Where do I begin?! An entire year has gone by and there are so many things I want to sit and fill you in on, but that would take days.. weeks... months! Michael has continued to THRIVE throughout all of 2014... reaching more milestones then I could have imagined. One of the biggest being WALKING! Our big boy started walking at the age of 20 months. Now, there are "time frames" in which MOST children with Down Syndrome start to walk and majority don't until at least age 2. We have our wonderful Physical Therapist Miss Nessa to thank for helping us reach this huge milestone. Michael now LOVES to keep us on our toes. He is receiving PT three times a week. Recently through Early Intervention, he has joined a Gymnastics class that is funded by the state of NY so we will be decreasing PT to twice a week. Michael absolutely loves his gymnastics class and enjoys being around the other children.
Michael also receives speech therapy, three times a week. Michael is definitely delayed in his speech, but as of recently has made such an improvement on making certain sounds and piecing them together with his signs. His first official word was PIZZA. Yup, Pizza. Typical first word for a male in my family; as they all love their pizza. Recently his favorite word is ByeBye! Michael mostly uses sign language to communicate with us. Some examples of what he can say are as follows: Mom, Dad, Eat, Drink, Milk, More, Yes, Please, Thank You, Bath, Fish, Book, Ball, Bear, Baby, Play, Music, Bubble.. just to name a few! Mike and I are avid ASL learners. I am hoping to take an ASL class at our local college, as I know that this will only help us communicate fully with Michael until he learns to piece actual words with the signs.
Additionally Michael receives OT once a week and also Special Instruction twice a week. A grand total of 9 in-home therapy sessions that last 45 minutes each. Michael attends a local program at a wonderful pre-school once a week. He has made many friends there and loves to socialize, learn & explore. I find that Michael really thrives in settings with other children his age. He also attends another group class during the week that involves arts & crafts, story time and music. Michael doesn't really get a lot of down time, but all of these programs and therapy sessions are what is helping our little fella thrive so much!
Now that Michael is two years old, we are starting to think of his future and where he will be attending pre-school. We have many options, which make my head spin. Michael will be eligible to graduate from Early Intervention next January, but if we choose to keep him in services he can stay in EI services until August 2016 and start preschool that September. Even though we have about a year I am already starting my research as to what is available for Michael and starting to list the pros & cons to each route. Once we start to get close to that time, I am sure I will be more aware as to what will be more beneficial for Michael; which would be to either attend a "typical" preschool setting and have therapists visit him at school OR attend a stated funded special education program.
I tried to keep this post as short as possible; as I hope to get back on here during the week so I can give you weekly updates of Michael. Those of you who are family and friends of ours, know that Michael is going to be a big brother this June! Mike, my husband, and I are so excited to give Michael a little brother and to add another member to our family. We know that Michael is going to be an amazing and VERY hands on big brother.
Last weekend we celebrated Michaels 2nd Birthday! It was a wonderful evening with our family and some of our close friends. We are SO thankful to have such supportive and loving people in our lives who adore our son.
Talk to you all soon!...
Hi Meg, Keep the stories coming! Love Grandma
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