Processing

I took J-man to the doctor today to have a follow-up strep test, which revealed that he is, indeed, a carrier. No big surprise there, right? He's had strep 4 times since February! The course of action for now is Clindamycin for 10 days, and that's supposed to knock it out of there. We'll go back to the doctor in 2 weeks and have him re-tested. If he's still positive then the next step is a tonsillectomy. There's something so unsettling about considering any sort of surgery for your baby. Yes, I know that a surgeon can probably perform the procedure with his eyes closed and one hand tied behind his back, but still... it's surgery, and it's my baby, and it rattles me.

And while we're on the subject of being rattled...

I also talked with his doctor about his motor skills, the testing we're going through with the school board, and what her opinion was about it. She's referring us to a neurologist for evaluation, and lightly mentioned that there's a possibility that he has a defect in his corpus callosum, which is the band of tissue that joins the two hemispheres together. Sounds scary, but she assures me that it's really not a big deal and that with some special services, he'll be able to do fine in school and life.

So, the proper paperwork has been submitted to the insurance company for the referral, and I'll be calling next week to get an appointment with the neurologist. They'll most likely schedule an MRI. Yikes!

It's a lot to swallow. I came home and did a little reading about this whole corpus callosum thing, and here's a blurb:

"Signs and symptoms of ACC and other callosal disorders vary greatly among individuals. However, some characteristics common in individuals with callosal disorders include vision impairments, low muscle tone (hypotonia), poor motor coordination, delays in motor milestones such as sitting and walking, low perception of pain, delayed toilet training, and chewing and swallowing difficulties. Laboratory research has demonstrated that individuals with ACC have difficulty transferring more complex information from one hemisphere to the other.[4] They also have been shown to have some cognitive disabilities (difficulty in complex problem solving) and social difficulties (missing subtle social cues), even when their Intelligence Quotient is normal."

Umm, yeah, so if a paragraph could be written to sum up J-man, that's probably it. Scratch the vision impairment, though. As far as we can all tell, his eyes work fine.

In the meantime I'm supposed to go through and gather as much info as I can for the neurologist-- things like when he reached milestones like sitting, walking, talking and also any significant family history of abnormalities. Umm, yeah, it could be a long list! :) All joking aside, I've got a lot to process and try not to worry incessantly over.