Where Are My Peeps?

Here they are!
Literally...they are in the tub playing as I type! ;) Can you guess who did not want to wash her own body today? LOL!!

"Blog Blurbs"

I could not think of a title for today's post. There is a lot swimming around in my brain. "Blurbs" kept coming to mind, so there you have it.

We went out to the Zoo today...and it was Emma's idea!! Oh joy. Being that I have so many thoughts taking laps in my cranium however I forgot my camera. (I also drove home with my phone and drivers license on the bumper of my van, but that is another story). The girls and I enjoyed our hour at the zoo. It was a MUCH NEEDED outing!! They ate a sack lunch in the double stroller and we ventured out to different areas of the zoo that we have not been to in a while. It was hot, man alive I was sweating pushing my two dollies around. Emma asked to walk after she ate, but Sophie preferred to ride. ;)

I have been observing Emma and Sophie interacting more closely over the past week. I marvel at God's orchestration of putting our family together. We all just fit together. My Mom and I shared a laugh over the way that Sophie has immersed herself into our family. As my Mom put it; it is as if she assessed the situation and figured out what she needed to do. Sophie truly LOVES her sister and looks out for her, she is a little mother hen. She guides Emma when needed and Emma takes to Sophie's self appointed role...most of the time. :) In turn Emma is fiercely protective of her little sister and always looks out for her. I never had doubts about Sophie's adoption, in my heart I just knew that it would all be okay. We are so lucky to have Sophie with us. She adds a lot to our little family. I can not believe how freakin' smart this little one is...she is a sponge. It is going to be fun to watch her grow and learn this year. She will be attending "school" with me one day per week and continuing her speech therapy with our dear Ms. Sara. When Sophie turns 4 we are going to enroll her in an activity...maybe soccer? She is SO ready. :)

My sweet Emma. She grows more beautiful each day. Inside and out. Lately she has been pretending to be a baby. She asks to be held and sang to-of course I am all too happy to do it! She even crawled around one day. She has also taken to carrying around a blankie. My gut just tells me to go with it. It might sound weird...but it really is not. She is regressing and bonding...she was not taken care of the way that any baby DESERVES to be...if she needs those needs to be met at age 6-so be it!

We had that appointment with Emma's ARNP on Monday. Her ARNP...we'll call her "KJ" is just fabulous. She is very intelligent....yet so easy to talk to. It almost feels like we are just meeting at Starbucks for a skinny latte when we see her. KJ called me this afternoon to discuss what the consensus is about Emma. You see, when we met on Monday Greg and I basically said "ACKKKK! HELP!!! We NEED to do something MORE to help Emma....enough is enough". So, KJ met with the head of the psychiatry & behavioral department at KU. He apparently is a guy who knows a lot of stuff. KJ also contacted "Pat" who is the psychologist who conducted testing on Emma last August-September. She also spoke to "Trevor" who is Pat's co-worker and the Neuropsychologist who worked with us when nobody else would. Seriously I love this man. He told us how to potty train Emma at age 5...but, I digress. This team of professionals (yes, apparently we have an actually TEAM...lol) has come up with a game plan. First we are doing some things pharmaceutically. I will spare you all of the medications...basically we are taking some away....keeping one to help her sleep at night...adding vitamin E and omega 3 as preventatives. We will try others, but not until next week. Secondly we are resuming therapy with "Pat". We might throw an OT into the mix. We are doing a full blood panel (oh yeah... are you not so jealous of ME, this will not be fun). Emma has not had a standard test since coming home back in 2006....medically we need to rule anything out. We are also going to do Genetic Testing. Tomorrow I will call a Genetic Counselor (yup, there is such a thing) who is located right here are KU. This is in order to rule out anything genetically based that could be causing Emma distress.

Tomorrow I will post pictures....I promise! :)

Procrastination

I'll admit-I have been procrastinating about blogging since we returned from our trip. I was not sure what to write...how much to share. It was a challenging journey for Emma and the rest of us. Greg claims that he is still having flashbacks of being trapped in the mini van. ;) Another excuse is that I have a cool new computer. While uploading pictures however I somehow lost some of the pictures that I *did* manage to take.

If you'd like to view the random mix of pictures just scroll down. I won't blame you.

If you are feeling up to some "heavy reading" then feel free to enter our lives for a paragraph or two. I believe that it is OKAY to share....VERY IMPORTANT actually to share. I don't expect people to understand....just try to roll with us. :) Parenting a special child and being a sibling to a special child is a gift. One that I'd NEVER return. Although, it'd be nice if the gift came with an instruction manual. Truly it does not matter whether my treasure has Autism, PTSD, RAD, even a mental illness. The symptoms are what we need to wade our way through and treat. The symptoms are difficult for Emma because SHE IS so very aware of them. They are no picnic for the other 3 of us either.

Our trip "home" to visit family in Michigan and Chicago was in one word a DISASTER. We LOVED seeing our families. But, it was just not an enjoyable time beyond that. The trip was just too intense for Emma-this time. We drove for hundreds of miles with "Linda Blair" in the mini van. I believe that we all lost some hearing. When Sophie was baptized I considered pulling the pastor aside and asking about an exorcism for Emma. :P We tried to do things but even our "own normal" was out of reach. We cancelled a lot of plans with friends and even family. It was what it was.

We have an appointment with our ARNP on Monday. This will be good. I have a lot of questions.

I am rambling now, that is my cue to stop typing. I have two little ones who want to splash in their pool and a sweet hubby to spend the day with. :)