Evan had his neurology visit today. We had and EEG in March to see how the Depakote was affecting his seizure activity. So the visit went well. Since Evan's seizures are pretty much under control we do not have as much to talk about.
So the Dr. said that his EEG is still abnormal but better. He has some activity on the right side but not as much as before and more on the left side but still less than he had before the Depakote. He said it is still pretty bad at night. So we are going to increase his meds at night and then get a level in two weeks. So this is good news, it sounds like Evan's seizure activity is more subclinical and not showing physical symptoms which is good but also bad because we do not know how many seizures he is having and they are probably affecting his quality of sleep and/or cognitive abilities.
As far as speech I asked the Dr. about his opinion on Evan's speech abilities in the future. He pretty much agreed with me that Evan will not have a functional speech but should be able to use signing and his Dynavox to communicate. He stated that Evan has the oral motor problems from the malformation on the right side of the brain and also malformation plus epilepsy on the left which is all contributing to his speech issues. This is pretty much what I already have accepted and expected but it still sucks to hear it fromt he professional.
Dr. said that all that Evan is doing is pretty miraculous, and I totally agree. As I have said before he is pretty much defying what his brain says he should be doing. I am very much thrilled that Evan does everything that he does, I have know that things could have been very different. While I am grateful for Evan's abilities I do not want it to come across as though I would not be able to handle a child with different abilities. I was talking to my friend today and saying that I do not know how I would physically handle if Evan did not walk, especially because he is such a big boy. I thought about it later and realized that I sounded like how a typical parent sounds when they say they don't know if they could handle having a special needs child. I know that if Evan did not walk, sit etc. I would be handling it but as with many other moms it would probably be at the expense of my hip, neck and back. Sometimes I try to be careful what I say about praising Evan because I do not want to make anyone feel bad, even though I know all of my friends are happy for his milestones and I feel happy for their kids milestones as well, even the ones that Evan has not hit yet. We are all happy for each other and somewhat sad for our kids. But we all know how hard all of our kids work to do the things they do.
