Our stress-o-meter

Gracie is our Stress-o-Meter (patent pending). It took us a while to notice the trend, but she used to have a seizure on, during, or after every family holiday or major gathering, at the birth of Ana, etc. She also has clusters of seizures with change in seasons or dramatic changes in weather. She's had remarkably few seizures in the last year since getting the vagal nerve stimulator implanted and turned up. We praise God!

However, last night she had a good long seizure that just wouldn't break so she ended up needing diastat - poor baby! Then we analyzed the situation (we can't help ourselves!). She's been acting stressed out, she clearly knows that something major is on the horizon as we await baby brother. (AND, the weather shifted from one of the hottest summers in a long time to one of the coolest summers in a long time.) Our kiddo is MUCH more aware of life stressors than we give her credit for!

We have been getting extra coaching on using Gracie's Vantage communication device. This is so exciting because she is FINALLY starting to be able to point her index finger in order to access the touch-screen icons. She obviously knows WHERE to touch to get the response that she wants (we have to be really silly to motivate her to work this hard! but that comes naturally to us!) and is able to narrow it down to essentially a four-square area. She still needs prompting to keep her other fingers tucked in and not just claw at the screen - but SO much progress!!