Jackson is a great helper!

He helps by carrying Zoe short distances on his lap.  As long as she doesn't get her head too much in his face, he is happy to help out.  What a great big brother!

Jackson's appointment at low vision clinic

Jackson had his annual appointment at Lighthouse.  Jackson has functional vision but he is considered to be Cortically Visually Impaired (CVI) due to his brain injury so he sees a low vision optometrist there. I am very happy with the doctor there.  Before we started going there Jackson was seen by a different doctor.  I am not exaggerating when I say I left that first doctor's appointment in tears (this was years ago, shortly after Jackson got out of rehab) he was so negative about his vision and future prognosis.  The guy had no clue how to measure Jackson's vision and no clue about how to deal with people.  This doctor is wonderful with him and has lots of very neat ways to figure out how well he is seeing.

So anyway, Jackson is about the same as he was last year.  He still is slightly near sided (although it may possibly be less than he was last year).  If he was getting worse she would recommend getting glasses for him again but he did not tolerate wearing them too well and the improvement would be minimal so she says it's ok for him not to have them.

His visual tracking is good, but his tracking items upwards is not as good as tracking items in the rest of the field of vision.

His eyes also still turn inward and outward, meaning they are not always working together as they should be. This is called esotropia. She says he seems to be pretty good about self correcting.  If he consistently had an inward turn or an outward turn a surgeon may be able to help improve it, but since they both go both ways there is really no way to surgically correct it.

She mentioned wanting to do a test called visual evoked potential. This will help get a clearer understanding of just how well Jackson is seeing.  She does not think he needs it now, but probably sometime in the next few years.

His overall eye health is very good.

So a good (but very long, as always) appointment.  Not so good for Lee who was hanging with the babe at home.  She took only a 5 minute nap and cried for two whole hours.  Poor daddy!!

Some cuteness for you

Look how big and pretty she is getting!

Here is a shot of her wearing the same outfit as in a previous post.  You can really see how much she has grown! Her jeans were all cuffed back then and now they are just right!

Happy girl!

Here she is driving her "car".

She loves playing in her bath tub!  She will drag it out to the living room all the way from her bedroom and sit in it.  We got the hat out of the $1 bin at Target...best $1 spent ever!

We gave her Jackson's old backpack to play with. He used to play with it when he was her age before he got sick.  She loves it!  You can see Grandpa Chuck in the background. 

I have a picture of Jackson wearing the same backpack that is very similar to this one of Zoe.  He was a little younger in the picture though, about 14 months to Zoe's nearly 18 months.

She loves her doll and she also has a little mouse in her hand that she was loving on.  It used to be a cat toy! She runs around with it saying "mouse!"

She always likes to run around with no clothes on for a while before bed time.  Last night she wanted to put on her hat and mittens.  It was just too cute that I had to take a pic.  But she was really tired so the camera got her all kinds of upset.  Still worth it though!

History of Rock 'n' Roll

Since Lee works a lot of late nights as a realtor and Zoe goes to bed pretty early, I get to hang out with Jackson alone for about an hour and a half before he goes to bed.  Or sometimes an hour because he does get kind of sleepy early.  I actually LOVE this time with him since Zoe is such an attention hog and it can be hard to make a good connection with him if there is a lot of commotion and noise going on.  So this time is precious to me because we can be together without these distractions.  He is such a sweetie, and I love seeing the way his mind works and what he likes and dislikes.

Jackson loves music more than anything else in the world.  I am so thankful that he has his iPod to keep him entertained but sometimes it can be difficult to figure out what music to put on it , especially now that he is not a little kid anymore.  He is outgrowing some of the music on there, and I am trying to find more age-appropriate music for him. 

I recently recorded the series "History of Rock 'N' Roll" and we have been watching it together in the evenings. We have a deal that if he can tell me that he likes a song, I will write it down and then download it to his iPod.  He has GREAT taste in music!  He likes all sorts of stuff...Bill Haley, Little Richard, Ray Charles, Chuck Barry, Rolling Stones, Beatles, Bob Dylan, Jimmy Hendrix, James Brown.  I also like seeing him try to make up his mind on if something is worthy of his iPod.  I asked him if he liked a Janis Joplin song and he did not respond for a while...he was just listening and then a minute or two later he indicated he liked it.  He did not want any Mamas and the Papas or Byrds or Righteous Brothers (told you he had good taste!).

Conversation with Zoe

Zoe: eh eh eh eh eh eh (this is the somewhat annoying sound she makes when she wants something)

Me: What do you want, babe?

Zoe:  eh eh eh eh eh (pointing at the window)

Me:  Do you want to look out the window?

Zoe: Yeah!!

Me: Can you tell me with words?  Can you say "window"?

Zoe: Peeeeese!!!? (We are working on saying "please".)

Me: Oh you said "please"!  That is a very nice way to ask, but can you say "window"?

Zoe: Yeah!

Me:  Can you say window?

Zoe:  Yeah!

Me:  Can you say window?

Zoe: Alright!!!

I gave up and helped her look out the window.

The truth about parenting a child with special needs

The truth about parenting a child with special needs

This article pretty much hits the nail right on the head. It's short, and it's bitter, and it's exactly how I feel most of the time.