Another week has passed and things continue to go well. Nick's levels have remained steady and despite his appetite pretty much being non existent, thanks to my "magic" shakes his weight has been maintained too.
Yesterday marked a great feat for Nick and a very proud moment for me. Nick suited and laced up and worked with a goalie coach who was unaware that he had cancer. With the exception of needing to rest because of his heart racing he was amazing.
The other boys are all doing good too. Maxwell is loving pre-school and has become a social butterfly. My shy and anti-social mama's boy is now making friends, humming little tunes and is even busting out the occasional self taught karate move for the amusement of strangers. On a fantastic note we FINALLY got a surgery date for his myringotomy and tube placement surgery in hopes of repairing his 80% hearing loss.
Kurt is doing great at school and today I registered him for basketball which is something that he has wanted to play for a while. This program is not specifically geared towards children with special needs so I dont know how smoothly things are going to go but if we dont try then we'll never know. I'll admit that I am really nervous about him playing with developmentally at par children, oh the situations that I can invision arising....... But I suppose if I want to see my children fly then I first must be willing to watch them leap.
Riddick is struggling with his life skills and is making poor choices resulting in him being repromanded more then usual. Most often even setting expectations of a four year old are too high for him and he is certainly testing my patience as a mother. Its trial and error and I have used every tactic that I have, I've called in behavioural therapists, consulted with the pediatrician, started medication, attended workshops, used IBI/ABA techniques, positive reinforcement and negative consequence. I am at the moment out of ideas but I know that eventually we will find the magic key that will unlock some fantastic gains for Riddick and until then we will just keep trucking along. Riddick also has an upcoming appointment with the eye specialist to see about treatment options for his worsening nystagmus and strabismus, maybe better vision will be the start of improvement.
As for me... well I've been pretty busy myself. I've lost a couple pounds and worked on developing some style (which is harder then I thought it would be). I've participated in a review from the parental advisory board of POGO in hopes of improving pediatric cancer care, assisted in a university students research project about blogging and cancer, have been brainstorming how to better promote my company www.treasure-beyond-measure-photography.blogspot.com and most recently was interviewed by a reporter with the Toronto Star about my thoughts and feelings about the notion of IVF treatments being refused to overweight women http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1057248.
While life is not great it is better then it could be and so each and every moment of each and every day I count my blessings. This blog was started as a method of relaying to friends and family what was happening so that I wouldnt have to retell the same story over and over and hopefully maintain my emotions but its become so much more. I never would have imagined that strangers would want to read about my life as there are many others with lives more worthy of being converted to text then mine but yet my words are read in multiple countries everyday.
I am always thankful for the messages of strength, praise and love and I feel very touched that so many people have reached out to me. I'm not a superhero I'm just an average girl who lives a not so average life and this blog has made me feel like there are so many people rooting for me and wanting to see positive things happening in my life and the lives of my family. Since things are going well for us I am hoping to lighten the mood of my next blog post so lets play a little game of ask Cassandra. Send me any question that you would like to ask me and my next blog entry will answer them all!
Until next time;
Cassandra
nkrm@live.com
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