Carrots and Bananas

OK so Kimberlee had her first feeding last week Thursday. Back then she hardly ate her food since she didn't really know how to open her mouth and swallow.

Last night I was once again blown away by her when she ate an entire jar of carrots and 3/4 of a jar of bananas. She was going for it. I was seriously amazed. I could not believe she almost ate two jars of food. She was hungry.

I stopped the rice cereal all together now because she definitely hates it. She only had it once during her very first feeding and she never liked it after that. She literally locks her jaw and I was using the pacifier to get her to open her mouth and now she does not even go for that if it is rice cereal. So smart.

TEETH: Amazing progress

WOW!!! My Kimberlee has two teeth already. She is only 4 and a half months. She was laughing today and I saw something white in her mouth. It was a weird moment because I was eating mini marshmallows (I know I shouldn't be, but moving on) and my mind went on a crazy rambling thought 'howthemarshmallowsgotinhermouthandnothatisnotpossiblebutIseesomethinginthere..' you know what happens when thoughts just speed across your mind in nanoseconds.

Lo and behold, she has two teeth on her bottom gums. I was amazed, proud, shocked, excited. I rushed and called Kimani and Moms.

First GFCF Grocery Shopping

Well, I have drafted my first gluten-free/casin-free grocery list. We are not fully turned over, but we are closer than we were last week. right now, that is a good place to be. We are currently eating Gluten free pancakes in the morning and though I still feel the healthiness (Marisol that is for you darling :D) a few hours later we are getting quite used to them and as a matter of fact they taste pretty good.

Ok here is the current list:
Chicken (dark meat/breast)
mushrooms
red potatoes (it may come off later)
fresh garlic
pure maple syrup
bacon
hash browns (cascadian farms brand)
Hebrew National hot dogs
fritos
lays potatoes chips
cascadian french fries
board head lunch meats
tostitos chips
fresh fruit (apples, grapes, bananas, kiwi, etc)
fresh veggies
gfcf butter
safflower oil
rice milk
gfcf bread
distilled/balsamic vinegar
lemon juice
gfcf sour cream
gfcf mayo
spices need to be McCormick's (they are gfcf)
Heinz Ketchup

this is only the beginning and it is already looking like it may not be all that bad after all. I think we decided that we will hit the gluten and casin first and once we are comfortable with that diet we will then tackle the yeast/candida and then see how things look.

Four-month check up

During Kimberlee's four-month doctor's appointment last week here is what transpired:
*Kimberlee is now 14 lbs 23 inches.
*She is no longer in the petite range for length, she is nice and healthy.

Regarding her milestones:
*she is goo-gooing and noise-making as she should
*she is reaching and interacting right on par
*she is not however turning over. According to the doctor it is actually our fault because we are not giving her enough belly time and if she does not strengthen her upper body she will be delayed in flipping over and even crawling. So we have been giving her more belly time after Nemi goes to bed to avoid her getting unintentionally trampled.

Well, the good news is that on Sunday night (two nights ago) as Kimani and I were up late talking, Kimberlee got up to eat and decided to chill out with us for a while instead of going right back to bed and she actually turned over right there while hanging out with us. We were so excited and of course she did not do it again. It was fun that we got to witness it together.

Besides that we could start on the solids and at the next appointment she will get her ears pierced.

STEP 1: TRANSITION TO A HEALTHY DIET

Ok so. Now I am reading book #2, Eating for Autism to help me understand why I have to delete so much out of his diet and what I need to introduce.

It is a great book. It is teaching me to take it one step at a time. It has 10 steps in total. It says that for some kids it is not necessary to go through all 10 steps. One family may only need steps 1 - 3 and that will be sufficient while others have to do all 10 steps. In either case, you cannot skip steps and you have to start with step one.

STEP 1: TRANSITION TO A HEALTHY DIET

Basically it tells you that though the FDA has approved 24 different types of additives to foods called 'generally recognized as safe' (GRAS) there are 4 specific ones that dietitians, scientist and doctors are concerned with regarding how they effect children with disorders. Those four are: artificial colors, artificial flavors, artificial preservatives and artificial sweeteners.

yada yada yada... at the end of the day I have to read all labels and get rid of everything that has the four "bad" additives

Artificial colors: Artificial Color FD & C, US Certified Food Color, FD&C Blue No 1 (brilliant blue), Blue No 2 (indigotine), Green No 3 (fast green), Red No 40 (allura red) Red No 3 (erythrosine), Yellow No 5 (tartrazine), Yellow No 6 (sunset yellow)

Artificial Flavors: Monosodium glutamate (MSG), disodium inosinate, disodium guanylate.

Preservatives: Butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA), Butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT)

Artificial Sweeteners: Saccharin (Sweet'N Low), sucralose (Splenda), aspartame (NutraSweet and Equal)

Refined Sugar: Sugar, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup (HFCS)

Fat: Trans fat, partially hydrogenated oils

Ok so this is a very heavy step just to start with. Just for fun go into your pantry and put some items that may have one or more of these ingredients and you will get an idea of the things we buy regularly that may have an effect on our Nemi... basically everything except the olive oil.

We have a long road ahead, but we are excited and looking forward to it. We just ran out of bread and today I will buy autism appropriate bread and I am excited... weird... who am I becoming with all this talk about health food. I am the queen of junk food... ok well, we are going down this road and not looking back.

Mommy's Healing from Autism

Last week I went to the library and rented out the book Louder than Words, by Jenny McCarthy. I had heard of the book several times in the past, but this day I felt an urgency to get it.

From the moment I got in my car with the stinking book, I began to choke and tear up. That day I read only the introduction and the preface in the car and cried my eyes out. I told Kimani, "I think this is gonna be a hard book for me to read." So I waited until after mother's day weekend to read the rest of it.

Monday after work, I began to read it and I was completely consumed from page one. By the time I got half way through the book I was sobbing uncontrollably from the depth of my soul. It was about 2 in the morning and I was trying not to wake up Kimani, but I could not hold in the tears and the waterfall was coming strong.

I cried for a long while. Kimani held me tight and prayed for me that I may fall asleep and I had to literally force myself to sleep. As long as I was awake I was crying. I felt all the years of pain rushing out of me. I had been holding back these tears for five years and through this book I felt release.

For so long, I did not allow myself to feel sorry for myself nor for Nemi. I always treated him like a 'typical' boy because I believe one day he would be.

From the moment I realized my boy was a bit delayed I tried to fight off my anger, towards the world; the doctors for their slow diagnosis; myself for giving him the damn vaccines; at him for not snapping out if it and even God for making my perfect boy Nemi go through all this. Everyone was to blame, but I held it all in.

I have always hated that I could not freely visit with friends or family because of how at times he is treated, or how unconsciously they look at him with sad, pitiful eyes. I still hate it, but never dealt with it. He is hyper and he tends to break everything he holds on to, so when I go visit people I think I may have to replace something expensive, I hope he does not break anything.

I hate the way I felt at the end of the day. Putting him to bed at times was the best part of my day and I thought I was being such a horrible Mommy. But dealing with an autistic child all day long wears on you. I was getting more and more tired and more impatient.

I never thought I would be such an 'angry beast' with my kids (or anyone at all for that matter), and be so stinking loud and such a screamer and lashing out with spankings left and right for all kinds of things. I hate that Datnee - I hated myself everytime I did it, but did not know how to stop. After pleading with the Lord to help me stop, I now understand why. I was not dealing with my emotioal health and it was all coming out the gaping whole in my heart.

This book gave me words to express the hurt I have been feeling. It gave me freedom to love Nemi where he is and not look to 'fix' him into a 'typical' child. I love Nemi with all my heart, but I felt like this autism has stolen a freedom in our relationship that now I realize I could still have.

This book allowed me to get rid of the emotional weight I had been carrying for the past 5 years and know that I need to gird up my loins and continue the fight for my boy.

It opened my eyes to know that though Nemi has been improving by leaps and bounds I had the blinders on because of his progress. I was so proud of him, I was slacking off a bit. I thought that with therapy alone he would get to where he needs to be, but I was fooling myself and the Lord had to open my eyes.

The next morning I was ready to stay in bed all day since every time I opened my eyes I would cry. It was about 12:30pm when Kimani came home for lunch and I was still in bed. When I saw him walk in the bedroom I felt like he actually picked me up and peeled me off the bed. It was so great to see him. I was planning to be in bed all day long if it meant that I would not be awake long enough to cry. He came in and gave me the strength I needed to get up and continue my day. Even better he told me he took the rest of the day off because he felt in his heart I was not well and I needed him for more than a half hour... Now that is God at work...

I wanted to just lay in his arms and cry some more, but I held it all in and we went to Barnes & Noble and got a couple of books on the Gluten/Casin free diet and we decided we are all going to switch over to this diet. Our boy needs something more than all the wonderful therapy he is getting and the Lord is waking me up to take the next steps.

For Nemi, I believe deep down that his current diet is not helping him get to the next level just yet. So we are surrendering it all to the Lord and believe He is going to give us the strength, taste buds and resources to switch over to this diet for our Nemi.

Here is the next battle to fight in order to win the war. I feel strong, I feel restored. God has been good and we are ready to keep moving forward. Keep praying for us, we wait for nothing less than a miracle.

Nehemiah James. We love you with all our hearts, and Mommy and Daddy are going to keep doing what ever it takes to help you get better, just like you pray every night. Jesus is hearing your prayers and He is going to answer them.

This past weekend

I love blogging about our weekends. It is so much fun. It seems like I cannot get to the computer until Wednesday to get it all out though..

Well, on Saturday, we went to our friend's baby shower and it was just a delight. That word sounds so weird, but it was. They are Nehemiah's godparents and are expecting a boy in mid June. We cannot wait to meet him. We are so excited they are having a boy I feel I am having another boy... That is how exciting it is.

Well, we got there kind of late, because I was working (I had called ahead to inform them), but luckily we got there just before gift opening. Everyone had eaten and we ate before heading out so it was perfect. They got SOOOOO MUUUCCCCHHH stuff we literally had an intermission from the gifts to cut the cake and then gift opening resumed. It was awesome to see how the Lord is blessing, we were happy to be there. After that we decided to head over to their house for more chit chat and coffee and ice cream and we had a great time. Nemi behaved very well given that he was three hours past his bed time. I had packed his jammies and a pull up and in the car he knocked right out.

Sunday, it was mother's day and I thought that a year ago we had just found out we were expecting Kimberlee and it was such a nice memory.

Kimani said he had to go out and I thought he was going to Dunkin Donuts to get us a nice morning snack, but instead he surprised me with and entire outfit. He got me a dress, earrings, necklace, bracelet and shoes. He hands it over to me and says this is what you are wearing today. Let me tell you, I looked good. I got so many compliments at church and everytime I made sure they know who dressed me that day. It was so beautiful to dress in what he wanted me to wear... he could not keep his eyes off me.

So we head down to Brooklyn to see his Mom for mother's day and we had a blast there too. We had not seen them in a while since we turned over the youth group and we missed each other sorely. It was almost necessary for us to be together again.

Again, we had a late night because we ended up talking to his parents about all sorts of things (including marriage bumps) and ended up leaving at 11pm again. Nemi was great though. I was so glad my boy tolerated such late nights.

We had a great weekend over all and next weekend we are looking forward to being with our friends Marisol and Javier. We have not hung out in a while and we need to fill our friendship cup, so we are looking forward to that.

Weird weekend

So it is kind of strange to report that we did nothing this past weekend. I mean nothing. well, I went to work Saturday (someone has to make some money here) and Kimani went out with his friend (and someone has to spend it - ja ja).

Sunday we just went to church and back and that was it.

It is sad to write such a trite report being that this is our fun filled summer, but it felt GOOD to do nothing and sit home - even in that we just enjoyed each other's company as the kids did their thing.

It was a good weekend after all.

Herbs today - gone tomorrow

Well, you knew this was coming. Sooner of later I had to tell you all about how my plants are doing.

Not too long ago they were in critical condition. I attempted to move the plants from the kitchen to the front window to give them more sun and half way there.... they fell.

Ahhh!!!!

Oh goodness! that was the end of them - or so I thought. I left them in the kitchen in hopes to reviving them and I think they may have a chance. Just in case the first batch does not make it out of intensive care, I purchased more seeds for round two.

Brother and Sister

My children are really the joy of my life.

Nemi brought me to tears recently when he grabbed Kimberlee's hands and told her, "up, up up" the way daddy does it to get her to lift her head. Since she was on my lap I actually lifter her up on her feet. She was loving it. The more she smiled the more he did it. It was such a sweet moment, just the two of them interacting with each other.

Days later Kimberlee brought me to tears when we were in the car and she was fussy. Nemi put the pacifier in her mouth and though she cannot fully control the movements of her arms and hands she reached over for him and grabbed his hands. (sob, sob) it was so beautiful to see that. So innocent and loving. The way only a brother and sister could be. The older trying to make the baby smile and the baby saying thank you to her brother with a simple touch.