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Sassafras

My little girl is sassy!  I'll tell you what, she's got more personality in her big toe than some adults I know!  I would love to tell you a little bit about my Abby Girl.

For starters, Abby is not particularly fond of the Speech-Language Pathologist (SLP) at UMMC.  I'm not sure why, because she's a lovely woman named Melissa who believed in Abby from the start.  I think it may have something to do with the fact that Melissa puts her gloved fingers in Abby's mouth all of the time!  Whatever it is, Abby basically cries the entire time Melissa works with her.

Anyway, the last time Melissa came to visit, Abby was wide awake.  As soon as she heard Melissa's voice, she shut her eyes tightly and pretended to be asleep in hopes that Melissa would go away.  Melissa stopped talking and Abby peeked to see if she was still there!  Melissa spoke to her and WOOP, the eyes closed again.  That stinker!  Melissa didn't fall for it though!

Another thing Abby likes to do is dirty up a brand-new diaper as soon as possible. I guess it's kind of like clean-sheet day...except instead of snuggling down under the covers, she turns beet red and poops.  It happens every time I change her.  Every time.

At times, Abby remembers that this huge tube that is in her neck isn't really supposed to be there and she tries to pull it out.  She has done everything to get rid of it and is often successful in knocking the tubing off of the trach.  She enjoys playing this game with the nurses who have done particularly mean things to her and thinks it's pretty funny to make the alarm go off every five minutes with disconnected tubing.  Several nurses have tried to tie the tubing to the trach to keep Abby from knocking it off, but that doesn't work!  When there's a will, there's a way...

My girl loves to be held and snuggles right on up to you when you hold her close.  While it's a little more challenging to hold her with tubes going every-which-a-way, I have gotten to where I can hold her quite naturally and almost forget she's connected.  I love our bonding time, especially when she studies me with those big dark eyes of hers.  *Melt my heart!*

I have a certain noise that I make with my tongue to get Abby's attention.  I guess it's a bit of a cluck.  Abby definitely knows it as my sound and will open her eyes when she hears me.  Matt tried to trick her one night when he was visiting her alone by making my sound.  Abby's eyes flew open and she looked for me, but started crying when she saw Matt.  Get your own sound, Daddy!  That's Momma's sound!

Abby's favorite word is monkey.  She smiles really big every time I say it.  It's so cute!!

When I talk to her, I often tell her about what Caleb has been up to, who has come to visit, where we went recently, etc.  It's just the normal stuff that I always did with Caleb as well.  (Matt and I are firm believers that if you want your child to be an early talker with a good vocabulary, you have to talk to him/her in a normal way modeling good vocabulary!  There's no baby talk at our house, folks!)  You should see the way Abby studies me while I'm talking.  It's like she's really taking it all in and comprehending what I'm saying.

My Sleeping Beauty often "cuddles" with her trach tubing by wrapping both hands around it and nuzzling it while she sleeps.  I have informed her that this is weird and that it is not natural to have tubes coming out of your neck, but she still does it.  I guess she doesn't know any differently, so it is normal to her.  Still, I think a teddy bear or a doll is a little softer...and cuter!

So that's a little glimpse of my girl. Since many of you won't get to meet her for quite some time (we're not going to be venturing out in public too much until flu season is over and we figure out how to make her "portable!"), I hope you enjoyed "meeting" Abby.  She's quite a character! 

I think she's going to take after her brother....Lord help us!

Comments

Unknown said…
That is a great glimpse of that Abby girl! Oh I miss her!! I can picture her doing all of those things as I read this entry though :0) Keep those pictures coming (when you can!) Big hugs to you, Matt and Caleb too!
Julie said…
Oh Megan, we miss you so much!! You definitely need to transfer to the Mount...and then start doing private duty nursing... :)
Unknown said…
Julie = what a beautiful picture of Abby you just painted. I feel like i know her now. I'm still thinking about you guys every day. Hope things are going well.
- Tara
Rebekah said…
Wonderful post. I love reading about her as a little person. With all the medical jargon it's sadly possible to think of her as just a little body, the little patient somehow dealing with all this. A persons a person no matter how small. [And I don't mean to rhyme, but] God know this best of all. Babies are amazing. Tiny packages of personality.

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