It seems a little hard to believe, but it's been nearly a year since the small Chinese boy had his palette repair surgery. Today, Monday April 22nd was the "one-year" check-up for that.
His appointment was for 8:15 this morning so good ol' Aunt Molly stayed overnight at our house last evening so she could get up and get Robby to school since we'd be long gone by that point. It seems that must have gone well, because he was there when I went to pick him up at 4. :-)
So we left the house this morning around 6am and arrived at the hospital in Iowa City right about 8am. Perfect. So we go and get checked in and Caleb is doing remarkably well when they call his name. Last year when they would call his name, he would just lose it at that point and start crying. We call this MAJOR progress!
We take him back for the hearing test... no go, he has wax built up in his ears and the left one is not showing much drum movement on their fancy little machine. Out of that room we go around to a different hallway to have his ears cleaned out.
He crawls up on the big mechanical patients seat and has a definite look of concern on his face, but, he's not crying!
So a couple of young docs come in and use some various tools on his ears to extract the wax. Once they had pulled a compact car sized wad of wax out of each ear, they sent him on his way.
Off to the speech therapist. This was the best part of multi-hour visit today. That doc sat with him and went thru a series of photos having Master C tell him what they were, colors, how many and that sort of thing. The doc said he was amazed at how much progress Caleb had made in the last year, especially for a kiddo getting his palette fixed "later" in life and only having it done a year ago. The doc even said, "wow!". So that was a good report.
We saw the orthodontists over there as well and they took xrays of his
teeth and gum lines, taught mom and dad a few things about making sure
he brushes better and explained piles of things to us in sometimes
repetitive detail.
Away from there we trot, on down to see another doc. We spend some time with her and get the low-down on what comes next for the boy.
Oh boy, what comes next is NOT going to be to Calebber's liking.
Without going into too much detail as to spoil my boys h.i.p.p.a. rights, he will be busy with various doctors, dentists and surgeons over the next year. Caleb doesn't understand it all at this point so we'll likely take it one visit at a time with him as to not overwhelm his pretty little head.
He's a healthy, smart little boy with a fantastic personality and smile to match it but we'll gladly welcome all prayers and well wishes as he enters phase two of cleft repairs.
Finally, we get back to the hearing tests. The ears checked out mostly good as well.
And finally, four hours after we started, we get to leave and oh buddy does Caleb have an extra spring in his step now!
We stopped at some river front restaurant for lunch and he was happy boy all over again. He napped nearly all the way from Coralville to Altoona as far as the interstate is concerned. So now that we've gone to pick up Robby from school, I have Robby, who always wants to do about 30 things at once when he gets home, and Caleb who slept for 3.5 hours in the car today both teamed up against a tired ol' Daddy!
Mom's at school listening to 4 hours of nursing lecture, so quite frankly, I think I have it easy!
That's all the update from here... No pictures because I forgot to grab the camera.
Oh! And one funny thing that happened was when the dude taking the 3D picture of one the cuter little Chinese dudes ever, asked where we were from. We've learned to just reply Des Moines, as it's easier than explaining Pleasant Hill or Altoona... Anyway, once Momma answered that we were from Des Moines, the fella responded with another logical question; "Hmmmm, Hawkeye's or Cyclones?". In an instant, all three of us answered, I said, "Both." Mom said "Hawkeyes" and Caleb exclaimed, "HAWKEYE'S!!" with his tiny little fist in the air.
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