Blindsided

Today started out as a disheartening day. We took Alex to the neurologist for his 6 month checkup and things just didn’t go the way I had hoped they would. I went into the appointment with a positive outlook, hoping Dr. Trock would be impressed with Alex’s progress, have some positive feedback….but he didn’t.

This was our third appointment with him and I have been very pleased with his demeanor in the past 2 visits, but not today. He seemed off and even a little rude. He barely spoke to us. He sat there and was waiting for us to just do all the talking and to fill in the blanks. I just don’t know about these Doctors.

At our first visit, he seemed positive saying Alex would walk and the main part of his brain that was affected was his motor area. Cognitive and Vision appeared to be fine. Now, he’s not sure how well he will walk and when I asked about learning and speech delays, he told me there is a good chance of it since that is what the statistics show. I mentioned how he said the MRI showed that the cognitive area seemed unaffected and he told me that sometimes it’s harder to see that on the scan. It was as if he was taking back everything he had said up to that point. I felt like I had been blindsided.

I know that all of these things are in question because Alex does have CP and it seems to be more on the moderate end of the scale even though I want to believe it is mild. Needless to say, I left the appointment upset, frustrated and feeling like we totally had a setback. I wondered if I should change Doctors as well.

Eric and I talked about it and in talking things out I realized that this Doctor doesn’t know Alex at all. He doesn’t work with him on a weekly or even daily basis. All he knows is his medical history and that’s why he only responds to us in medical terms and statistics. I don’t want to compare Alex to the statistics. Why should I? He is his own little person and he is capable of so much and I believe in him because I have seen him make progress.

Yes, I wish Alex were able to do more, like sitting and crawling and standing and walking. But he can’t yet but it doesn’t mean that he won’t ever be able to do these things. He works harder than any 18 month old I know. It’s a lot of work for him to go through 6 hours of therapy a week and it’s frustrating to me that he still can’t control his muscle movements, but you know what….it doesn’t seem to bother him because he doesn’t know any different. This whole process is 100 times harder on me emotionally than it probably is on him physically. This is who he is and this is what he knows. It’s hard for me to understand because I don’t have the issues he has so I want to feel sorry for him, but he doesn’t care. He is just a beautiful boy who loves to smile and laugh at his crazy funny brother. He isn’t suffering, he is fully loved and taken care of and he will have a great life because we are all going to make sure of that.

Alex is going to do what he is going to do and I am not going to let any Doctor out there get me down. I wish I could see into the future to know what will come of all of this, but I can’t. We can only take one day at a time and hope and pray for the best. I will never stop believing in him.