Head,Shoulders, Knees and Toes, Knees and Toes

Peas are not Audrey's favorite

Since our last post, Audrey has seen her clubfoot doctor, her pediatrician, her ENT and her pulmonologist - the last two are brand new doctors. I hope that gives you a good indication as to why I haven't posted in a while... Uh Miss Brittney - your request for pictures and videos will be fulfilled momentarily. But let me just explain the reoccurring outfits... She can only wear outfits that button up the legs and we have about 7 of them, only 4 are for warmer weather.

Clubfoot Doctor = Dr. Lund. Audrey was about to go into her 5th cast, I believe, where we left off earlier this month. Well after 2-3 days of being in the cast her foot slipped and Dr. Lund told us to come in and we'll just put her into her shoes. I had to leave work after being there a couple of hours because he could only fit us in between his scheduled surgeries. He put her shoes on and when we got home her new shoes actually stayed on her feet!!! That means all of the effort Dr. Lund put in correcting them worked!!! Her right foot is perfect! Her left foot still has a lateral crease, however, when we gently stretch her foot it flattens out. It may be all in my head, but I think it's flattening out even more as she wears them. She's in them 23/7 for 3 months and we go back to see Dr. Lund 02/05. Hopefully he'll see some improvement or no change in her foot at all and he will not decide to put her back into casts.

Her new shoes - I have personalized them and will post photos of them next time.

You can see the lateral crease on her foot, this is a sign that it is atypical. Also, you can see her extra piggy-the one with leftovers, it's her second toe.

Here you can see how differently shaped both of her feet are...

Pediatrician = Dr. Porter. Everyone at Dr. Porter's office couldn't believe how big Audrey has gotten. I was actually able to carry her in on my hip (she's a hip baby now and I love it!!!) and not in her car seat. I am happy to announce that it had been exactly a month since we saw Dr. Porter last. He was so pleased with how well she's doing and how animated she has become since she had her shunt placed.
Now onto the stats of her 8 month check-up:
Weight: 19 lbs 8.5 oz
Length: 27 inches (same as last time...?)
Head Circumference: 47 3/4 inches (it was 47 1/2 at 6 months)
I raved about how well Audrey's doing at home, she's eating from a spoon, holds her own bottle or helps Mommy and Daddy hold her bottle, rolling over!!, head control is great. He noticed her eye/hand coordination was where it needed to be and was impressed that she had good aiming skills. He gave us a few techniques to work with her at home to build her leg and arm strength. He also wants to see her back at 10 months and sent us home with a goal to work on, he wants to see her bearing all her weight on her legs by 10 months.

She will only stay in her jumperoo for about 10 minutes before she gets tired and starts wheezing. We're hoping it will help in strengthening her legs over time.

ENT = Dr. Bauer. We went to see Dr. Bauer on our own interest. Audrey rubs her ears a lot and has had 2 ear infections. Also, we wanted to have a formal hearing test done to see if she has any hearing loss. At our visit, she saw an audiologist. She put this measuring device in each of Audrey's ears and the results weren't great... Her right ear had little movement and her left ear was flat. Dr. Bauer examined her and couldn't see anything in her ears from that ear thingy (I'm sure that's the medical term for it), felt her throat, looked up her nose and then attempted to look down her throat... I warned him that Audrey gags easily and as I said that up came Chuck all over my work clothes :0 Thanks Dr. Bauer! He requested that he take a look at her ears under a microscope and Audrey screamed while he was checking her right ear. He said she had a lot of fluid behind her ear and since Audrey was PO-ed, he assumed her left was the same. He thought she needed tubes put in and an Auditory Brainstem Response test (ABR). She had tubes put in today 01/22 and the ABR all under anesthesia. Tubal surgery lasted all of about 5 minutes and the ABR took almost an hour. The audiologist came out to discuss the findings and she was able to determine that Audrey has hearing loss in both ears. I sort of stopped listening to her after she confirmed it and said Audrey was a candidate for hearing aids, so I'm not sure what type of hearing loss it is... I'll find out at her check-up.

Is there anything more beautiful?

Pulmonologist = Dr. Schochet. Dr. Schochet saw Audrey on Monday 01/19. We were sent to him by our geneticist because she was concerned with the shape of Audrey's chest cavity and her breathing. She thought Audrey's chest wasn't properly proportioned and she was concerned that she doesn't have the lung capacity her body needs. Audrey has also been on breathing treatments since she was 6 months old because she pulls in real hard when she inhales and there are indentions under her rib cage. So... what did Dr. Schochet say... he isn't sure what's going on. She's thriving so what could it be? He ordered a swallow study to look for aspirations and reflux as well as a chest x-ray to see what her chest looks like. He ordered us to stop the breathing treatments since we didn't feel like they were working/benefiting her. We follow up with him in a month to go over the swallow study and the chest x-ray. I'm sorry that's really vague but since he can't give us an explanation yet, we can't give you one.

Look at that smile... and that Bow. She must know that Mommy has fun playing dress up!
Yeah that's right, I rolled over!!
Me and my Madi!

Here is a video of Audrey rolling... it's a little long because she was working really hard to get turned over. She did it all by herself with Mommy and Daddy encouraging her the entire time.