The Parker Update

BIG things have been happening with the little man. Big. Huge. Here's his latest list!

His scope results are in. His EOE is much improved! His esophagus is less inflamed, less swollen, less streaking and his biopsies showed extremely low counts of those cells along his digestive tract. Score!!!
He did great with surgery, spent the day hanging out with me and running a few easy errands afterwards - he does so well with these easy procedures and I'm beyond grateful they don't take him out for a whole day or more. Payton went with us to the appointment and helped talk him through the whole thing since he was a little nervous. We stay with what we're doing for now and will go back in a year and do another scope. We've never had a whole year between follow-ups with anyone.

After almost a year of working with OT for sensory things with noise (mostly) he's made huge progress! School buses that dropped off and picked up kids in the afternoons at respite care were a major source of anxiety, fear and problems for him. With school just starting and the buses being back....we've been problem free. We have to do a lot of talking about all of it to get through it and walk past them, but no major meltdowns. And in other fantastic sensory news, Parker did something else major - he went in a bounce house. Actually inside. We were out at a carnival and they had a small one that was just for little kids - 3 years old and under. The compressor for this one was much quieter and we were outside. There weren't any other kids playing in it. The girl running it agreed to let him take his puppy in with him, and of course he had Payton with him. He didn't stand up or jump around, but he went inside on his own and there were no tears, no fear, no anxiety. "Mom, I did it all by myself. I'm not afraid anymore."

And with our teachers help, Parker was the first kid in their class to be put in potty training bootcamp. He went first and several other kids who were having a hard time with started following along too. It's been good for us to have the extra support and them on board too since they spend all week there. So I'm claiming him potty trained, and about a 50/50 split on nighttime. I will take it! Our biggest issues have been when he's getting tube fed, but we've got it down to a system now. He's doing awesome and gets a little better all the time. Super job buddy!!

Preschool!

We made it through our first full week of preschool...it was a huge success!

The twins are reunited with several of their friends who had moved over to the preschool room already. They are now the pack again - Payton, Parker, Kierra W., Kierra A., Elaina, and Owen.

They have been totally worn out in the evenings. They have had a blast manning their way through an obstacle course on a few days, they are making special art for the big art sale in a couple weeks, they are helping take care of their class frog (yep, it's real!), computer time, bigger and better art time and thrown in regular school library time. It's amazing. No kidding, I can already tell a difference.

Their new teachers are amazing. Their old teachers are still making small appearances. It's the best possible situation. They are having a great time and I could not ask for anything else!

Also in big news from last week...I'm crowning Payton as completely potty trained. HOO-RAY! Not one accident since she decided she was ready to stop with the pull-ups. She's waking up from naps dry. We're still using a pull-up at night just in case, but at least half the time she's waking up completely dry. So proud of her! Now if we could just get the little brother to get on board.

And speaking of Parker...he had his surgery follow-up. All is good. Everything looks fine. But...he just finished a round of antibiotics for a sinus infection. We also did steroids since somehow between surgery and sinus infection, or some combination of all these factors, he was getting pretty stridorous (squeaking when he was breating) again. He had me checking him out all the time in a mini panic. Now that the meds are done, he's good as new.