Nate

Nate is the wonderful child that I got to spend all of my time with last summer. I fell head over heels in love with this 13 month old bundle of joy!Nate was born premature to the point he was on a feeding tube for almost 6 months of his life. He had several developmental problems related to eating, talking, crawling, walking, and most of all hearing. But physically he was a normal child. He is truly one of the most beautiful children I know!

With all of his developmental delays comes therapy. We did therapy 5 times a week. Feeding therapy to help him learn how to eat, audio-visual therapy to helpfully teach him to talk through working with hearing aids and visual aids, physical therapy to help him walk and crawl and use his arms and legs more, and we did sensory therapy to help him tolerate different textures. It was a lot of work, but nothing that we couldn’t handle. I enjoyed experiencing all of these things and getting to help him learn to eat real food rather than a bottle, and watch him learn to crawl and stand, and trying to help him talk.

Unfortunately, my time with Nate was short-lived. The summer break from school came to an end WAY to fast. I soon had to leave him after 4 short months. It was the most emotional time of my life. I had grown so close to him and his family and new that I wouldn’t be able to spend time from 8-5 five days a week with him. I visited on Fridays when I was headed home from school and enjoyed being able to see him for a little bit on those days but a few months after school started back Nate moved to Marietta where his mom is from. There are many opportunities and programs for Nate offered there that aren’t offered here in South Georgia. This was best for him. I think that has made it easier for me to think about not seeing him anymore.

 

I still keep up with him via Julia’s(his mom) facebook and get to see my booger growing! I really wish I could have quit college and become his full-time nanny all the time but I am halfway done with school and can’t do it. I hope to make a trip up there to visit him sometime soon!

 

Julia and Scott have been looking into cochlear implants for Nate. They are surgically implanted hearing aids that could potentially help Nate hear which will eventually help him learn to talk. He had his left implant done in early July. Yesterday, the activated the implant for the first time. Here is a video of his AMAZING response. I cannot wait for updates from Julia about Nate’s progress in the days, months, weeks, and years to come!