Back to our roots...

I don't often post really preemie-related things here anymore, largely because we are fortunate enough to not have Shoshanna's prematurity affecting our daily, or even weekly or monthly, lives. But then I see stats like these (posted by PeepsMama) and I get a little reality check. We know how lucky we are to have Shoshanna be so very healthy, so developmentally on track. I think we sometimes forget how lucky we are to have her be ALIVE. We were talking last night about how her being big for gestational age at a pound-thirteen probably did help her, because it meant the difference between her dropping to a pound-five at her lowest and somewhere barely over a pound. When you're that little, those few ounces really do make a difference.

And then while I was changing her diaper this morning, I noticed that for the first time in a really long time, I can see Shoshanna's ribs; they're not visible ALL the time, but when she's lying down and giggling and squriming, they definintely are. She's been doing some good growing - her percentiles have increased in both height and weight, but her proportions have changed. Several months ago she was roughly 20th percentile in both height and weight; now she's more like 30th for weight and 50th for height. Seeing those little bones sticking out of her chest reminded me of when she was so very little, and I found myself reminding myself that it's normal for toddlers to alternate growing vertically with growing horizontally. And she's definitely been on a vertical-growth tear these past several months. Almost daily, we put something down where we're sure she can't reach it, only to be proven wrong.