Rough and Tough!!

Matthew has been doing good lately with the exception of the reoccuring ear problems.  We have battled the same ear infection since November 3rd and in January we had to take him to Pediatrics After Hours because he was bleeding from the ear.  I am not talking about a little...It was puddling in his ear.  For the second time, a ruptured eardrum.  Matthew shows no symptoms other than a few tugs at the ear.  Finally, we have an appointment with an ENT in February.


We also caught the nasty stomach virus that seems to be everywhere.  Matthew has still not gotten over it completely.  He is slowly getting his appetite back.  He has gotten small.  With that being said, his stats have been extremely good since the stomach bug.  He is running 100% O2 and 102-108 HR.  His heartrate has never been this low before. Prior to this, his HR was steady at 136-142.  His O2 stats have been hanging from 95-100% since his stent.   


He is so busy now...forget walking.  He runs everywhere now.  Here are a few things he is doing:

• Matthew takes 2 naps and goes to bed around 9pm and still gets up at least twice a night.
• He LOVES music~Bobbing his head and bouncing up and down.  If you turn the music down he will fuss. 
• He weighs 20.3 lbs and is 29 inches tall.  We don't think he is going to be very tall.
• His newest activity is taking off his socks.
• He would rather go/be outside than anything.
• He is a meat eater, even before sweets.
• He is also in the stage of putting food in his mouth and then taking it out to inspect it and on many occasions he spits it out once the flavor is gone.
• He can identify his nose, ears, mouth and sometimes eyes and hair.
• New words are ear, eye, more, and ba ba.
• Matthew's sisters got him a signing book for Christmas and has actually learned to Sign the words more, all gone, give me, and eat.  He uses "more" a lot and in the correct context.
• He is 14 1/2 months old.
• He still takes his bottle.  He will drink from a sippy cup but in order to take naps, he must have his bottle.  He has never taken a pacifier.  I wonder if his bottle is his paci? 
• He loves driving his car with the cutest little car sounds he makes.
• He has started bending over and putting his head on the ground.  I will have to get a pic of this.  It is so funny.
• He will look at me if he is doing something he knows is a "no no" and will continue to do it and when I say no, he runs.  He does not respond to "Come Here" at all.  Best I can tell, he thinks it means run the other way.

I have not been taking a lot of pictures and when I do they look like the ones above.  I am trying to hide the fact that I can't always be there to protect him.  The reality is that sometimes, all we can do is pick them up, dust them off and love them.

This is the Reality! 









As you can tell Matthew has had a few falls.  His balance has been out of sorts.  We think it is from his ear problems.  He seems to rotate from one side of his forehead to the other.  Once one begins to go away, he will fall and hit the other side.  As you can tell from the pictures, this last one was a big "boo boo."  He is so Tough!