Jack is one and a half today.

As every parent knows time seems to shift into hyper-speed once you become a parent. That being said, when you’ve got a child recovering from brain injury or in rehab time can also feel like an eternity. When you’re waiting for those improvements. On that note:

Jack is four-point crawling (hands and knees crawling) all over the place these days. He only seems to revert to a commando crawl when he’s tired or straight-up being a goof. Like today in physio.

Other improvements we’ve seen in Jack in the last month:

• he is pulling to stand a lot now, although he sort of rolls over his feet and locks his legs then gets stuck so it’s something we’re actively working on.
• his left hand is opening more freely now.
• occasionally seeing him grasp or play with something two-hands although this continues to be a big focus for us.
• increased babbling – more “words” and of course the singing… (I’ll try and capture it for a story on the Boy Who Breathed Again’s Instagram account). It may very well be the damn cutest thing you ever saw.

Goals we have still include more two-handed play, building strength and dexterity in his left hand, improving his balance and pull-to-stand method, and “cruising” the furniture (or stepping along furniture).

Jack had a respiratory infection a couple of weeks ago which sent me into a bit of a tail-spin of anxiety. Matt and I have both noticed now that Jack is stable our own trauma seems to be creeping to the surface. I think that’s partly why it’s been hard for me to post updates as often. It’s two-fold really. First, now that we’re home and surrounded by our support system we get to debrief and give updates a lot more in person. (I realize there are plenty of people who care about Jack and have supported us who don’t get these in-person updates.) Plus writing these updates was therapeutic for me and now it seems like it takes a lot of effort for me to unpack some of this and brings with it pretty heavy flashbacks and emotions. I’ve started counselling through the brain injury program which I hope will help with the anxiety.

We had our initial meeting with the Biomedical team at BC Children’s Hospital yesterday to investigate whether Jack may have an underlying metabolic condition that could have played a role in the lesions found in his basal ganglia. This will also determine whether he needs to continue receiving the vitamin therapy. The doctor there will be coordinating with the doctors in Germany to get the genetic results and figure out an action plan from that point forward. We now also have a requisition in place for a follow-up MRI. The doctor we met with was thrilled with how well Jack was doing given the reports she had read from Germany. In her words, “he’s perfect.”

We happen to think so too.

Happy 18-months little lion!