one year old!

Carly had a fun 1st birthday!
I got the kids a little pool to play in during the summer. Carly obviously didn't think much of it. A few toys helped improve her mood slightly but it didn't last long. Guess we will have to work on the pool thing!Carly has also taken a liking to playing on daddy's computer. This is one of her favorite things to play with and pull herself up to. She's getting blogging practice early.
1 year stats
18.3 lbs. (10th%)
28 inches long (75th%)
44cm head (78th%)
Its been quite a week. Carly got her 12 month shots on March 23rd and showed no reaction to any of the shots. But 8 days later she started a reaction to her MMR and Chicken Pox vaccines. All tuesday, wednesday and thursday of this week she had a fever ranging between 101-104. Needless to say we didn't go much of anywhere, I was up a bunch during the nights and I had a FUSSY little girl. Luckily her fever broke by friday morning and she was able to have her MRI and shunt reprogram.
Now to the nitty gritty. Friday Thad and I had her to the hospital at 7am for her MRI. I wasn't able to be with her when they put her out because of the radiation (radiation, pregnancy...not so good) so Thad stayed with her and I watched from the door while she was put under. I better get used to seeing that since it will be a yearly experience. But the test went good, the shunt reprogram went good and we got the results after. Everything with her hydrocephalus is under control and her brain function looks good so far. They did find that she has Chiari One Malformation which right now is non-symptomatic but could be symptomatic in the future. Symptoms could include gagging or major headaches which if she becomes symptomatic could result in surgery to remove the extra bone. We also have to be careful of head trauma, especially at the base of her skull because the extra bone decreases the cushion between her brain and the skull. Also the bone has a higher chance of herniating the cerebellum. We also found that she has Agenesis of the corpus callosum which is a break in the corpus callosum surrounding her brain. We were told that it is the most common defect in children with congenital hydrocephalus and isn't anything too concerning. The major symptoms we could see from this is seizures which we could see from just having hydrocephalus. But the fact of the matter is that we are starting to see the effects of the hydrocephalus and things are starting to appear. We are at the point that we could start seeing other things start to appear that are associated with her hydrocephalus. The Dr's obviously do not hold a crystal ball and even though her brain looks fully functioning, things can change. But we are hopeful that this will be the end of it and she will have full undamaged function of her brain. Because of these new findings she will have an MRI every year to monitor the Chiari. And to top it all off, miss Carlykins developed hives to the anesthesia and looks like a rose bush.
I got some really cute pictures of her in the bath tonight so those pictures will be posted soon.....HA!

5 comments:

Aubry said...

So, does this mean she shouldn't get any more of those particular shots because of the reaction she had? Scary! Glad the MRI went well. I hope for the best for her as she continues to grow! How exciting that she's pulling herself up and moving around a lot. As for temper tantrums...Shalie started throwing major fits around 1 1/2. I guess they are all a little different.

Gina said...

I am glad to hear the optimistic outlook! That must be so hard to watch your little baby go through all that.

PS- be glad she's throwing fits now; maybe she'll be done with them before she's three and strong enough to hurt you on accident!

Leslie said...

Sydney started temper tantrums right around that age too actually!! Two has just brought on different issues. haha! She looks cute in her pictures. I really hope she is feeling better by now.

Maury said...

Carly looks like an angel in her blessing picture... what a sweetie. I know Carly will turn out just fine. She is one tough cookie!

katester said...

Poor Carly. Sounds like Carly, mommy and daddy are all troopers though.
Sienna is totally throwing fits like a 2 year old and they started before she turned one. and she is already manipulative. oh no!