Logan John

Logan is my preschooler.  His life has been anything BUT uneventful. 

It took a long time and the help of the fertility drug, Clomid, to get pregnant with Logan.  My pregnancy with him was easy-peasy, even with the heat of summer.  I was induced on the 20th of July (Joe’s birthday!) and after things finally got started after about 10 hours of nothing, Logan was born just 8 hours later.  It was a very easy delivery and he weighed in at 8lbs 3oz, was 21.5″ long, and had a 14.25″ noggin! 

Logan was nursed until 14 months old when my supply dried up thanks to my pregnancy with our angel baby that left us at 10 weeks.  He was a big eater.  Wow.  Logan was born in the 60th percentile, but by 4 months old he was down in the bottom 5% of the growth charts.  It was baffling because he ate a LOT.  As an example, by 8 months old he would have for breakfast: nurse, 8-10T cereal, 1/2 cup or more applesauce, banana, and a handfull of cheerios.  We just thought he had high metabolism or the like…

All during Logan’s first year, I often brought up his delays in gross motor skills such as lifting his head off the floor, rolling, crawling, and so on.  He did have a very large head and as I said above, he was not a chubby baby, so our doctor chalked it up to his tiny body not being able to hold up that big head.  Finally at around 9 months old, our doctor was concerned about the size of his head and sent us to see a pediatric neurologist.  He relieved our concerns over his head size as he didn’t feel it was big enough to worry about, but he diagnosed Logan with hypotonia (low muscle tone), which is also called “floppy baby syndrome”.  Just before his 1st birthday, Logan had blood tests, x-rays, and an MRI to determine the cause of his low tone.  The culprit ended up being a lack in Carnitine.  Carnitine is critical in the production of skeletal muscle… as well as the citric acid cycle – essential for the processing of fats from the foods we eat!  This also answered for us why he was so tiny!  He wasn’t getting any fats from his foods!

Soon after all of this, he began taking a carnitine supplement (Carnitor) and started physical therapy through our state Easter Seals program, Birth to 3.  At this point, Logan could lift his head off the ground while on his tummy, could roll quite well, rotate on his tummy, and sit with pillows behind him. 

At his review before his 2nd birthday, we added occupational therapy to help with his posture, hand strength, and eating with a spoon/fork.  We also added speech therapy because I was concerned that he didn’t communicate at all.  Not that he didn’t use words, but that he didn’t point at anything he wanted, things in books, body parts, etc. 

Logan started walking just before his 2nd birthday and is now working standing on one foot with support, tiptoes with support, walking up the stairs without support, walking down the stairs with non-human support, peddling a trike, and jumping.

In the spring of 2009, Logan went through a screening and then evaluation process to be diagnosed with autism.  He has classic autism with auditory sensory processing disorder.  He currently attends the local school district’s early intervention preschool, but I am not happy with the amount of useful therapy he gets there.  I also have hired a daycare helper so that I can do more ABA with him on my own. 

Logan has been improving, although starting school meant a large regression in his ABA targets (attending, following directions, etc), but they are coming back slowly now that I am working with him again.  He uses a few words now, signs “more” consistently, and is being much more interactive with the people around him.  His sensory issues are also lessening in degree, but are definitely still there.