Monday, September 3, 2012

Giving Thanks Step By Step

It's been quite a week for the Knox family.  Okay, maybe just a few days.

Andy's EEG
At 10am on August 30th, Andy, Ben, and I drove to an international hospital in Madrid for Andy's first test (an EEG) to hopefully shed some light on his speech delay.  We walked into our room, met the nurse who'd be taking care of us for the day, and she started marking Andy's head with a sharpie.

Andy absolutely hates having his hair touched.  We've resolved to let his hair grow out since he's been terrorized the last few times we've taken him to get it cut (even and those cute kiddo places where he can sit in a little car and watch cartoons).  He was a bit squirmy in my arms during the process of measuring and marking his head, and later gluing 26 electrodes, but all in all, he did great!  By 12:30pm, he was all "electroded-up" and connected to the machine that would read his brain waves.

Ben clearly remembers the neurologist saying we'd be in and out of the hospital in about 5 hours, so that's what we'd planned for.  We didn't bring a laptop or work to do as we thought we'd be devoted to keeping Andy in the sight-line of the 2 cameras that were video-taping him the entire time.  Well, 8 hours later, we finally got to leave the hospital!  Andy was an angel the entire time.  He played really calmly on the bed for about an hour, then took a 3 hour nap!  Ben and I ate lunch (wow, hospital food is good there), then woke Andy up at about 4pm.  By 6:30pm, we were going stir crazy, so we took turns sneaking out for a little air, but again, Andy was great, which is what mattered most.

Andy's First Day of Preschool
I have been dreading today for quite a few months, though the scheduling of Andy's tests has made the first day of school for him sort of pale in comparison.  We all woke up at 7:30am, and by 8:45am were walking out the house to Andy's school, named Sweden Garden (pretty cool as my mom's dad was 100% Swedish).  Last night, I had terrible dreams of being in school myself, finding overdue library books, trying to find my classes, being late, etc.  Nerves I guess.  When do these dreams end, right?

We walked in, handed Andy over to his teacher, Vanessa, and collected his uniform and little backpack while hearing him cry.  It was a tough few minutes!  Ben and I left to get a coffee and a little breakfast a few blocks away.  I tried pan con tomate, a typical Spanish breakfast, for the first time.  A baguette is cut length-wise, toasted, and topped with olive oil, tomato puree, and salt.  Pretty yummy.  We bought Andy a mini sugar doughnut and headed back to his school after an hour.

The director opened the door, and we saw Andy happily playing with the other kids.  Unfortunately, another kid had just thrown up (in another room) - I guess we'll have to get used to Andy catching some bugs there.  But, Andy hardly wanted to leave!  He was having a great time!  He sat outside and licked all the sugar off the doughnut before eating it, then walked around the neighborhood a bit.  It was a great morning.

Giving Thanks
Thank you for your prayers.  We couldn't have gotten through the last few days without you.  Please keep praying!  Andy will have blood drawn on Wednesday, Sept. 5, as well as an MRI on Sept. 12.  On the 12th, he has to fast from noon until 6pm, which could be tough for him to understand.

Thank you, Lord, for being faithful to us as we take steps through transitions.  

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