Dear Noah:

Wow. Just got back from your cardiology visit. Talk about trauma and drama! I had explained what might happen to you even before we went. We went over the heart and studied taking pulses and doing echocardiograms and EKGs at home in school. However, even with all that preparation you still freaked out in the doctor's office. You keep thinking back to when you had to go to the lab and have those EIGHT tubes of blood drawn. I guess you kept thinking someone was going to stick you with something or hurt you. We kept trying to explain things to you but you cried and screamed and cried some more and would calm down for a short time before the entire process would start all over again. It is hard to make you understand things to begin with let alone when you are upset and not calming down. We finally got the EKG done. The doctor came in and you freaked about him just listening to your heart. You freaked about your blood pressure. You had a hard time today with your entire visit there.

THANKFULLY they did not hear a heart murmur today and this doc feels your heart is probably just fine. SO that is good. No more visits like this one. A couple of weeks ago before the blood draw however you were hugging your docs and nurses and calling them your BUDDIES. Not sure if you will think that way again though you still have some favorites. Now I am getting a bit worried about speech therapy, occupational therapy and physical therapy. You have done these things all very well in the past...but....they were done in the school setting and not in a clinic setting. Hopefully you will not have a hard time with all those in the future.

I think I am going to cancel your eye doctor visit. You have better than normal vision we already know that. They only wanted to assess you squinting and/or you looking at things sometimes peripherally. I personally am not worried about that and know it is part of autism. So there...so what. Why go through even more trauma just to find out what we already know.

Makes you almost wish we had never taken you for the genetic blood tests and 8 tubes of blood draw. I mean it would not really change the outcome of anything anyway. They said it was to rule things out or in I guess. But so what? Nothing would be handled differently than it is now anyway. That was one reason why I did NOT choose to have an amniocentesis during my pregnancy with you. It would not change anything as I would have had you regardless of whether or not something was wrong with you. They try to tell you it is just so the hospital staff can be more prepared in advance if you will need something special after your birth. I personally think they do that to offer some women a way out of having a child that is perhaps less than perfect or even severely disabled or deformed.

Anyway..you are off filming now to calm down.

I still love you Noah even though you had a very hard time today at the doctor's office. I know you worry we think you acted badly. BUT it was how you felt and you at least showed us very well how you were feeling about today's visit.

SMOOCHES AND KISSES AND HUGS FOREVER!

Mommy