"I did it!" ~ Easter 2012

On Easter Sunday 2011, 14 month-old Scarlett officially walked on her own for the very first time. Exactly one year later on Easter Sunday 2012, two year-old Scarlett walked on her own again after not having walked for three weeks after another bout of rhabdomyolysis that severely weakened her skeletal muscles (see a few posts below for more information).

Chris, Scarlett, Max, and I were out on the otherwise deserted playground at Our Children's House after lunch, despite the thunder and imminent rain storm, trying to get a few minutes of outside playtime in before Scarlett's nap. After crawling and then walking (assisted) up the stairs of the slide, Scarlett must have regained her confidence, because next thing we knew Sister was walking around the playground all by herself. What a joyous thing to see.



In addition to making great physical progress, Scarlett is doing better eating (although she still has a ways to go). The doctors have cut her tube feeds in half so that she'll be hungrier for actual food, which seems to be helping. We are hopeful that if she continues to progress at this rate, she will get discharged in the next 1-2 weeks (although there's no guarantee of that; she has to eat and drink enough on her own consistently for a few days before they can take her feeding tube out, and that needs to happen before she can come home). In the meantime, she'll be getting speech therapy (for eating), occupational therapy (for coordination), and physical therapy (for walking, climbing, etc.) each day and our fingers are crossed for discharge sometime the week of April 17.

Here are some Easter photos of Miss Scarlett and Mister Max.








Happy Easter, everyone!