Panda Update - 1 year and 4 months

Since we hit the year mark of Panda being home, I haven't been updating regularly - mostly at this point changes are coming slower and healing is more long-term and less obvious in the moment. BUT...here is the latest!

Eating: Our little guy is finally beginning to open up to trying new foods. This is huge when it comes to his health. He's even allowing me to make a green smoothie in the morning to go alongside his eggs, so as to make sure he's getting some leafy greens. I literally took a picture of his plate the other day at lunchtime because it was so beautiful to finally see a plethora of different food groups all on his plate being eaten! Proud Mama over here.

As a side benefit, it has really helped to make our daily lives a little bit easier. Between his fear of foods and yet a constant fear of hunger, Ladybug's medical diet, and my medical dietary needs (which differ a bit from hers) I was making 3 separate meals every time we sat down to eat!
It was definitely a full-time gig. It may be why Panda lovingly dubbed the kitchen "Mama's Kitchen."

 

Panda's first American hot dog. I felt it needed to be documented.

Drinking: Panda is finally drinking fluids throughout the day and even has begun to ask for water when he's thirsty! It makes me laugh to think of the random things we are so thankful for, like our littles finally drinking enough water to keep them hydrated.

Sleeping: He's back in our room in his little panda cove. He sometimes naps upstairs in his actual room in his "big boy bed." We just keep praying that he will eventually want to move there, but we don't want to make the mistake we made last year of pushing him before he's ready. He's healing so much where he is right now, and we don't want to disrupt that process. His nightmares are few and far between these days, and it is much more likely for him to wake us while laughing in his sleep than it is screaming. And if you've ever heard a Panda laugh, you know that it's hilarious!


The Great Outdoors: Whoa!! This is an area that is like night and day from April of last year. Last April being outdoors exhausted our Panda physically and mentally. The sensory input from the wind, the brightness of the sun, all of that strange grass and dirt, the unknown sounds of birds and airplanes - it was all just too much for the little guy. He'd go outside with us, terrified to be set down, and then after 20 minutes go inside and pass out for two hours as he tried to recover.
Today, he willingly walks outside, in the grass, barefoot, to feed the ducks when they come by our house each afternoon. What a transformation! I love that he is learning to appreciate the beauty of the world around us.

Speech/Language Acquisition: While Panda's vocabulary is expanding on a daily basis, his pronunciation improvement has come to a stand still. The doctors thought he needed tubes in his ears, but it turned out he didn't - he just has abnormally thick ear drums, which means they don't vibrate properly. Ladybug's speech therapist has been talking with me about him lately and it looks like it won't be long before he's in speech therapy. He struggles producing certain sounds and his speech has a nasal quality, which points to more serious issues. We shall see! But none of this has stopped our little chatterbox. Learning English has come easily to him, and he speaks constantly in full sentences. He pretty much has a running monologue from morning to bedtime. It definitely earns us quite a few looks every time we are out and about as people wonder why the one-year-old is speaking so well! ha! It makes for fun conversation.

Growth/Age: Our Panda has grown almost 5 inches since being home with us. He receives a growth treatment daily that we administer through injection. I have had to overcome my extreme discomfort with needles - you can literally do anything for your kids. And he's thriving! His endocrinologist is impressed with how well he's responding to the treatment and has high hopes that he has plenty of time to catch up. He still wears 12-18 month clothes, and is most likely (according to doctors) between the ages of 4-6 years old now. We will probably never know his actual age or birthday. That really bothered me at first, but over time I've come to terms with it. In all reality, what does it matter? He has a legal birth date, and we are just planning to stick with that. Not knowing one's age or birth date makes one no less precious or valuable as a human being. His Creator created him for a beautiful purpose and values our Panda beyond measure, and I pray that he takes comfort in these facts as he ages and begins to understand the confusion.

We celebrated his fourth birthday at the beginning of this year surrounded by family. Panda was in heaven! He wanted an airplane birthday as airplanes are totally his thing. His imagination is incredible and at any given time you can pretty much guarantee he is flying a toy airplane around the house, is an airplane himself, or "reading" a book about airplanes.

His love of airplanes comes in handy as we seem to be constantly on one.

He's just too cool.

Panda is rocking it at life. It hasn't by any means been an easy process and there are more challenges ahead, but every moment has been worth it to be able to finally hold my son and love him.