Another successful day....
We had another great day. This morning we started out learning behavior disruption. We now use the commands "lap" (he lays his head on Hannah's lap to help her to not melt down), "nuzzle" (goes to her and puts his nose to her for
lovin') and deep pressure (he will lay on top of her, either legs, back or stomach). I think this will really be useful to help her before she gets too worked up.
The afternoon was all about health care. We learned how to care for the dogs from head to toe. It was very educational to learn exactly how to meet the dogs needs.
We tried a different harness with Blitzen tonight. We went to the mall to practice and he did fantastic! Hannah is able to walk on the other side of him with a second leash. It is better for her too. He could not have done better at the mall tonight. I was very proud of him!!!
Aunt Bev brought Josiah and Elijah to visit us and meet Blitzen tonight. It was so nice to see them. I know they were counting the days until they could come and see us. They were excited to see all the "tricks" that Blitzen can do!
Tomorrow we have class at the center in the morning and back at the mall in the afternoon....
How this journey started....
Hannah was born prematurely at 34 weeks gestation. She was a relatively healthy preemie; initially having difficulty maintaining body temperature and needing to grow. She weighed 4 pounds 9 ounces at birth. When she was four months old she began to drool, non stop. We were told the first year she was "teething." At 18 months old, we really started searching for reasons of why her shirt was always soaking wet. We saw various specialists who always sent us to another specialist, saying "everything looks okay." She spent years in oral motor/feeding therapy to help her not to drool. It wasn't until she was four years old and in preschool that we started to get some answers. Her preschool teacher commented one day that she wasn't reponding when her name was called. I took this information to her pediatrician who then orderd an EEG, "just to rule it out." Much to our shock and amazement, the results showed, she was having seizures. That is the day our journey REALLY began. Once she began taking seizure medication the drooling almost stopped completely. (She will still drool to this day when she is having seizure activity). Since then, it has been a roller coaster; countless medications and medication changes. She has never really reponded well to any medication.
About two years after she was diagnosed with epilepsy, the doctors noticed that her blood pressure was running high. After many tests, she was diagnosed with hypertension. We still are not sure why, but her cardiologist feels her blood vessels are thicker than normal.
About this same time, we also began looking into why Hannah was such a horrible sleeper. She would thrash, talk, move every which way, during her sleep. The sleep studies revealed that she has alveolar hypoventilation sydrome, which means she has too much carbon dioxide in her system when she sleeps. To help this, she wears a BI-PAP at night. This has been monumental in giving her more effective and quality of sleep.
Every day is a challenge for Hannah and our family as a whole. Blitzen has been an absolutely wonderful addition. She calms herself sometimes just by petting and loving on him. He has been trained in behavior disruptions and will sometimes be able to stop a meltdown from getting out of control.
It has been extra hard on the whole family since daddy is deployed to Iraq. He has been gone since January 09 and will gone until Jan 2010. We get to talk with him by phone and on the web cam; which is nice, but not the same!! Blitzen has helped to make his absence go just a little smoother....
We had another great day. This morning we started out learning behavior disruption. We now use the commands "lap" (he lays his head on Hannah's lap to help her to not melt down), "nuzzle" (goes to her and puts his nose to her for lovin') and deep pressure (he will lay on top of her, either legs, back or stomach). I think this will really be useful to help her before she gets too worked up.
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