A Year Different From Any Other!

Maycie had her 1st Birthday last Saturday. Having a helmet changes things, that is for sure! My dad and I were talking the other day and I wondered where the year had gone. He said it went into a helmet. And that is true! So here are some of our helmet memories to celebrate Maycie's first year!

Portraits!

One thing I would highly recommend is having some professional pictures done! We had some family pictures taken and had her do some pictures of Maycie in her helmet. I am so glad that we did! They are so wonderful and I am so glad that we will have these forever.

You don't have to spend alot of money on them. Even some place like Target or Wal-mart, but something to make it special. You want them to know about this part of their life. And at least for me, embracing it has made it so much easier!

Ours were done by a friend and she really is amazing and does a wonderful job with all kinds of portraits! If you are interested in seeing some more of her work you can find her at: http://portraitsbyemily.blogspot.com/ Thanks again for everything Emily!

There is Life After The Helmet!

Maycie had her 6 week appointment with the plastic surgeon today! It was a good appointment! She no longer need to wear it. It isn't perfect (but who has a perfect head?!) but he feels any more changing that needs to take place will happen naturally!

I came home and was met by my other kids and when they saw her without the helmet they first asked to make sure and then let out quite the yell! It was so cute! My oldest son is just getting ready to play football so we joked that we were trading Maycie's busy helmet season for Jaxon's busy helmet season! So we put the helmet back on and took our last pictures in the helmet! I also took some after pictures for myself. I thought it might be kind of fun to see some before and after shots. Another reminder that what we have done and been through is totally worth it! I can't imagine where we would be if we had decided not to do this.

This is Maycie at our first appointment at Fit Well.

She was about 5 months old.

This is Maycie now! After 5 months and 2 helmets what a difference!

The first helmet put too much pressure on the back of her head. (I think her head shape changed between when they did the mold and when we got the helmet so then it put too much pressure and caused an infection. But that is just my thinking!) This is a picture at it's worst! This is why we needed a 2nd helmet. They allowed room for the bump on the back of her head and then put the padding in so the pressure still had some give to it!

This is the back of her head now! I should have taken it from the side! But you can't even tell anymore! The plastic surgeon was telling the intern (I think it was an intern!) with him today about the bump on the back of her head because they wondered why we were so excited over the back of her head!

Everything looks so much better it is almost hard for me to believe! It has been a long road. I will not deny that. This has been the last 6 months of my life and almost 2/3 of hers! We are still doing physical therapy. I am hoping we will see a drastic improvement there now that the helmet is off. I will go and do until we are done. I don't want to give up and then have her regress. Besides that therapy hasn't been bad! They are more like a friend then anything else!

Thank you to everyone for visiting and your comments! I think I am going to add a new gadget so we can "converse" a little easier! If anyone else has wisdom ideas for decorating the helmets anything else they would like to share I would be glad to do a post with your insights. Please e-mail them to me at the address on the right! Also is there anything specific that I should be blogging about? Keep the comments coming! I need your help to know if this blog is helping! Thank you!

Make it Yours!

We have had so many comments on Maycie's helmet! I knew one of the things that would be hard for me with the helmet was no bows and cute stuff. I talked to a friend who makes bows to help me figure out how to put bows on the helmet. She was amazing and came up with Velcro! Don't you just love Velcro! We put the soft side on the bows so they wouldn't stick together. That way you can have a bow for every outfit just like "normal!" The other thing we did was vinyl flowers! We have gotten lot's of great comments about those too! I can't take credit for those either, my sister totally took care of them! But what I learned with the flowers is that you can do anything with vinyl! And it holds up really well to the heat they have to use to adjust the helmets. We were in for a check today and one of the flowers was in the way so he needed to take it off. He was way surprised in the trouble he had getting it off! I have talked with people who for boys have made them into "football helmets" for their favorite team! So the vinyl is good for more then just being able to do what you want it will really stand up to what you have to put the helmets through too! So I say make it yours! I would have had a bow in Maycie's hair everyday so I found a way to put a bow on her helmet! When I told someone we were going to put the flowers on they told me not to. They said it would draw attention to the helmet. I figure, it's a helmet, people are going to notice! I might as well make it cute! And for the outfits I didn't have a bow for it was still cute! And I think doing fun things makes it easier for people to talk to you about it. And for me I would rather people ask me about it then just look at my baby like there is something wrong with her. I would love to hear all the fun things you have thought of to make your baby's helmet personalized and unique!

THANK YOU!

To Inquiring Mind,
I would like to thank you for your comment! It is so good to hear from someone who is done and can say that this is but a moment and it will seem so short in the big picture of it all. I would like to know how you found us! I hope this means that this is getting out there! If you know of others in your same situation please let them know about it also. I really feel you can help us! So again, thank you, thank you, thank you. I just can't say it enough!

To Chelsea,
I hope all is going well with you and that you are adjusting to life with the helmet. Keep it up! And my advice to you is the same as Inquiring Mind's was to me, don't be so hard on your self! Find the humor in all of this. It is those things that will help get you through.

I would love to hear from both of you. Please e-mail me. It would be really great to be able to "talk" with you!

Thank you again for helping to lighten my load a little!

6 More Weeks

We went to the Plastic Surgeon's last week and he said we should be all done in 6 weeks! Now don't get me wrong, I am so excited! But at the same time I have to admit I am ready to be done with all of this. I am ready to kiss her head when ever I want without kissing a helmet. I am ready to snuggle her without being afraid of getting clunked in the head! Again, I am not regretting our decision to do the helmet. I know this is for the best, and I know 6 weeks really isn't all that long. I just have my moments! I try and keep things very positive on our family blog. And I know I should probably do the same for all of you, but I want you to know we ALL have our moments! That is why I am doing this. It is important for me to know that other people are going through the same thing that I am. I guess I can only assume that you all feel the same. Part of what I want this blog to be is a place for us to share with each other. I found this quote that I hope says it all:
Author Anna Quindlen says, "The great motherhood friendships are the ones in which two women can admit [how difficult mothering is] quietly to each other, over cups of [herbal] tea at a table sticky with spilled apple juice and littered with markers without tops" (Loud and Clear, 30).
What we are doing for our babies is difficult. But by being there for each other I am hoping we can lift the load a little. So we have 6 more weeks (actually 5, it has been a week since we went to the Plastic Surgeons, not that I am counting down or anything!) but this is something that has changed me for the rest of my life. There will be life after the helmet, and this too shall pass!

How Far We Have Come!

This is our Maycie at her first appointment with Fit Well. This is the end of February beginning of March. What a good mom am I that I don't have an exact date! Sorry!

This is her 6 weeks ago the day before we got the second helmet. She was still tilting her head and you can still see the flat kind of spot over her left eye. Better then when we started but not there yet!

This is Maycie today. Her head tilt is pretty much gone and her head shape is so much better! We go to the Plastic Surgeons office tomorrow. I'm sure we aren't done, but look how far we have come! I look at these pictures and know that we did the right thing!