Two seconds after he was born they knew he had a problem with his eyes. The room got quiet and you could have heard a pin drop. And then the nurse said, I thought loudly, that a specialist would have to look at my baby's eyes, something was wrong with them. When we brought him home from the hospital all we knew was that he was our baby boy and we loved him.
Nothing else seemed to matter. And at first, even with all the doctor appointments, it didn't seem like it was going to be that big of a deal. But as each milestone came by and little Bobby didn't meet them, we began to have our doubts. By this time, we asked the eye specialist to tell us simply if our baby could see. His answer gave my husband and I both shudders. He said he didn't know.
It was impossible to test such a small child, he explained. And because of that there was no way to know for sure what our little boy was seeing.Or not seeing. By the time he was nine months old, Bobby's missed milestones were becoming a constant source of worry for me.
By almost one year old, Bobby didn't respond to visual stimuli by tracking anything that was further than twelve inches away from his face. And even then he couldn't track it with both eyes or as well as he should have. But more worrisome than that, Bobby couldn't sit up, roll over, stand, crawl or even reach for a toy. Cerebral Palsy was being whispered.
And then we recieved our first Christmas miracle. Right before he was to turn one and right before Christmas, our little boy reacted to and reached for his first toy more than once or twice. Right at the same time he was able to sit up and started rolling over.
It would be a few more months before he mastered all of this. He was walking by eighteen months and by the time he was almost two years old we were working desperately with therapists to try and get him caught up even more. That year, we recieved our second Christmas miracle. Bobby started eating solid foods. Those with babies know that this milestone usually occurs much sooner than two years. But Bobby was so far behind in so many areas, and one area in particular was sensory dysfunction. He couldn't stand to touch or eat most foods. And before this he was still eating baby food.
So you can imagine our great joy when he finally decided to start with solids. We considered it a miracle. He had a brother by this time who was about eight months old. His brother was eating solids already and enjoying them immensely. So now I could feed both of my boys. I no longer had to hold Bobby's cup up for him and he was drinking from a sippy cup! All of this is such a short ammount of time - we were impressed with the Lord's work that year.
But this year, the Lord has outdone himself. My son has, at almost three years of age, really started talking! We've spent the last six months to a year working on his speech development and his speech therapist had already very gently told me he might not ever be able to get over the hump so to speak. Within the last few weeks, Bobby has gone from speaking and signing around twenty words total to speaking or signing at least forty and maybe fifty. He's repeating words we say - which he never used to do. And do you remember baby jabbering? You know that precious talking that babies do that only they can understand? He is starting to jabber!
So you understand the significance of this, he NEVER did this before. He has never picked words up this quickly before. And he has never before repeated words back to us. And now it is constant! He does it all the time.
So now you see what this year's miracle has given us? It's given us the ability to communicate with our son!
Oh, he still has so much work ahead of him. He has low vision, he is still significantly behind in his speech development and fine and gross motor skills. But this year, we again saw evidence of the Lord's handiwork. And it only took a small child to show us. And to show me. That sometimes the greatest miracles we could ever wish for are the ones we don't think will ever come!
There are so many things we were told Bobby would never do. And he's proving them all wrong, one at a time. And I consider that a miracle in the works all by itself!
So don't go looking for miracles in a blaze of glory - look for them in front of you, in the face of a child or the blossom of a rose. Look where you dont' expect to find them, and there they will always be!
(Addendum -- this was written on almost Christmas of 2001 - look for Bobby's newest soon)
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