Follow up MRI and more

Left: December Right:April

MRI
This past week we went for another follow up MRI. The image is one Gabriel took off the computer from his phone so it's crooked but you can see the difference. The image on the left is from December, six weeks post shunt. The image on the right is from last week. The white spaces are the ventricles which were enlarged and putting pressure on his brain tissue. The shunt helps the brain to circulate his CSF (cerebral spinal fluid) properly which allowed the brain matter to expand and fill the space that was once taken up by fluid. You can also see another slice under the picture on the left and compare it to the slice in between the two larger images.
I keep having to remind myself how big of a deal this is. Less pressure generally means more cognitive ability. Not only is this more affirmation that we made the right choice to put in the shunt but it gives us more hope as to how well Isaiah will function in the future. And again, he has continued to be infection and obstruction free. Technically, anything up to six months after the procedure is still considered "post-op" so we aren't COMPLETELY out of the danger zone. But my understanding is that most infections would have presented by now, and we would have seen an obstruction in the MRI if there was one. We continue to pray that Isaiah will be in the minority and never have to have his shunt cleared or replaced.

Leg rolls!

Developmental Delays
With all of that being said, Isaiah is still developmentally delayed. He acts more like a 5-6 month old than a 9 month old. He can sit independently for thirty seconds pretty consistently, sometimes longer. (This has been one of his biggest jumps so far!) He can roll to his side and has rolled to his back from tummy but not very often.
Most children that show delays in gross motor also show delays in speech. Isaiah is still not making consonant sounds although I heard his first "baba" this past Saturday. It was VERY exciting.
Children develop from the top down and the middle out. What this means is first they gain head control, then torso, then legs. And from torso out to hands and fingers. So Isaiah has great head control and is working on his core muscles and torso. The tongue makes such fine motor movements to speak that until he gets better control over his big movements it's less likely for him to make much progress in speaking.

Eyes
We have held off on the muscle surgery for Isaiah's lazy eye until he is developmentally closer to six months. He was also still making improvements from what we could see so we wanted to wait until we felt like his eye was functioning as good as possible. We will probably schedule the surgery after our next appointment which is next week. I will for sure post an update if that is the case so you can be praying for it to go well.

Here's a link to Isaiah playing with his laptop, which I promptly left in a hotel :(

As always, thank you all for your continued prayers and support. As you may have noticed, I'm not super great about updating so if you ever wonder how we are doing please feel free to facebook me or send an email!