One Year Ago

One year ago today our family of three became a family of four as we all went to Fuling, China to meet an 18 month old little boy named Fu Bao Gao. Mama, Baba, Joey and Lao Lao boarded a bus for a 90 minute trip from Chongqing to Fuling to meet this little boy that would be coming home with us. We were all so excited and nervous as well. How would he react? How would Joey react? Is he going to scream for hour? Is he going to shut down and ignore us for days? All we wanted to do was hold him, hug him and kiss him but we knew he would not be ready for us at all. How do you explain to an 18 month old that they are going away from everything they have ever known in their short life?

Here we saw "Gao Gao" from across the room. He is trying to figure out what is going on!!

Brothers at Last!! And Joey starts taking care of Caleb right away!

One scared little boy, not too sure what is going on clings tight to Baba.

Brothers in every way!! Christmas 2008 the best of buds!

Getting to be such a big boy!

Baba, Caleb & Joey

What a year it has been, Caleb went from this scared boy to the most happy kid. Joey and Caleb love being together and are rarely apart! Caleb wakes up happy and goes to bed happy. We have been blessed with the most amazing children. Thank You God!! And happy one year "gotcha day" Caleb. WE LOVE YOU!!

Caleb's Adventures

Caleb has decided to have a busy week this week. After a fun day playing at the lake Sunday the boys were playing in the dining room and next thing we know Caleb is crying and when Ba Ba picks him up his eye is bleeding. Well after cleaning it up a little we can see that his skin has popped open on the corner right next to his eye.

We go out to talk to Joey and try to find out what he hit it on and Joey is hiding under the table systematically pulling all the chairs in around him. Well.........after explaining to Joey we are not mad at him that we just need to know how Caleb hurt his eye in case we need to go to the Dr. he decides to come out of hiding. I call Lao Lao to have her come over and watch Joey so we can take Caleb to the Dr. In the mean time Joey is "demonstrating" on Rammy (his CSU Ram he carry's everywhere these days!) what happened to Caleb. So as far as we can tell via Joey's demo is that he either dropped the booster seat on Caleb or he put it on Caleb's head and pushed down on it..................so off to the Dr. we go and the thought they would have to do stitches but were able to use Dermabond to seal everything up. Here are a couple of pictures.

So............we are thinking ok........crisis over..........we are done for a while..........BUT..........

Caleb has other ideas!!

Monday night I come home and Lao Lao and I are getting ready to go to golf lessons and next thing I know I am in the other room and Caleb is crying and Lao Lao is asking him if he is ok. Go into the room and he had decided to stand on the couch and try to get Lao Lao when she wasn't looking and stepped (or tried to jump) off the couch reaching for her and landed hard on his arm. Well he gets up and is not using his arm at all!! We finally get him to raise it to about shoulder height but it just doesnt look right.

SO..............I call Ba Ba and tell him to come home we are going to Urgent Care again tonight!! Lee comes home and Lao Lao stays home to take care of Joey for us again! Well, by the time we got there and in to see the Dr the Motrin I gave him at home kicked in and he is moving his arm just fine like nothing ever happened!! Ba Ba has now told him no more visits to Urgent Care for the rest of the year!!

Fatty Filum

Caleb is having surgery on Thursday for a Fatty Filum or Tethered Cord. Here is a great description of what it is:

"The filum terminale is like a thin elastic band, about 8 inches long. At the top, it is formed from one of the layers of tissue surrounding your spinal cord, and extends from the bottom of your spinal cord to the tip of your tail bone. The outside of the "elastic band" has a few nerve fibres sticking to it.

The filum terminale works as an anchor for the spinal cord. For people with normal anatomy, the filum stretches when they bend over to allow the spinal cord to move up in the spinal column and then goes back to normal length when the person straightens up and gently pulls the spinal cord back to its normal position.

When the filum is fat-filled, fibrous and tight, it will not allow the spinal cord to move up and down within the spinal column, and so the spinal cord and the nerves end up being stretched instead of the filum. In most people this causes nerve damage".

Everybody has a filum terminale; it is a threadlike piece of tissue that connects the end of the spinal cord to the sacral end of the spinal canal in the pelvic area. In patients with a thickened filum (defined as more than 2 mm in diameter) [Yundt, 1997], the filum is shorter or lower-lying than normal and is thickened with fatty or fibrous tissue. This abnormality causes the filum to become relatively inelastic (a bit like a rope or cord, rather than an elastic band) and the spinal cord becomes tethered at an abnormally low level, thereby giving rise to the recognised signs and symptoms of a tethered spinal cord. "

More information can be found on the following website http://www.btinternet.com/~tetheredcordresources/tethered_cords.htm

Tomorrow we will be going to the hospital for labs and a pre surgery physical. Please pray for Caleb as he prepares for this surgery.