In South Africa, a school year is from 1 January until 31 December. We don't have it from September like some countries. We divide it in 4 terms, each ending with a holiday. So at this moment, we're done with our third term and in our third holiday for the year. Just one last term left, ending in our month-long summer holiday and the children passing (hopefully) to a new higher grade, starting that again in January.
So what happened with us after my last post? Well, quite a bit. Firstly, we took Monkeyman, Mr N and Boeboe all for evaluations at the biokineticist. She said that Monkeyman most definately has hypermobility and quite badly so. Especially in his back. She has worked out an exersize program for him to strengthen his muscles while protecting his joints. I've been very surprised at the kind of movements that's actually bad for him. Like rolling your neck. Or situps. Sometimes, one movement will be totally off-limit, but a very similar one will be great for him. It's all quite complex and confusing. And hard work! Excersizing them for 4x a week. It's difficult fitting it in in a week with everything else going on. A few weeks ago, he hurt his shoulder (a joint, go figure) while practising his tennis serves at his lesson, so I let him rest and didn't do the exersizes. It made me realise how innocent aches and pains can have much far reaching consequences in the children. It's a learning process for all of us.
The bio-kineticist said that Boeboe also have the same hypermobility. She thought it's a little less than Monkeyman's though, which I first thought was strange, as well as informative to know. We still have to exercise her too. Mr N has very slight hypermobility issues. Compared to the other two, it sounds negligable. So at this point, I don't think we'll call him hypermobile, but just keep it in mind that he may have similar issues in the future.
Next we took Boeboe to the cardiologist as the rheumatologist wanted her to evaluate Boeboe for Marfan's. Firstly, her Aorta is perfect!! Within normal limits, not enlarged at all, no problems she could see anywhere on it. It's wonderful! So no Marfan's we need to worry about currently. Unfortunately, she did pick up 2 things. Firstly, the hypermobility is much worse in her than what the biokineticist picked up. She showed us quite a few weird things she was able to do with our daughter's ankles and arms. Her shoulders seems quite afflicted, and her ankles are very instable. Which may be one of the causes of her trips and falls and drop foot. Interesting. So she needs to strengthen those muscles.
The second issue she picked up was that Boeboe's ventricle heart wall is also thinned, just like Monkeyman's. It piqued her curiosity, as its quite rare in an otherwise healthy heart with good function. She assumed that it must be inherited as part of the hypermobility syndrome, so she asked Boeboe's dad if she could do a heart sonar on him. She declared his heart perfect with no wall thinning. So she asked if she could check mine. And lo and behold, it comes from me. My left heart wall is thinned, precisely like Boeboe's and Monkeyman's. I haven't yet dealt with this. Not the finding in my daughter, nor in myself. I just haven't had the time! Literally. The cardiologist said that we need to check it up every few years, and never do any strenous exersizes. No marathons, no training for any event, no extreme sports, no contact sports, nothing that will push our hearts to extend too much. It may be dangerous or cause damage. She even speculated if that couldn't have been the cause of my mom's heart failure that led to her death. It worries me, obviously. Shortly after the visit, we had cross-country at our school, and I told the kids they're not allowed to participate. It saddened me, and Boeboe tried to participate on the sly. :-( Ai man, this is going to be tough.
So that's where we stand currently. Boeboe most definately has the hypermobility too, Mr N most probably not and Peanut we don't know yet. Boeboe and Monkeyman and me all three have a curious heart condition, and we have no idea if Mr N or Peanut has it too.
Things at school is going well. For me, it was a very busy, very interesting term. I loved getting to know myself better as a teacher. What I learned was that I'm better with bigger kids. I thought kids from around age 10 or 11 would be fine (I always knew I'm not good with little ones under age 10, except my own). But I now also know that I'm best with teenagers, rather than 10 or 11-year olds. I found them cute, sweet, adorable and wonderfully inquisitive. But also nagging, difficult, tiring, loud, noisy, hard of hearing, stubborn and sometimes quite naughty! I had less control over them, and found it difficult to one minute having to discipline a child and next moment they hug me and tell me I'm the greatest. I struggled with the sensory overload that came with smaller ones. The loudness. The noises. The talking! It tired me out soooooo much more than the teenagers. I loved them, and I'm gonna miss them. But I'd rather see them in about 3 years time again to teach them. :-)
Mr N did less well this term. He's tired. You can feel how the year is nearing it's end. The workload is increasing, pressure rising, and he's feeling it. He started to fall behind a little, not finishing homework, and putting in less. But, the teachers all understood, took it up with him and he tried to turn it all around. I'm relieved, he could so easily have been rebellious and undisciplined or disrespectful. Instead, he realised we're all trying to help and he worked with us, to his own benefit. It's a sign of maturity, and I'm grateful.
Boeboe. Well, academically it went really well. In the subject I taught her, she did exceptionally good. And it's not because she got any special tips or help or anything more from me that the other kids didn't get too. Once, when I queried her, she admitted that she was really scared of dissapointing me and making me sad if she were to do badly in my subject. LOL. It made perfect sense to me, so I let her be. Even though her doing soooo well, could cause me more grief than her not doing well would've. :-) In her other subjects she did very well too. Passing everything comfortably enough. She's still not strong, but it's definitely going much better with her than last year. And the amount of work is now really within her ability. Unlike with the previous school. Even though the difficulty is at the same level.
Monkeyman. Oh man, this kid is amazing. His report card looked amazing. 5 out of 5 for everything, except 1 thing where he got a 4/5. You know what I marvel at? His beautiful handwriting. I write atrociously, but as a child, my writing was pretty. And I prided myself on it, even getting the prize end of the year. My eldest two kids, well, let's just say, it's the complete opposite with them. So much so, that it has caused me alot of stress. Now, Monkeyman... his writing is amazingly pretty. Straight lines, staying in the lines, rounded curves, every letter the same size. Just perfect (in my eyes).
But, his actual strength is his math ability. A while ago, he was looking at some of the work I'm doing with my grade 7's, and it piqued his interest. He took a page and started doing the sums himself. Only querying me a bit here and there. And there he was doing grade 7 sums!! A few weeks later, he asked me to help him make a little maths book for fun for him to do. I'll add some pics at the end of the post.
Peanut. The term was a bit difficult for her. She's still loving school. But it took more out of her than what I would've preferred. She was tired. Very tired. Fortunately, our holiday is/was almost 3 weeks long! More than enough time for her to rest and relax and spend time with me and her siblings. And next term, I have much less classes again. I'm done now with the 2 subjects I helped out with for just this term. So there will be much less demand on her and we'll spend more time together again. I'm looking forward to it. Apart from being tired, it's going well with her. She still has her very best friend. It amazes me, that two little girls age 3 can bond like that and stay bonded. Playing together almost every day, every moment they can. What also amazes me, is how healthy Peanut is. She just started school the first time this year, at age 2.5, and she hasn't been to the doctor once (touch wood!). She hasn't needed any antibiotics. Oh, she did get a few colds, about 3 or 4 times this year. But everytime it was self-limiting.
There's one other thing medically speaking that's been on my mind the past few months. It really kinda hit home this past weekend. We were camping and I was watching the kids next to the swimming pool. Boeboe was sitting with her feet dangling in the water with her side towards me. Her back in perfect profile. I was watching the curve of her spine, following it from shoulders down to the coccyx. It made a very normal, perfect curve. Outwards at the shoulders, inwards just above the bum. I've noticed how this curve was formed over the past 4 years, and it never fails to brings me to tears. When she was a very small child, I noticed how abnormally straightened her back were. When sitting at a table, it would look like she swallowed a long ruler. Literally. Her back had absolutely no normal curvature. Just one straight line from the coccyx up to the shoulders, where there would be a more normal curvature to the shoulders and neck. Some of the doctors noticed this, like the one peadiatric neurologist who otherwise said she's fine and definately doesn't have an occult tethered cord. It was also noted as something like "loss of normal lordatic curvature" on her MRI, and dismissed as not important. Motherly instinct said otherwise. But hey, when did a mother's instinct count for anything in the medical world? ;-)
Since the detethering operation, this has changed. For 7 years, she sat straight as a plank whenever she sat down at a table or on the floor even. Since then, for the past 4 years, it has started to change. Slowly in the beginning. I can't even remember when I first noticed the changes. But now, she will slouch just like any normal child, especially one with hypermobility syndrome. Her shoulders will hunch, her back bend like a little cat, when she's lost in thoughts, sitting at the table. Or when standing up, her bum will be pushed backwards, carrying the weight while the tummy is pushed forward. It's amazing. Obviously, it would've been better for her posture, and for "beauty-standards" if she could've held onto that straight-back profile. But knowing that it meant a pull on the cord, I can't help but be happy that it's gone. I don't exactly understands the instricacies of why her tethered cord caused this, since it's somewhat the opposite of what it usually does. But what I do know, is that her straight back was abnormal and a sign of the tethered cord. And that now it's gone. The operation fixed what was wrong and caused her back to recover and developed normally. A fantastic thing, in my opinion. Isn't it amazing, this whole occult tethered cord and detethering and all these little signs?
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| Like he says at the bottom, he's grade 1 currently (age 7). Amazing, how he just cottoned on to algebra without a proper foundation yet! He just instinctively understand numbers. It's lovely to see. Especially his enjoyment in maths. |
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| My two adorable daughters. So crazy about each other! Its such a reassuring thing to watch, knowing that if anything were ever to happen to me, my baby will still have her older sister, providing her with as much love and comfort as any mother ever can. |
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| I added this just because it's such a lovely pic to me. She loves softness and animals sooooo much, so combining the two in this cat is precisely what my daughter is about at this age. So kind and sweet and gentle. Instinctively, animals realise that she only means them well. She would've made a lovely vet one day. This pic was taken when the girls in her class were absolutely horrible to her. The cat provided her with acceptance and comfort on that, day and the fact that the teacher noticed it and took the picture, warmed my heart. |
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