Monday, August 23, 2010

It will be better when....


When Ty was diagnosed with his bleeds we knew we were in for a long haul. In the back of my head I always thought he would be "fine" and he would be one of the lucky kids who had no effect from the bleeds. His was SEVERE and I really thought he would be "FINE."

The media is full of stories of the babies being born early and being perfectly healthy, nothing wrong and 100 percent perfect. The media seems to forget to report the ones that don't turn out so fabulous. ( Remember the McCaughey sextuplets. Most don't because Jon and Kate took over! Some even speculate that it is because 2 of the babies have Cerebral Palsy.)

Cerebral palsy effects everyone differently. No two kids are exactly alike. What works for one won't work for another. A preemie who is 28 weeks, could be in a wheelchair while Ty who is 25 weeks is not. A 24 weeker who has some delays but no diagnosis for CP and is now older while another 24 week twins with only one surviving and has cerebral palsy but isn't in a wheelchair but is still struggling to walk.

Full term babies can be struck with Cerebral Palsy. Babies have strokes in the womb and are affected by Cerebral palsy. Some can't eat on their own, while others can. Others are fine but can't run and jump.

One phrase heard often is " It will get better when... ( insert whatever you wish would get better)" But what I didn't' understand is that the chances of "Whatever" working just like I thought was seen through my own wishes.

Tyler walks.

When he was learning to walk and going through therapy we had a therapist who said he would never walk independent of a walker. She also said that we should hold him back from walking till his gait was "normal." We soon left that therapist and he soon walked on his own. His gait is not normal but I thought all my problems would be solved when he could walk on his own.

Again, not the case. His stamina is not "normal" and therefore distances are really hard for him. He can't be expected to keep up with a normal 5 year old because ( as much as we try) he just can't go that far for that long.

I thought, if only he could talk then it will be all better. While the talking makes parenting SOOOO much easier, it didn't solve all the problems. It gets easier, better and the works but nothing fixes what we thought was "normal."

What did get better, was my ability to cope. My ability to be handle when it didn't get "better" like I thought. We still rejoice in his abilities, we celebrate the milestones and in the end we remember where we came from.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Oh hun I cannot imagine being where you have been. But I hope that if I were I would face it with the same grace you have..