Today she graduated

A little over a year ago Jadzia weighed 16 pounds and did not talk. Around the same time Ronan had just gotten out of the NICU after his 38 day stay. I had read a lot about Early intervention being crucial to children with Down Syndrome and what was kind of funny was a month before Ronan was born (before we knew he had Down Syndrome) I had gone to a baby event at the children's hospital and a group called Early Access had a booth.

For some reason they stuck out in my mind so after Ronan's Down Syndrome diagnosis was confirmed I dug through paperwork to find their flier from the event. I placed a call and left a message on their machine. At the time I placed the call Ronan was still in the NICU so the next morning after I had called a nurse came into Ronan's hospital room. She told me she was from Early Access and just wanted to let me know I was the first NICU parent to ever contact their Early Access program before Early Access had been able to contact them. We made arrangements for Ronan to start treatment after he came home from the NICU.

The day Ronan was released I gave them a call and that same week they sent out Cheryl Hood. The woman who would become Ronan's OT (occupational Therapist) and be the person whose worked with him the longest. I mentioned to Cheryl how Jadzia just did not talk and her 2nd birthday was approaching. I mentioned all the medical problems Jadzia had been having over the last year and how they had really put her development on hold. She decided she would send out Steffie. A teacher who works for Early Access. Steffie came out and gave Jadzia an evaluation and determined cognitively she was ahead of schedule but her communication skills were far behind. In other words the mental capability was there but for some reason she refused to speak.
Steffie continued to come out twice a month and work with Jadzia on communication skills. Steffie would show me different games and techniques to get Jadzia to use her words. Now over a year later Jadzia is talking full sentences and carrying on coherent conversations. We don't always understand every word but she gets her point across. The Early Access program ends at 3 years of age and Jadzia turns three on Saturday so today she graduated from the program. Jadzia loved when her teacher came over and always watched excitedly by the window on days I told her teacher was coming. Today when Steffie was leaving Jadzia said "See you next time!" We had to explain to her it was teacher's last day and she wasn't coming back because Jadzia was a big girl now. This was proceeded by a lot of tears and hugging.

Ronan's teacher came with Jadzia's teacher and she brought me over a video that shows 65 basic signs. It's easy enough that Ronan and I can watch it together and learn them. The video shows a picture then the corresponding sign then the picture again and so forth. I'm looking forward to learning all these signs. Once we get through the basic sign dvds she's going to bring me conversation signing DVDs. Hopefully by the end I will know quite a bit of sign language. I figure eventually I'm going to go get my sign language interpreters certificate. There are five main classes American sign language 1-5 and when I get to the end I will know sign language fluently.

Ronan has picked up the sign language quicker than I expected. He signed two words in a row yesterday. He signed "Eat more". Food is a strong motivator for him. We are working on drink and then he also knows "All done". I'm excited to teach him more so I can learn to communicate with him more effectively.

I'm off to bed now. Ronan has an EEG tomorrow to check for seizures. I'm told even if he is having seizures the test may not pick them up but we're at least giving it a shot. I have to wake him up at 3:00 am and keep him up until his test which will be around 7:30 for this reason I am going to bed now. I'm not sure Inara will take this too well though because now is her time to get cuddle time with mommy but we'll see how it goes.