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| Eye deviation at nine weeks old. Also lots of cuteness :) |
How We Discovered Isaiah had Toxoplasmosis
Last Monday, September 23rd, my dad and Gabriel finally convinced me to call the pediatrician about Isaiah. He had turned 10 weeks old and wasn't making eye contact, tracking, or smiling. Most of these skills happen in the 6-8 week range. We also noticed some time after Morgan's birthday party (around 7 weeks old) that Isaiah looked to the right. Almost exclusively when his eyes were open he was looking right. So I called the pediatrician thinking they might say, oh wait a few more weeks and get back to us. But they told me to go ahead and bring him in and that's when I first started to worry. By the time I actually got a call back we couldn't go in until the next day, Tuesday. So I had a whole night to try not to think about why my kid didn't want to look straight.
Tuesday came and Gabriel and I took both boys to the doctor. Gabriel actually took a separate car because he was planning on going into the office after we left the pediatrician. Not so much. Our normal doctor was out of town so we saw one I'd never talked to before. Dr. Conlon immediately noticed the eye deviation. Isaiah's pupils reacted to light but he didn't want to look straight. That, paired with a lack of social smile, led to a call to an ophthalmologist three floors down. Dr. Kumar allowed us to come right then, which later turned out to be a huge blessing.
So down the elevator we went. One of the first things Dr. Kumar told us was that some babies are just slower developmentally and that eye deviation in a two month old isn't worrisome. Then he discovered Isaiah wasn't responding to light at all in his left eye. They did some dialation drops (which take 45 minutes to work) so Dr. Kumar could look at the anatomy of Isaiah's eyes. He said if nothing was physically wrong we could just come back in a few months for another check up. At this point we were 30 minutes PAST Morgan's nap time. He was obviously tired but was such a trooper. They had a movie on in the waiting room and he sat in Gabriel's lap, leaning back on his daddy's chest. No fits or tantrums. Such a good big brother.
After the drops had time to work we went back in for a more thorough exam. Right eye looked good. Then when Dr. Kumar was looking in Isaiah's left eye he asked us if we had any cats. We have two indoor cats. He then tells us he sees scars on Isaiah's eye that look like classic toxoplasmosis. After looking some more he said Isaiah had three scars in his eye. One of them in the middle of his 20/20 spot which would prevent him from ever seeing perfectly. Nothing looked like an active infection but toxo almost always affects the brain as well as the eyes. Dr. Kumar suggested we get a CT or MRI as well as blood work as soon as possible. He rode the elevator with us back to see Dr. Conlon to tell her what he saw. After a very quick discussion, Dr. Conlon said the most efficient way to get all of the testing done quickly and easily was to admit Isaiah as a patient at Memorial Hermann across the street. Cue the tears. While I fed Isaiah (it was past three at this point) Gabriel and I called our parents to let them know what was going on. More tears. We arranged for my parents to take care of Morgan so Gabriel and I could stay at the hospital. Our 11:30 appointment eventually turned into a four day hospital stay. To keep from having the longest blog post ever I'll post about the hospital later. (Since this post is past tense I do want to say that Isaiah is not in any immediate danger and we are officially home from the hospital.)
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Super Basic info on Congenital Toxoplasmosis
