The Doctor Is In

Seriously, I don't make this stuff up, my family is chronically ill. Why have I been cursed with the sickness? And once again I have to praise the miracles of modern medicine, which you're probably sick of hearing from me, but get used to it, the next few months aren't going to get any easier with this family.

Talin has been running a fever since Monday night. So finally this morning I decided that viral infection or not, he needs to see a doctor.
So this morning we first went to Collin's ENT appointment on the fourth floor and then went to the third floor for Talin's doctor's appointment.
Collin first: The appointment went great. He does not have hearing loss, just a build up of fluids that are expected to clear up fully with Spring and Summer on the way. We go back in three months from now to make sure that happens. Sigh of relief, no tubes needed!

Now for Talin: He has a nasty viral infection which is causing the high fever, major congestion, and a lot of fluids all over this kids head. Nothing to do but wait it out and treat the fever and congestion with over the counter meds. I guess they've been seeing a lot of cases of this extreme cold going around where kids are having the high fever for a week straight. I was told that if it is not gone after ten days to bring him back in. I'm praying it disappears over the weekend.

Everyone took a turn playing the role of doctor in our house last night as Tom listened to Talin and looked him over with all his fun doctor tools. The boys love it when he gets out the doctor bag.
Talin on the other hand is still running a fever and it's almost five o'clock, but he insists he's feeling well because he has free basketball tickets for a game tonight that he got from school. So Tom says he can go, but he looks terrible. I guess if he feels too bad we can always leave early, he is so excited to go. Me on the hand, not looking forward to going to a basketball game tonight. I've had a head cold for the past few days, and it sucks because being pregnant all I can take is Tylenol! Curse! So I haven't been sleeping well and that makes me cranky. But who knows, maybe basketball and family time could put me in a good mood.

Update

Yesterday I went in for an ultrasound. Everything looks great. He's becoming quite squished in there these days, but giving quite a fight. His weight gain is looking good. He has put on weight and now weighs 4 pounds 15 ounces. So he's almost to the five pound marker, which is great. He did drop in his percentage again though, and now he is in the 18% bracket, which isn't bad. I'm trying to be optimistic about this. My doctor says that if he gets to 10% then they'll deliver him right away, but I have three weeks before I get induced anyway, so I'm not too worried.
On the other hand I find it quite amusing. I'm three days from being 36 weeks along, which is the same gestational age that Collin was delivered at, and he came into this world weighing 7.6 lbs. So it's crazy for me to have a small baby, never had that happen before!

Here's his heart, pumping away. It's so ironic to think it can work so perfectly while he's inside me and yet when he's born it will slowly fail. All I can say is that I feel extremely blessed everyday to live in a world of modern medicine.

So today Talin is home sick. He had a fever all night and was still running a 103 degree temp this morning. So he's at home. And we had a bad winter storm last night, nasty ice outside, so I didn't take Collin to preschool because I didn't want to drag Talin out into the weather this morning. And maybe I'm just a little lazy and am justifying not leaving the house today.

I'm scared it's going to be a long day; already I've broken up a fight. Supposedly Collin is teasing Talin while he's watching Star Wars on the couch. Sometimes I wonder, I mean isn't the older brother suppose to be the tease? And Collin is already getting bored, ate breakfast an hour ago and keeps asking for treats. Argghh!! It's going to be a long day. And my throat hurts and I just want to lie down in bed!

On the other hand I'm not looking forward to this week, I have to go back to the hospital tomorrow for stress testing, and Collin doesn't have preschool on Wednesday which means I'll need to drag him along.

And then on Thursday I'm going on his preschool field trip to the Historic Building downtown, this involves riding in a crusty school bus with fifteen other four year olds.

And then on Friday I have to take Collin into the ENT (ear, nose, throat) to let them have a look at his ears and decide if he needs tubes.

Then on Saturday we have a tour at the hospital to check out the NICU and meet the staff that will be caring for Junior when he comes.

Sorry, don't mean to sound so whiney today, but I feel exhausted, and four hospital trips in one week is tiring. I know, I know, I should get used to it! In a few weeks it will be two to three times a day I'll be down there! But for now I'm dealing with this.

SPT - Pick Me Up

What do you turn to when you need a quick "pick me up?" I actually don't like the royal dark chocolate, I'm more of a pure milk chocolate kind of a girl. But when things get me down and I need a pick me up, this is what I turn to.

Chocolate.

And Easter happens to be the one holiday that has my favorite kind of chocolates around, Cadbury Eggs.

Here I am holding my own bag of eggs, unfortunately I ate the rest of the bag before I could get a picture of it.

Thought I'd do a pregnancy picture update as well with this SPT.

Here is the official 34 weeks and four days shot.

I know it a terrible shot. I can't seem to take a decent one, the flash causes chaos and you can't see anything, but the non-flash makes it blurry. I'm not very camera savvy.

And I stuck this picture in because I thought it turned out kind of cool in its blurry craziness.

Sunday Snow Day

Sunday morning we woke up to a snow day, and church was canceled. Apparently someone forgot to tell this little guy that it wasn't a good idea to get out of bed today.

How cute is he?

I leave peanuts outside for him everyday, I like squirrels. They might be diseased, but they're cute.

Here's the backyard. It wasn't a bad amount of snow, but we had a lot of ice built up under the snowfall, and some nasty winds creating blizzard conditions.

It's only this beautiful first thing in the morning, when nothing is disturbed yet.

We've all been there, right??

Okay, so I know I probably don’t live in the most fertile state, people often freak out at the idea I’m going to birth my third child and I look so young. I used to be pleased with this and take it as a compliment, now I realize that people just don’t have a lot of babies in their twenties anymore. That is unless you live in Arizona or Utah, where I would be behind in my child producing at this point.
So I went into Talin’s classroom yesterday to attend the Valentine’s Day party, and eighteen kindergarteners turned around and could not stop staring at my belly, wide eyed with mouths open. Many of them started shouting out, “do you have a baby in there?” or “are you going to have a baby soon?” It was a little embarrassing, there were other parents around and I didn’t realize it was such a big deal to have a protruding stomach these days.
Sitting down at Talin’s table with five other kids to color our Valentine’s, the questions became quite interesting.
“Do you really have a baby inside of you?” (Must be an only child asking this??) “Why don’t you take the baby out right now so we can see it?” Um…not a good idea.
Talin’s response, “My mom has to go to the doctor’s to get the baby out.”
“Where is the baby going to come out of? How does it come out?”
My response, “maybe that’s something you should talk to your mom about, she can tell you.”
Talin’s kindergarten teacher walked by with a big grinner, it was quite amusing.

Earlier that day I went to Collin’s party, but not before I had a complete and utter break down. The morning started off well, I woke up and Tom had bought me potted tulips that I can plant in the spring, a box of chocolates and a card. So sweet.
I knew the day was going to be busy; my first run was to Wal-Mart to get the groceries for dinner I was making that night, and get it into the crock pot before heading to Collin’s party.
I waddled around WalMart for an hour, collecting everything I needed, plus some extra stuff for lunches and what not. The store was crowded, everyone was there picking up last minute Valentine’s Day goodies. So the line behind me in the check out was quite significant.
The lady starts ringing everything up. I look in my wallet for my food card.

No food card.

My stomach dropped.

What was I going to do??

I needed this food for dinner tonight, I couldn’t imagine telling the lady I couldn’t pay for it, and I was way too embarrassed as I thought of just walking away and wasting the past hour I’d spent collecting all the food. It takes me a lot of energy these days to do menial tasks.
I was seriously freaking out.

While I contemplated she finished ringing it all up and the total came up as $87.

Oh my goodness!

I did not have $80 in my account even, and all I had was my debit card.

What to do, what to do??
I rummaged in my purse and realized I had $37 left over from JoDee’s contribution to our Valentine’s dinner. Thank goodness for JoDee! So I handed her that.

$50 more.

Took the risk and ran my debit card, fully expecting it not to go through.

It did.

Sweet!
Unloaded my groceries into the car and drove away and lost it. I just could not stop sobbing. Twenty minutes later I’m still going at it, sobbing away, gut wrenching sobs, over this money. It was just so upsetting to me to think I had $400 on my food card somewhere, but not in my wallet to use that day. Made me sick.

Then the low point came.
There I am sobbing as I put the milk in the fridge, I go to blow my nose, and consequently wet my pants. Yeah, it was that kind of a morning. I mean I know I’m nine months pregnant and these things happen, but the timing of it all, I couldn’t believe it! It really sent me into a whole new commotion of tears, more for self pity reasons than anything else.
In the end things worked out well, I pulled it together in time to make it to Collin’s school for the party. Tom was not upset at me, like that’s a surprise! I found my food card. We had a lovely dinner, and my husband was very sweet (won’t go into those details!). And this morning I was able to go into Wal-Mart and get the money refunded onto my debit and repaid with my food card. But wow, what a morning!

Maybe tomorrow I can laugh about it, right?

My Valentine

Happy Valentine’s Day to my one true love, Tom.

I first met Tom at a young single adult activity, he had just returned from his mission a few days earlier. I was informed, I can’t remember if by him or someone else, that he had a girlfriend in Flagstaff that had waited for him. It seemed like a sealed deal that he was taken and practically engaged. So of course my guard was completely let down.

Thus I found it rather shocking when one of the first few times I hung out with him and another friend, we were squished in the front of a pickup truck going somewhere, and he nonchalantly placed his hand on my thigh. Hello! Fireworks erupted and I was very surprised. But then he realized what he’d done and jerked it away as though I had leprosy. I had to remind myself, yeah, he’s taken.

Not very surprising, he was broken up with his girlfriend by the end of the month and started coming over to the house more regularly “to bug me”, is how he put it.

I didn’t mind.

One day while hanging out, Aleta (a family friend), called and had two theatre tickets to a production downtown that nobody was using. So Tom and I decided to go. It didn’t seem like a first date, especially since he didn’t ask me out, it was more like two friends consenting to hang out without the group.

Well he drove us out to Phoenix, and we saw the play, I can’t even remember what it is that we watched, it didn’t matter, I realized I really liked him.
After the play we walked around for awhile and then stopped to hang out and talk.

Except we didn’t talk, we just stood there.

I casually watched people walk by, and Tom casually watched me. I couldn’t take it anymore; I finally turned to him and asked, “What?” He just smiled at me and replied, “Just looking”.

Yeah, he melted my heart right there and I haven’t looked back since. Two months of dating and we were engaged; three months later we were married. It was a whirlwind, but once I realized I had found a man that treated me different than I’d ever been treated before, who had so much respect and love and loyalty for me, I never wanted anything different.
Seven and a half years later and I’m still so happy with my Tom. Each day I realize how much he means to me, the little things he does for, the emotional support he gives to me, and the fact that he’s the only person out there that can calm my inner demons.
I love him!

Thai Delight!

So I've found my new love this Valentine's Day, move over Tom, I'm in love with Thai food!
We went with a group of friend last night to The Spice, an upscale Thai food restaurant. I was definitely a little worried, never partaken of Thai before, and knew that their dishes were typically spicy. And well, with my stomach squished up into my ribs these days, that didn't forebode well for me, and I had forgotten to bring along my stash of Tums to get me through the meal.
Well let me just say that I was wondrously surprised at how amazing the food was. So so good. Amy had made some suggestions on what I should order and I was brave and went with her on the Pad Thai. It's thin rice noodles sautéed in three-flavored sauce with egg, chives and bean sprouts, and I added in beef with it. It was fantastic. I even sampled the other five dishes of everyone else at the table; yeah, I was one of those people, with my wandering fork! But I wanted to experiment, I even went for the spicy ones too, and they were all great. So glad I went and was daring with an actual Thai dish, paid off. So if anyone is going out to eat anytime soon, go to Thai food.
I really wish I had pictures of the food, next time I'll take a camera.

SPT- Love, Me

what will you do for yourself this valentine's day?

Okay, so this Valentine's Day I got my haircut. Which you wouldn't think is such a big deal, but for me it is, especially since it's been since July while in Cedar City, that I last got it cut.

That's insane!

So I figured I owed myself a trim, I owed my hair a trim; seriously, it was getting frizzy crusty. If this day had been any less hectic I would have dyed it too, but I'll save that for tomorrow, I'm sick of this color! I'm a girl that craves constant change.


Talin's gift to me this Valentines has been a nasty onset of eczema, which he's always had, but this week it has moved to his lovely face. That's a problem for him, he's a vain child, knows he's attractive, and won't stand for blemishes such as eczema covering half his face. I feel bad for him. I've been lotioning like crazy, to no avail. So the doctor has suggested hydrocortisone cream, and if it doesn't go away, we get to go back next week for the prescription cream. Geez, can you not just give it to me now!! I hate Methodist hospital.

Collin's Valentine's gift to me has been his recent hearing loss. Why??? So I originally told his pediatrician about my concerns two weeks ago, he sent me to the audiologist, who then sent me back to the pediatrician today to check for infection. No infection, but fluid in the ears and no drainage, so now we're going to see an ENT. Tubes are a likely possibility. And we still aren't done, he also has wheezing in his chest, which has been going on for awhile, so we're getting antibiotics to get rid of it, plus using the inhaler. If it doesn't clear up by next week, he gets to go back into the doctor as well. Did I tell you how much I'm hating Methodist hospital?

And now for the update on baby. Ultrasound was yesterday and he's looking great, the only negative thing is that he's dropped in his weight percentage. He used to be in the 30%, which was beyond fabulous, now he has dropped to 23%, not so fabulous. But Dr. Mahone tells me not to worry and she won't be too concerned unless he drops further down.

And then I went in for my regular appointment yesterday and was told that I could be induced on the 17th of March. Woo hoo! Dr. Hoeg even called to put me on the list that day, so it's official. Yeah!

Now I can breathe and officially thank my super wonderful older sister JoDee and her husband Shane for the evening out that Tom and I plan on enjoying tonight. She sent us some dinero to make it possible, and we are very grateful, because like she said, we won't have very many opportunities to go on a date in the future!

Love Makes the World go Round

So yesterday morning Talin woke up with a real nasty cough, he was barking like a seal kind of cough. Lovely croup. So Tom kindly volunteered to stay at home with him. It was difficult for me to smile and agree, so very difficult. I didn’t want to teach a class, I didn’t want to figure out what in the nine hells would fit me and get me through three hours of church, and I didn’t want to torture my back with the three hours of sitting. But I did it, with a smile.

Collin and I went off to church with one another, as we pulled into the parking lot he informed me, here are his words, “Mom, you can drop me off at the door there and then say have a great day and pick me up later, I’ll be fine.” How ‘bout no? Bitter disappointment at not going to church all by himself was quickly washed away when he was greeted heartily by the elders and other church friends. He really is quite the popular boy in public situations.

Still feeling a little irritated about being there I was approached by Sis. Hoopes, she’s part of a missionary couple with her husband, they’re both from Gilbert, AZ serving here in Des Moines. She seems sad, talks about home a lot, and misses her grandkids. She has taken a special liking or I should say loving/adoring attitude towards Collin. I’ll catch her stopping him in the hall to adjust his tie, straighten his jacket, or just give his chubby cheeks a sweet caress. It’s beyond adorable. Anyway, she hands me a bag of obvious Valentine’s goodies for the boys and tells me to save it for after church. My heart was instantly warmed, why is she always thinking of my children and my family? I feel so guilty when people show extra kindness towards us. But it put a smile on my face for the rest of the block.

Skip ahead to sharing time, I was finally able to talk to the primary president and asked to be released when the baby is born. I’ve been so nervous about this; I’ve totally built it up and put it off for weeks. I don’t know why I’ve made it such a big deal to ask to be released, it’s not like we don’t have a legitimate reason coming up. I mean I might not be to church for quite awhile when this baby comes, still it was hard. But she surprised me, she being the president, and was so warm and nice about it all, and even told me she’d been thinking about this for awhile anyway. Wow, why am I so wrong in my judgments about people, you’d think I’d learn.

So with my three hours done we headed home, not before being handed Little Debbie Cakes from the Greenwoods, I call them my adopted parents in the ward, they really look out for us. Valentine treats in one hand and a thrilled little boy holding my other hand we made it through.

Fast forward to Sunday evening, the boys were nicely tucked into bed when someone knocked on the door. The Greenwoods had come by and brought us cupcakes for Valentine’s Day. How sweet is that? But, Tom answered the door, its negative degrees outside, and he didn’t invite them in! I feel so guilty about that. I tried to call them and thank them that evening, but no one answered, I guess I’ll call tonight. Why do I feel so much guilt when someone does something nice? I feel this need to constantly repay and make the playing field even, but I guess that’s just one more lesson I need to learn, life isn’t even, and people don’t expect to be repaid for kindness.

And on a completely different note, we went to WalMart on Saturday, and a lady stopped me to ask about my baby. I got the question on when I’m due and what I’m having, and the expected, you poor thing, another boy, keep trying for that girl! Then Talin, out of the blue, as we’re walking away, yells after the lady, “yeah, our baby has a hole in his heart!” Okay, let’s not shout that out to total strangers! Funny kid. I wonder what he’s telling his classmates at school?

Yeah, I'm Alive...

Okay, okay, all you persistent family members, I just have to say that I have not felt like posting lately. Typically I have pretty intense feelings, so this one has held me off for awhile. But here are some updates.

1. Yesterday was a lovely snow day. Tom’s school was canceled along with the boys and it was so nice to have Tom around and spend time with him. He’s been very busy and I’m an exceptionally emotionally, needy person, so it was nice.

2. I took Collin to an audiologist on Tuesday; I had been worried about his hearing over the past couple of months. He would totally ignore me, which isn’t surprising if you know Collin, but he would ignore the exciting things, like questions on if he would like dessert or if he’d like to come into the kitchen to make cookies with me. He also would look at me and say, “I can’t hear you mom, what?” Hmmm….Turns out he has hearing loss in his left ear. I now have to take him into his regular pediatrician to get it checked for an infection, if it is an infection the hearing loss will be restored, if not….I don’t know. Go back to the audiologist and get a hearing aid? Maybe it was from that time Talin stuck the q-tip in his ear and he started screaming, which side was that anyway?

3. Went to my doctor on Tuesday, everything is still looking great, I’m definitely nice and plump, and the stress tests are reading well. It’s all so mundane and annoying anymore. I see them again on Monday, for regular check-up, ultrasound, and another stress test. I’m thinking of calling Methodist hospital my new home.

4. Talin, being the handsome, sweet natured guy that he is has turned into the object of some girl’s affection in his classroom. Every day his backpack has at least one love note from a girl at school, pictures of hearts, pictures of them holding hands, her writing I love Talin and signing her name. Isn’t it a little early? I’m so proud of my little man though, he doesn’t seem interested and wants to wait until after his mission to have a girlfriend. We’ll see how long that lasts!

5. I’ve discovered a great way to kill a conversation as of late. Just come up and ask me how my pregnancy is going, or ask about the details of the “complications” I’ve been having. Yeah, I would think people had more social skills, I mean isn’t it obvious what to say? Just say something like, “Oh, I’m sorry your family has to go through this, what a hard thing.” Or something similar will do. But don’t just remain silent and then make an excuse to walk away! So very awkward. I’ve decided to avoid social events, especially since when you’re a monstrous pregnant person people can’t think of anything else to talk to you about except what’s staring them in the face.

6 . On a lighter note, I feel really blessed lately. We went in to see the Bishop on Sunday and he gave Tom and I both a blessing. It was an amazing reminder that the Lord’s looking out for us, and the things that were said were very touching. I’m glad we went in. I’ve felt such a sense of calm, peace and patience enter me. Which is so fabulous, cause I can’t make it through the next month without some relief, so I’m very grateful.

So there is the run down. I’ll try to be a bit more diligent about posting.
And I would just like to add in that I have the best husband in the world. He wakes up extra early in the morning to make sure our walkway is shoveled and salted so I won’t trip taking the boys to school in the morning. Isn’t that so sweet? I did good choosing that one!

This Week...so far

I told Talin and Collin about Pres. Hinckley’s passing on Monday night while we were eating dinner. I expected Talin to be upset, but he really wasn’t. He asked me how he died, I told him that he was 97 years old and had died from old age. Talin got really worried and asked me, “Mom, are you getting close to being 97 years old?” I had to laugh that he would worry about me being old enough to die. I reassured him that his mother was a young 27 years old and would be around for a long time.
Then Collin turned to me with a very perplexed look on his face and asked me, “Mom, how will we know the way now?” I thought it was so cute, because he’s a very self-centered child that does not worry about anything that doesn’t affect him directly, so I was happy to hear him voice some concerns about the prophets passing. Plus, his favorite primary song is “Follow the Prophet”, so his concerns do make sense in his little four year old mind.

On another note, Collin went in for his yearly physical yesterday. It was interesting. First of all the doctor spent about ten minutes playing with the transformer Collin had brought with him. I was almost a little disturbed by it. The doctor kept saying things like, “I need to put this down and see my other patients”, or “I just love solving things with my hands, I could do this for hours.” Okay….so is this what you’re doing when we’re waiting for an hour to see you each time we come in?? Great.
Then we were told that Collin would need five different shots. He was not thrilled about this. Every nurse that came in was informed by him that he didn’t like shots; I think he thought he wouldn’t have to have them if he let them know how much he hated them. In the end he did really well, screamed like a banshee, but it was a lot of shots at once.
Then this morning he wakes up with a raging fever. What??? No other signs of sickness but the fever, I think it’s the aftermath of all the shots. I seem to constantly have a sick kid lately; I guess it’s that time of year.

And lastly I went to my OB specialist for an ultrasound on Monday and everything looks great so far. The baby is getting nice and big and I’m still showing no signs of pre-term labor, so we’re really happy. I’m thinking I won’t need any of the preemie outfits I was thinking I would need. Here’s the happy, chubby kiddo.

Cupcake Hell

I wanted them to be beautiful, perfect, beyond edible. It turned into hell. I love the whole process of baking and creating fun things, but not being pregnant and on my feet doing it all day. Maybe I shouldn't have stuffed each tiny little cake, I don't know. I guess in the long run it paid off, the new mother loved her cupcakes (it was for a baby shower) and the guests enjoyed taking home leftovers to their husbands, and I'm enjoying laying on the couch eating them myself.

The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

The Good:
So the good news from yesterday is that we get to deliver the baby in Des Moines. I’m so excited by this news, it means the boys can stay in school and I won’t have to worry about them the way I would have if we’d been in Iowa City, and I’ll be able to be at home with them each evening. The baby will probably not do great after delivery and they’re expecting him to need to stay in the hospital for about one to two weeks afterwards. The main concern is feeding. Children with heart defects do not eat well, it takes a lot of energy to eat, and they just don’t have it. If he doesn’t do well he might have to go home with a nose tube for feeding, especially if they don’t want him to use up the calories it takes to breast/bottle feed.
We’re also hoping to let him get about 4-6 months old before needing surgery, which will be nice because it will be in the summer then and more convenient with the older boys to go out to Iowa City for a few weeks.
We got a tour of the hospital, it is really nice and their pediatric center is amazingly staffed with places to stay and totally family oriented. I was even informed that they have specialty nurses primarily for the entertainment of the children, to do activities with them. The nurse coordinator told me that they would take my older boys and do activities with them and keep them busy throughout the day so that I could be with the baby. And each room is equipped with dvds, movies, and playstations. Tom was excited about the playstation, but if I had to sit in a hospital room with him playing Steve Madden Football, I think I’d eventually kill him.

The Bad:
His heart condition is more than just the atrial and ventricular septum defect. The official title is Atrioventricular Septal Defect. So besides those two holes, the atrial hole is so big that it spans down into the ventricular hole causing one large atrioventricular valve to exist rather than two separate valves. This causes the oxygenated and un-oxygenated blood to mix together freely, there is no separation in the chambers of the heart, and everything is free flowing, the two valves that flow into the right side, and the three that flow into the left side are swinging all over the place.
Here is a normal heart:
Here is what my baby’s heart looks like:
When he is born the right side of his heart and his lungs will receive too much blood, and the body won’t receive enough oxygenated blood. Plus the one large AV valve might not work well and may allow blood to reenter the top chambers, which we won’t be able to see until he’s born. He will be on a lot of heart medication to keep the strain off his body and heart for as long as possible for him to get older before the surgery. He will most likely stay weak and small until the condition is fixed.
Here is a picture of the surgical procedure: (Sorry about the pics, they should have red in them so you can tell the difference between the oxygenated & un-oxygenated blood flow in the heart, but the printer ran out of ink at the hospital, so these are the pics I got, and I couldn't find ones of this condition on the Internet, probably just didn't look hard enough!)
What they will do is separate the top two chambers of the heart and the bottom two chambers, and make two functioning valves out of the one large atrioventricular valve. This will have to be done with open heart surgery while he’s on bypass. It’s a scary thought to think that they’ll be stopping his heart completely.
Now if he starts going into heart failure a lot earlier and they don’t want to perform the surgery on a newborn, they can do a temporary fix where they put a pulmonary artery band to restrict the extra blood flow to the lungs until open heart surgery could be done when he’s bigger and stronger. This procedure is done with a small incision in the side, and the band is taken off during the later surgery.

The Ugly:
The hospitals, the wires, the medicine, the stress of a sick child…I sometimes wonder if I’m strong enough to do this. I know I won’t sleep for a long time, and I hope I can stay semi sane for Talin and Collin throughout this whole process. And I’m just scared. I’m extremely blessed and feel such gratitude that we have modern medicine that can just about fix anything, but it’s still scary. I don’t want my baby to suffer, to feel pain or fear when he’s so young, I can’t stand the thought of all he’ll endure, and I wish I could take it on myself so he didn’t have to suffer through any of it. But I also have a lot of faith that the Lord will be by his side doing just that.
I just wish it wasn’t so complicated now. The ASD was easily fixable, not such stress, but the added in problems are scary, there is too much that can go wrong. I have to have too much faith in the surgeon to fix it properly the first time and hopefully the only time. I also realize that I can’t focus on all the if’s and I have to be grateful and upbeat about all the positive things. If nothing else it will make our little family stronger, right?

And just a quick thanks to everyone who has commented, emailed, called me with well wishing, prayers and thoughts, it’s more than I deserve. I have such a great support system I really don’t know what I would do without family, even though everyone is thousands of miles away!

One More Day

One more day...

this makes me think of the Les Miserables song they sing before the revolution. Kind of fitting, kind of not. For me it's not a revolution I'm going into but hospitals and cardiologist galore, and possibly some long awaited answers I've been craving since the end of November.

My anticipation for the 23rd has been beyond intense the past few weeks, I've literally been counting down each day, and now here I am, at my one more day status.

Thank goodness!

I've spent the entire day trying to keep myself absolutely occupied. Last weekend it was crocheting, I made five baby hats and a scarf and hat for Collin, all within three days.

Today it was cupcakes.

I made over a hundred cupcakes that I'm storing in the freezer until Saturday for a friends baby shower.

Will I need a hundred cupcakes?

Chances are exceptionally slim that no, I won't.

Do I care?

No.

Not in the least, I mean it occupied four hours today.

Besides the fact that there will probably only be 25-30 people at the shower on Saturday, I needed to make those cupcakes, all one hundred this morning. But it wasn't enough, so then I decided to make frosting flowers to put on the cupcakes when I frost them Friday evening. I made a lot of those, probably too many. That's okay, that was another two hours.

Then I cleaned the kitchen, swept, mopped, dusted every surface, and then cleaned the bathroom. All the while I managed to talk to Rachel (my cousin), Betsy, Rachel (my neighbor watching the boys tomorrow), and Mandi on the phone, for a significant time each. And yet I'm still going, I mean, I'm writing a post! Oh, forgot to add in that I cleaned the boys room without making them help me either.

Am I nesting?

It seems a bit early to be doing so. Maybe I am, who knows.

If I am it's in preparation for the big day tomorrow.

Random little tid bit here, but I've been spending a lot of time with my children lately, I know, that's what mother's do, but with them being sick all last week and now with the past two days off from school it's seemed like more than normal.

Here are some odd things that have come out of Talin's mouth lately.

"Mom, you look skinny today, except for your belly, it looks real fat."
"Dad, I love your dreamy eyes, and sparkly teeth."
"I can't wait to grow up and get married, then I can have as many kids as I want."
"It's taking too long to grow up, I've been waiting forever!"

Well I'm off to vacuum the downstairs, make my bed, start dinner and fluff the couch, yeah, I said fluff the couch.

Friday News

I just found out that my baby has a second hole in his heart. A ventricular septal defect as well as the atrial septal defect.

Sometimes life gets you down, and yet I can still smile at the Flight of the Conchords. (and an apology to my mother for the constant use of the word "flippin'" throughout the song, but I can get away with it today, my baby has two holes in his heart, she can't yell at me.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FArZxLj6DLk