04/06/2026
Update 4/6/26: Hello everyone! Sorry for the delayed update on our little Angelica! We are always so nervous to post updates due to previous updates resulting in breakthroughs shortly thereafter. BUT we would like to provide an update as we near Angelica’s 3rd birthday! She has changed A LOT, and a lot of big this are happening or coming!
Our last update was back in the beginning of November for Halloween and family pictures! Since then, we have celebrated Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, Cassidy’s birthday, Easter and soon Angelica’s birthday!
Over “sick season” Angelica was rarely sick and when she was it was milder than previous illnesses! That being said, on April 12th of this month, she will have been SEIZURE FREE FOR 11 MONTHS! The longest we have been able to go previously was 7 months! Once we are able to hit 1 year, we will be able to discuss with Angelica’s neurologist to see if we want to work on switching out her phenobarbital seizure medication with a more long-term seizure medication. If we don’t feel she has been seizure free long enough, we will push this change out until we feel she is more stable. Just before fall of last year, we made the decision as parents to give Angelica lion’s mane tincture and elderberries tincture in her bottles. We believe that the lion’s mane has helped improve her brain development and the elderberries have helped improve her immune system. Since getting her tubes placed, she has had a lot less ear infections as well. Currently, one tube is partially out and one is still in. She does follow up with ENT every 6 months to monitor her hearing.
From an eating standpoint, Angelica is still eating 6oz bottles with her Kate Farms formula as her sole source for food/nutrients. Since attending the CP daycare last October, she has made improvements with table foods. She no longer wants purees but is willing to try foods we send with to daycare or what other kids are eating there. We continue to try and some days are better than others but her GI doctor has been happy with her growth and said we are able to remove the additional duo cal powder as of March of this year and we don’t have to pump the remainder of her bottles anymore to try to initiate the hunger feeling to see if this will help her want to eat more table foods instead.
Between November and now, Angelica has improve, went backwards and is now improving again with her speech. Currently, she likes to babble a lot more and say more single words such as “mama”, “dada”, “all done”, “hi”, and “bye bye”. We continue to work with her on this but also have been providing other forms of communication options to her to help her communicate while being non-verbale such as pictures to select what toy she wants.
For mobility, Angelica has been doing AMAZING! She can now army crawl all over the place, roll, spin/pivot, get up on all fours, push up onto her knees, when by a bench she can pull herself up into a kneeling position and will try to stand up, she can sit unassisted, can sit to stand with assistance and can take steps assisted. At daycare she has a gait trainer (pediatric walker) which she goes in and can push herself around in. Lately, she is not a fan of this anymore. Her physical therapist says she has core strength but lacks back strength which is why she still struggles with standing by herself and the gait trainer for walking. The daycare also has her stander there and plan to use this more to help her build up strength in her back and legs to help with getting her ready to walk. She is one determined little girl and wants to do things her way when she wants! Her personality has started to show and this comes along with an attitude! She is starting to use her right hand/right leg more but it does take a lot for her to tell that side of her body to do something. Her left side is extremely strong because of this! When she throws something, you best watch out!
She is now getting a gait trainer for at home and is also getting a transportation stroller as we are preparing for her to start 3K at Lannoye Elementary in Pulaski this month! We have met to “team” for her at school and are finalizing her IEP as well. She will have a special education teacher, a nurse, OT, PT, speech, and psychologist working with her at school. She will attend school Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday until the end of this school year and then will start back up in the fall of this year. She will ride the bus to and from school as well. Everyone has met her and completed their evaluations of her and can’t wait for her to start! She will continue to go to the CP daycare and there is no plan to change this anytime soon.
As a family, these past 11 months have allowed us to do so much more as a family, reduce the stress on our family and all the family that we rely on closely to help us weekly in our life! At one point you feel that this is serial because this is not how we have been living our life since Angelica was born. Angelica is now able to go places with us such as two weekends ago we went to Barkhausen Waterfowl Preserve to learn about maple syrup. All her changes and improvement of her health has allowed us to include her in so much more as a family and we are finally starting to feel like we are at our version of “normal”.
I am aware that this post is extremely long and there is a lot that goes on with Angelica and in our lives so if I missed something or if there is something you specifically want to know about, please ask in the comments section and I am more than happy to respond back to you all! We appreciate everyone who continues to follow, support and care about Angelica’s Journey through life and we will continue to update everyone, hopefully more often now!
I have included some pictures/videos from daycare, home and therapy of Angelica over the past few months 😊 Hope you all enjoy!
**Side note (Brittany): Since my back surgery in June of 2025, I have been off any form of restrictions since January 1st 2026 and have been pain free and healthy since. In July of 2025, I decided that I needed to do something about my weight to prevent anything going wrong with my back in the future and to get myself healthier to do more with both of my girls! This has been a huge goal of mine and with Angelica stabilizing out more it has allowed me to focus a little more on mom. I started taking Trulicity, an injection for diabetics, even though I am not diabetic, it can also be used to help with weight loss. Since July 2025, and getting to the highest dose on this medication, I have lost to date 82 pounds! In the beginning of January, I started to work out to help get my strength back and tone back up. My goal is that by July 2026, I will be at my wedding day weight as this year is mine and James’s 10 year wedding anniversary! I truly believe I can make this goal a reality and I can’t remember the last time I have felt this good about myself or focused on myself. I give everything to my girls, husband and family and tend to push myself aside but I have had a lot of support and will do anything to make myself healthy for my family. Thank you for reading my full post if you made it this far! 😊
