02/02/2026
Grief is hitting me hard today. Elaina turns 9 months old in 3 days. 9 months old. This was her big sister, Emersen, at 9 months. Crawling. Scooting on the ground. Pulling herself up onto furniture. Sitting without support. Babbling mama and dada. Trying new foods and drinks. Breaking in teeth.
Most babies spend their first 9 months learning how to move through the world.
And Elaina… spent hers learning how to breathe, recover, endure procedures, tolerate pain, survive sedation, and come back from things that would break most bodies. I wonder what’s to come for her.
I know that development is not a straight line, especially after medical trauma. As the doctors have said over and over again “Many babies like Elaina don’t show progress the way textbooks describe. They pause, then surge. Skills stack quietly under the surface while the body stabilizes. What looks like “laying there” right now is actually a nervous system finally getting a chance to rest.”
And when she’s ready, not on the calendar’s timeline, but on hers, movement will come. Different order. Different pace. Still real. Still hers. Right?
