No Appointment Needed

The GI doc called today with James's bloodwork results, and (drumroll, please) his bilirubin is now in the normal range! (It's at .2.) His other liver numbers are also looking good. They're not quite down to normal, but they're close, and much improved over what they had been. So, the doctor doesn't think he needs to see James again, and didn't order any further blood tests, either. Hooray!!

The session with the auditory-verbal therapist went well today, too. Part of the therapy is teaching associations of certain sounds with certain common objects (toys, mostly), like trains and farm animals. She started out today with an airplane and a car, and James clearly reacted to the sounds she was making with those. They were both higher-pitched sounds, and she was just getting to the toy snake which is a lower sound, when James got fussy -- so we don't know if he would have heard that or not. The tricky part about this "Learning to Listen" aspect of the therapy for us is that some of the sounds are not the sounds we'd automatically make with these objects (so, the sound for the car is "brrrrr beep beep!", which makes sense, but isn't what I would have spontaneously done with a toy car). But the sounds are designed to cover a range of different frequencies, etc., so it will be helpful in both making sure he's exposed to all kinds of sounds and (later) in helping determine how well he's hearing each of those types of sounds.

I think Matthew will enjoy this therapy, too -- he seemed quite fascinated by the new toys and the sound effects!

As the therapist was getting ready to leave, Matthew and James were lying on their activity mats, and they were having a little conversation with each other! So cute!!