Well, sweet pea, at 6 months you are an absolute doll.  Everyone we meet tells us that you are the most beautiful baby they've ever seen.  Up to this point things had been great, tremendous in fact.  We had this amazing little girl who brought colourful rainbows into every moment of every day.  To us and to everyone else you were as healthy as can be, you had just the other day rolled over onto your side for the first time.  You were grabbing toys and bringing them to your mouth (everything to you was edible).  You smiled, giggled, laughed, cooed and just enjoyed yourself to the fullest while we sat back in amazement and enjoyed you.

The only thing that others with children noticed was that you weren't as active as other children at 6 months.  Your daddy and I didn't take much notice of what others said or did only because it mattered not to us whether you did things at the specified time.  You were you and we loved you regardless of whether you could grab your toes and sit on your own.   You would do these things in your own time, you were just going to do them when you were ready.  We didn't ever want you to doubt yourself and your abilities, your daddy & I were going to do everything we could to make you comfortable and happy with who you were and to love yourself.

At your 6 month checkup and immunization appointment we casually told the doctor that you weren't able to sit on your own and that it seemed to hurt you when you were bent too far forward or when your legs were brought up too far to your chest.  We also told her that you projectile vomited (it seemed such a large amount brought up - looked like a whole feed) at least once a week.  The doctor said not to be concerned about the vomiting unless it happened more often but she did say that she would have liked you to be a little more active than what you were but not to be concerned because all babies develop at different times.  She scheduled an appointment for a month away to see if there would be any progress.

We decided to check out a couple of open houses for child development classes so that you could interact with other children your age and to have some fun with exercise and music.  The first open house was Kindermusik which is an interactive music appreciation class for babies.  The second was Gymboree a combination of exercise, music and play.  We were very impressed by the Gymboree program and decided to sign you up for a 10 week program.  The open house was separated into 2 classes, one for 6 months and under and the other for crawlers (6 months plus).  Although you were 7 months you were still not able to sit on your own and you definitely weren't close to crawling so we went to the 6 month and under class.  It was there that we first had the unfortunate realization that you were much more delayed physically than others your age.  Cognitively however, you were beyond your age (although I'm sure all mommys and daddys feel that way about their precious little ones), you have always been so aware, with those beautiful bright eyes watching and listening to everything around you.

The past month you had started to gag more often, almost like you were trying to bring something up but were unable to, you would start to convulse and you would have trouble catching your breath but it wouldn't last long and you would either end up vomiting or nothing would happen and you would be fine again.  You were also having more episodes where you would stiffen right up, we noticed it mostly when other people went to pick you up, as soon as you were held you would stiffen up as straight as a board.

And the wonderful sleeps you had  since you were only 2 months old were becoming less and less, but we thought this was just due to your age, you were becoming a little girl and didn't need to sleep as much and because you were growing maybe you needed to eat more often.  You would go from sleeping 8 - 9 hours a night, to 7 hours, 6 hours, 5, 4, 3, and then it seemed you were sleeping only a couple of hours at a time.  It didn't seem a big deal to me because it wasn't as if I had to get up and go to work but I was worrying more about you, that you weren't able to settle, you seemed uncomfortable.  I thought it was just that you were suffering from gas, or that you were needing to be fed more, I just wasn't sure what you needed, I'd burp, or I'd feed, or I'd cuddle, anything that would settle you again.

We took you back to see the doctor and as we suspected the doctor was a little concerned that you had not progressed since the last visit.  She referred us to see a pediatrician the next day.