How it all Began

I keep telling people that I don't blog. My other blog was updated in 2009. But, recently I have been asked a lot about some of the learning issues my boys Logan and Cole are working through. I thought I would start a blog dedicated to it so I can get all my thoughts into one place.

Our journey started when several people mentioned they didn't think that Cole was focusing with his eyes. The photographer that took this first picture was the first to mention it. She said she couldn't get him to look at her. After that my Grandma and Mother in law mentioned that they noticed something off. I took Cole to his 3 month check up and casually mentioned to the doctor their concerns. (I wasn't too concerned) He said that he saw something called Nystagmus which is involuntary eye movement. He recommended that we go and see a pediatric Ophthalmologist right away. He made a call to Dr. Bruce Hess . The pediatrician also told me that Nystagmus can mean many different things and basically don't go online and freak myself out. We went to see Dr. Hess the next week. He looked at Cole and said "Well, he does have Nystagmus, however, I don't see anything causing it like cancer". I was glad I didn't read that Nystagmus could be caused by a tumor. Dr. Hess ordered a cat scan which basically confirmed there were no tumors. As Whit likes to say in his best Arnold Swartzenagger voice "it's not a tumor". That was good and we were thankful for that all joking aside. Dr. Hess wanted to see us every 6 months so we made the hike to St. Pete to see him. One thing with nystagmus that we saw with Cole was that often times people with it will have what is called a null spot or a head tilt. Here's a good picture that shows this in Cole. Dr. Hess never saw a reason for Cole's nystagmus so he called it "Congenital Nystagmus" After doing my best "Dr. Google" exploring I found some parent websites and yahoo groups that helped explain it to me. One of the warnings that parents gave over and over in these groups was that often children w/ nystagmus have other various delays in development. So based on the advice of these parent groups I scheduled Cole to be evaluated by Early Steps Early Intervention.

At the same time as I was working on figuring things out with Cole, I started to wonder if Logan was on track with his speech. Being a new Mom, it was hard to know if he was on track b/c I really didn't have the experience to know what was typical for a 2 year old. Other mom friends of mine said "oh, don't worry he'll catch up." But I continued to have a feeling that something wasn't quite right. An acquaintance of mine was a speech therapist, so I called her and asked for her opinion on what Logan was doing with speech. She said that by the time a child is 2 they should be able to make at least 2 - word sentences. I was shocked b/c Logan was only saying a few one word phrases. So I called the Early Steps office again and made an appointment for Logan to be evaluated by them as well. Let me just say this here....had I brushed off my "mom" feelings and listened to my uneducated friends trying to make me feel better, I would have been making a huge mistake. Mom instincts are very strong and should be listened to! (you will see this plays into our story ongoing)

Our Early Steps Caseworker, Karen Childress, evaluated Logan and Cole with a group of other specialist. They determined that both boys qualified for Early Intervention services. These services are provided at no cost for children under 3. In January of 2006, Karen scheduled us to go to Pediatric Therapy Services in Lakeland.