Monday, November 25, 2013

Stayin' Alive!


 
I'm like John Travolta sans the cool moves, I feel like I'm just Staying Alive!  You see, Mr. Death paid me a visit on late Saturday night in the form of either food poisoning or the-worst-motha-fu*&%^# virus you ever did meet (I will allow your imaginations to run wild on what was occurring at my porcelain throne).  At any rate, what started off as me running to the bathroom, slowly resorted to me walking, then crawling, and ultimately ended with me just holding a bowl in the bed = keepin' it classy!  12 hours of this pure joy & not being able to hold down any water landed me in the ER for the better part of the day yesterday.
I was treated like utter royalty in the ER......3 IV saline solutions for severe dehydration, Zofran, then Phenergan, Tylenol, followed-up by some delicious contrast solution for my CT Scan.  I'm tellin' you they really know how to wine & dine a lady, 5 course meal!  I left yesterday evening with 2 types of powerful antibiotics for my intestinal colitis and anti-nausea meds and have to say, I am on my way to recovery.  I pretty much feel like I was hit by a Mack Truck, but other than that I feel good ;)!  My mother-in-law is taking care of my kiddos today, praise the lord, 'cause I wouldn't be able to!!!  I knew that yesterday was not my day to meet my maker, I think I have a bit more work to do before I make my departure, so here I am, Stayin' Alive! 

On a more positive note, Connor requested that my husband film him early Saturday morning doing "a dance."  "This dance" is to a really awful Iron Man intro song that lasts for about 20 seconds (you can faintly hear it in the background), so Connor repeatedly runs back to our tablet to replay it.  Apparently, Connor practiced for a long while before he was ready to be filmed; how on God's green earth my husband holds the camera phone for 3 minutes and 50 seconds without laughing is beyond me, good work babe!  WARNING: It is like watching a REALLY terrible 80's aerobic video without the hot girls in spandex & leg warmers, he's no Denise Austin!  My son has clearly inherited his "dance moves" from my husband, and his love of dancing from me = one hotmess!  He not only inherited his love of dancing from me, but sadly inherited the "lizard tongue" from me as well--begins roughly 24 seconds in and really gets going at the 1:15 mark (referenced back in this post here.....May God bless him!).  Giving him some credit, his dancing gets better after 2 minutes.  He was happy to hear that I was sharing this little gem!  Aaaaannnddd the video is sideways, I don't know how to use technology people, don't judge me!

 

 
 


Friday, November 22, 2013

Being Picky

Happy Friday Friends!!!

Golden Rule if you are under the age of 5:  There is NO location, NO company, and NO time that doesn't lend itself to "digging for gold."  Anytime is the right time to do "maintenance", 'cause there ain't no shame in our game! 

Just when you think you've captured something cute, you realize that you were way wrong (taken 2 days ago, I just started laughing so hard when I found this little treasure yesterday as I went through my SD card):

 
 
Favorite Connor quote: He was 2 1/2 years old and was just digging away one afternoon.  My mother finally asked him, "what are you digging for Connor, you've been very busy in there?"  He looked at her with a very serious expression and responded with a confident, "chocolate"!  Gotta love the stuff that little people say!
 
Speaking of Connor, we are leaving our home in a few minutes to get his Continuous Glucose Monitor inserted at our local Diabetes Center (yippee!).  It's like I am 4 years old on the night before Christmas, I know Santa is coming and he's bringing me something great!  I AM THAT GIDDY!!!  My husband and I will greatly appreciate the bit of assistance that the CGM will provide. 
 
Have a blessed & beautiful weekend!  I'll be back on Monday with a new post :). 
 


Thursday, November 21, 2013

New Hair-do(n't)

There is a VERY important member of our family that got a new hair-do last week.  If you follow either my husband or I on Facebook, you probably saw a few pictures that were posted.  My cocker spaniel, Tuck, desperately had to get to the groomer, he was shedding so much hair that I had tumbleweeds in my house, and what a pain it is to keep sweeping 10 times a day! 

I think there might have been some confusion between the Petsmart Grooming attendant and I......I probably wasn't descriptive enough, I had requested a "mini-Mohawk", but in my head I was envisioning a tiny/short tuft of hair left on the top, just to give my Tuck a little something extra special.  What was given to Tuck was more of a bad-ass, I'm-gonna-eat-your-children-for-breakfast-kinda-Mohawk, which had been lovingly fluffed and sculpted.  Needless to say, when my son, Connor, and I went to pick Tuck up last Thursday, neither of us were mentally & emotionally prepared for what came running toward us from the grooming department.  I almost had to sit down I was laughing so hard.  Connor, forget about it, that kid could barely walk through Petsmart he was laughing so hard.  "Do you like it, is this what you were looking for?" asked the grooming attendant.  I didn't have the heart to tell him "no", it was 5pm, and he had been sculpting dog hair all day long, so I said "yes" while laughing my a$$ off, and took Snoop Doggy Dogg home with me to run the mean streets of Purcellville.

Without much further ado, may I present you with my cocker spaniel, Tucker Magin, with his post-grooming bouffant:






 

Tuck is honestly the most kind and loving pain in the a$$ dog (he steals food, I'll leave it at that) you've ever met.  He's been so amazingly gentle and patient with my children, which of course, makes me love him even more.

I trimmed down this new hair-do on Saturday morning (I took a little over an inch off), he just looked absolutely absurd.  I'd send him out to do his "business" in our backyard, and the breeze would be blowing this thick clump of hair all over the place.  Tuck would come in 10 minutes later with a new look, it was flattened & parted down the middle (not attractive!), so I just had to take the scissors to it:

Tuck & this lucky man sported a similar look:

So with that tuft trimmed down, I got Tuck looking like much more of a love-bug and less of a toughy-pants.  My new pledge to Tuck is: To always be as verbally descriptive as humanly possible (also provide: gestures, exhibits, dioramas, pictures and maybe even sculptures) to every grooming attendant that has contact with him to hopefully prevent these types of hair-doN'Ts in the future!  Sorry Tuck! ;)

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Vomitorium

I squeezed myself into my size 2 jeans, picked out the cutest floral top you ever did see, and made sure my make-up and hair were perfection.  Yep, looking hot!  One last spray of over-priced perfume and I was ready!  I had just turned 23 and was going out with my best friend to a bar on Capitol Hill.  As soon as I arrived at the bar, I locked eyes with the most gorgeous, blue-eyed, dark-haired man that God has ever created (or will ever create, and no, I'm not biased or anything ;)).  We made eye contact all night long, played a game of pool, and eventually fell in love.

Flash forward 9 1/2 years later.  It was 1:05am, and I looked at myself in the mirror, uncombed tresses with 2 inches of dark roots, no make-up, dark circles under the eyes, and certainly not a size 2 anymore!  I looked over at the back of my husband's head and initially started giggling, and before I knew it, I began to laugh hysterically.  I am not sure if it was due to pure delirium/exhaustion/stress, or if I just have a sick sense of humor.....but I couldn't stop laughing. 

You see, at 1:05am, my husband and I were cleaning chunks of vomit off not only my daughter, but also her sheets and pajamas, FOR THE FIFTH TIME.  Yes, you read that right.  My daughter, Chelsea, who is a whopping 20 pounds, somehow created about 2 gallons of vomit.  It was on/in her bedroom carpet, in her hair, stuffed animals, inside the crib, on the crib, and coated her blankets and sheets.  We never prepared for more vomit that night, nope, I was adamant that after each vomit that we should clean everything perfectly, because I mistakenly kept saying "that was DEFINITELY her last vomit of the night."  Now I know, tiny human beings can fool you and can create more vomit than a 500 pound man who just gorged himself at a Western Sizzlin' buffet.  I now know to always prepare for more vomit in the future.  There will be more!

So after lots of laundry and cleaning, there we were at 1:05am, "manning our posts"....me at the bathroom sink for the fifth time to "clean" things coated by vomit, my husband, at the bathtub, to clean our daughter who had been coated by vomit.  I looked at the back of my husband's head, and had the image of me at age 23, entering that bar, shaking my tail feather, smelling like sun-ripened rose petals, wearing my finest and meeting the man of my dreams.  I quickly reminisced about the amazing years of us dating, getting dressed up, trying to impress one another.  Our beautiful wedding and honeymoon.  There we were, 9 years later, in a tiny bathroom, both of our clothing covered in bits of vomit, smelling like eau de vomit, and cleaning lots and lots of vomit off of 'stuff', together.  I thought to myself, me and my babe, we are co-vomit-cleaners, in our lovely home, which has become a Vomitorium.  This partner-in-crime, love-of-my-life, soul-mate of mine, phrases that used elicit passionate feelings about true love, like something out of a Danielle Steel novel, have now been exchanged for new phrases, like my vomit-cleaning-sidekick.  I couldn't stop laughing.

If someone could have pulled my husband and I aside the night that we met and provided us with a glimpse of what we'd be doing the night of November 17, 2013, I know for a fact that that young woman would have been completely repulsed and shocked.  I feel like I don't even know that young woman from 2004 anymore, the one who was worried about her hair and her make-up.  That young woman had no idea what was in store for her, she was clueless about 3 things in particular: how hard and exhausting the job of parenting could be at times, what marriage and love were really about, and exactly how much vomit a tiny person could create.  Sadly, my future probably holds more nights of vomit, but as long as I have my vomit-cleaning-sidekick by my side and can keep on laughing, I can make it through that Vomitorium and be just fine!
http://smartparentingadvice.com/parental-advice/tips-to-care-for-a-vomiting-child/

 

Thursday, November 7, 2013

Breaking Point

I am 100% done, super-saturated done, at full-capacity done, filled to the brim, done!  I have been without a "good" night of sleep in many months, but for the past 2 weeks I am averaging 5 hours of VERY interrupted sleep.  I feel (and probably look like) a tired & cranky zombie wandering around.

Beyond Connor's diabetes, he has had "something" wrong with his foot for the past 13 weeks.  He began slightly limping 13 weeks ago, and that eventually turned into him full limping. We have taken him to a doctor's office about 8 times now (pediatrician, endocrinologist, and orthopedic surgeon).  He went for an x-ray that revealed soft tissue inflammation on the top of his foot.....the cause?  Your guess is as good as the doctor's.  Every morning we'd have to strap a giant boot to his foot that would take 3-4 minutes.  Bathing Connor was a problem because you'd have to carry all 42 pounds of him to his bedroom and strap on the boot.  The metal on the boot would bruise his interior ankle bone on his other foot.....it came into contact with his sister repeatedly, bruising her. After wearing the boot for 5 weeks, the doctor said that it wasn't working and to just take it off.  Is it diabetes neuropathy, drop foot (neurological), growth plate break, we don't know, so we are looking at potentially months testing to figure it out....multiple blood tests, an MRI, and physical therapy.  Not looking forward to any of it!

On to Chelsea.......she began to cough here and there about 13 days ago.  It eventually turned into non-stop coughing for 6 days straight, and the next thing I knew she had a 105.3 fever, refused to eat or drink anything, and the worst cough you ever did hear.  We have been to her pediatrician twice, an x-ray/imaging office, and the ER.  As of today, her fever is down, but her coughing absolutely non-stop is literally breaking me down!  For 4 days now, I have been giving her albuterol treatments every 4 hours, Ibuprofen every 6 hours, alternating Tylenol every 4 hours, fluids every hour = I'm tired!!!!

In the interim, my house is sooo dirty!  I have spent days upon days holding Chelsea (because she only wanted to be held), so NOTHING has been done.  We have no money for a maid.......I have a diabetic celiac child and can't order take-out, so I'm forced to cook every meal......so dishes are piling up and so is laundry.  Guess what?  That's right.  Connor has wet the bed for the past 3 nights, so we have had to wash sheets for the past 3 days (my hubby took care of that because I literally couldn't get to it).

I would absolutely be lying if I were to say that this is not what it has been like most days.  Since Chels entered this world, she has been perpetually ill, 2 RSV infections (1 landed her in the hospital), Whopping Cough (4 months of very intense coughing), 4 UTIs (2 landed her with hospital stays), 6 ear infections, 2 bouts of Influenza B, and countless colds, viral infections (like this one, that has been unidentified). 

Beyond her sicknesses, I am counting carbs and giving Connor constant injections, I AM A FULL-TIME NURSE.  I don't have the world's healthiest kids, but I am very grateful to have them despite their ailments!  I typically get this 'woe is me' outlook after days and days of blood checking/wiping noses/administering nebulizer treatments, but I try to remind myself that at least their sicknesses are curable and/or manageable, some parents aren't so lucky!

I'm writing this in the blog so that I can remember in 20 years how hard my life was at times (and my amazing husband's for that matter)!  It has been years of this, not to mention my own physical ailments.....I'm hoping that the next couple of years only get easier!  It has to, right?

Say a prayer for me!