A little bit of everything

I realized I have not written in about a month where does the time go?  Hayden has been a busy little guy. He finished his second year in preschool and is already back in summer school for three weeks. He also ended his baseball season in the beginning of June. Hayden loved baseball so much and we are very sad the season is over. However, he was very pleased that he received a trophy on his very last game. We proudly display the trophy with his Special Olympic medals on a shelf in his bedroom. Every night Hayden must say goodnight to his trophy. He has been having so much fun already this summer. Pretty much every night he is outside playing with his neighborhood friends.  This honestly melts my heart. He use to ask every day to go outside and play with his friends. I was so worried the kids next door would not want to play with him because he cannot run around but to my surprise this just was not true. They come and ring our doorbell and ask for Hayden to come outside to play. I love that he has friends and I love that he can be a typical four year old boy playing outside at night. He might not be able to run around and chase them but boy can he crawl fast and play tag. He can certainly stand in his walker and play basketball. He can play in the sandbox with them and blow bubbles. I cannot tell you how much this makes my heart happy. I am very fortunate that children today have compassion and do not see a difference. They just see Hayden who is funny and they do not mind Hayden cannot walk. They gladly explain to children that do not know Hayden that he has a "walking problem" but it is OK because he is our friend. I love love love this.

Now, onto the doctor dilemma. I know I last posted we were thinking of taking Hayden to John Hopkins. Well, after much debate and chat with family I decided NO. NO more testing. I think what got me started on the testing bandwagon again was his doctors. I know they mean well, but they make me feel like I have not done enough. Like I should be doing more, testing more, researching more but in fact I need to be doing just what we are doing. We are being a family, we are going on vacation, we are playing outside, we are swimming, and we are just taking one day at a time. Yes, Hayden still does not really have an "official" diagnosis. Maybe one day we will figure it out, but for now we know Hayden will accomplish whatever he is meant to accomplish. A diagnosis would not change that for him. We have one more major appointment this month. We are going back to Dr. O'Reilly because Hayden now is of age to test for vestibular dysfunction. I feel like something is "off" here he just does not have any balance. He does not know where his body is in space. This would be at least helpful to know this is what is causing his balance concerns. I do not know what it will mean if we find this out but it certainly will be helpful. Well, sorry for the late catch up and brief post. I will try to write more again soon.