milestones

we have an odd relationship with milestones.

right now didi pants (the littlest one) is all over the place. not quite crawling on all fours, but army crawling to get where ever she wants to go. but the big thing the is that she can push herself up to sit. like all by herself. we didnt need to teach her that or anything. she just kind of picked it up on her own.

and i mean that's a typical milestone for a kid of her age, but i cant help but think back on how hard we worked on that with dominic. for darn near a year we worked with him on where to put his hands, how to move his legs, and how to coordinate everything to sit up....until one day he just did it and we celebrated big time.

these moments are fantastic for both didi and dommy because 1) didi doing that and learning that on her own is just mind boggling. you never realize how complex movements are and how much coordination goes into them until you struggle with them...and it's super exciting to see didi just fly through them with no issues. but then, in a sense, dommy's brain is speaking french and his body only understands japanese yet somehow he was able to coordinate those and make things happen. i'm so proud of both of them.

d and i dont really spend much time thinking of what dom isnt doing as compared to his peers. we know things are delayed, and we're fine with it. when dom is in our house he's not disabled or developmentally delayed...he's just dom.

but occasionally we are forced into those comparisons. yesterday we got reports back from OT and speech evaluations...which kind of knocked us on our ass. seeing words like "cognitively delayed" and "non ambulatory" and "other reduction/deformities of brain"...those are hard. really hard. we're not in denial. we look at the rate at which diya is developing and can see a stark difference in how gommy's developing. we know. but it's just hard to see it in writing.

best comparison: i can look in the mirror and think "hey i'm looking kind of fat" and just sigh and move on. but if someone else says "dude you're looking kind of fat" that's devastating. not information i dont know or havent thought about but come on man, dont just say it.

it's these quiet moments that bring the tears on. it's these quiet moments that we sit and talk about whether the future we want for dommy is possible. it's these quiet moments that we just wonder what's next.

and then we kind of move on because we have to. because dwelling in the future (or the past) requires more emotional energy than we're able to muster up.

yesterday reminded me of how hard all of this is. we're on an uncertain journey guided only by the strength of our family and the tenacity of our son.

there are so many good days. but then there are bad days. and sometimes it's ok to admit that.