When I found out I was pregnant with my daughter in June of 2019, I was over the moon with happiness. We had had an early pregnancy loss while after our son while trying for baby number 2, and there were a whole lotta emotions. Little did I know what the next year would bring 🥴
When I was 9 month’s pregnant I contracted Covid 19 and went into pre-term labor. They were about to give me the steroid shot to rapidly develop her lungs and transfer me down to Boston for delivery at 35 weeks. Thankfully, they were able to stop labor and baby girl seemed okay. I was placed on partial bedrest for the rest of my pregnancy and was walking around at 2cm dilated. Sadie Rose Moore made it to 40 weeks and joined us earthside February 20th, 2020. Just 2 weeks before lockdown. I had a csection, so I was in the hospital for 5 days before we happily & healthily went home.
8 days later the world shut down. My husband and our company are essential, so I was stuck home, mostly alone, with a newborn and an autistic 3 year old. I didn’t even get a post-op appt. They literally called me like “You alive? Any bleeding or infection? Alrighty then see ya when we see ya!”
In June 2020, Harrison’s ABA preschool was allowed to re-open, because they are technically a behavioral program. However, they could only do in-home therapy. So I was stuck at home Monday through Friday from 8-3, supervising ABA therapy. Needless to say, Sadie was basically in total isolation, besides her family, for the first year of her life.
I noticed at 14/15 months that she had a speech delay and enrolled her in Early Intervention. BTW, you do not need a pediatrician to refer your child to EI, you can call your local agency and do it yourself. It is also free for every child nationwide, regardless of insurance status. Upon evaluation, she was given the sensory checklist and checked off over-sensitive in every single category. She is terrified all the time, of other people, loud noises, heights, etc. Once she gets upset, it takes an enormous amount of time to calm her down, and I’m the only one that can do it. Cry it out does not work for her, and she’ll scream for hours until she’s vomiting until her mama picks her up. She has speech therapy twice a month and OT for her sensory issues twice a month. Over the past 9 months or so she has made a lot of progress!
The is a 12 month waitlist to get her into developmental medicine for an official diagnosis. However, I’ve discussed her at a few of Harrison’s appointments with his developmental physician and he says she does not have autism. And based off of EI’s most recent evaluation, she has a global developmental delay. Basically she’s behind by one year across the board – fine motor, gross motor, speech, sensory, etc. He also says that they are seeing more and more of this with babies born right around the beginning of the pandemic. Thanks Covid 19 😤
They assure me that she’ll grow out of it and catch up to her peers in no time and that by the time she’s elementary school age there won’t be a noticeable difference between them. She’ll always have the IEP though 🙌🏼
Mama Bear Inc 