Changes, adventures, and awarenesses...

Time has slipped past again.  What a wild awareness of how priorities can be switched, rearranged, and completely forgotten.  The last couple of weeks, my evenings have been spent fighting Liam to go to sleep.  He has been getting 90% asleep and then waking himself up or getting uncomfortable somehow leading to his eyes popping open and we start the dance all over.  A thought came to me the other night, a friend once shared she had read or heard that a child starts to break away from a connected consciousness and starts to become sovereign around two.  Liam is turning two next month and I am curious if we are getting to witness this in action.  Plus, there is another heart beat in our home now, and change is brewing.  What a gift to have this little being remind me to ground, breathe, and relax, if I get wired, he feeds on that and we end up with pinches, tears, and a fussiness that is usually not present.  I laugh because each time I think I am getting a hang of this mommy thing, the rules change, and I am at square one again, thank goodness, I am always up for an adventure!

The last month has been an adventure in gathering information, collaborating with doctors and health care teams, passing information to coordinators, and taking time to allow for guidance to unfold.
There hasn't been much movement in getting Liam into the feeding therapy other than we have 3 letters of medical necessity that have been given to the DDD coordinator and we have requested his primary care provider to refer Liam back to the feeding evaluation.  Each time I think we are done with this feeding therapy, another door opens and in we go!

With this new little being, we are wanting to gather information about how this little one is doing.  I was confused with a blood test thinking that I was receiving a full panel of screens but in reality it was just for Down Syndrome.  As I wrote before, the fear of a child having Down Syndrome is minimal since we know the joy that Liam has brought us and we already have connections to support a child with Down Syndrome so this screen wasn't exactly what we thought.  And then there has been so much information about how Iceland has almost a 0% Down Syndrome population due to genetic testing and terminating positive pregnancies and my heart drops.  All the false positives that were terminated and all the joy that is not present in our world.  I also understand there are huge burdens for some children with Down Syndrome, and isn't that a possibility for any child?  Being at Phoenix Children's Hospital I met mothers with 'typical' children diagnosed with terminal cancer who had been there for months, other conditions for frequent visits for testing or follow ups, therapies to be rehabilitated or habilitated.  I guess what comes to me is that there are no guarantees.  And why would one diagnosis be singled out to be terminated?  A friend shared, the fear of difference, could be a reason, and that makes so much sense to me.  My desire for adventure puts me in situations to meet differences, to stay curious, open minded, and open hearted, but some do not have that same thirst.  So with all of this news, I am trying to stay curious, not take the decisions of others personally and to truly enjoy the absolute joy we have in our home!

Oh and the joy we are experiencing right now!  Liam is growing by leaps and bounds.  His personality is blossoming each day and what a personality!  He is letting us know his likes and dislikes with laughs, pinches, signs, snubbing his nose, and faces.  His walking is getting steadier, he is starting to navigate thresholds going down, he has about 20 signs that he uses to communicate and each day there seems to be another one added.  Going out to public places, Liam has yet to meet a stranger, he loves high fives, 'knuckle bumps', and waves to any one and EVERYONE, even if the gesture is not reciprocated.  We are excited to find out how he does having a baby brother in January.

This week also marks a new journey for me personally.  I have been part of ASIS Massage Education as a teacher and today I had the privilege of graduating my last class.  Being pregnant, wanting to experience Liam's joys everyday, and being present for Sean, I have chosen to step away from ASIS.  This is one of multiple ways that an external identity has been sluffed away so that there can be more space for an authenticity to be present of 'being' instead of 'doing'.  The last 20 years, I have identified myself with what I do, and I would much rather have an identity of 'being' instead of 'doing'.  And after writing that I have to giggle, I will still continue to 'do' massage through this pregnancy until my body lets me know I need to rest.  I feel so grateful for the experience of working with new massage therapists, guiding them through personal explorations and learning so much about myself in the process.  I am excited to put all that I have taught others into practice in my own daily practice.  And the adventures continue!