The Tomatoes are doing great!
Tabitha crawls everywhere and has recently become obsessed with climbing people. She'll climb other objects but prefers people. She's been enjoying a good crawl over, grab hold, then she lifts onto her knees. Over the last week we've regarded this as her favorite position. But Tabitha, she is a-changin'. Knees aren't enough, now our eleven month old missy wants to be all the way up on her feet. And this girl is tall! She's still in the 50th percentile for height and weight for her actual age - we're only correcting for developmental assessment purposes - otherwise missy Tabitha is jamming along! How one tiny little-grape tomato born an entire trimester early can just catch up in a matter of months is beside me, but she sees to be doing it. And make no mistake, she's HUGE!! Depending on the article, manufacturer, and cut of clothing she can wear a size 18 months or a 3T, oh yes, I said a 3T!!
Jackson is still quite a bit smaller. Being a boy he is just barely on the chart, just. barely. But he's definitely growing and looks AMAZING. He still has trouble with ref1ux and with all of the food he eats has some terribly stinky spit ups. But he does eat, loves the solids and the ref1ux doesn't seem to hinder his sleep. His crawling is less traditional, it's more of a seal crawl then a hands and knees crawl. It seems to take quite a bit of work, effort + energy, and he was only using it when he really wanted something for about two weeks. As he's perfected his skills and increased stamina and determination, he's gotten faster. Now he does a seal crawl on hyper speed which looks a lot like this in action. It's unbelievably cute, especially next to his perfectly determined to do it perfectly crawling sister. I've actually taken a video of them racing and hope to get it on our sister site this week or next. They really are too cute.
Now both Tomatoes (and of course when I say Tomatoes I mean it in the most beautiful and endearing way, much like this) can get down from a seated position and each has put themselves into a seated position, Jackson by chance and Tabitha purposefully just this week.
They are babbling like crazy, mama, dadad, bababa, variations of my name - especially Jackson, Tabitha prefers to crawl over and pull on my pant-leg, and doing it all the time. There are loads of High5's in the house, clapping and saying "Yay!" are equally prevalent.
Our PT continues to come every week. Soon we may begin climbing stairs.
Roger and Sara seem to be doing well. Although as more developmental growth occurs more discipline related issues arise and I can see more concerns regarding the future. Norah has come across some research regarding preemies-parent interactions based on believed vulnerability. And while both Roger and Sara are doing great jobs I'm trying to find a polite way to suggest they go into therapy. Having a traumatic birth story and NICU stay is a lot harder than most parents are willing to admit. Research has found it may cause PTSD in one or both parents.
Parenting is tough work. Taking care of yourself, your children, your spouse, your career, finances, life in general is a lot of work. Taking regular time to stop and have another person only think about you - that would be great for every parent (nearly every person if you ask me), imagine how stress-relieving it could be for a parent who has even more on their plate. Going the therapy doesn't imply that one is broken and needs fixing, it just allows one an opportunity. The opportunity itself is variable and differs from person to person. But if one has adequate healthcare and can make and hour every other month, month, week, why not give oneself that opportunity?
