Happy Birthday Cameron - May 22, 2007

Today is a huge milestone!When we look back on the progress Cameron has made in the past year it's amazing. He is an inspiration and has taught us so much in such a short time.

Cameron can just about sit independently, he's able to bring his knees up in an attempt to "really crawl", with lots of hard work he'll get there soon. He can drink yogurt from a straw, he's sprouting two teeth and is starting to make some sounds that might be close to "da da da" ...and he's just the happiest guy in the world.

We put together a video of the last year, we hope you enjoy it and if you can't play it from here email me and I'll send it to you directly. rory.dominick@gmail.com

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Here is a poem that I adapted from a great book on being the mother of a child with special needs.

My son is one today.
Little hair and gray-eyed, he is all
Beaming smiles, sly grins and dancing eyes.
Squirming, inching, babbling, he exhausts each day.
An old soul. One year wise.
Happy. Alive.

One year ago, my worst nightmare played out.
Dread, panic, pain at 29 weeks.
Too soon, too small, this baby, my baby, who diagnosis was grim
Was to be born 8 weeks early.
The words incomprehensible: brain surgery on my baby boy

Dogged and brave, he was born,
Four pounds of pure soul and will.
At once frail, impossibly fragile, yet indomitable.
Swaddled in a great technological womb, time stopped.
We waited, watched. Exulted and despaired.
Powerless.

One year is a lifetime to a boy; vast and unfathomable.
One month an eternity to his mother. An eternity of
Days measured by breaths per minute, cat scans and ultrasounds,
By breast milk in drops and weight in grams.
Diapers weighed and recorded.
Infinitesimal triumphs and terrifying setbacks.

My son, my son. The universe lay with him,
Incubated and sedated, fed through a tube.
So far from coming home. Cracks in the armor hastily constructed,
Widened as hours became days, became weeks, then months.
Asleep, I searched at midnight through the hamper for my
Missing baby. Grieving, exhausted.

One year later, the scars that mark his head and tummy,
Are insignificant to those of a one-year-old.
Needle scars only tiny marks on his hands and feet.
And so I hope those first months too have paled to insignificance,
The psychic scars shrinking until there is no trace, no memory.
No ghosts.

Leave the ghosts to mother.
My son is ONE today.