Jonah - Jonah continues to make great progress. He continues to have an IEP in school for his
speech deficiency. He gets speech
therapy during the school week and assistance where needed that is provided by
the school therapist. During the summer,
he receives speech therapy near Children’s Hospital in Milwaukee. He works really hard, one-on-one with his
therapy and the different exercises they do with him. However, in “normal” situations, he struggles
to slow down and make the concerted effort to speak slowly and clearly. It’s just not natural to him to “force” his
mouth to move in such a way as to make his words sound “normal”. Since being in our family, Jonah has grown A
LOT! At his very first medical check-up
when we brought him home four years ago, he was 3 feet 9 inches tall and 44
pounds (at the age of six years old).
Now he is 4 feet 8 inches tall and double the weight. He sure is thin but he has grown so much in
height! Jonah really enjoys the
electronics of all sorts. He loves when
we allow him time to play on the Wii game console and he also enjoys utilizing
his school-issued chrome book to play math games and complete reading lessons,
one of the pros of the chrome book, I guess.
He really enjoys our Friday movie night, something we typically have
each week. We don’t really watch
anything on the TV during the week (who has time for that?) so Friday night is
a bit of an “event” in our house and Jonah seems to “Live For It”!
Rees - Rees continues to be our biggest helper and seems to
thrive in his assistance of things needing to be done and tackling tasks as a
family. He is really doing pretty well
in school and strives to do a good job.
He now has an IEP in school for reading as this continues to be a
struggle for him to grasp quickly. He is
progressing and does put forth a good effort … it just, as is the course for
Rees, is taking a bit longer for him to get to where he ultimately needs to
be. I would say that his favorite thing
to do is helping his baba with whatever Baba is doing but next to that, he
enjoys watching movies probably just as much as Jonah. He continues to be our little worker bee and
I really see him as growing into a role with great responsibility. He is currently about 67 pounds and 4 feet 6
inches tall compared to 45 pounds and 3 feet 7 inches four years ago. These boys sure are sprouting! We get so many compliments on Rees’ go-getter
attitude, his kindness and compassion for others, and his cheerful disposition. It’s truly amazing how resilient these boys
are. They love Asian food and movies and
would probably be happy if those two things were all their little lives
included … just kidding, but maybe not kidding.
:-)
Medically speaking, not a whole lot has happened this
year. We have been attending regular
appointments and making several considerations but for the most part we are on
a medical lull. Jonah has a lot of different
things going on with respect to his jaws, his teeth, his abilities with speech
(and how much of his speech is affected by his current physiology). He has had several follow-up xrays to
evaluate progress with his growth and teeth movement and, for now, “they” are
just continuing to monitor as the things they are watching play a part in
determining the next steps and which surgery is necessary. One thing is certain … Jonah has grown so
much that it is likely that he will require jaw distraction again in the
future. All of his growth has affected
the previous distraction which, logically, seems to make sense. We requested a 3D CT for Rees during the
summer and it revealed what we suspected might happen. His tumor, that our previous surgeon worked
so hard to eradicate, is still growing, although, it’s being said that it is
growing slower than he is. That is a
good thing and means that it does not have to be addressed right away. Rees continues to be in a holding pattern
while he grows. As long as he okay with
waiting, the best thing for the moment is to continue to wait before diving
into the big surgeries that he has in his future.
Last night we took them out to dinner for their
“adoptiversary”. They actually LOVE this
… that we take just the two of them and celebrate the day they joined our
family … and so far, they still LOVE to get to do it together. We took them out for Asian food, of
course! It was a great time and they
enjoyed every bite immensely. At the end
of our meal, instead of the server coming to our table with the check, the
owner brought it and she told us our meal had been paid for. We were stunned and asked by whom. She pointed to the booth behind us and we
looked but there was no one there. She
asked, “you don’t know who they were?”
And we told her that we did not … (I had not even seen who had been
sitting there). I was speechless and
wondered what it was that caused them to be so generous … to people they didn’t
even know! But that is how it has been
ever since we answered the call to bring these two boys from the other side of
the world into our home, our family, and our hearts. You are receiving this letter, year after
year, because YOU … many of YOU whom we’ve never even met … saw us and were
moved to do something, something so kind and so generous … something we really
could not do alone … something that has made a lasting difference, a lifelong
impact on two special boys (and their family too!). This time of year is the perfect time for
their adoptiversary as it is just an extra reminder of all that we are SO
THANKFUL for … and surely this includes YOU!
With love and blessings for Thanksgiving and all the year
through, from the Prendergast Family.
