The Changes in Jedidiah

   Not sure if I will be able to get this all typed up.  Soccer is in the morning, waiting for muffins to cool before I can go to bed.  As an aside you must check out the vanilla white bean cake recipe (that I am using for cupcakes, as it is the girls lost soccer game tomorrow).  Now on to the post at hand.

   Jedidiah had his speech therapy this week.  He's only getting speech therapy twice a month.  A far cry from the recommended three times a week.  But that's because we are homeschoolers, using the speech therapy services in the public school.  Oh well.  Needless to say his speech therapist surprised me with this question, "So, how's the new diet coming along?"  Huh?  Ends up that Jeremiah told her about the diet when he took him to speech last month.  Now, this had me wondering.  WHY was she asking me this question?  Most people do not ask us about our diet, even if they know we are on it.  So I told her I thought it was going well, and that I was definitely seeing changes in Jed.  Come to find out, that was the reason she was bringing it up.  She said that she has only had him for 4 sessions, but can't get over how well he's doing.  She can understand 'all his story connections'.  I suppose that means that there are words she  can't understand, but as he continues talking you can make out what he is saying over all.  I told her that I also noticed he wasn't just labeling things, but actually talking about them.  She agreed and said that he has an extensive vocabulary.  I was very glad to have had that short conversation with her.  It was just confirmation that the changes I've been seeing, are indeed real :-) 

   Along with his speech development, he is talking more over all.  Not only that, but he's interacting in ways he never has.  One such way isn't exactly wonderful, but it's nice to see him acting like a 'normal' kid.  He has started to tell me when Jonah does something wrong (tattle tale).  Ha!  Again, not wonderful, but *normal*.  He's doing more pretend play on his own.  When he first started pretend play a while ago he was basically following what his sisters were doing, or told him to do.  Now he can come up with his own scenarios. 

   I wrote on my other blog about him drawing his first picture.  Jonah, who is three, started to draw the normal 3 year old person.  Where they draw a circle with a face in it, and arms and legs extending out from the circle.  Jedidiah has never drawn a picture.  He would color in a coloring book, but not draw free hand.  Well that all changed last week when he drew a banana, snake and a turtle. 

  Today was another first.  Lately when Jed gets hurt he has been coming up to me for a hug.  That in and of itself is totally new (been happening for about three weeks now).  But today, he fell and got hurt.  I happened to be sitting down, and he climbed in my lap to be cuddled.  At five years old, he may be past that age for running up to mom for a hug when hurt, but he's *never* done that before....ever.  It almost seems like he is now catching up.  Kind of going through some stages that he would have gone through a couple of years ago.  Any picture you may see with Jed in our laps is only because we put him there, not because he wanted to be there.  So this was a welcomed change. 

   There are a few areas that I am personally hoping to see some changes in.  Don't get me wrong, I am delighted to see all the new things he has been doing.  But I have a little wish list in my head of a couple of things :-)  I would like to see him gain some more weight, and a bit more height.  I am sure that will come with time.  Two other things:  to be potty trained and to be able to dress himself.  I think once we reorder our household ( a post worthy of my family blog, when I get the chance), then I will dive into those two skills.  In the mean time, I am going to be happy with all the progress he has made in the last few weeks.  I'm not sure if he's ever had this much progress in such a short amount of time. 

Lots to Catch Up On!

Oh, my!  I can't believe how much time has passed since I last wrote.  My intentions were for this blog to be updated regularly to mark our progress.  That plan was undone when I got extremely ill right after my last post.  It ended up that I had a massive sinus infection, that was leaking it's contents into my stomach, which made me very nauseous and not able to eat for days.  I ended up with what I believe to be an electrolyte imbalance.  I've been sick many times in my 40 years on this earth and I don't recall ever thinking I was going to die from any of them.  This time was a first.  I seriously thought I was going to die, I was that sick.  But, nothing that a round of antibiotics and a few days recovering didn't fix.  It took me a long while to get back on my feet.  On top of that, my rash that I was hoping was benign, wasn't.  It was the buggies!  I'll get into that in more detail later.  Just suffice it to say that our world stopped as we knew it.  All my attention had to go into creams, laundry, laundry, creams, laundry, food, laundry, more food, etc.  We even had to stop homeschooling for a week for me to get this all done, and find a rhythm to the madness before we started back up.  It was absolutely crazy!!!  So much has changed since I last wrote.  I am going to try to address some issues in more detail in other posts, but for now here is the short of it:

*We came out of the intro stages and onto the full GAPS a wee bit faster than we should have.

*Salad never tasted soooo good after all that soup and cooked veggies

*Fruit never tasted so good (see above) :-)

*Staying two steps ahead is essential to my sanity.

*The four of us who have needed to loose weight have continued to do so.  The others have progressed as they should have.  Jed has gained a bit more weight as well. 

*Lots of little and not so little things have improved:
Isa's hernia, which wasn't (see family blog for that story), has not bothered her in weeks!
Moira's tummy pain is gone
Saoirse isn't a basketcase like she was weeks ago
I've had this breakout on my chin (acne) that has been there for years and years.  It only goes away when I am pregnant.  Well I'm not pregnant AND I don't have a break out!  Pretty cool.
Jed has made amazing progress in his communication, interactions and other areas of development--worthy of it's own post.
Flannery's pricking sensations have all but gone away (unless she over eats on honey and fruit).

*My every morning aches and pains are gone

*I seriously think that Aubrey is the brightest baby we've had.  I have a sneaking suspicion it may be all the good food he's been eating.

There is more that could be added to the above list, but those are some of the highlights.  I am hoping to do a post on Jed's improvement, how we are making the diet work for us, and tips that I've learned to make things go a bit more smoothly.  However, those will all have to wait as it is late, and I need some much needed sleep.  Teething baby. Need I say more?  :-)