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Thursday, July 2, 2009

July 4th, 2008...A day I will never forget!



The type of seizures that Karissa had were in the temporal lobe of her brain. One of the main functions of the temporal lobe are speech and language. This may explain why, at the age of
3 1/2, Karissa only had a few words. She was still saying "dada" and "mama"; her speech was still like that of a baby just learing how to talk and babble. Every once in a while a word would come out of her mouth from nowhere. Clear as day. We always rejoiced, sometimes even cried! However, it was never consistent.

The main way we communicated with Karissa was through signing. She was a pro at signing "more" and "eat." Even though we tried to use a variety of signs and made them a part of our daily routine, those were really the only signs she used.

A year ago today, we were on our last vacation with Karissa in La Quinta. I remember the day so vividly. We were just hangin' out in our room. Mark and I were both reading and Karissa was playing. Out of the blue, Karissa says, with perfect clarity, "Momma, it hurts me. I love you."
Mark and I looked at each other with both of our jaws dropped to the floor. Wow! It brought tears to our eyes.

It is hard for me to look at the pictures from that vacation for 2 reasons. First, it was our last vacation with our daughter. Second, looking at her, you can see that she hurts. She looks like she has the worst headache in the world. It breaks my heart.

I thank God that He gave Karissa those words that day. It was truly a gift that will last a lifetime and one that I will cherish forever!

2 comments:

  1. You make me cry EVERYTIME but I have to read your words. I love you!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I am so glad you had that moment of clarity to remember. I love you!

    ReplyDelete