Tuesday, October 31, 2006

6 months

I want to write something beautiful about our first half year together. How much you’ve changed our lives for the better. How I love the way your face lights up when you see one of us (especially your sister) and that silly little grunt of happiness you put out. How surprising you are; you’re so damn small, but you act your age by doing things bigger, but younger, babies can’t do, like rolling over and sitting up. There’s so much more and I want to put it in some eloquent way, but this sleep thing, it’s just killing me. It’s definitely the reason why the post about you turning 6 months is 5 days late. So I’m going with the sleep deprivation as my excuse for a less then stellar post. You deserve so much better baby.

It’s so hard, because most of the time you are so damn happy I can’t stand it. You entertain yourself with your toys (you’re especially fond of your lion & whozit) and you already “play” with your sister, which is soooo awesome because I so want you both to be good friends and it seems like you already are. You started food this week and as expected, you love it. I can’t feed you fast enough and you get so upset when we’re done, but that’s ok, I’m trying to make sure you don’t eat too much in a sitting and make your poor little tummy worse. You’re best time of day is at night, you eat about 8 & are ready to par-tay. You’re so much fun during this time. Daddy and I get you all to ourselves (cause big sis is in bed) and you giggle and play peek-a-boo with us until you finally drop off in Daddy’s arms. I do a sleep-feed with you and then we recline on the couch for half an hour (because you have to stay upright for at least 30 minutes after eating.) It’s a nice excuse to get to hold you & snuggle.

.....And then the reflux kicks in, and you and I are doing our 3AM dance with your little legs pumping to make it stop and your alternating screams and whimpers. I hate this. I hate that I have to work and be away from you during your happy hours. I’m less then you (and everyone else for that matter) deserves these days because I’m not getting much sleep. I’m so sorry you have to go though this sweetie. They keep saying it will get better, and it has to some degree. But I pray for the days when we both get to sleep through the night and play all day. I know they’re coming. In the meantime, Miss BS, I will dance with you however long you need me too. I love you so much. Posted by Picasa

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Boring but Informative

Doctor’s appointment went well. Both girls got their flu shots—yeah! TS didn’t cry at all and BS didn’t start crying till her 3rd (of four) shot and stopped as soon as they were done giving the shots. My kids are so good like that. BS is still in the 5th percentile for weight (13#, 5 oz.). She’s jumped on the height chart to 25-50th percentile (from the 10th), which is how TS is built too. TS is 50th for weight & 95th in height. I believe both girls will be tall & thin (like my MIL; that woman has the best metabolism! Hopefully they got all that from her. Just pray that they don’t get her feet; shoe size-11! Yikes!) I’m giggling about BS’s weight, we got an email from a childhood friend of DS this AM. They have a 4 month old little boy; he’s in the 95th percentile at 18#. I know EIGHTEEN! Her doctor told her he’s the size of an average six month old at four months. So I guess my six month old is their average four month old. Her back must be killing her. I can’t imagine.

I talked to the Dr about my stress related to SIDS and reflux and he told me what I already knew; no known correlation. He also told me that while reflux is being diagnosed much more now; the incidence of SIDS has not gone up, which is good. And the risk of SIDS goes down exponentially at 4 months, 6 months & a year. I guess that makes me feel a little better. If my sleep gets better then we’ll know for sure. He told me to go ahead and start food with her, so last night she got to have some yams with us. DS wanted to know if she ran over to the doctor to give him a hug; this kid wants to eat people food so bad it’s not funny. I only gave her an ounce so if it wreaked havoc on her stomach it wasn’t so much, but she seems to be fine.

Ok, this is such a boring post I’m falling asleep. Not just from sleep deprivation, cause BS has slept at least 7 hours the last 4 nights; actually 10 hours the last two, so maybe the medicine is working. But I felt obligated to let you know what’s happening, going to the doctor and all.

Hopefully new baby pictures later in the week. I know it’s been a while. We’ll see, w/Halloween and all I may not be able to get anything up before that.

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Easily Distracted

Boy is that an understatement. Going to make this as quick as possible because I NEED to get to bed! (If I had a dollar for every time I say that…)

BS seems better. We’ve had 4 nights in a row w/6-7 hours of strait sleep! Getting to sleep was another story, so it’s not great, but it's better (I’m sure I just jinxed that now & will be up with her in a couple hours again.) We go to the doctor’s (pediatrician, as opposed to the GI Specialist, yes I feel like I live over there. All our doctors seem to be in the same complex so I’m pretty sure I’m getting my own parking space pretty quick here,) for her 6 month (I know, how the heck did that happen??? She’s too little to be SIX MONTHS OLD already!!!) appointment tomorrow. So I have a list of questions for him to refer me to others about. (Ok was that paragraph distracting enough? That how my brain is ALL THE TIME NOW.)

I’m creating new things to get stressed over with her. I sort of don’t want to mention it because my anxiety level is so high over it already. (It’s related to SIDS and kids with reflux and there I said it, so maybe it’ll go away & I can sleep for a change.) I have no reason to be anxious over this, she hasn’t done anything for me to think this is a problem. I just got an idea in my head about it and now I’m totally stressing about it. Apparently, I must just need more drama in my life. I should know if I can officially get stressed about this tomorrow after our appointment.

OK, so “Look! Something shiny!!” Long story, but I’m getting my X-mas/B-day/Mother’s Day gift from this last year. I just bought it. DS, while well intentioned, did the “here’s what I want to order you off the Internet” thing for these gifts last year, but then we never followed through. So I finally found something ridiculously expensive and I’m justifying the purchase by remembering that I never actually got any of those gifts. Do you like it? I do. I haven’t been walking very regularly since I started work and a large part of my excuse is that BS has gotten too heavy for me to carry her in the front pack while pushing TS in the jogging stroller. Remember I have a dog on each side when I do this. I’ve put on 5 lbs as a result (the emotionally eating I’m doing over BS’s problems isn’t helping either I’m sure) So I can push both of them in this (easily, our friends have one so I tried theirs out) and still walk the dogs. No more excuses. Plus the cost alone will make me use it every day for the next year.

Ok, that was my version of keeping it short.

Thursday, October 19, 2006

Tiny Dancer

We sway in our own little dance in the dark. Me holding her close, trying to ward off the cramps that her body seems to be racked with, Her, curling into my shoulder whimpering, occasionally when it gets really bad, screaming from the pain. I do my best to soothe her; we rock in the dark, I murmur quietly in her ear, she starts to doze. She is so tiny. So perfect. Just as I think I can put her down again her back arches and she screams in pain. Again. We start our dance over.

Wash, rinse, repeat…

And so goes the wee hours of my mornings.

I hate to listen to my baby hurting. The lack of sleep wouldn’t bother me nearly as much if my staying up would somehow bring her some relief. But instead she’s in pain & I’m exhausted. I guess it could be worse, she could be waking up the rest of the house. I have a call into her GI specialist about what I should expect from the medicine and when. I stopped eating soy (luna bars) on Tuesday, on Sunday I drop dairy. Then I’ll be really fun to be around. Thing is, she’s happy most of the time. Very sweet, fun, happy and then come middle of the night all hell breaks loose on her insides.

I just wish I could fix this for her.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Gimme a break!

Know what I’ve been doing today? (I’m at work.) No besides writing this, something equally productive and (non) work related. I’ve been figuring out our personal budget.

I F’ing hate it here! Ok, I don’t hate it. But I don’t love it either. I actually spent most of the morning in meetings finding out just how F’ed up this place is. Honestly I don’t care. I really don’t. Since I don’t care I’m not that inclined to help them fix it which is what is going to be expected of me. Because of the reorg I am being asked to do many things which I had no part in previously. The fact that a few managers saw my resume and realized I know how to do these things hasn’t helped the matter. That same fact (that I’ve done these things before at other company’s) is why I don’t want to do any of it. These are all things my previous boss dealt with. She worked full time. I, do not. This is what I would call a cluster fuck. Not a new term when dealing with business, just something I really don’t want to deal with anymore. I have one of those (a CF) going on at home, I don’t need anyone else’s. So instead of working on a plan to fix the crap at work, I went through our spending for the last 6 months to see where we stand. (If there were a chance in hell that I could stay home. Hahahahahahahaha…) We fall right into the category of needing my husband’s salary plus $1. Amalah’s description, not mine, but an accurate one, so I’m stealing it. We need ONE of my paychecks to be comfortable. It’s very frustrating. At this point we couldn’t get a cheaper mortgage by buying a smaller house, so no need to suggest it. When we moved last year I made sure we set things up so that our mortgage payment stayed the same; i.e.--more money down. (We’re paying the same for our 5 bdrm house as we did for our 2 bdrm. Crazy I know.) It’s a smart move & in a couple years it’ll be really smart, but I want it to be that smart RIGHT NOW! I realize that part of my problem is that I get no breaks now. Before TS went to school two days a week & I could “get things done” on those days. (I could've even napped, what was I thinking????) Now, I’m at work while she’s at school. No Breaks. I need one. I’m tired and sad & don’t want to be here. Sigh.

Monday, October 16, 2006

Eyes Wide Shut

Ok, so I had great intentions of getting in some blawging this weekend and but I also had great intentions of SLEEPING this weekend too. I know, I’m so crazy like that, wanting to sleep like 5 hours a night or something. That’s me; wild & crazy girl. When reading the post and realizing that it’s rambling and incoherent (more then usual, shut up!) please understand that I’m averaging about 3 hours a night right now. No, that’s not all at once.

Yeah, so that reflux thing, not going so well. Actually BS might be better today. She slept most of the night last night & didn’t really get upset until later in the evening. But since I wrote last, she’s been getting up around 3:30-4 every morning. On the one night when she stayed up late (1 AM) I ended up getting up with TS over bad dreams at 3 AM. Since BS slept though her 3 AM thing she decided to get up at 5:30 that morning. They’re plotting against me I’m sure.

The outlaws left today. I’d send out a cheer, but I’m too tired. It was an ok visit. It was intrusive as usual, but less intrusive then past visits, so count your blessings right? I realized during this visit that I’m good for about 4 days (a long weekend) maybe 5 and then I’m done. (i.e.—I start getting bitchy) During my 5 ½ years of marriage I’ve concluded that I’m a somewhat private person. (I didn’t realize not everyone is like that until I met my Outlaws.) I lived a lone for several years before meeting DS and I enjoy an evening here and there alone with a book or the remote ALL BY MYSELF. DS is also like this, but his parents, my outlaws (at least my MIL) don’t really get that. I can tell she tries to give me some space once in a while, but it’s not in her nature & she can’t back off completely. So their visits become exhausting. Because I can tell she’s trying (the trying part is new) I am trying not to be so bitchy. So visit went ok. They’re talking about coming back at X-mas. Woo!

I went out both nights this weekend too. (I guess I could tell everyone that my lack of sleep is from all the FUN I was having. HA! That’s almost funny.) Friday afternoon a girlfriend called & asked me to go w/a group to this wine tasting bar nearby. I figured I would fall on my face after half a glass, but decided I really NEEDED to go. It was fun. We even went to the pub next door and had a drink after we were done wine tasting. You know, like real adults! (The rat-bastard working the door at the pub didn’t ID us! I know ,how rude!!!) On Saturday, DS & I went out on like a real date. We went to this restaurant Straits; very good food. It was fun to do something just the two of us. This was a also a good chance to see what “the kids” are wearing these days. Oh My! (It’s the 80’s again.) So glad I’m not in the dating scene any more. Ok, I need to get my 45 minutes of sleep now. More later.

Thursday, October 12, 2006

Getting my ass kicked daily!

Jeez it’s been crazy here.

So we had our appointment w/the Pediatric GI Specialist yesterday. The day before we met with him our regular doctor called & informed us that she had “severe reflux”. Oook, what does that mean exactly? We kinda knew that right? I mean that’s why we’re going to the specialist, right?

So anyway, I think the specialist was impressed with how much we’d done so far (eliminating dairy for a week, rice cereal in bottle, propping her up after feedings, various levels of drugs, etc…) He would like me to eliminate soy (read: luna bars) for 5 days and then if I feel up to it to add dairy along with it to see if it makes a notable difference in her condition. Bah, my lifeblood; Luna bars & vente mochas. Before I do that I’m going to give her 5 days on the round of meds so I have a baseline to know how much improvement is from the medication & how much is from the change in diet. He also wanted to know about how often she poops; the more she goes the less there is to come up right? She goes every 2nd or 3rd day (which is really weird to me because you could’ve set a clock by TS, the kid went like every day at 11 AM. I know that’s actually a little weird, but I meant it when I said the kid liked schedules.) He said BS is normal, but with what is going on with her it’d be better if she were to be going every day, so she now has some pear juice added to her rice cereal. We’ll see how that goes. Should boost my stats since my readership goes up whenever I discuss poop.

The meds he put her on are a stronger version of what she’s currently taking. These are both acid blockers & don’t actually treat the reflux problem, but knock down the stomach acid so the child isn’t hurting so much. If this doesn’t resolve the problem they‘ll go to a round of drugs that actually treats the reflux itself. They don’t like to prescribe these drugs if they don’t have to because they can have some significant side effects.

So we’re all good right? Except that the pharmacy doesn’t carry the drugs he prescribed her in the medium he wants (they have it as pills, not so good for an infant). The pharmacy wanted me to call him & get him to go with a different drug & I told them they needed to discuss it with him, I wasn’t playing intermediary. If the doctor feels strongly either way they could work it out. Just get my kid something to give her some relief! They apparently couldn’t work it out before business hours ended yesterday so I wasn’t able to get the drugs until this AM (doctor insisted on the original prescription he wrote.) We gave her the drugs she’s been taking as usual and thought it would be fine. Hahahahahahahah, that's what we get for thinking...we really could’ve used the new stuff.

First some background; TS is sick with a really bad cold. She stayed home (with my mom, the Outlaws went to the beach for the day yesterday, yes they're still here too) from school, which is another story in itself. Anyway, after the appointment I had TWO SICK KIDS at home with me. No freaking fun. BS spent the afternoon & evening screaming & TS vacillated between meltdowns and playing quietly, more on the meltdowns then the playing quietly. In the end BS was up till about midnight last night being super fussy & “spiting up” (lately it’s gotten to be much more projectile, she should be hitting the milestone of her head spinning around very soon now). At 3:30 this AM she was back up, inconsolable. It took me till 5 to get her back to sleep. I emailed work that I wouldn’t be in until noon. I figured with the Outlaws here I could sleep in till 9, get ready for work, nurse her, get her meds & then get off to work. I did do all of that, but BS woke up screaming at 8 again, so less sleep for me still. I’m feeling so bad for her (And for me too now that I read all of this) I did get her meds so hopefully some RELIEF tonight.

So that is why I’m getting my ass kicked on a daily basis.

Monday, October 09, 2006

Holy Spew Batman!



So BS had her baptism yesterday & the outlaws are visiting for the week. I can’t really write much because of their visit (limited computer time). The party for the baptism was really nice and I’m glad it’s over. (Too much time w/my mom—I’ll fill you in later.)

But look! Gratuitous baby photo! Baby in impressively cute christening gown! (Father’s grandmother’s gown & bonnet to be exact.) And look, mom w/hair blown out AND make up!! Yes, in fact it was a full moon.

Today we had an upper GI for BS to confirm her reflux. Which she does have, and let me say I have the most excellent baby ever! She couldn’t eat 4 hours before the test which was at 9 this morning. I had good intentions of getting up at 4:30 to feed her hahahahahahaha, let me pick myself up off the floor now. That obviously didn’t happen. So she hadn’t eaten since 8 PM the night before. I expected her to be screaming the whole time in the waiting room, but not at all. And during the x-ray part she laid really still & was super good. She let us turn her which ever way we needed no problem, & drank the crap they needed her to drink like a trooper. We got home I gave her the milk I pumped earlier & has been good all day. The radiologist confirmed she has reflux (thanks, do you think the fact that she spewed all over me right after the test clued him in?) and that they didn’t see anything else. That was actually useful and good news. So on Wednesday we go to a pediatric GI specialist. I have no idea what to expect from that. I'll keep you posted. More fun!

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

The Grind

I started back to work this week. Sigh. So far it’s actually OK. My schedule is Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, 20 hours a week. So it’s not like I’m only getting an hour w/my kids every night or something. That would SUUUCK! Anyway, I’m in the “honeymoon phase” still so it’s hard to tell how it’s really going. TS is already at preschool/daycare Monday & Wednesday so not really a big deal for her. Spending Thursday at G’ma’s is actually a bonus in her book, so I’m pretty sure she’s digging it. I wouldn’t be surprised if she starts telling me to go to work on my days off by sometime next week. I think BS wasn’t too happy about it on Monday. She was fine for my mom during the day. But when I got home all hell broke lose. Ok, hell didn’t exactly break lose; she just wanted to be held constantly. By me. Oh, and DS is away all week at a conference which means it’s just me in the evenings; cooking dinner, feeding kids, doing dishes, baths & bedtime routine. Soooooo wanting to be held constantly is not so easy until after 8 (when TS goes to bed). So work right now, not so much to do and kind of a vacation from the constant responsibility of my kids. But then I like the constant responsibility of my kids, even more then I like peeing alone which I can do at work, but not so much at home. The hardest part is that BS is really having a hard time w/the reflux now. It’s been getting worse and we’ve upped her meds and food intake (just rice cereal until the reflux gets under control). In some respects it has gotten better (volume) but over all she’s still spewing projectile vomit several times a day (I do more laundry…) and I can hear it “refluxing” in her esophagus all the time which it shouldn’t be doing as much, not on meds at least. So the doctor now wants her to have an upper GI and see a specialist, so being away from my baby when she’s not perfectly happy is hard. But at least she's with G'ma, right? Also today I’m having trouble staying awake. At home, not such a big deal. At work, falling asleep and drooling all over my desk probably frowned upon.

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Breathless


I started back to work this week & will probably write about the chaos that is my life right now sometime tomorrow. You know, while at work when I actually have the time to do something like that. Also, I get to go to the restroom ALONE while there. What a novelty. However, I digress….

Just got a link to our friend’s photos. It was her daughter’s b-day & they had the party during the weekend I went to my SIL’s to crop, so I missed it. I think that was in August? Anyway she just posted the pix and this one caught my eye.

Actually, it took my breath away.

TS takes lots of photos in which (I think) she’s cute or pretty or sweet. Photos you can see her quirky personality in, or that she wasn’t really up for photos that day. There’s even one in this group where she looks so much like her father its sort of scary. (He would’ve been a good-looking girl, who knew?)

But this photo;

her hair’s a mess, her face is obscured by it, so you can’t really see how beautiful her blue eyes are and she’s not smiling or looking at the camera. I think it’s because it’s such an unexpected pose that I find that how stunningly beautiful she is and will be.

It is a picture such as this that I can see the women I believe she will become and it takes my breath away.