he's 9 months old and...

he's one of the happiest babies. always laughing, smiling and "talking" to his feet or the ceiling fan. when you get in the car to go somewhere don't bother turning on the radio you couldn't hear it if you wanted to. he squeals and laughs so loud it's pointless. it's so cute & even makes big brother laugh. he eats great and sleeps like a little angel. he only cries when he sees me eating and thinks he has to eat too. he can roll from one end of the living room to the other and laughs when you try to catch him. he loves his daddy & daddy's beard. big brother entertains him and he entertains brother. he's mommy's little cuddle bug and our City Lake Miracle. he's 9 months old today.

but also being 9 months old there's milestones that should be met. he can't do those things. while still small on all the growth charts he feels "large" to us. he can't push up on his arms, he can't sit up supported or not supported, he can't pull up, he can't hold a bottle. he's just started clapping in the last week or so and started to put a few consonants together occasionally. he can't pick up gerber fruit puffs and put them in his mouth. he can't pick up and hold toys for very long unless they're small and even that is a somewhat difficult task. he sometimes has a hard time focusing his eyes. he seems to have little to no muscle tone in his upper body & core that he needs to do all of these things. branson had the same problem, just of the lower extremities. it's called hypotonia. it's a condition in which the muscles have little to no tone and strength. infants with it are often floppy or rag doll like. it does not affect their intellect but does affect social, language and reasoning skills. while the motor skills in strength and tone can be corrected with physical therapy it takes longer to help the other areas. they are often clumsy and have speech problems. it can be a lifelong issue.

branson has been slow to develop his speech and ability to know how to put into words what he's thinking. he is very clumsy and is able to stretch beyond what is considered "normal". jaxon is the opposite where his problems are the upper and branson's are the lower. there are many things that could cause these problems and it's hard to determine exactly what they are. genetics play a role and the most common predicted reason for hypotonia is CP (cerebral palsy). we know for a fact neither one of the boys have that. so other than genetics the only possible cause i can conclude is the massive amounts of drugs i was given during pregnancy with both. i was given terbutaline and steroids with both. with jaxon i was given terbutaline, procardia, steroids and magnesium. what possible lasting effects could these drugs have had on my children? no one seems to know but i think i do. it also seems that hypotonia affects boys and girls are the carrier. no one else in my entire family has this problem. they don't have preterm labor and pregnancy problems, small children, fast deliveries or children having problems after they are born. i am the only one in the family with this. no one else in the entire family!! the worst thing i probably do during my pregnancies is drink dr pepper like it's going out of style. so why does this only affect me & my babies?

it makes many other questions arise to me that didn't make sense years ago but are ever so slowly making more and more sense. but that's a blog i'll save for later. jaxon has his 9 month appt next wednesday and i am 100% certain he will be run through a series of tests and be in physical therapy before the end of the month. even with branson being born early and adjusting his gestational age he was still sitting up and holding a bottle by 9 months (adjusted 7 months) but his problem was the lower extremities and jaxon's seems to be the upper. i just wished something or someone could give me answers as to why. but at least they are both happy, healthy just physically delayed. and did i mention happy? you'll never find a happier baby and i mean ALL the time happy. and "they" say the 2nd child is terrible. guess that's their's because it's certainly not mine. neither of mine are "terrible", they listen. but that is called parenting. i know a few who should probably try it. but yet again, that's for another blog. i'm just having mixed emotions. he's 9 months old, so much closer to being 1 which is a great milestone in it's self but other milestones aren't even met yet.