Testing for Melina

We brought Melina in to get educational testing done in April.  Her teacher was concerned about her writing delays and that she was regressing a little bit in school.  I still think it's due to her selective mutism and anxiety, but there was talk about her being held back without a diagnosis, so I called a place and asked for it to be done.  Somehow though, the educational testing was never done and it had turned into a psych eval instead.  They called us in for the results and they confirmed the selective mutism and expressive writing delay as well as the sensory integration disorder, but they wanted another set of eyes to see her in play therapy to rule out Autism.  I got really upset over that one as I just didn't see her having autism.

I took her to her play therapy session and the lady worked with her and said that she thought she got enough and that she didn't need to come back for anymore.  They ruled out autism.  I was so glad!  Reading The Highly Sensitive Child to try to help her more.  Can see parts of myself in that book...even some of Deidra too.  However, Melina is by far the most sensitive of all of us.

Tonsils and Adenoids No More

Over spring break this year,  Melina had her tonsils and adenoids out due to getting strep throat so often.  She was getting it 1-2 times a month.  She was a trooper and refused to take the meds that the doctor prescribed for her pain, but she would only take motrin.  We finally figured out that the tylenol burned.  She spent a lot of time in Mommy's lap and she slept with me at night too.  I could see the pain on her face and she was pretty tempermental at times, but that was to be understood.  I think she has a pretty high pain tolerance.  It took her about a week to bounce back...we rocked a lot.  She'd get down to go play a little bit and she ate ok, but she just wanted her Mommy and so I didn't really do much but hold her.  Thankfully, Daddy was home with us too and so she went back and forth to Mommy and Daddy and we babied her all we could.  She hasn't been sick really since they've came out though, other than allergy related stuff and a bad upper respiratory infection since.

Melina

This is my little Melina.  She was our unexpected blessing that we found out about shortly after finding out that we were goign to be able to adopt Emmy and Tracie.  I hadn't been feeling well off and on in the middle of some meetings about Emmy and Tracie.  I thought it was just stress of not fully knowing what was going to happen.  I had been really tired, throwing up here and there, and in prayer about a lot of things.  My father-in-law had come down to visit and we were in the car and again I felt like I was going to throw up.  I asked my husband to stop for some fries thinking that if I ate something small it may help.  We were on a day trip and I battled nausea off and on all day and my chest had begun to hurt.  The next morning, I decided to take a pregnancy test totally expecting it to be negative.  I was totally blown away when the pregnancy was positive instantly.  I had no idea of how far along I could have been because I had skipped a cycle as well and that test had been negative.  The dr wound up doing an ultrasound and confirmed that I was 10 weeks pregnant.  Wow!  Hubby and I just kept looking at each other and smiling and giggling.  We were thrilled!

The weekend that Spring Break was supposed to start for my school-aged kids I started having little contractions.  The nurse told me to go to the hospital and get checked out.  They wound up admitting me due to high blood pressure and I also found out I had gestational diabetes again.  They had just done the test in the office, but I hadn't gotten the results yet.  My urine at the hospital had sugar and protein in it.  :-(  Anyway, my doctor was on a missions trip, so another dr in the practice came in to talk to me the next morning.  Since I was only about 27-28 weeks, they said that depending on my urine tests for pre-eclampsia they may transfer me to the big hospital in Dallas and keep me there until I delivered.  I was scared and I wanted to be able to get out for the girl's adoption was scheduled for a couple of weeks away.  I wanted to make them a part of their forever family before baby girl arrived.  Thankfully, my regular dr came back from missions and came to see me in the hospital and checked my test results and said that he felt ok letting me come home as long as I came in weekly to the office for him to monitor me.  I agreed.  We were able to complete the girls' adoption as well a couple of weeks later.  That was an answered prayer too!   At 34 weeks, I started having regular contractions again and I went in and found out my blood pressure was also back up to a level that he didn't like.  They sent me to the hospital for monitoring and an hour later, he came in to let me know that they were going to keep me until I delivered.  I was shocked, but wanted what was best for baby girl.  They did 2 rounds of steroid shots and an amnio to check baby's lungs and determined that she was ready.  The doctor said he could see that I was really needed at home and since she was ready he said that we could go ahead and deliver if I wanted or we could wait it out a little longer.  I didn't want Josiah and Melina to have the same birthday, so I just asked that we wait a day so we could celebrate his birthday and they could each have their own day.  She was born at 35 weeks, just like big sister, Deidra.  She was 5 lbs and 12 oz.  She did spend about a week in the special care nursery as she didn't have the swallow reflex down and we had to work on feeding.  She did great though and came home about a week after she was born.  She is such a joy to all of us!

She is very shy and has some developmental delays with speech and fine motor.  I put her in preschool last year to work on talking to others more as she is SO shy that she wouldn't talk to people that she didn't know and took a LONG time to warm up to others and would hide in my arms or behind my legs.  The teacher let me know that it was taking her months to talk to just a couple of students and that when we had Christmas break she regressed although she would at least answer if she was spoken to by the teacher.  She had gone to Bible study with me also for 2 years at that point and wouldn't talk to the kids there or to the teachers unless it was motions with her head or anything.  I got her in speech and occupational therapy in February of this year and found out that she has "selective mutism."  That really began to make sense.

She started kindergarten this year and I was so nervous with how she was going to do with going full-days everyday as preschool was only twice a week.  She is talking to some other students in class and she does answer her teacher.  My other big concern was with her writing as I knew she was behind there.  She is doing great!  The OT at school gave her a pencil grip and worked with her a few times and her writing took off.  She is a strong reader and is testing a couple months ahead of her class.  Now to just catch her up on paper as her teacher does agree that verbally she is ahead, but on paper she is a bit behind.    So proud of her though!