Skip to main content

Harpers Beginning Part 1

 


When we received Harpers diagnosis of Autism my way to deal with my grief was to dive into the world of autism. I wanted to read and learn everything I possibly could. When I would find a new blog, podcast, instagram or facebook page I would scroll all the way to the beginning. I wanted to see if someone had a child like mine. Trying to find any community I could. So my blog is going to start at the beginning. This is Harper’s story. 

With my oldest I had preeclampsia and high blood pressure and I delivered Savannah at 35 weeks. With Harper I had a plan and was more informed on what to do and not to do to try to prevent having those same issues again. But at 13 weeks pregnant with Harper on September 24th 2017 I was admitted to the hospital and immediately rushed into surgery because my appendix has ruptured. I remember everything from that time. I knew pregnant women shouldn’t have surgery, anesthesia, medications, all of the things that I was about to have done to me. My OB came and walked into the surgery room with me, stayed through the entire thing and was there when I woke up. They advised me about all the percentages and likeliness of losing the baby and told me they wouldn't do an ultrasound until day 5 after surgery because if anything would happen to her it would happen during that time frame and they could get a good look at/if anything had happened to her. That heart beat on day 5 brought me to tears. 26 weeks later our 7lb 3oz baby girl was born perfectly healthy! I can tell you and it might sound crazy but it never once crossed my mind about any developmental delays being present. She looked perfect. The doctors said she was perfect and I put everything else behind me. 

Looking back now I recognize Harper was a very quiet baby. I remember getting some laughs but not much crying and very few cous or sounds. At the time a baby that always seemed happy and never cried seemed like a gift. She would smile and loved watching the fan on the ceiling. She loved looking at the tv and any toys that had lights or sound. She met her sitting, crawling, and standing milestones on time but walking seemed to be delayed. Around the same time we were noticing she wasn’t walking when she should. We also noticed a head turn to the right. I could really tell in pictures because we would be getting her to look at us and focus. She had a head turn and would look out of the corner of her eye. We took her to the eye doctor and discovered she had very poor vision. Almost the exact same vision Derecks brother has. She was prescribed glasses at 13 months old and after that she started walking around 14 months. We blamed the walking delay on her vision the vision has hereditary from Derecks side and moved on.  She still wasn’t talking but at her 15month well visit when speaking with our pediatrician it was chalked up to she had a older sister that never stopped talking and would do a lot of talking for her. I was advised that some kids are late talkers and we should look into help me grow. I had heard about help me grow and was familiar with what it entailed and I decided to ask for a speech referral and after a little time on a wait list she started speech therapy a little before her 2nd birthday. 



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Speech Device.

 Speech Device.  A huge misconception about speech devices is that they discourage children from using their verbal language.  This could not be further from the truth.  Keeping a communication tool away from a non speaking child is not a way to get them to speak.  Harper and Dallas both started with PECS. A picture exchange system to express their wants and needs!  As a mom of 2 non speaking children getting them to use PECS as a means of communication was a life changer for us.  Now Harper has her speech device. Dallas’s is in process and will hopefully be here soon.  Since getting Harpers device that has verbal output when she presses a button to make a request.  She is able to answer so many question and let us know what her wants and needs are.  She is also repeating the words after she hears her device say them.  Harper can answer me with her device when is ask, What’s your name? How old are you? When’s your birthday? What do ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Communication Looked Different

I remember before diagnosis. There was a stretch of time where I was just a tool for Harper and Dallas.  They only needed me to get them food, change them, open items and that’s it.  There was no verbal communication and not much non verbal communication.  Communication consisted of crying.  Dallas when he would want something he would just cry.  There was nothing that led to the crying. He was either fine or crying. If he wanted a drink to let me know he would cry.  Harper would just drag me around. She would grab my arm and pull me to the fridge and it was a guessing game of what she would want. If I grabbed the wrong thing she would cry. If I grabbed the right thing she was silent. For both of them there was no pointing or reaching. This time of our life was hard!  But this time of my life taught me so much!  I learned so much about my kids. I compare it to a newborn. When you have a newborn you are in tune with them. I remember I learned diff...
Post a Comment
Read more