In Which We Contemplate A Companion For Connor

Our apnea monitor is picking up messages from space.

No, not literally, like this family's monitor, but we do seem to be getting some interesting interference. I think one of the families in our apartment complex has a monitor that runs on similar channels. Ours still picks up Connor very well, but in the background every once in a while we'll hear something that sounds remarkably like the grown-ups in Charlie Brown-- you know, "Mwa mwa mwa mwa mwa" in conversational tones. Sometimes there will be a higher pitched "mwwaaaaaa mwaaaaaaaaa" which is probably the baby crying.

What's really weird is that if you turn off Connor's apnea monitor at his bedside but leave the remote monitor on, the voices suddenly become much, much clearer. Sometimes you can even pick out phrases. It's very strange, though I guess if I were a voyeur I'd be pretty excited about it. It sort of makes me wonder if someone picks up what happens on our monitor. They probably think we're beating Connor or something. The kid likes to scream and yell a lot when he goes down for nap time. Not because he's sad or anything; just because he likes to scream. Since CPS hasn't shown up at our door yet I'm guessing no one's listening very hard.

We'll be doing a little bit of surveillance of our own pretty soon. Once we get to the new house and Connor is back in his own room instead of sleeping in ours, we'll be getting a video monitor so that we can make sure he's not having a seizure while he's back in his bedroom. We'll have a huge TV in new living room mounted on the fireplace, and we can probably hook up the video monitor receiver to it and have a GIANT picture of Connor. We could probably see his nose hairs and everything; I think those TVs get pretty good definition these days. It'll work for now, but we may have to figure out something else once we adopt if the kids share a room or as Connor gets older. It seems kind of like Big Brother parenting, if you know what I mean. I guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

One of the solutions we might end up with as an alternative to video monitoring when Connor is older is to get a seizure response skilled companion dog. The difference between a skilled companion dog and a service dog, for those of you who don't know, is that a service dog is bonded and mainly cared for by the person who requires the dog's services, and a skilled companion dog provides those services with the help of a facilitator (ie me) who takes care of the dog. It would be very, very helpful to have a dog that was trained to stay with Connor at night and alert us if he was having a seizure. I always have the fear in the back of my mind right now that I might be in the shower or in a far part of the house and not hear the monitor alarm going off. Having a dog that could come find me or Jer and alert us to the fact that Connor is having a seizure would really alleviate a lot of the stress there. Of course, on the other hand, then we'd have a dog. Which means more responsibility, more expenses, and more poop. And we all know how fond I am of poop around here.

Still, Jer and I really think a skilled companion dog for Connor would be really, really beneficial for him, and with the new house we would finally be in a position to own a dog. I may have to start doing some homework!

~Jess