Six Months In

Obviously the past six months have been a busy time around here. It has been a strong mixture of exhausting, guilt-ridden, freeing, fulfilling and ultimately rewarding feelings! I have barely kept my head above the water with so many challenges we have faced this year, yet somehow I've managed to extract so much happiness along the way.

I have never felt such a purpose as I have this year helping students become better readers. There have been so many moments that have caused me to pause and think this is what I'm meant to do....this is what it's all about! My goal for myself this year was to not only help kids advance their reading skills, but also to teach them to LOVE reading. There have been so many ah-ha! moments with different students who have made that shift to truly enjoy reading. There is no better feeling!

As for the challenges: I think we're finally coming out of our roughest patch....knock on wood.

Our little boy, who is 18 months old now has suffered from severe asthma; he was hospitalized six times in the past year for respiratory distress, each time for a couple nights. Looking back through his notes, his doctor averaged it out to a hospitalization every six weeks. There is nothing scarier than your precious baby not being able to get enough oxygen. Our world ceased to exist each time the skin around his ribs began to suck in. In fact, he had a partial lung collapse on two separate occasions. We grew fearful of public places and anywhere germs gathered; wiping down shopping carts, never allowing anyone over with the slightest of colds, hardly ever going anywhere. Add in that I have been working full time and along with our daughters, carrying incessant germs home from the cesspool that is school.

My little guy was also officially diagnosed with a milk allergy this year....on a 0 to 5 scale, 5 being severe, his severity rolled in at 4.96. This has led to a total shift in food shopping, food preparation, eating out and expectations. We were steamrolled at how much of our common foods contain some kind of milk ingredients. It has taken time and is still a process, but we have found some good substitutions. There is hope that he may outgrow it by the time he is 6-8 years old; we will have him tested once a year until we have a definitive answer. For now, we always carry his epi-pen and our routine involves a lot of label reading and packing safe foods anytime we go anywhere.

Finally, after his last hospitalization, we were referred to a pulminologist, a lung specialist. After listening to the cutie drinking his coconut milk he began asking a lot of questions about his gurgling sounds after eating and drinking. He felt a test to check for reflux would be a good idea. Turns out he doesn't have reflux, but he has dysphagia, which just means that he has trouble swallowing properly and he was aspirating every time he drank something. So this whole time he had been inhaling liquids into his lungs! No wonder he kept getting respiratory infections. No wonder he cried so much as a baby. No wonder he was so small. 

So now he is on a daily corticosteroid inhaler, a completely milk-free diet, and thickened liquids. After we started using the thickener, the gurgling stopped, he has gained weight, and has even gone through a cold with only nebulizer use at home. We have not visited the hospital since Thanksgiving! It is amazing the sanity that is slowly creeping its way back into our household. We still have a long way to go, but with the end of my 11-month commitment looming ever closer, it seems there is hope for us after all!

This school year has left me feeling drained yet superbly fulfilled, as both a tutor and especially as a mom. I will end this year with a bittersweet concoction of relief and sadness. I am truly going to miss my students and they will always have a special place in my heart. I am so looking forward to being home with my little man next year, and to have the ability to help in my girls' classrooms will be such a blessing! I have come to know so many amazing people over the past year that I would never have had the opportunity to know without my service with the Minnesota Reading Corps. I will forever be grateful.