With each new development Ella is achieving, there is a thought that follows asking whether she will retain this ability after surgery? What will be lost? From reading we understand that most kids do well after hemispherectomy surgery. But not all do. How will Ella do? No one can tell us. We are realizing that she is missing some of her milestones already. This isn’t all that apparent when she is alone. It becomes very apparent when we meet other babies of the same age. For now it seems that the milestones that she is missing have to do with her motor skills. She is still quite ‘floppy’. She’s made progress with holding her head up but she is still far from holding it up consistently on her own. Reaching out to grab things in front of her has also been slow, though in the last few days she has done that more than before. On the other hand she is progressing nicely with focusing on us and responding.
She definitely has a smile of recognition now and reacts differently to different people. The tick in her left leg has been persistent and after contacting the neurologist he recommended a supplementary medication that could help. We started that two days ago and noticed a definite change in the left spasms. They almost disappeared.
We’ll see how that goes (they recommended trying it out for four days). We are thinking that those ticks have a direct effect on the limpness of her left side and are hopeful that taking away the ticks might lead to an improvement there.