Appointed meetings

Now that all of Sophie Kate's parties are behind us and we seem to be recovering from all the excitement of turning one, I can take a moment and catch ya'll up on what has been going on behind the scenes.  Last Friday, we found out that Sophie has another ear infection, yeah the count is up to 4 now, so that is the magic number for getting to see the ENT (ear, nose and throat doctor).

Sophie Kate saw him on Wed. (Nov. 11), and no surprise to us, told us that Sophie needed tubes put in her ears.  She still had the infection in her right ear and also had fluid behind her left ear.  As I have said before, Jacob also had to have tubes put in his ears and this was his same problem, this fluid behind the ears constantly whether or not there was an ear infection.  Well, it affected Jacob's hearing and speech development, so we certainly want to be on top of this with Sophie Kate.  She doesn't need things to be any more difficult on her than they already are.

Sophie's surgery is scheduled for Tues. Nov. 25.  The doctor is also going to do a laryngoscope, which means he is just going to be taking a look at her airway, making sure that everything looks ok there.  Yes, that would be two days before Thanksgiving, so hopefully everything will go well and she will be back to her smiling self that same day.  They will be doing her procedure downtown at Children's and have given us very good odds of going home that same day, we were told there is a small chance we may have to stay overnight for various reasons that I won't bore ya'll with now.  I am only thinking good thoughts, though.  I am not even taking a bag with us that morning, so take that!

I have to share another encounter with ya'll just b/c I think it is so neat.  I met with one of the nurse practitioners that works with our ENT doctor and of course over our conversation of her getting to know SK, she told me that she too has a daughter with cp and that she is 12 years old.  We exchanged email addresses and talked about different therapies that each other had tried and some of the triumphs and setbacks that both of our daughters have had.  It was a great conversation and she was just precious.  In fact we talked so long that the doctor was actually waiting to come in, I love that, but truth be known I would have rather continued talking to her.  Conversation just erupts and barriers fall when you are talking to someone who knows exactly what you are going through.

I personally have not been ready to go out and join support groups and meet these parents and see these children.  I don't want to be a part of this group and I do not want to see the future.  I absolutely know that I am not ready for that right now.  It has been really neat though to see how God has slowly trickled them into my life.  First was the nurse I met that night at Children's South Afterhours Clinic, whose daughter had just gotten a gtube (the same feeding tube that SK has now), I still talk to her.  Second, was the group of girls I met at the beach, remember, one of them has a special needs child.  We talked a lot in that short time.  She lives right here in Homewood.  Then there was the girl I met at "The Chick" whose son has exactly the same things going on as Sophie and now this nurse at the doctor's office.  I have learned so many different things from them, they have each shown me different perspectives for looking at things and different ways to cope and deal with life everyday.  Praise God for these meetings, they are so clearly His hands at work here, I am blown away.

Wow, after listing all those people that I've met, it seems like I am growing a little group of people with special needs children around me, you know I am totally against that as I have stated earlier (hee hee not really), but I wouldn't trade meeting any of them for anything.  Some people would call those meetings or encounters random or coincidence, but I believe they were divinely appointed meetings that God arranged just for us.  Whew, I'm glad I wasn't late!