Elias’ Development

We have decided to create a new regular segment to the blog discussing Elias’ development. He is really beginning to catch fire and rapidly conquer tasks that once challenged him. We thought it would be great to isolate these accomplishments and create a self resource to chronicle the things he is doing. This will be especially useful as we transition from our current therapies here to our new home. It will take some time to get all of that coordinated and resumed. We are not sure how often we will do this yet, once a week may be too often, but then again at the rate he has been doing things that may be best. Regardless, it will be fun.

Elias has developed a fascination with paper. Not so much with crumpling up and playing with it, but looking at it. We first noticed it in the E.R. last Monday when we asked for a copy of the CBC numbers. When the nurse brought it in Mommy was reading it while holding Elias. He was so intent on it, almost as if he was reading it. This was a simple black and white computer printed sheet, nothing special or eye-catching. At home in the mornings I usually read the nursing notes for the night before while holding him. Again I noticed how intent he was focused. We progressed to placing books in front of him with pictures, but not doing the whole reading to him thing. Just laying it out on a desk while we held him in a sitting position. He started reaching and touching, which we know is typical, but for Elias he had never done this when we read to him. Then he figured out how to lift the page. Today he progressed with the therapist who was watching him to turning the pages. He was very excited and smiled when he saw the new pictures in front of him. It was amazing to watch.

Elias continues to build his core strength and is able to at time for brief moments support himself sitting. We think he is close to being able to sit on his own. He can pull himself up into a sitting position while we hold him from as far back as 3/4 way on his back, cradled in our arm. When you watch you can see it is all abs doing the work. After a nap yesterday while encouraging him to raise his arms to signal me he wanted up he tried to pull himself up from flat on his back. Not quite ready for that strength wise, but I was impressed he was trying. It demonstrates that he is developing the desire to do it. We have learned quickly with Elias that when he decides to do something, he is going to do it!

He is really starting to develop the separation anxiety too. He was also reluctant to go to his therapist this morning as she tried to take him from my arms. He has never done that before. He usually jumps right into her arms, but something clicked today for some reason. It was cute because while he would play with her and do things as soon as she would put him down he would roll over to where I was and put his arms up, saying hold me! She was also impressed with how much attention he is focusing on our hands as we sign to him. We are using several basic signs right now and he is starting to figure out it is communication. We feel like he understands EAT now and responds more accurate to Mommy and Daddy Signs. So he is recognizing that we are doing something to him with our hands and while we do not expect a response he tends to give relative cues that he just might be beginning to understand the correlation.