It's felt like a really long week this week.

Tuesday, the older kids went back to school. This kicked off the daily drive-a-thons, homework projects and talk of tests and quizzes. Amanda even had a pop quiz in science when she got back after Easter vacation. I don't understand why, but apparently, the teacher felt it was important. No comment. Andrew also has exams this week after being off for Spring Break last week. I can't wait until summer when I don't have to have their school stuff hanging over my head. Even thought I've distanced myself from the responsibility of it getting done, it weighs heavily on my mind.

Zoe also had her NICU follow-up appointment on Tuesday.



This was really just nothing more than an after-thought in my mind. I know that I have mentioned her gait abnormalities in the past, but I have kind of been working to let go of some of my concerns for her. We were set up for an appointment in the cities with orthopedics and got a letter from them stating that intoeing is very common in young children and doesn't need to be evaluated unless it doesn't go away by the time a child is 8. So...Thomas and I canceled the appointment and decided to try and move past our fears.

At the NICU appointment though, the OT/PT person was not happy really with where Zoe is at developmentally with her motor tasks. Apparently, Zoe's motor *planning* is off or something. When she was younger, she had a weird way of crawling. Now, she has a weird way of going from standing to sitting, continues to show right-sided dominance (which I would not have guessed was a problem, but apparently she has shown handedness and a refusal to use the left hand for tasks since she started attending the follow-up clinic) and when she examined Zoe's gait by having her run up and down the hall, she took wide, awkward steps, her legs started buckling in and by the third pass, she had tripped herself. Right there...in front of the PT/OT specialist. Zoe is also a bundle of energy that is sometimes just frenzy. Tuesday was no exception and the PT person felt that it could be related to the difficulties Zoe has integrating her environment or something. Who knows. I'm not even sure that I buy into it all anymore. In any case, she wants her evaluated by PT again to see where we need to go. She is sending us outside of the system this time because the PT people here never followed up with us. The NICU doc suggested that Zoe was *borderline* on several of her tested tasks.

To me, this is becoming like an extension of the bad pregnancy and all of the ultrasounds that I had for her.... "this is wrong, that is wrong..." I just can't get myself worked up anymore. I feel numb to it all now, and really...I don't know whether to believe all of this anymore or not. There is a big part of me that wants to just skip the PT eval and move on.

The rest of this week has been a blur of kid's activities, get-togethers with friends and playdates for Alex (who has been on Spring Break).

We are all looking forward to the weekend as a chance to hang out and relax. Thomas has to round both days and so he won't be here and we're expecting snow. (ummm...yeah? ). I think I'll have to work a little harder to find my funny bone this weekend.

The good news is that we have had a few really nice days. I've been able to get outside and walk and enjoy the sunshine and fresh air. Even though snow is on the horizon, I KNOW that Spring is on its way![/quote]