Speech Therapy Day

Thursdays are Speech Therapy days for Havana! In all cognitive, social, and motor skills Havana is either in her age range or above average, but her speech is so delayed she has the verbal communication of a 6-9 month old. That really breaks my heart. Granted, she is GREAT at communicating with us through the use of sign language and the fact that we understand her grunts and such. But, when they actually put a number on it (6-9 months) it makes my heart sad to think of her having such a delay. I wonder how much of her heart she can't share with us. If you ask her to point to a certain object either on herself or in a book - she can do that - so she knows things, but can't express things to us. Sometimes I just want to cry. However, we are doing all we can with her and have seen lots of improvements in just the past month. Anyway, I was a little nervous about this meeting - only her second with our speech therapist down here (who is awesome!) and just because of how sad I get when I think that Havana actually has to have therapy. Well, the Lord was amazing today and really encouraged my heart through our speech therapy session!

Our therapist, Elizabeth, is AMAZING! She was so encouraging towards me with Havana and even called me a "dream mom" and she said she could tell a difference in Havana since last week based on some of the things we were working on with her. She was also very complimentary of Havana (and Jonah too!). Havana warmed right up to her and loved spending an hour playing with her. She was even putting several signs together in order to communicate in a sentence and was making sounds when prompted by the end of the session. Elizabeth certainly has a way with Havana... and with me... she is very good and so encouraging that I was left feeling confident instead of sad. I think I'll look forward to Thursdays now.

Per Elizabeth's advice from last week, we've started doing "Mat Time" twice a day with Havana. This is supposed to help her attention span. We bought a Dora area rug and twice a day I tell her it is time for "Mat time" so she sits on her mat with her back to the wall and then I pick out a toy that she has to play with for three minutes. By the end of the three minutes, she is usually crying trying to get past me to play with something else, but I make her sit back down and play with the one toy or book I had picked out. Hopefully soon we can start increasing it to five minutes or so per toy. But, in today's therapy session, she did sit and play with the puzzles that Elizabeth had much better than she did last week, so I guess it is working.

That was the main excitement of today. I was able to sleep in until 10am - that is when Jason and Havana woke me up with breakfast in bed. So sweet... and humbling. Every since we have had Jonah, Jason gets up every morning with havana (she usually wakes up around 8:30). However, for the past three weeks, Jonah has been sleeping through the night so I don't really have any excuse for not getting up with havana, but Jason still willingly get up with her and then I just wake up when Jonah needs to eat (usually between 9-10am). Before Jonah was born, I was always the one to wake up with H and if Jason slept in a lot, I would find myself a little grumpy at him for it. If I ever asked him to get her up - he would certainly do so - but if I didn't, I would just get her up and them play with her until he woke up and would silently be upset that he always got to sleep in. And yet, here is my husband, on week 9 of working outside the home AND waking up with havana (last night he got home from work around 2:30am) and instead of being resentful towards me for sleeping in - he makes me breakfast in bed! What an example of Christ for me... I am going to do my best to remember this day and try and start letting him sleep in and instead of wondering "how long is daddy going to sleep?" I'll say, "I hope he sleeps a long time, he deserves it."

Personally, I know I sometimes try to play a "martyr" role. It is something I have to watch with myself because that is a personality trait that I DO NOT want... I'll say things like "I have to do everything." That's why I would get so upset with Jason for sleeping in, I would think I had to ALWAYS get up in the morning and do EVERYTHING. Which is not true, he helps out more than most husbands, but that martyr syndrome comes into play. Jason doesn't have that in him at all. So to see the way he handles me sleeping in every morning (responding in love and with breakfast in bed) is clearly and example of the personality traits that I DO want in my life. I'm thankful for a husband who loves Jesus so much that is helps him love me so well!

Moving on...

Jason loved the Monkey bathroom theme I picked out! I love that we have toys and juvenile things all over the house. I'm so happy being a mommy. We bought a Picnic Table today for havana - now she has a place to color and play as well as room for friends to sit with her for lunch or dinner. We're having two different play dates tomorrow - one at the science museum in the AM and then some friends coming over for dinner. So, best be going to bed so I can be rested and ready to go in the AM. This is the 2nd night in a row Jonah was asleep by 9pm -- would LOVE that to be his new bedtime!!!