Bennett had his health screening from Kids on the Move today. The nurse came out to our house to test his hearing and eyesight to rule those out as possible causes for his lack of responses. I think Dave and I were both holding out unspoken hope that we might uncover a hearing problem that would explain his lack of interest in us or other people around him because we both suffered from major ear problems when we were kids.
Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), his hearing and eyesight tested perfectly. This is great because it means we're not having to look at tubes or fighting any of the obnoxious ear stuff Dave and I did as kids, but we both admitted to each other that night that we were a little sad because we had hoped just a little that all of this might be easily explained away as a hearing problem--rather than a neurological one. Hearing seems like a much easier battle to tackle than neurological issues.
Similarly, I took him to the chiropractor today (who has always been a little worried about him neurologically because his reflexes have never been quite right since he was born) and asked him to assess any physical limitations on his ability to crawl. He said Bennett checked out perfectly and there didn't seem to be any physical reason why he couldn't get his knees under him to crawl, so his first guess would be a neurological disconnect of some sort that's preventing him from being able to coordinate the muscles correctly. I felt the same way about this as I did about the hearing results. I was maybe hoping a little more than I was admitting to myself that I wanted this to be a simple physical therapy fix, and it was hard to swallow that by all accounts he should be able to use his muscles correctly by now.
He was out of alignment again, so we'll see how he does after the adjustment, and we still don't know if the medicines have played a role in the delays, so I'm trying to hold out final judgment until we can have more clarity. After a week of lowering the Keppra he is DEFINITELY more responsive, engaged, less fussy, sleeping better (putting himself to sleep finally!!!!), eating more readily, and overall a little closer to pre-seizure Bennett than we've seen in months. So I have high hopes for when he's off of it completely.
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