Finally

Meet Avery.


Avery is our youngest son.

He's blond haired, blue-eyed, squishy in more places than I can count, and has completed his first year of life.

He has two middle names, Voreneus Sidney.

When Avery was near the age of seven months (a little before a little after), I noticed his almost complete use of his left hand. I was so excited, a lefty! Finally one of us will be using their right brain. Over time, Avery continued to use his left hand, leaving his right usually dangling at his side. After experimenting with toys, nuks, small items, I realized he wasn't using his right hand at all. He wasn't trying to get up on his hands and knees, he wasn't crawling, and rolling from stomach to back and back to stomach was a chore.

When I brought this to the pediatrician's attention, Avery was referred to the neurology department at Children's Hospital. After a series of questions, poking, prodding, pushing, and shoving, the neurologist sat down and gave me the news.

Avery, more than likely, suffered a stroke in utero. The portion of the brain that controls the right side of his body doesn't seem to be working. With therapy, he can retrain his brain to start sending signals to that side. It's the brain area that isn't working, the right side itself is just missing the commands. There is a roadblock set up in his brain that is keeping the signals from crossing over. This has yet to be confirmed by an MRI (Avery was scheduled to get one in June, but has been suffering with a summer cold that absolutely REFUSES to go away enough so that he can be sedated), but the neuro is almost positive that this is what has happened. He has classic symptoms to a classic case. She also told me that it wasn't my fault. Nothing I did while pregnant caused the stroke to happen. It just happened (I looked it up...there is no known cause...it just happens). I was told to not (stop) beat myself up for realizing there was a problem with Avery so late because up until the seventh month or so, most of babies movements are involuntary muscle jerks which make it seem like the baby is using both sides of the body.

Here is what we can expect from our bright eyed bushy boy.

He will skip the crawling stage more likely (since he is over a year and not crawling...more likely than not). However, he hasn't let this get in the way of his exploration. Avery's method of travel includes rolling, pushing his legs (both of them...seems the right side of his body will mimic what the left side is doing) to reposition his body so he can roll where he chooses, and scooting around on his rear. The scooting, which consists of him being in an upright sitting position is basically him scooting across the floor using his buns of steel, his legs, and feet. I'll get a video of it up here someday. It's the funniest thing I've seen a kid do sans none! It's hysterical. The good doctor says that with therapy, he will regain the use of the right side of his body again, but that his mental learning will be slower than the rest of the kids his age.

Boy, that was a hard one for me to swallow. I think I was handling myself pretty darn good up until that part. Had a hard time not crying at this point. I think I did. And not because I was shamed at having a child with a possible learning disability. Don't even go there. Having worked with children with disabilities, I know first hand how tough it is for them, the ones that truly have a learning disability. That particular road will be a hard one for him. Maybe I did cry a bit in self pity, but my heart was breaking in advance for the struggles my son would have to endure in the future.

Him? How does he feel?

He thinks its cake.