Adoring Roy

Sheena has done well to avoid Roy's horrible virus. She adores him, and expects him to go wherever she does - not so easy when he's been so sick.

Sheena's fringe is getting way too long. When we go to trim her hair she thrashes about to the point that it is dangerous to get near her with scissors, and she refuses to wear a clip or a hair-band. I guess hair-gel will be our next option. Talk about a drama queen.

Her little tantrums are improving a lot. They are not so frequent and the intensity isn't there anymore. She seems to reliably have one just before her daytime nap, but it is quite manageable. I just ignore her and acknowledge that she is feeling upset. This seems to be working for now.

She went for a huge walk today. She walked over several steep hills along our street, and kept charging ahead without needing to go in her pusher. I was very impressed. It worries me that she is going to outgrow her pusher in the next year, but that she doesn't have the stamina that other kids her age have. She is 16 kilos all of a sudden. She was 14 kilos the beginning of the year so she's been busy piling on the weight. Her top half is size 3, but her bottom half is size 1-2 because she's shorter in the legs. I have no idea how she got up to 16 kilos because she is a poor eater to put it mildly.

She went to her cardiologist this week, and her pulmonary hypertension has cleared up since having her tonsils and adenoids removed in January. She's obviously getting more oxygen overnight now that there is less tissue in her airway. Although her tonsils were only medium in size, some people with D.S have such low muscle tone that the airway closes over even with average tonsils. A huge success.

Her creative play is coming along. We had lots of animals visiting dolly in her dolls house - but I had to lead the play. Her lack of speech makes her ability to lead more complex creative play very hard. Her receptive language is ALL there, but her expressive language is extremely limited.