A Fine Balance

Weight: 19lbs 10oz

Height: 31 inches

This puts Ben in the 1- 2 percentile for both height and weight.  At least he is consistent. 

I just realized tonights workout is just under 6 miles.  The high today in NYC is supposed to be in the Mid-90’s.  This should be interesting.

PS.  The whole point of this running class is to build up to a 10k which is just over 6 miles.  Seems to be jumping the gun a bit with this weeks mileage, no?

I just bought Lady Gaga tickets!  Yay!

Yes.  #6.   I’m sure our insurance loves us.

Hearing test #6 has brought no more info than hearing tests #1-5.  The way the test works is they are supposed to condition Ben to be excited by lights flashing and a monkey banging a drum on either his right or left side depending on where the sound comes from.   Every time Ben hears a noise on either side he is supposed to look up to get the “reward” of the monkey banging on the drum.   Ben doesn’t really go for the conditioning.  I mean, yes, he looks the first or second time.  But by the 15th, he is all:  I don’t really care about that monkey banging a drum but I do care about those Ritz Bitz I know Mommy has in her bag right behind this chair here. So by the time they are even really ready to start the test, Ben is over it.  Of course, we then need to look for the reason Ben doesn’t care about said monkey and drum and generally they like to blame it on it being a bad time of day for Ben.

Now, lets think that statement through.  Ben’s schedule is as follows:

7am wake up

730am Breakfast

9-11a Nap!

1130-12p lunch

12-3p play!!

3-5p Nap!

5p Dinner

6p Bath

730p Bed

This varies of course and you have to throw in gym class and 1-2 therapies a day.  But basically, Ben’s “good window” when he isn’t supposed to be eating or sleeping is 12-3p.  The appointment was at 130p.  So pretty much, the absolute best time ever for Ben. Unfortunately for the audiologists, Ben is just an active soon to be two year old who could care less about the banging monkeys.  And really?  Does this test actually work on some 2 years olds??  So, in light of this, they would like us to move on to a different type of test which relys on brain waves and impulses rather than Ben.  He will need to be sedated and have a breathing tube for this testing which actually makes it more involved than getting the tubes.  BUT, it will be 100% conclusive in telling us how Ben hears.

This brings me to the next question that I invariably get from anyone whether it be friends, family or even his therapists.  But you know Ben can hear, so why do you keep testing?  Our ENT summed this up pretty well:  Do we think Ben is a deaf child? No.  Do we think Ben can hear everything that is being said? No.  Think of it like people with vision problems.  I wear glasses and Josh wears glasses.  Are either of us blind?  No.  But we can’t see everything without our glasses either so we get help to make it so we can see.  Ben is not deaf, but he may need help so he can hear everything.

The suspicion for Ben’s hearing loss lies with higher frequency sounds.  This includes women and children’s voices as well as consonants such as, f, t, and z, even though vowels can be heard normally. Consequently, people hear but cannot make out what is being said.  This would affect his speech as well as his comprehension so its very important that we are sure in whether or not he has this type of hearing loss.   Although I am really not thrilled about sedating Ben for this testing, it will help us figure this all out.

Last night was the first night of the 10k training class.  We met in Columbus Circle and split into groups based on current mileage.  This is a bit different than what I am used to as usually you split based on your mile times, but hey, it’s free so I can go with the flow.  There were probably over 100 people there and they talked to us a bit about what to expect week to week and then set us free.

I ran with the Intermediate/Advanced group and the goal was 2 loops around the lower park loop (approx 3.4 miles) and then stretching with a bit of core work at the end.  They told us our goal for this run was to meet people…introduce ourselves to at least 5 people.  This is where I failed.  I have trouble talking and running because running doesn’t come naturally to me.  So, generally, for my entire run, all that I think about is “just keep going, just keep going, you are X% done, just keep going”.  This doesn’t lead to me being an interesting conversationalist.  When I used to run with my friend Beth, she would chat and I would agree where appropriate. That doesn’t usually work when you are attempting to meet new people.   But, I’m going to work up to meeting some people as it does make the time go faster when there are people to motivate you.

I did manage to run all 3.4 miles without stopping which is unusual because I normally have Ben with me which means I have to stop 347 times in the span of a 3 mile run.  Ben needs to be offered food, drinks, told to stop taking off his shoe, have said shoe taken away so he doesn’t throw it, be told to stop screeching…you get the point.  Afterwards, I took some time to walk home on Central Park West which is one of my favorite walks in the city.  Next class is Wed and I’m excited for them to start offering ‘running tips’ which may help improve my speed.

So much for trying to get to work early. 

I had a few things I wanted to finish up this morning and we happen to use a system at work that is the equivalent of ‘Atari’ when ‘Xbox’ totally exists.  This means that if more than oh, say 2 users want to use it at the same time it could take approximately 40 minutes to do something ‘Xbox’ users could do in about 8 seconds.  That being said, I was just trying to get a jump on the morning.

As I walked down 96th street where normally I pass about 10 people in walking towards the park, I was met with about 1000 people streaming against me.  I mean, it looked the a parade was headed towards the park and my first instinct was confusion.  There were no sirens and nobody seemed particularly traumatized so they probably hadn’t been evacuated.  I turned to my iPhone to figure out what was happening.  (for all non-NYC’ers.  We live in between the 123 train  on Broadway and the ABC train on Central Park West so most likely everyone walking against me was on their was from the 123 to the ABC)  I go to the MTA website and….nothing.  I went to the local tv station website….nothing.  I debated just going with the flow, turning around and heading towards the ABC but that would defeat my getting to work early mission so I trucked on.  When I finally hit the 123 station, the same amount of people were going in as coming out.  The transit police were telling everyone service had been shut down indefinitely.  Um, things that you might want to update on your transit service website!  Then all of a sudden, the word was changed to : it’s all fine, trains are running again.    You have to love NYC.  I mean, no explanation for why the train was shut down nor why its back up and you are blindly supposed to trust that it is safe and hop on?  Which is exactly what I did.  I made it to work in one piece, luckily. 

This IS why I love NYC.  There is never a dull moment, always something new to keep you on your toes.  I made it to work early-ish and figured out here that it was a signal failure that was delaying the train, nothing scarier than that.  I can only hope my commute home is slightly less exciting.

The duvet we ordered for Ben from Restoration Hardware Kids arrived last night and I was disappointed, it’s totally denim looking.  I don’t really ‘do’ denim for decoration and I specifically asked the sales girl about it because it didn’t look denim-y in the pictures but the sheets that went with it did, so I had my suspicions.

Now we need to find an alternative duvet.  His rug and curtains are solid navy so I’m hoping to find something in the navy family but with some other color/shade thrown in.  I lean towards strips and can’t deal with anything outwardly kid like dinosaurs or spaceships.  Any suggestions?

We met with Ben’s nutritionist who said we are doing everything right (yay!).  Ben doesn’t have any texture issues and is more than willing to try anything we put in front of him  Favorites are vanilla Oreo cookies, carrots and cantaloupe.  Such a balanced diet!  We aren’t over-relying on the bottle and we are providing enough choices, yet not pushing any of them.  Ben has become a better eater over the past few months, but still doesn’t eat a ton.  He prefers fruits and veggies still so we are going to work on introducing those at the end of the meal and only in limited portions. Who would have ever thought we we be limiting his fruits and veggies?

Ben’s vocabulary is expanding.  He has da-da down which he likes to say on repeat while searching the apartment for Josh.  He also says: ba-ba, ball, brown bear, hat, open, bubble, yeah and is working on cookie, cheese stick and banana.  He signs the words open, hat, give me and more.  The signing has helped a lot with the frustration of not being able to communicate.  We are still waiting on further testing to determine what range, if any, of hearing loss he may have but we should have an answer on that sometime next week.

Ben also finally has some more teeth!  7 to be exact.  5 on top and 2 on the bottom still.  His molars are in before his top front teeth but we can feel the front teeth coming.  All in all, Ben is on track in the majority of areas for a soon to be 2 year old!

I just signed up for a 10k training program (for free!!  thank you NYC for having perks unlike any other city!) through a partnership by Footlocker and Runner’s World.  Eight weeks starting next Monday on Monday’s & Wednesday’s at 630p.  It means time away from Ben but I think in the grand scheme of things, finding some me time will be good.  It will also help me get back into a running routine that I have never quite achieved since Ben was born (yes, almost 2 years ago.  Sigh.)  I am currently running about 3-4 miles at a time so I’m not sure how much the training program will help but its a start.

I also just signed both Josh and myself up for a 5k in July in Chicago!

I got Ben’s hair cut for the second time in recent weeks. The first haircut, while costing $30, didn’t really cut enough hair. Josh needed a cut so we hit a local barber on 96th st and the sign said they did kids so I figured why not? Ben sat nicely for most of the time, mainly because watching daddy also get his haircut is distracting and in under 5 minutes we had shed all the crazy curly locks for a summer look. Grand total: $30 for both Ben & Josh including tip! Pictures to follow.