Moved

If you're wondering what the heck the title of my post means, today I was struck by something I encountered.  I was moved to share another one of the challenges we've been facing with our little man, Nicolas. Nicolas was diagnosed with deformational plagiocephaly at 4 months of age although I started to notice that something was not quite right at 2 months of age. He had limited range of motion of his head and preferred resting his head on one particular side. The neurosurgeon determined that it was caused by a restricted intrauterine environment, and we began treatment using a Hanger helmet on January 19th after careful thought and consideration and upon the neurosurgeon's recommendation.

I was moved to share our situation because we went in for one of our progress appointments today where they measure Nicolas' head to be sure we are seeing improvement (which we are, by the way at 4 weeks post.) When I walked into the waiting room, I stumbled upon a support meeting of older people who all had lost a limb and had been fitted by a Hanger prosthesis. Most of them were male and war veterans and every single one of them looked like they needed a hug. I know for a fact that my sweet smiling baby helped brighten up their day, even if just for that moment of his sweet little giggle in his Aggie-fied helmet. The purpose of the meeting was to help find volunteers to meet with other Hanger clients who had recently lost a limb and needed support from others who had undergone a similar situation. What touched me was when a gentlemen spoke up and honestly said, "look, I haven't even come to grips with this myself and I'm not sure I could be of any help, but I'll try to find it within myself to help, even if just to go and let a person know that I know what they're going through." He was one of two people that spoke and the other 4 just sat and had a look of hurt or pain that I couldn't quite grasp.

So, I sat and looked at my precious and healthy boy and decided that if there is at least one person out there who is going through the same thing we are, I want him/her to know that I know exactly what you're going through. What I can say is that there is no need to apologize for my baby being in a helmet. I continue to hear, "I'm sorry," but there's nothing to be sorry about. I'm not. We chose to put our baby in a helmet to fix something that is merely cosmetic in nature and which only requires a relatively short time (8 to 12 weeks) to modify.  He is otherwise healthy and beautiful, and I chose to rock out his helmet by making it look like a Texas A&M football helmet. I purchased the decals from Bling Your Band and I was most impressed that such a company exists to make a potentially dreary situation bright. I was really sad and emotional on the days leading up to him getting the helmet on, but the second I saw it on him, I knew we made the right choice and felt better knowing that we are doing everything to fix his flat. :)

So, here are some pictures of the helmet and my beautiful little man rocking the helmet. :)