The Mathis Family

Why I've Been So Quiet

2012-01-25T14:06:00.002-05:00

Many of you are friends of mine on facebook. About 2-3 weeks ago, I posted an update that read:

Got some news this morning that has rocked my world. I'm very thankful for supportive friends and family. Prayers for wisdom and peace would be appreciated...

What resulted from there was an outpouring of love and support from most of my friends and family. While this was a fairly cryptic and non-specific message, I felt as if I could say nothing at that moment because I didn't know what was going on.

Basically, what I knew then and what I know now is this, my cousin informed me that my biological father reappeared.

This seems to be a fairly non-event to most, but this was the man who decided that he wanted nothing to do with my mom and I and, literally, walked away from us one afternoon when I was just a toddler.

I, like most kids, who do not know a family member, was curious and my mom was always very honest with me. She was always very careful to give me age appropriate information and never had anything negative to say about him, but I connected the dots and always had some negative feelings associated with him.

Eventually, I just chose to believe that he fell off the face of the earth, rather than believe that he wanted nothing to do with my mom and me.

My mom eventually was remarried to a man who I consider my read dad, the one who went to every dance recital, band concert, football game, graduation, walked me down the aisle and was present during both of our children's births.

So, this is why I've been quiet. I've not really had anything to say about all this. I, however, can see how many people in my family could be hurt by all of this. My dad, being the amazing man he is, was concerned about me. That's why he's my dad, my real dad.

The most difficult part of this is not if he wants to know me, but how do I explain this to Caleb and Piper? They don't know any different than my dad. They are too young and deserve to be innocent to this type of dysfunction.

I still don't know what is going to happen with this, but I choose to not hide anymore.

So, that's where I've been.

Life Change

2012-01-03T14:46:00.004-05:00

I feel like the past couple of years have really been life changing for me.
Many people mention that certain things are "life changing" when they really mean that they are moment changing for them. Something that they may remember, but it certainly won't affect the way that they live their lives.
For me, my husband, my children, cancer, the loss of family members have been life changing events in my life.
These past few years have caused me to reevaluate the people in my life and determine that there are just some that don't belong for a variety of reasons.
It seems that I've been in the presence of some folks who just thrive on drama and making everything about themselves.
No more.
These people will no longer be in my life. I am slowly but surely disengaging with these folks and making my family and true, real, loving friends, the ones who care about me and my family, a larger part of my life.
Someone who I thought was my friend unfriended me on facebook today.
This seems fairly insignificant, but this was someone I trusted with my daughter. Someone whom I thought was my friend. Someone who falls into the category that I described above.
No more.
Does it hurt and make me angry that this was how she chose to do this, yes. Passive aggressive and I do not mix. I come from a family where you speak what you feel, get it out and move on.
I don't make New Year's resolutions, because I feel as if anything you commit to doing needs to be done whole heartedly, which most NY resolutions are not.
No longer will those self involved, drama loving, "world revolves around them" people be a part of my life.
I will now surround myself with those people who love me and my family, support our decisions for our lives, speak truth in our lives and allow us to do the same.
This is my life change for 2012.

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-24T15:22:00.001-05:00

Merry Christmas,
From our Family to yours!

Catching Up

2011-12-21T09:32:00.003-05:00

So, here it is again, another catching up post. I've been woefully bad at keeping this blog up to date, but I'm going to try to do a better job. A few things in my life have necessitated that I drop some things that were taking up precious moments that I needed freed up.
However, some big changes are on the horizon. The biggest, is that my work schedule is about to be changed significantly. For the last 6.5 years, I've been work 4 nights a week, Monday through Thursday, many semesters from 5 until 9. During the summer, my classes run from 6 to 11 pm, 4 days a week. However, starting at the beginning of spring 2012, I'll be working on Mondays and Wednesdays only. My class load is the same, it's just all crammed onto those two days which means that I'll be teaching from 4 until 9. Most of the time when I mention this to folks, they comment that it will make for a long day, but what they aren't considering is that I'll be off the other 5 days of the week.
A lot of the reasoning for this was so that I would be home with the kids at night more nights per week. Since Jes started his new job back in October, we've been employing babysitters 4 nights per week so that I could get to work on time. Aside from the financial implications of this, the kids were having a really hard time not having one of us with them at night.
Secondly, Caleb's school is taking up a lot of our time during the day. We have MOPS on 3 out of 4 Mondays of the month and Piper takes dance on Wednesday mornings. Caleb really needs to do school work in the morning to be able to even attempt a level of attentiveness, so unless we get up and do school, we are struggling through the afternoon before I have to frantically pick up around the house, make dinner, go get our babysitter (half the time), and get to work. (Sorry about the run on sentence. My life is like a constant run on...)
The last reasoning behind this is somewhat selfish, I'm just tired. Six and a half years of working all day with the kids and then having to go to work after that makes a girl tired, so hopefully this change will remedy these situations.
I've thought about updating here and have been pretty quiet on facebook but I've been keeping a secret and am not good at not saying anything, so I just didn't post at all.

Here's our secret. We got a kitten, but not for us, he is for my parents.

We took him to their house on Sunday and they named him Maverick, which is fitting considering my dad's love for all things related to the basketball team. He is just the sweetest, snuggly kitty and I was afraid that we would have trouble leaving him. Piper has had the hardest time with him not being at our house. Every time we talk about Christmas (we are going to my parents'), she asks about Maverick. I think she may be just a smidge more excited about seeing him than she is all the presents!

Conversations with Caleb - Syllable Edition

2011-11-10T14:50:00.003-04:00

Today, during school, I was teaching Caleb about syllables. Part of this process was practicing counting the syllables in words appointed by our curriculum.
We had made it through lists with 1 and 2 syllables and I presented a list of words that were mixed up (1 would have 1 syllable and the next would have 2, etc).
Me: Caleb, what is this word?
Caleb: baby (clapping two syllables)
Me: How many syllables does baby have?
Caleb: 2
Me: Good. What is this next word?
Caleb: buh-y
Me: What?
Caleb: buh-y
Me: by?
Caleb: Yes, buh-y. It has 2, Mama.
Me: *sigh*
He's a Texan, for sure...

It Finally Happened

2011-11-04T20:35:00.002-04:00

The kids have been fascinated for quite some time about my pregnancies and births with each of them. Both of them have just wanted to know how they got out of me, but never the other way around. They know that I had a c-section with both of them because they've seen photos of their births and we've briefly talked about the other way of having babies (without too much detail, of course). But no questions about the other.
Until today.
Caleb just randomly asked me today how he got into my tummy.
Now, I have been thinking about this conversation for a long time and how I would appropriately answer this question without going into specifics. I do not believe that a 6 year old boy needs to know all the particulars, so I've carefully considered what I should say, but still really had no idea what would actually come out of my mouth.
So, when the question came out of nowhere today, all I said was, "God put you there."
He seemed fine with that answer and went about his business, so we're going to leave it at that for now.
Whew.

Hearing Test - Take 2

2011-10-27T09:48:00.002-04:00

This past Tuesday, I took Caleb and Piper back to our beloved ENT for Piper's post-op check up and Caleb's 6 month follow up for another hearing test.
Piper came back completely fine and looking good. Her tubes were still in place and in good position, just in time for ear infection season to start. We are all hoping and confident that she will be spared this year. We all feel like she should be, seeing as she has had countless ear and sinus infections in her short 3 years of life!
Caleb was scheduled to take another hearing test. You'll remember that 6 months ago, he failed a basic one at his pediatrician's office and then was found to have a documented hearing loss in his left ear. The theory was that if it stayed the same, then it was likely a variety of events that caused the loss. However, if it worsened over that time period, it would be attributed to a genetic, degenerative condition that would result in a hearing aide for Caleb.
Basically, the test results came back that his hearing loss is static, has not changed significantly. Our doctor just recommended that he sit in the front of the classroom at school (not a problem) and that we retest in 1 year.
I've asked a variety of times what could have caused this and no one really knows. What they do know is that Caleb was exposed to some treatments in the NICU that causes hearing loss, that he did have some middle ear fluid at various times his first few years of life, and that it could be totally spontaneous.
Caleb has always had trouble with hearing tests, failing the first time in the NICU, but they had always been able to retest and get a satisfactory reading. So, we don't really know where this is going or if it will ever get worse, so we will just watch and see. I have to say, that we are really in the best hands, if it were to get worse and he needed further treatment!

Surgery Results

2011-10-08T20:56:00.002-04:00

Friday was Piper's adenoid removal and tube insertion.
Both went well, but she did not handle the anesthesia as easily as hoped. Her brother never had any issues from being sedated, so we were hoping that she would follow in his footsteps. It just wasn't meant to be.
Piper was very difficult to wake up, had some GI issues, acquired some "junk" in her lungs, and has been cranky, irritable, emotional and clingy since. She is better during the day, but spent last night crying out in her sleep, tossing and turning and not sleeping well in general.
I know all this will pass, so that makes this all easier, but boy is this mama tired!
Our doctor did tell me that her adenoids were a mess and likely the cause of all her issues these past years. One of the first things he said to me was that it was the right decision to take those right out since they were so "soupy" (his word, not mine).
Anyway, I'm glad it's all over. She didn't freak out too much but she did melt down a bit in the OR. I'm just glad they didn't have to rip her from my arms, screaming and crying. She was very brave, but certainly not in a rush to go back and do it all again! Neither am I.

Surgery for Piper

2011-10-06T14:59:00.002-04:00

Since birth, Piper has been struggling with, first sinus infections and, now, ear infections. In fact, we have reached the point that if she were to have another ear infection, we would have to go the route of giving her a series of antibiotic shots (Rocephin), that are super painful and, frankly, don't really work.
Our nurse practitioner is also a bit concerned about her ending up with a bacterial infection that is resistant to all antibiotics. I also do not like the idea of my 3 year old being on antibiotics so much and have tried just about every homeopathic treatment, etc that is out there and she still keeps having ear infections.
So, I went ahead and made an appointment with our fabulous ENT, the same ENT who did my surgery last year. This also the same doctor, if you don't remember, who treated Caleb in the NICU 6 years ago and was the only doctor who was able to figure out what was going on with him. Needless to say, I trust him implicitly!
Our doctor agreed that something needed to be done to help Piper get through this developmental speed bump, but was adamant that she was ahead of where most 3 years olds are with regard to intellect and speech. This means that whatever issues she may have with her ears, it hasn't affected her speech or ability to recall information, so it's just getting rid of the fluid.
So, tomorrow, at 5:00 in the morning, I'll be pulling both kids out of bed and putting them into the car. We will drive down to the very same surgical center where I had my surgery (super nice facility!) and Piper will have her adenoids taken out and tubes put in her ears. I'm nervous, but so glad that this will be taken care of and she'll have no more ear issues. I'm a little nervous, but so ready for my baby girl to be healthy!

Job Changes

2011-10-02T18:46:00.002-04:00

For nearly 4 years, Jes has been employed at the same company. We've become comfortable there, but Jes hasn't been happy. He's had some negative experiences with someone that he works with, so he's been looking for a new position for months.
Early on in our marriage and his career (they both began simutaneously), he moved around between companies quite a lot. Most of this happened because of one event, September 11th. Since he makes his living in the aircraft industry, we were a casualty of war, so to speak.
Because of all this moving around, Jes was able to gain a huge amount of experience on a huge number of aircraft. So, when his resume ends up on a website, he will literally have many offers from companies without them even meeting him.
The past few months, in his looking for a new job, he's been offered quite a few positions but none of them were what he was looking for, didn't have insurance (a must for us), or would be a huge pay cut.
Last year, nearly exactly a year ago, Jes began the process of interviewing for a job that was government driven and would take him to Afghanistan for a year. The money would have been good, but the living without him for 365 days would have been very difficult.
Then, he found what we thought would be a marvelous opportunity with a man who owns a company about an hour north of us, but part of his year would have been spent in New Zealand. Due to the nature of business he works in, we thought that it would be inevitable that he spend part of his time in another country.
With this last job, he was offered a position and then the stock market crashed. All the investors backed out and we were again playing the waiting game.
The owner of this company new that Jes was just dying to get out of the company he was in and it seems knew that his opportunities were taking a significant amount of time, time we really didn't have or want to wait out, so he heard of another opportunity. He called Jes two Fridays ago and let him know about it and gave him a phone number to call.
Jes called the owner of this new company and the owner was very interested in seeing his resume. Jes got all that together and sent it to him 11pm Saturday night, got a call at 11am Sunday, had an interview on Monday and was offered a position on the spot.
This job is local, pays very well (it will give us a raise!), will have insurance shortly and is management.
This whole job change makes me super nervous, but looking back at all the events that have led us to this point have been clear pointers that those other jobs are not the ones for us. All the events of this job have fallen into place and seem to be a good fit for our family.

First Day of School 2011

2011-09-03T15:31:00.002-04:00

We decided to wait and start school at our house this past Thursday. Last year, I started on the day that all the schools around here start, which is always around the 2nd or 3rd Monday in August. That has always seemed so early to me, but it was my first year, so we were kind of flying by the seat of our pants. Since we started so early last year, and even with 1 full week of during Sweet Repeats (a kids consignment sale that I coordinate), most of Thanksgiving week off and 2 weeks off at Christmas, we were done with Caleb's curriculum by late February.
I ended up spending the last couple of months trying to piece together work for Caleb to do so that he wouldn't get out of the habit of working on school, which was a stressor for me.
This time around, I felt more confident and our curriculum dictated that it would best to start on a Thursday. So, I picked this past Thursday, the 1st, to start school, even though both kids were begging me for weeks beforehand.

This isn't the best quality photo, but it's the cutest. These two look so big this year. It's hard to believe...
When I was a kid, my mom always made it a point to take me to breakfast on my first day of school. Last year, we just went for donuts at the place down the street, but Caleb and Piper have developed a fascination for the International House of Pancakes (IHOP), so that's where we went. Both kids wanted those super bad for you, sugary Funny Face pancakes, so that's what they both ate. The pancakes are around twice the size of my kids' heads, and you better believe that they both ate every single bit of them. It's such a treat for them and me!

This year, like last, we are using My Father's World for Caleb's curriculum. I was pleasantly surprised at how easily Caleb took to working on school work again, as the beginning of last year's school year was a huge battle. He just sat down, started his work and went about his business, all with a smile on his face. Love that boy!

Piper's been begging to work on school with us as well. I tried to get some curriculum for her together, but she's not too keen on all of it yet. So basically, what she's been working on is coloring and gluing shapes to paper. I figure, she's having fun and learning a little, so it's totally fine. Caleb and I are sure to include Piper when we are reading or doing some sort of art project, but she's doing great working for a bit on her own.
All in all, I'm super excited about this school year and it seems that the kids are too!

Getting Back In the Swing Of Things

2011-08-31T14:20:00.002-04:00

I've been remiss in updating this site as much as I should, and really it's not for lack of things to post, but just that I haven't had a moment to breathe, much less type.
I worked all summer from 6-11pm, add in VBS, swim lessons, many playdates and just everyday life things that have to be done and there was barely enough time in the day to sleep.
Tomorrow, we start school here so I'll be back with a first day of school post.
Get ready for all the cuteness!

Story Time With Caleb - The Three Little Pigs

2011-07-11T14:27:00.001-04:00

As told by the boy wonder:

Once upon a time there was a little pig and his 2 brothers.
They all lived in a cardboard house together.
Then, the big,, bad wolf came to their house and knocked on the door.
The 3 little pigs said, "Whose there?"
The big bad wolf said, "Me! I'm here to blow down your house!"
The 3 little pigs said, "But we aren't done with our house! Go away!"
And so the big, bad wolf gave up and went home.
The end.

That kid cracks me up.

Three

2011-06-30T14:46:00.009-04:00

Today, Piper turned 3. This girl of mine is quite a character and, to me, quite amazing. She pretty much rolls with the punches and is just happy to reside in someones lap. Piper is still super into all things pink, princess, and girly. She loves wearing bows, flowers, and having her toes painted.
However, she sees a certain benefit to getting dirty at any point in the day. If there is a puddle of any kind, you can be certain that Piper will be streaking toward it if you blink.
Piper is super active, but she is also a kid who loves to do any kind of craft. She currently owns around 25 coloring books, every possible art and craft supply (and yet I'm surprised daily when I discover she doesn't have an item) and loves to "read". She, of course, cannot read the written word yet, but she loves to look at books and must have one in her hand each time she lays down to rest or sits still.
Another thing that Piper is really into is music, which is absolutely no surprise to me. Jes and I both have musical backgrounds and Caleb also has had a significant ear and love for music as well. You will often find Piper listening to and singing along with any song that she's heard more than once. She is very intent, often concentrating really hard, while we are in the car and constantly asking us to "turn it up".
If I had to pick a future profession, however, for my girl, I would say that it has to be something to do with animals. The girl just can't get enough of any type of animal. She even has an appreciation for bugs, something that most of her counterparts run from.
Piper is 33.2 pounds (73 %tile) and just over 3 ft (97cm, 68 %tile) tall. Piper has always fallen within the 50th to 75th percentiles for height and weight, which is SO different after her brother who consistently landed around the 99th.
I had a good discussion with our NP about Piper's diet, something that concerns me greatly. She is super picky, which seems to be the norm for 3 year olds, but it's just strange to me and hard to deal with. Her brother is not picky and will, literally, eat anything I put in front of him so to have her turn her nose up at mostly everything is a bit frustrating. I was told that if her nutrition was affecting her negatively, then she wouldn't have grown much and would be much, much smaller. Also, Caleb has entered that phase of life where he is ALWAYS hungry, so he often gets the lunch/dinner she won't eat.
Speaking of Caleb, I have to include in this post about Piper that they are still the best of friends. Piper has started attending an every other Friday Mother's Day Out program that my friend is running and the first person she hugs and tells she missed them is her brother. She then will proceed to tell Caleb every single event that happened in her day and just hang with him. She loves being with him and the feeling is totally mutual. They do still fight, but it does my heart good to see how close they are. Since I didn't grow up with a sibling in the house, I didn't have anyone my age to share much of my childhood with. I wanted to ensure that my child(ren) had someone with which to share the sad/difficult/happy/exciting moments.
Piper is super sweet, loving, happy, and fun and we are so blessed to have her in our family. She is the perfect 4th and makes our family complete!
We love you Piper and are so excited for all the fun that is in store!!!

1 Year Ago

2011-06-24T14:44:00.002-04:00

Exactly one year ago today, I was lying on a table in an operating room in a hospital in Plano, Texas while my fabulous surgeon excised all the cancer that had invaded my body.
Two weeks ago, the 9th of this month, was the 1 year anniversary of my diagnosis. I chose to not make a big deal out of that day for a few reasons. The main reason being that while the actual diagnosis changed my life, my outlook, and my reason for living, the surgery saved my life, my outlook and my reason for living.
This day is so vivid in my mind. I was a complete and total wreck and had a couple of major breakdowns before being wheeled into that room, the last one in the presence of my anesthesiologist who, mercifully, gave me some Versed to calm me down.
I remember begging my surgeon and my anesthesiologist to promise me that I would wake up, but my biggest fear was that they would open me up and have to close because it was too progressed.
That, of course, did not happen and I woke up 7 hours later, vomiting, without the use of my left arm, and without the ability to swallow anything more than a liquid, but I woke up.
My first thought was of my children, husband and parents, the people I most did not want to leave but was even more elated to know that I was returning to.
One year ago I feel as if my life was handed back to me, albeit with some restrictions and with some difficulties, but it's mine again. Cancer can't have me and won't have me.

Dogs

2011-05-27T22:16:00.002-04:00

I posted way back in April about the newest members of our family, Bebi and Sadie. I've been kind of in and out of here for some time since then and part of that is because of the issues that these puppies have been having.
There are many situations in which I post to facebook, deferring to a short 2 sentence update to get the statement out there to the world, and choosing to not put it on here. However, this is something that I've not posted anywhere.
So, the long and short of it is that the dogs were diagnosed with sarcoptic mange about a month ago. Just google that if you want to know alllllll about it. Basically, the long and short of it is that it is a treatable form of mange, but can be contagious to humans. Fantastic.
If you know me at all, you know that since college, I've been somewhat of a germaphobe. This issue started with me way back in college when I took a class called microbiology. This class basically taught me all about microbes, etc, and what they can do to the body and how they get into the body.
My germaphobia got worse when I started working in one of the only hospitals left in Texas that had a dedicated TB ward and it was impressed upon myself and my grad student that we were to be VERY careful.
Another escalation occurred when Caleb was in the NICU and yet another set of medical professionals ensured that not a moment passed by that I wasn't regaled on the detriment that I could be doing to my kid if I had not washed correctly.
I'm not one to wash constantly or not touch anything, my kids do get dirty, as do I, but I do have some non-negotiables when it comes to hand washing.
So, imagine my horror as I stood in that vet office, the vet refusing to even enter the room after the diagnosis, realizing that both of my kids had loved all over and carried these dogs all around for weeks. Not to mention the fact that they were both well beloved by the neighborhood kids and had come into contact with other pets on our street as well. I was sick to my stomach and wanted the floor to open up and swallow me.
From what we know now, the dogs came to us infected with the mites that cause this type of mange. Their mom was found wandering in the environment, who knows how long she had been there, so it stands to reason that she would have something that her puppies would likely get as well.
Anyway, after the diagnosis, we had to literally wash everything that we owned with bleach and clean everything that couldn't be washed, again with bleach. I spent the morning after the diagnosis washing down my walls, floors and hard surfaces, vacuuming (literally 9 times in one day) and bagging up all the stuffed animals and plush items that couldn't withstand a trip through the washing machine on hot. Those stuffed animals had to remain in a sealed trash bag for 2 weeks. For my girl, who is so totally attached to her "guys", as she calls them, this was heartbreaking for all of us.
I can still hear my washing machine and dryer groan as I approach them with a load, but I can say that we are in the clear now. Today, both Bebi and Sadie had an appointment with our vet and he feels that they are in the clear. However, we are continuing with their medication for another 2 weeks just to be sure. No one that is in or outside of our house that came into contact with them have had any symptoms and Sadie's hair has grown back (she had lost much of it from her hind legs and belly).
Both of our new furry babies are doing well, growing and are happy in their new home. We are thankful to have them and the kiddos are now able to love on them again without worry of getting something! Hooray!

Results

2011-05-08T20:09:00.002-04:00

I juuuuuust realized that I never posted about my more recent medical drama.
Boy, this blog is all medical all the time. I really need to stop this.
Anywho, I recently turned tail and fled from my old endocrinologist due to his fact that he was just inept, uncaring, rude, lied to me on a regular basis, and had staff that couldn't read medical reports any better than I could. My new endo did a good overview of my health and decided that I needed to have my TH (thyroid hormone; would tell if I'm on the adequate dosage of synthetic hormone) and thyroglobulin (cancer marker) levels checked.
As a side note, I'm fairly certain that I have post traumatic stress disorder after this whole cancer thing went down last summer because I got the orders on a Wednesday and waited nearly a month before I got my blood drawn. Every tremor, increase in heart rate, hair lost and drop of sweat I developed over the past year had me "convinced" that the cancer had returned. Needless to say, I was a nervous wreck.
Well, Dr. L called me while I was at work on a Tuesday night. I was in the middle of class and assumed that I could call him back the next day and talk with someone, until I heard the message he left. Basically he said something along the lines of the following, "We have your blood work back and now we need to talk about our next step." In my mind that meant the following: YOUR CANCER IS BACK AND YOU'RE GOING TO DIE AND LEAVE YOUR FAMILY ALL ALONE AND YOUR CHILDREN MOTHERLESS!!!!!
PTSD anyone?
After phone tag for the next 3 days (and a little stress related hair loss) I finally called his nurse and told her to tell him to call me anytime and I would stop my life to answer his call.
He called me on a Thursday night, right smack in the middle of my class, so I stopped and answered. Basically, my TH levels are right on the dot where they are supposed to be and my thyroglobulin was undetectable.
The best part is that my blood has always had antibodies in it, an indication that my immune system was trying to fight off the cancer and, essentially, kill my thyroid, and this time they were undetectable! The bad thing about any antibodies is that any blood test with them present is null and void because those antibodies skew the results. There was a long shot procedure that could have been done on a blood sample that involved some subjective analysis and a lengthy process involving sending it off to a California lab. Since the antibodies came back, essentially, negative, that was one expense we didn't have to worry about.
So, all in all, everything looks good. As soon as I talked to Dr L, all of my so-called symptoms were gone, another indication that this was all psychosomatic. In other words, I'm crazy...

Hearing

2011-04-25T13:47:00.002-04:00

A couple of posts ago, I mentioned about the very basic, rudimentary, test that Caleb underwent during his 6 year well check that he failed. Today was our trip to the audiologist and our beloved ENT to have all this investigated.
The first step when we arrived was the actual hearing screen with the audiologist. Now, if you've been around this blog for a long time, then you will remember a very ill-fated 3-4 month span where we had at least 3 hearing tests with 3 different audiologists, with each one returning as inconclusive. We finally found a pediatric audiologist who could handle a crazy 3 year old boy and get a good test, which he passed with flying colors. So, I was a bit nervous about this go around but Caleb, as he is known to do, surprised me and cooperated and did great!
The long and short of the hearing test is that his right ear is just great, but his left has a measurable, but mild, hearing impairment.
The ENT did a very thorough exam of both his ears, looking for issues that he felt could be the cause, but found nothing. So, there are 2 options as to what is causing this. Either he has some calcification of the bones in his middle ear or he has a degenerative, genetic condition. With the first, Caleb could potentially have surgery at some point to have the calcification removed and restore his hearing. That issue is not progressive and he shouldn't have more hearing loss. The second, genetic, progressive condition will worsen with time and there is nothing to do about that short of fitting him with a hearing aid when it gets to the point at which he can't hear any longer from that ear.
We will go back in 6 months and will know pretty quickly which issue this is. Jes has always had issues with hearing, having trouble when we are in loud, busy places, which we've seen in Caleb. Jes's hearing hasn't worsened over the years, so I'm hoping that this is what this issue turns out to be like. The ENT and I discussed getting Jes in to be tested as well, which will give us another piece of the puzzle, so I'm working on him on that too.
So, that's the long and short of it all. Not great news, but not the absolute worst either.

The Newest Mathis Family Members

2011-04-14T15:56:00.002-04:00

Saturday was Caleb's birthday party and including the festivities that we had planned, we also had a huge surprise for him and Piper.
Basically, a friend of my cousin's took in a dog who was abandoned near her home on the coldest day of the year back in February. Little did she know, this dog was very pregnant and gave birth to a litter of 8 puppies. Seven of those puppies were black with white accents, like mom, but another was blonde.
Susan, my cousin, started linking to photos of these puppies on facebook and I did my dead level best to try to stay away from them, but the pull was just too strong. The kids had been asking for a dog for just over a year now, so I started thinking about these dogs, especially the blonde one.
After a couple of conversations with Jes, we decided that we would go out and get Bebi, the blonde puppy as a surprise for the kids. So, after the party, we packed everything up and hopped in the car and made the trek. When we got there we were welcomed by the family who had taken in the dogs and we set up shop in the back yard to meet he puppies. Caleb was super cute because he thought we were just there to pet them and visit.
This picture I took just as we told Caleb that we were going to take one home! He was SO thrilled!

As we observed the puppies, we quickly discovered that Bebi was quite timid, but super sweet so Jes was concerned that she would be very lonely. He decided that we would take one of Bebi's sisters as well. This came as a total surprise to me, so I guess we were all surprised all the way around.

Here are the kids with the puppies. Bebi is being held by Piper and Caleb is holding Sadie in the above photo. Needless to say, we are thrilled with our new family members. They are super sweet and surprisingly smart, now if I can just stop them from peeing on my carpet...

Caleb's 6 Year Appointment

2011-03-29T13:18:00.003-04:00

Bright and early this morning, I packed up the kids and drove to our beloved pediatrician for Caleb's 6 year well appointment.
I came armed with a few questions and some expectations of what our appointment would be like and, true to form, it was a great experience, for the most part.
Basically, this is what we found out:

Caleb is growing and developing as he should. He is in the 73rd percentile for weight (a decrease from last year), but in the 99th percentile for height. This did not come as any sort of surprise to me as all his clothes are not getting tighter, just shorter. And really, his gene pool pretty much guaranteed his tall-ness.
This visit, they did the hearing test where they put the probe in his ears to measure the movement of his eardrum. If you've been around here at all then you will remember that we went through a series of these tests a few years ago where he failed each and every one. Our NP and I decided that instead of wasting more money for him to fail another of these tests, I am going to try to get him in right away to see the audiologist. I do not think that he has any hearing loss, but we need to be sure and get it checked out.
Caleb is right on where he needs to be developmentally, even ahead, for his age. As always, they were very impressed by how intelligent he is, which is always good for a Mama's heart!
The last thing that we got today was an unofficial diagnosis of ADHD. This does not come as a surprise to me at all as this is something that we have thought was in play for many years now. Since Caleb is not in the school setting, we are able to be much more flexible in treatments and working with him. He does not have any disruptions in his everyday life (eating, sleeping, etc) like many kids, so his is deemed mild and we are able to monitor everything for now. One thing that I really appreciate about our doctors is that they are not over-medicators and don't jump right to that, so we are going to wait, watch and work with him as we have been.

So, all in all it was a good visit, other than having to literally lay on top of him during his one vaccination that was missed at his 4 year appointment, it was an easy appointment. It really is a joy to visit our pediatrician who care so much, not only for our kids but also the rest of the family!

Seriously?!? What Is Wrong With me???

2011-03-19T17:00:00.003-05:00

For the last 2+ years, I've been totally open about the fact that I don't ever want to be pregnant or have another baby ever again. Ever.
Then I got cancer.
That changes/changed everything. Last summer, as soon as I got my diagnosis, I immediately started wanting to have another baby. I totally thought I was out of my mind and just reacting to this major life issue and thought it would pass.
It never did.
It, in fact, has gotten much, much worse. To the point where I have had a gut wrenching, visceral reaction when friends recently announced that they were pregnant.
I have 2 kids who are pretty much in the age where they are fairly easy to go and do things with, so why in the world would I want to start over?
What in the world is wrong with me?

Eye Update

2011-03-15T14:26:00.003-05:00

For the last year, Caleb has been wearing glasses. Last February, we took him in for his 6 month visit, something we had been doing for a year previous to that. It was determined at that time that he needed some sort of corrective lens, but only for one eye that had an astigmatism.
The other treatment that we were working with was that he was wearing a patch for 3 hours a day.
Now I know that sounds like SO much fun, but believe me when I tell you that it was a battle every single day.
This morning we went back to visit our family eye doctor to see where he was. His last visit occurred while I was in the hospital in August during my radiation treatment. During that visit, he did not see his regular doctor and Jes took him, all of which threw him totally off and he was less than cooperative. So, to say that we didn't have the best picture of where he stood.
I'm thinking that he was starting to have difficulty seeing at this point, but just wasn't able to articulate that. He's been telling me the past few months that he can't see certain things, usually small print, so I had an idea that this time around would be different.
Caleb is a typical first born and would rather not do something or try to fix a situation if it isn't working out just the way he wants it to. This is also true when it comes to his vision. He often would refuse to complete a task when he was having trouble seeing it, so I knew that we were going to have to have a good screening this time to ensure that we got his prescription correct.
So, before we went to see the doctor this morning, I had a talk with Caleb and let him know that all he had to do was say that he couldn't see something if he couldn't see it. This seemed to be exactly what he needed to hear and probably was what he needed to hear last year too.
Being a mother makes me feel so dumb sometimes. It was just so simple and I made it so hard.
Anyway, his last glasses only had one corrective lens, the left one, because his right eye was just barely outside of normal, not enough for a corrective lens.
However, this time around, his left eye was worse and his astigmatism in the same eye was worse, as was his right eye that was barely out last time.
So, Caleb got new glasses today. They are blue and he loves them.
The best news is that he doesn't have to wear his patch anymore! That's the benefit, I supposed, of his eyes both getting worse.

Feb 9-16, 2011

2011-02-16T15:55:00.004-05:00

I take an inordinate amount of photos with my iphone. Mainly because it's usually in my hand when there is a cute moment or we are out somewhere. So, because of this, I've decided to do a weekly post with just the photos from my iphone from the week before.
iPhone Photos Feb 9-16 2011:

Last Wednesday, the 9th, we went to a playdate with some of our moms from our MOPS group to exchange Valentines and let the kids play.

Mostly, it was Piper's age and younger, but Caleb had a good time teaching those younger kiddos a thing or two...

On Wednesday, a friend of ours mentioned that she had a dollhouse that she was going to donate to our kid's consignment sale and asked if we would want it. I, of course, said yes because we had looked and looked for one for Piper at Christmas time. The one house I wanted was sold out before I got to go buy it, and it just so happened that this was the very one that our friend gave us! We were so excited and Piper loves it!!

After all of our snow and ice the last couple of weeks, my car was just filthy. I had taken the kids to Dairy Queen the night before and we got a free car wash, so we decided to just go through and knock the dirt off. Both of the kids are terrified of car washes, Piper in particular. Jes had to get her out of her car seat and she sat with me the whole time we went through.

Caleb is still a bit afraid of them too but not as much as his sister, so he decided to hide under a blanket that we keep in the backseat. It was a good thing that we were only in the car wash for a max of 3 minutes because they probably would have both had a nervous breakdown had we been in there for longer.

We love to go to Cabela's in Forth Worth to look around and the kids love their huge fish tanks! We happened to hit it at just the right time this go around to watch feeding time of all the fish.

The director of the aquarium actually donned a wetsuit and got into the tank with all these fish. The feed for the majority of the fish in the tank are other smaller fish, so I was a bit concerned that the kids would be bothered by this but they seemed to be unfazed and were just in awe!

This may seem like a strange photo, and is, really, quite bad, but I wanted to record this for the future. This, my friends, is my non-milk drinking girl drinking milk from a cup that she requested. Piper hasn't had any milk to drink since we gave up the bottles, so I've had to be extra diligent about ensuring that she gets plenty of calcium from other sources. So, when she requested milk in the middle of school yesterday, I jumped up and accommodated her request. She drank around half of what I put in the cup, something that I deem a huge success!

Piper, like most girls, is fascinated by my hair products and makeup. She has one of my brushes just for herself to play with while I'm getting ready to go somewhere. Yesterday, while I was getting ready to go to work, she wanted to play with my eyelash curler so I got my phone ready and handed it to her. I've tried to catch her doing this in the past and she will say she doesn't want me to take her picture, but I was faster this time!

Caleb is coming along in his school work. This week, we crossed over into lesser than/greater than in his math lessons. This is a concept that was very difficult, for many reasons, for me to learn as a student, so I was sort of dreading it. All I had to do was explain it to him once and he got it. He really does have a knack for math, something he definitely got from his dad!

We have missed the last 2 dance classes because of the weather, so this morning when I informed Piper that we were going to dance, she promptly gathered up her "people" and off we went. In her left hand is Puppy, the little stuffed dog that Jes gave her for Valentine's Day. She hasn't let that dog out of her sight since she got it. In her right hand is Birdy. This stuffed bird was Jes's grandmother's and Piper just latched onto it at first sight. She has slept with, cried with, carried around, loved on Birdy for as long as we can remember! He's like another member of the family!

Snow

2011-02-09T12:09:00.002-05:00

So, there's been an inordinate amount of the above here in Texas.

Texas, people! This, we don't know how to deal with. Give us 45, 100+ days in a row and we can deal, but we haven't a clue how to do this!

That photo was taken at the beginning of a major weather event (imagine your most animated, panicked, weather man voice when you read that) that lasted most of last week and it's snowing now as I type this.

Needless to say, we're all super tired of all the white stuff and are ready for it to go back from whence it came!

We haven't really had any issues in the Mathis casa from all this cold weather, however I know quite a few people who have had to deal with frozen pipes, busted pipes, loss of heat and loss of electricity. So, the fun has worn off.

Schools were closed last week, 4 out of the 5 possible days. This meant that the college was closed as well. Couple that with the fact that I missed the Thursday the week before (terrible, horrible, nearly death causing GI bug that my family and I fell victim to) that and you can imagine the mess that our class schedules have become. Missing today is going to be a big problem as will tomorrow, if they decide to close school again.

So, I'm off to try to manipulate my syllabus, once again, to add some time in that doesn't exist. Anyone have any idea how I can increase the hours in the day, just for a little bit?

Neglect

2011-02-06T23:02:00.002-05:00

I had no idea that it's been nearly a month since I posted here...
I've got some posts swirling around in my head, one in particular, that I'll have done and up in the next week or so.
In the meantime, we've been recovering from a particularly nasty GI bug, nearly a week long confinement due to major amounts of ice and snow and are looking toward, but not forward to, more to come this week.
I've been in a near panic, trying to figure out just how I'm going to catch up on all the days we've missed due to weather, but my coworkers and I are about to come to a consensus on those issues. After we're clear on those things, I think I'll be able to breathe easy.
More to come. Stay tuned!

Dance

2011-01-10T11:45:00.004-05:00

Sometime ago, I met a nice lady who owns a dance studio. After we talked for a bit, she mentioned to me that she had a 2 year old dance class that was a Mommy and Me class. This dance class sounded right up our alley and something that Piper would really enjoy, so I signed us up.
When I talked with Piper about it, she got super excited and acted like she would really love it. Piper and I took some time out, left the boys at home and we went to a darling little dance shop in downtown McKinney to purchase her leotard, tights and shoes. She was so excited and danced around and had so much fun!
Our class is on Wednesday mornings and this past Wednesday was our first class. I didn't get a whole bunch of photos since it is a Mommy and Me class.

Here's my little dancer before we left for class on our first day! She was SO excited just to put on her new dance outfit and got more and more excited as we went along.

We got to the studio a bit early, since it was our first day and I wasn't sure how long it would take to get there (it's in a neighboring town). This actually worked to our favor because by the time that class started, Piper was totally comfortable in her new surroundings.

Caleb even had his own area to hang out in that has a window that opens up into the studio that Piper and I were in.

I was a bit worried that Piper wouldn't do what was asked of her because she's never been in school or taken any kind of class and she tends to be super shy and distrusting of strangers. However, she surprised me and paid close attention to the teacher, trying and sometimes mastering what was requested of her. The dance teacher asked me a couple of times if Piper was in gymnastics and was surprised when I told her no.

At the end of the class, all the girls got a butterfly stamp and she hasn't stopped talking about that since last week! We can hardly wait to go back this week!

2 and a half

2010-12-30T11:50:00.007-05:00

Dearest Piper,

Today, you are officially 2 and a half. This means that in exactly 6 months, you will be 3, the big girl that you proclaim yourself to be every single day.

You are right at 3 feet tall and 32 pounds, but you still are my pocket sized diva. You love all things girly, but are such an enigma, equally loving to play in the dirt and mud. You love to do anything that requires running, jumping, swinging, climbing and just being physical. We have caught you on top of various pieces of furniture without knowing how you go there. Your Daddy and I have to watch you like a hawk, lest you break your neck completing one of these daring adventures of yours.

You are still not potty trained yet, but you are working on it. You love to sit on said potty and have me read you books, but the actual act, on a regular basis, eludes you. I'm really in no hurry to get this task accomplished and you are pretty laid back about the whole thing too, so we'll just wait until you are possessed with the spirit of determination on this front.

Just a few months ago, we decided that you needed to give up your crib and move to a big girl bed. We set out to purchase a daybed that would grow with you, but you had other ideas. You, my dear, sweet, bold girl were afraid of the big beds, but managed to crawl into and cover yourself up in a toddler bed. You can probably guess what we left the store with and you sleep in now. You alternately love and hate that bed all at once and are still adjusting to the idea of not having your walls that they crib provided you. We're working on this.

You have the most fun, sweet and equally frustrating personality, all at the same time. You are most definitely a 2 year old, wanting to constantly do it yourself, but also wanting help and love when you try and fail. You love to run around in your high heels, princess dress and boa, while wielding your brother's Light Saber, trying to rid the universe of the bad guys.

Your most favorite color is pink and everything in your world has to be some version of this color. You know all your shapes, numbers up to 20 and then 10's, most of your letters and all your colors. You are well educated in all things girl and boy. I suppose that is the benefit of having a big brother to teach you.

Caleb and your Daddy are two of your most favorite people, but, truth be told, you are a Mama's girl. I cannot tell you the joy that that gives my heart. One of my dreams was to have a little girl and to have the same kind of relationship with her that I do with my Mama. We have that, little one.

I love you, my Pster! You are and always will be my most favorite girl in all the world!

Love,

Mama

Half Way Through

2010-12-20T19:00:00.002-05:00

I've posted here many different times about our choice to homeschool, but it dawned on me this morning that I've not updated with Caleb's progress in the whole process.
One of the less academic, but needed things, that I was hoping for Caleb to learn during school, whether it was in a building or in my dining room, is that of self control. He is a very typical boy, busy, active, and yet super smart, but needed that ability to excel. During the past few months, we have watched our boy go from a kid who can't sit still for even a few moments or control his impulses to a boy who can sit through a whole church service quietly entertaining himself. I also just witnessed on Saturday Caleb holding a present in his lap upon my instructions to wait until we got all of them. He then opened one and waited me for my instructions to move on. This is a different, self-assured, controlled boy with an appropriate amount of confidence.
We are using My Father's World curriculum for K and supplementing with various other things based on his need and interest. The main curriculum provides 5 days worth of worksheets, with each week concentrating on a certain letter and topic. For example, last weeks letter was E and the study is over elephants, with the next few weeks contributing to this so that the whole month is study in non-farm animals (elephants, penguins, etc). It's really well organized and the work is very much on target for what it is written for (a kindergartner), so all in all we've been happy with it.
We only do school 3 (sometimes 4, at most) days a week and it only really takes us, at most, 2 hours to get through all the work that is assigned to him. At the beginning of the year I was pretty surprised at how fast we moved through his work, but we were able to ascertain that Caleb is quite ahead in some areas and we aren't dealing with 30 students here, so we can get done in a timely manner. I am firmly convinced that learning isn't all about sitting in the classroom at a desk, so we get out and make even ho-hum trips to Target a learning experience.
I usually combine Days 1 and 2 worksheets. Day 1 is introducing the letter and exploring the topic. The worksheet has the letters printed in both upper and lower case, prepping him for his handwriting lessons to come, as well as giving him some examples of other things that start with the letter of the week. These pictures are meant to be cut out, which gives him the practice he needs to master this task. When we first started, this was a big issue for us. Part of this was my fault because I wouldn't let him near scissors. Ever. Heh.
Day 2 worksheet is a handwriting practice on one side and a phonics practice on the other. Honestly, handwriting was one of the biggest things that I was worried about. Caleb wasn't even able to hold his pencil correctly before we started. After many frustrated mornings, many tears shed and me second guessing our choice, Caleb finally got it and is able to hold his pencil correctly and print well. Of all the things that he has accomplished thus far, this is the one that I'm the most happy about.
Phonics was a real issue, in my mind, as well when we started this whole process. Caleb started reading, by sight recognition, when he was 2 and would remember any word we told him from then on out. So, because of this, I was concerned that he would get a point where phonics would be lost on him. We've worked really hard just introducing the concepts of phonics that he needed to put it all together. It seems that he may have had a lot of the concepts needed for this all along, just needing someone to show him how to put it all together.
Day 3 and 5 worksheets are drawing, counting, and handwriting practice, while Day 4 is reading practice. All things he was doing well in (with the exception of handwriting) when we started this whole thing.
I have added some extra phonics and handwriting from Abeka that seems to be right up his alley. His most favorite, though, is math. I recently acquired a workbook from a friend of some 1st grade math concepts and we've been slowly working our way through that, ensuring that we don't get so far ahead that he's actually behind. As of now, we've made it all the way through addition and just started some simple subtraction.
This year, so I've been told, is more an exercise in learning what he needs and how he learns. I have to say that this is more true than I thought it would be. Caleb is doing really well and is enjoying the process, and I'm so happy and looking forward to the rest of the year.

Conversations with Caleb- Disturbed Edition

2010-12-15T14:13:00.002-05:00

For the past couple of days, I have been fighting off some sort of mutant allergy attack that hit in full force last night. This morning, I made it very clear to the kids that we needed to take it easy today because mama didn't feel well.
We did venture out to grab lunch at Sonic because, really, what is better when you are sick but a bit of Sonic... After we got home, Caleb and I were talking during lunch and had the following coversation:

Caleb: Mama? Are you still sick?
Me: Yes
Caleb: *crying*
Me: Caleb! What is wrong?
Caleb: *still crying* I'm sad because you're sick. Are you going to have surgery again and go to the hospital again?

Hm. Maybe the events of this past summer affected him more than I thought.
I'm thinking we may need a therapist here...

The Boy Wonder (and his Mother) Needs Your Prayers Updated

2010-12-08T15:24:00.003-05:00

UPDATED: So our visit with the doctor was this afternoon and he did a very (and I mean very) thorough exam on Caleb. With all our visits with medical practitioners through the years, Caleb has never had an exam where everything was looked at, all at once, with regard to his overall health, so this was refreshing and calming to a mama's nervous heart. It also gave the doctor the opportunity to evaluate Caleb in all aspects of his life, not just his basic health.
The overall result was that, yes, there seems to be some issues with the fact that Caleb's joints, most all of them, are overly flexible, but he has no other issues that would really form the diagnosis of anything super serious.
What we do have, for now, is a diagnosis of hyperflexibility. Basically, what this means is that his joints can dislocate much easier and he may have some real pain during growth. Frankly, I had significant pain during my formative years, especially those when I was growing large amounts at a time. One summer, I added 4-6 inches to my height and I remember that summer well because of the unrelenting pain that never seemed to end. I'm thinking that this was something, once again, that he got from me. Poor kid.
While I hate this for Caleb and I certainly don't want him to suffer at all, at least this way we will know what is going on. Since he has a diagnosis on the books too, we will have a fabulous doctor who will be evaluating him at every visit for problems and issues so that we can head them off at the pass.
Our doctor is going to consult with an orthopedist, just to make sure, but he was very confident that this was the issue.
I'll update if there is anything different that comes up in the coming days.
Thank you all for your well wishes and prayers.

About a year ago, I noticed Caleb had a popping sound coming from, what I thought, was his hip area. When he was in the NICU, one of his more minor issues that we were watching was the fact that one of his hip joints was "loose". It wasn't a huge issue, completely overshadowed by the more serious things, and seemed to resolve on its own. That's why when I heard that, I intially didn't think much of it.
Back in August, I realized that the popping noise was actually coming from his knee, and seemed to be getting louder. Now, I have one knee that has been looked at by more than one orthopedist and they all said that my ligaments are loose, so I was thinking that the same thing would be said of his. I took him to the doctor last week, partially to get it looked at before the end of the year and also because my mommy gut kept telling me to do it.
Well, during the work up, our wonderful nurse practitioner noticed that Caleb is super flexible and wondered outloud if this could be something more. Needless to say, knowing what I know about the human body and what can go wrong, my mind has since jumped from bad to worse.
The NP told me that she would discuss with our normal doc and call me back and he wants to see him.
We are going today.
I'm a nervous wreck.
This could be nothing or something completely life changing and life threatening. I'm seriously praying for the former.

Pumpkin Bread Recipe

2010-12-01T16:20:00.002-05:00

I am well known in my family and close, close friends as being good at many things, but baking is something that I, historically, have been terrible at. Jes makes fun of me and calls me his cardboard queen. He also will just shake his head when the kids ask me to make cookies and run to the freezer to pull out the break apart cookie dough.
This Thanksgiving, however, I was aiming high and decided to try my hand at 2 different pie recipes and a batch of cake balls. Other than opening too many cans of pumpkin, it all went off without a hitch and each of my desserts was a huge hit! My mom even remarked that I should be in charge of desserts every year and my dad is already putting in orders for the next batch of cake balls.
Needless to say, I have had a huge confidence boost and decided to use up said opened cans of pumpkin and make pumpkin bread.
I'm recording this here, partially to share with all you guys, but more so to have to written in one place before I forget it. Please note that this recipe was taken from allrecipes.com, but altered to my liking. So, without further ado, pumpkin bread:

Ingredients:
1 cup butter (can use margarine, but I'm against the stuff)- which is 2 sticks, softened
3 cups sugar
3 eggs
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cloves
1 1/2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
1 (16 ounce) can pumpkin

Feel free to add in all types of things. I had chocolate chips, so I put a small amount of that in there (my kids will eat anything with chocolate in it). I also had part of a medium sized bag of pecans left from one of my pies, so I put those in there too!

In a mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar. Add eggs and mix well. Combine dry ingredients and stir into creamed mixture until moistened (I call this step my bicep workout!) Stir in can of pumpkin (I had a whole can and another 1/3 of one, so I just added it all). Pour in 2 greased 9 X 5 X 3 in loaf pans and bake at 350 for one hour. I wanted to have serving sizes for the kids and myself, so I baked mine in cupcake form, filling up the cupcake papers to almost full. If you are making the cupcake version, you will need to bake them for 25-30 minutes, or until cooked through. I had a yield of just under 3 dozen, so we had plenty to freeze for a quick, healthy breakfast!
The kids tried these out as their sweet with lunch and they just loved them! Next time, I'll put in a bit of flax seed too to boost the omega-3s! I hope you all enjoy!

Cancer and Competition

2010-11-23T13:50:00.002-05:00

Have you guys ever noticed how competitive some folks are?
I'm pretty sure that everyone knows someone who when you engage in conversation with them they always have a come back about how they know someone or are better than your experiences.
I'm not naive and think that my experiences are far and away better than others or that they make me anywhere close to an expert on anything, but I do, however, feel like some of those competitive types of conversations should be taboo.
Obviously the title of my post being one of them.
A couple of weeks ago, I reached out to an acquaintance on a social networking website who had suffered from another type of cancer that, to look at her now, you would never know. Basically, she made me to feel, stopping short of actually saying, that my issue was far and away the most minor issue as compared to hers.
Here's the thing, how would she know when she's never walked the path that I have?
She bears no outward physical (we all have emotional) scars from her cancer. I have a huge one.
No, I didn't have to partake of months and months of chemo, but I did lose a large amount of my hair and eyelashes, much like her.
Do I even think that I can understand or empathize with her? Absolutely not.
I guess my whole point is that until we walk anothers path and know what the experience is to go through what they are going through, we should never assume that we know.
It doesn't matter who you are, you won't ever know.

Yearly Photos with The Boy Wonder and his Trusty Side Kick

2010-11-14T15:12:00.004-05:00

Every summer, I try to schedule an outdoor photo shoot for the kids to not only capture their adorable faces and antics, but also to capture them in their natural state. While I think there is a time and place for posed, studio type photos, I much prefer my kids to be in their natural state, running, laughing, jumping and having a great time. Just a few weeks ago, a former student of mine, who is trying to build her portfolio, offered to take their pictures. For. F-R-E-E! Yes, please.
Anyway, I wanted to share a few of my favorites, although it was so hard to narrow them down to just these few!

My sweet 2 year old. I'm not sure how we ended up at this point where my sweet little baby is a big 2 year old girl, but we are. She is super fun and loves all things girly. Love, love, love her!

I have mentioned many times how much Caleb loves his sister. The above is just photographic evidence. He is her biggest cheerleader, favorite playmate, and often the one she runs to when she's sad/hurt/scared etc. If you were to split to the two of them up and take them separate places, they are lost. As an only child (with much step siblings, most of them MUCH older), I had no real idea what the idea of having a sibling to grow up with meant. Now that I have a pair of kids, I am so thankful that we were blessed with the two of them!

Can I just tell you how scary it is to have a walking, talking clone of yourself? We have compared photos of myself, my mom and Piper and it is very difficult to differentiate between all of us. She does have some of the more distinctive Mathis characteristics (her AMAZING eyelashes!), but she is mostly an exact replica of myself.

A bunch of people commented on this photo on facebook that is was so pretty and that it looked like a greeting card, but if you could read her mind you would hear that she was plotting taking a swim. What you can't see in this photo is me right behind her lunging toward her to catch her before she leapt into this pond! My girl is super sweet and so fun, but she has NO fear!

My boy! I love this boy more than words can say. We have gone to our highest highs and lowest lows with this little boy of ours and are so blessed that we have him for this short time.

I think that this is probably one of my most favorite photos of the kids. Ever. A good friend of our family once commented to me that Caleb always had a smile on his face, regardless of how gloomy the day was and I have to say that is so true! Piper always has hair in her face and is always laughing with her brother, while they move on to their next, newest adventure.

My sweet, curious baby (don't tell her) girl!

So, here's the thing about my kids, Caleb is 5 and can do SO much more than Piper, and Piper, being 2 and, in her mind, indestructible, will try to do everything her brother does. But, most of the time what you will see is Caleb coming down to a level where his sister can keep up and participate in his activities too. Yet another example of just how wondrous my boy wonder is and how blessed we are to have him!

3 Month Post Op Visits

2010-10-27T14:36:00.002-04:00

The past two weeks have included many fun activities, but listed among them was my 3 month post-op visits with both my surgeon and my endocrinologist.
First up, I saw my surgeon. Let me just reiterate how much my family and I love my surgeon. The morning of my visit, Caleb was full of questions and curiosity (more than normal) and Piper peed on me (she's potty training and in Pull-ups, but that's another story for another day). My doctor didn't even bat and eye and we were able to carry on a conversation and get a physical exam in during all the chaos.
During my exam, my doctor was checking my incision and also checking for other swollen lymph nodes or lumps. He found none and felt that my prognosis was very, very good.
The next week I visited my endocrinologist and this visit I had the opportunity to see the nurse practitioner, whom I just love. In fact, I have opted to see just her from now on, with the exception of my once yearly visit with the "head" doctor. The last time I saw this NP, I had made an emergency appointment for a racing heart rate and the inability to write or hold a scalpel due to a severe tremor. During that visit, she put me on a beta blocker, a potent heart and blood pressure medication. So, needless to say, this visit was vastly different from the last.
Basically, she went through a long laundry list of symptoms, asking severity and if I was experiencing any of them. Mostly, these symptoms are negative, indicative of disease.
I explained to her that I have felt so terribly bad for so, so long that I wasn't even aware of how bad I was feeling or how sick I was and that now I felt like a totally different, well, whole person. Seriously guys, I haven't felt this well and good since I was probably a young teenager. Anyway, she took a look at all my blood work from August, the day of my whole body scan after my in-patient radiation treatment, during my appointment. Based on that bloodwork, it appears that the cancer is gone. I will have the blood work again in January at approximately 6 months. The only other thing that we had to do was the monitoring of my hormone levels to ensure that I have the correct amount from the synthetic hormone that I will take for the rest of my life. Right now, I am in suppressive mode, meaning that I'm taking a bit more hormone than the average hypothyroid patient. This type of therapy, for at least one year, decreases, dramatically, the ability and chance of any more cancer cells to grown and multiply. From what I gather, after a year on this type of treatment I will be retested, maybe by scan, and my medication will gradually be decreased to normal levels. I just had to up my dosage by a half a pill on Sundays and that's it.
So, that is the long and short of it all. Essentially, I'm well and healthy and waiting for my appointment in January. All in all, I'm super happy and forever thankful that I'm as well as I am!

Homecoming 2010

2010-10-20T16:37:00.006-04:00

About a week and a half ago, the family and I packed up the car and headed out to East Texas for my college homecoming weekend. It also, just so happened to be the 10 year anniversary of our graduation from said college.
Friday night, we drove to Tyler, about 2 hours east of our place in McKinney. For some reason we thought that driving half way there on Friday night and staying in a hotel would be easier on us and the kids than just getting up super early and driving all the way out to Marshall, about 4 hours from our home. Let's just say that we won't be trying a visit to a hotel again for awhile. Caleb, being the kid that he is and super laid back about sleeping somewhere other than home, did just fine. Piper, on the other hand, was a holy terror both Friday night and most of the day on Saturday due to sleep deprivation. Eventually, around 11pm Friday night, 4 hours after her normal bedtime, Jes put Piper in the car and drove her around until she fell asleep. He then had to hold her most of the night and then she was up super early.
Just suffice it to say that she was a real joy the next day. Can we say tantrums 'r us?!?

Here is the boy wonder and his spit fire side kick in front of the sign at my alma mater, ETBU. I had forgotten how homey and comforting the campus was. When my parents and I were looking for a college, while I still in high school, we visited numerous schools, none of them feeling quite right. As soon as we pulled onto campus and got out of the car I knew that ETBU was where I was supposed to be. As it so happened, my future husband was a short 30 minutes down the road in Longview at LeTourneau, so it all worked out! :)

Here are the kids in front of the student center. This building holds the bookstore, the cafeteria and the mail room and boxes. I spent many a late night in this building studying, eating many and memorable (not necessarily in a good way) meals, and burning myself out on Chick fil A, our only on campus food choice that wasn't cafeteria food. The place smelled exactly the same and took me back!

We took the kids to the bookstore, thinking we would emerge with t-shirts for both, but both wanted some sort of stuffed animal. Caleb also got a cool camo ETBU hat and I got Piper a hooded sweatshirt that she'll be able to wear for a couple of years, so everyone was happy! Here they are with their new friends, Beary and Ribbet.

Caleb got to hang out with his friend Dallas,

and I got to see some college friends that I don't get to talk to near or see often enough.
Even with the sleep deprivation it was a super fun weekend.

Thinking

2010-10-07T23:36:00.002-04:00

I know that I've not been updating this here blog as often as I should/have been, but, in the interest of full disclosure, there are some reasons for that.
First and foremost, this place that I started to post photos of my adorable children has kind of turned into my medical drama. However, I have come the conclusion that that is an issue that I can change and will.
Second, I have been inadvertently, on my part, been drug into some family business that really have no business being in. To top it all off, this family member has made me swear to secrecy all the while putting me in between a rock and a hard place and in between this person and another close family member, who happen to be warring on a regular basis on the topic of choice. It's hard for me to write here when one of these family members could potentially read about it and then I would be drug into the issue even more. So, I'm keeping my mouth shut and trying to censor myself, but the by product of that is I feel censored in my writing too.
Lastly, Jes and I have some pretty big decisions to make. He has an opportunity that would be huge and in some ways fabulous and in others potentially disastrous. So all in all, another thing that I can't really talk about. If you are inclined, just pray for us and for clarity of mind and peace about whatever decision we come to about this particular issue.
I'll be back soon with some uber cute photos of the kiddos soon! We are going to my 10 year college reunion Saturday, as well as a quaint little festival dubbed The Fireant Festival. It's a whole level of craziness that many of you have never experienced, but is deeply beloved by my college friends. I'll have lots of fun photos of all the fun and craziness for y'all when I get back here!

Birthday

2010-10-02T20:45:00.003-04:00

Have y'all seen that American Cancer Society commercial? It's the one with Justin Bieber (did I spell that right?) singing happy birthday. The next screen is the statistic that 11 million cancer survivors will celebrate a birthday this year. Mine comes in 16 days. I can say that this year I will appreciate that day more than I think I ever have!

Catching Up - Health Edition

2010-09-09T15:12:00.003-04:00

So, it seems that it's been nearly a month since I posted anything here. I guess I should back up and fill everyone in on what has been happening the past few weeks with my health mess.
I left all of you on the day before my radiation was to happen. The next morning, Jes and the kids too me to the hospital and dropped me off. I was then ushered to my plastic covered room
Yes, you read that right. Everything that I could possibly come into contact with was covered in plastic. There was even plastic sheeting underneath my sheet on my bed. Nice and homey, huh?
I was told to be at the hospital at 9am, but when I got there I was informed that I was not going to be given my treatment until 1pm. Fun times. So I waited around, ate a bit of lunch, ala Presbyterian Hospital (yum) and watched a bit of bad daytime tv.
Around 11, I was consulted by the head of radiology on what could potentially happen during the treatment. Basically, what we were hoping for was that the radioactive iodine would go to all the thyroid cells, wherever they may be, and kill them. In the body, the thyroid cells are the only ones who take up iodine, be it radioactive or not, so this type of iodine would just zap them and kill them.
After I took the radioactive iodine pills, everyone rushed (practically running) out of my room and that was the last contact that I had with an actual person for nearly 48 hours. I would see a nurse crack the door open and peek her head in to make sure that I was ok and they would bring me my meals. This process was somewhat comical with the nurse peeking her head in and me walking to the door to grab the tray from her as she ran off down the hall.
As for the symptoms that I had, let's just say that nothing that I was warned of was what I experienced. I was very sick to my stomach and could not eat most of what was sent to me (remember that I went from eating a diet of mainly fruits and vegetables to anything I wanted). It was all just too heavy. In fact, there was a very unfortunate evening in which a perfectly lovely lasagna was involved and I will probably never be able to eat it again. Let's just leave it at that.
I knew, from my personal research, that I would be exhausted, but boy was that an understatement! I am normally a go, go, go kind of girl, constantly going and doing things that need to be done, but this literally made me feel as if someone had hit me with a truck. I was so exhausted that I couldn't even sleep. I also was super swollen from the treatment, to the point that my eyes were just slits and my jaws had the appearance of having mumps. It was super attractive. Lastly, I did, and still do, experience pain where the remaining thyroid tissue remained. I experienced pain only where my incision is, so that told me that maybe, just maybe the cancer hadn't spread.
Monday, I was left alone all day and night. Tuesday afternoon the physicist at the hospital donned her protective gear and came into my room briefly to check my radiation level to determine if I was ready to go home. My levels had to be 4.9 or below before I could leave the hospital and Tuesday it was 6. So, I was to stay another day. By Wednesday I was just miserable and begged for them to call the physicist before lunch time to check me out again. She came around 10ish and we discovered that my levels dropped to 2.7, low enough to leave and go to my parent's house. I could not be in the house with the kids as the high radiation levels could destroy their bone marrow and their developing reproductive systems. So, my parents graciously let me me hang out at their house.
Meanwhile, Jes was home with the kids all day long and going a bit crazy, so I was ready to get the show on the road and get out of there so that I could rest up for the day I was able to go back to my home, Sunday.
I spent Wednesday afternoon and Thursday hanging out with my dad and resting up.
Friday morning, I went back to my endocrinologist's office for my body scan. This was the scan that would tell us for sure if the cancer had spread, along with a blood test to be drawn the same day. The nuclear medicine tech performed the scan and it was discovered that all the cancer had been contained within my neck area. She also mentioned that my surgeon must have been amazing because she could see the bony part of my jawline, something that she rarely sees because surgeons do not do a good enough job of removing all the thyroid tissue. I just smiled at her because I knew the truth, that I had the best surgeon around!
My blood test came back about a week after my scan and it revealed that the number that needed to be low was nearly undetectable. This is very good news because it reveals that there are no thyroid cells left, which means there is no more cancer left.
It seems, for now, this mess is done. I will go back every few months and have the same blood test done and the further out from my original treatment we get the longer between blood test it will be. Eventually, I will just go back once a year for the blood test as well as monitoring of the thyroid medication that I will be on for the rest of my life.
Whew! That was a lot to type. Thanks for all the prayers and well wishes and interest in my story! I just pray that it can be used to benefit others.

Tomorrow Is The Day

2010-08-15T16:57:00.002-04:00

I haven't written for a number of days, for a variety of reasons. Some of them include, but are not limited to, I'm just tired (10+days of no thyroid hormone will do that to you), we had finals last week, I've been grading like a mad woman, I've been on a horrible, horrendous, no good diet that takes all that I've got just to find something to eat, and lastly, I'm just in a bad mood.
Tomorrow I go into the hospital, provided that all goes well, and I'll take my radiation and hopefully this whole ordeal will be behind us. I'm not really nervous at all about the actual procedure, but am nervous about the full body scan that I'll have on Friday. Friday will be the day when we will know if this has gone anywhere else, however, provided that the dose is high enough, we can be pretty confident that the radioactive iodine will clear it from my body.
I've been following a low to no iodine diet for 11 days now that seriously limits what I can eat. Basically I can have no dairy, soy, iodized salt, commercially prepared meat, and limited pasta. This seems like it would be pretty easy, but there is salt in EVERYTHING! Just go look in your pantry at even your cereal boxes and salt will be listed, which means that I can't have it at all. So, I'm hungry and can't eat anything. That makes me an unhappy person to be around.
Anyway, tomorrow is the day, well I hope anyway. I had about 10 years shaved off my life on Friday afternoon after a very negative and upsetting encounter with my insurance company whereby I went back and forth between them and the hospital and the doctor, all claiming that the codes either didn't come from them or that they didn't have the right ones and the insurance co wasn't going to pay. Needless to say, I wouldn't be able to do this on Monday, but after calling, directly, my patient advocate, Yulanda, I was told that it was straightened out and I am expected to appear tomorrow. I'm hoping and praying that it all goes off without a hitch as the insurance company has/had no sympathy for me whatsoever and was not interested in helping me straighten this out. We shall see.
So, if you don't hear from me, then I'm in and doing what needs to be done. Let's just hope for that and no other setbacks.

The Plan, It Has Changed. Again.

2010-07-28T15:55:00.002-04:00

Nearly 2 weeks ago, I received a phone call from the patient liaison at the hospital where I am set to do my radioactive iodine treatment. She proceeded to give me some basic guidelines. She asked me if I was going to go home and I innocently replied, "Oh, no. I'm just going to check into a hotel room."
At which point her head exploded.
Just in case you don't remember, a hotel room was one of the options that my doctor gave me, so I thought we had made a good decision.
I was told that, and I quote, "they absolutely forbade me from exposing others by checking into a hotel room".
Hm. Ok.
So, it's ok for me to go home and expose my home and pet to the radiation, but it's not ok to go to a hotel and be holed up in a room for 3 days?
This whole conversation led me to find out that I would have to take 3-4 days (that's a whole week in summer session, which equals out to a months worth of material in a regular semester, which we cover) off work. If you remember I had just backed out half way through the first half of the summer because of my surgery. While they had and continue to be super understanding and supportive of everything, I was pretty certain that this would not go over well.
So, I rescheduled everything. It will go like this now:
August 6th: I will take my last doses of the fast acting thyroid hormone that I've been on since right after my surgery. I will also start my special low iodine diet this day which includes me eliminating nearly everything that I love from my diet. I will post about that later, but just suffice it to say that all I can eat is veggies, fruit, and Matzo bread. Should be fun.
August 12th: This is the last day of summer 2 classes and I will have all my calculations done and entered before I leave the school that night.
August 13th: I will go into the office for some quick blood work
August 16th: I will check into the hospital as an in-patient to complete this treatment. I will be in complete and total isolation for at least a couple of days, so this solves the issue of where I'm going to live for those days.
August 20th: I will travel back to my doctor's office where I will have my total body scan and, hopefully, will be declared free and clear of this issue for awhile.
The only thing that I will be missing is our annual and mandatory associate faculty meeting that happens the Thursday after I do my radiation. As far as I know, I won't be able to attend, but my boss has been super kind about this an agrees when I thought it was the lesser of two evils.
While I'm in the hospital, I'm going to start a detox plan that I've done in the past, but also include an external detox, so that my radiation levels drop faster and I won't be such a risk to Caleb and Piper. That's really what I'm the most concerned about is exposing them to something that could affect them long term or in the future.
I'll also be investing in a Geiger counter to monitor my radiation levels. Words I never thought I would ever formulate into a sentence.

My Big Girl

2010-07-17T19:49:00.004-04:00

Some of you probably noticed that I did not update the blog on Piper's birthday, the 30th of June. Part of this was because I was just 6 days post op and was having trouble just getting through the day with the kids and because her 2 year appointment had been put of at least once, maybe twice, due to her normal nurse practitioner having some issues with her pregnancy. I wanted to be able to record her stats, for posterity, so here goes:
Weight: 29.6lb (81%)- I keep waiting for her to break that 30lb mark, but she just hasn't gotten there yet. I'm not sure why I consider this some benchmark, but I do...
Length: 34.75in (71%)- She's short compared to where her brother was at this point. Maybe that's where I'm getting the 30lb thing, but then again he was over 20lb at 3 months too.
Head Circ: 19.5 (92%)
All in all we were told that she is growing very well and is very proportionate.

Piper is much more daring and physical at this age than her brother ever was. Anytime we go somewhere, one can be certain that she will be trying to and probably succeeding at whatever her brother is doing. Speaking of her brother, she and he are inseparable still. They play and fight together all day long! They just have the funniest relationship in that they can beat the tar out of each other all day long but if someone else tries to hit/push/etc, the other will come to their aid immediately. I never have to worry about them as long as they are together!

Piper is now at that age and stage in life where she has some definite opinions and really has no qualms in expressing them! She is super verbal, speaking in full sentences, very clearly. Very often we get comments about how well she speaks, but she is getting more and more shy around strangers, that is until we leave. At that point she is yelling, "Bye! See ya later!"

Piper also really loves to play in the dirt and mud and just generally get dirty. We recently tore down and rebuilt, from scratch, the kids play structure in our backyard. During the process it rained a bit and Piper discovered the fun that playing in the mud could be! At one point she was covered from head to toe in mud and having a great time doing it! Piper also loves all things non-human, animals, insects, etc. She will chase a fly around the house for hours and is equally as happy to sit and pet a dog. Our poor cat, Gus, is the one who really bears the brunt of most of this fascination. If he even dares show his furry little face when she's awake, she will shriek and start running after him calling, "Get it! Get it! Kitty, kitty, kitty!" I can't help but laugh and watch the fun she's having!

Piper is super girly too, loving to wear pretty, frilly things, having her toenails painted and she certainly won't leave the house without her hair done and her bow in place. This has been such fun for me after 5 years of boy stuff I really am having a blast keeping her happy in this area! She especially loves having a mini-pedicure and will walk around for days saying, "Mama paint toes!" over and over again. So sweet!

Piper is just really the sweetest little girl! She is certainly more than we could have ever asked for in a daughter. Piper does have her moments, like all of us, but is generally a fun sweet 2 year old that we feel so blessed to share our life and moments with!

Perspective

2010-07-12T16:10:00.004-04:00

I used to keep up with many, many blogs, but through the years I have whittled that down to very few. There are 3 blogs that I will visit everyday to gain updates on the little girls on them. One of them, http://ourturkey.blogspot.com, belongs to a dear friend of mine from college whose first born daughter is quickly losing her brave fight with neuroblastoma. Her daughter is just a bit younger than Caleb.
Another, http://ashleyadamsjournal.blogspot.com belongs to a mom of a little girl, just about 4, who is gravely ill and fighting severe rejection of a transplant that she had a few years ago.
The last, http://cotaforemersonw.com/node/46 belongs to another mom of a tiny precious girl who has been fighting after 2 multi-organ transplants over the past few years.
Here's the thing guys, I have cancer, I know that, but I'm going to be ok. I don't know that I would be able to live through one of these different scenarios. To have your child gravely ill, dying in my college friend's case, is so much more than my issues. I will be fine. I will, the Lord willing, be around to see my children grow up, get married, have babies, but my dear friends more than likely will not.
Please pray for these families and little girls now. While I don't know, in person Ashley or Emerson's mom, I feel as if I have known them for years (isn't the internet wonderful!). It just puts my situation all into perspective.

Endocrinologist Appointment and the Plan

2010-07-08T13:17:00.003-04:00

Yesterday I went to my endocrinologist's office for my 2 week post op appointment in order for him to get updated on my condition and for us to lay out a plan as to where to go from here.
What he said was that he was pretty surprised that my condition turned out to be cancer because it was so atypical. I really had no symptoms from the cancer other than the lymph node issue and most of my symptoms were stemming from my thyroid being so hyperactive. However, he did tell me that there was a lesion (cancer) on half of my thyroid so I'm wondering if that may have been what started the hyperthyroid symptoms to begin. I'm in the process of researching that one. My doctor did seem a little miffed about the fact that there were 24 lymph nodes in all that were removed and only 1 tested positive for cancer. My response to this was what you would probably expect me to say. I told him, in no uncertain terms, that I had a positive diagnosis of cancer and that I wanted to be sure that I didn't have to repeat this surgery and have all the cancer removed. He just looked at me and finally agreed that I was probably right. Hm.
Anyway, my endocrinologist said that he felt that I was probably "cured" (his word, not mine) but if I wanted to do the radiation treatment with the radioactive iodine then we would do it. I told him that I wanted to do it and do it as soon as possible. Since we are going to go ahead with this. The plan is as follows:

On the 23rd of July, I will take my last pill that is basically giving me the thyroid hormone that my body needs. This is the part that I am dreading the most because even if someone has a diagnosis of hypothyroidism, they still have some native tissue that is secreting the thyroid hormone that they need, but I have none. So, once I stop the medication I'm afraid that I will be a lump. The best part? I will be off this medication for nearly 3 weeks. Great.
The 30th of July, I will go back to the endocrinologist's office where I will have blood drawn (by the way the word endocrinologist must mean vampire in some long ago language) and have basic blood panels checked as well as a pregnancy test performed.
August 2nd, I will check in as an outpatient into Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas where I will be given a rather largish dose of radioactive iodine in pill form. I will simply swallow the pill, be evaluated for a little while and leave. The kicker with this part of the treatment is that I have to be in complete isolation from my children. My doctor told me that I could go home but I would have to be completely isolated from Caleb and Piper, meaning that they couldn't even be in the house with me. Seeing as it would be much more difficult to move them out than to move me, I'll be getting a hotel room where I will be staying for 48 hours, only leaving to get food and go to work.
On the 6th of August I will go back to my doctor's office to have my total body scan. This is where they will determine if the cancer has spread to any other part of my body. This would normally be a scary part of the test except for the fact that whatever cells take up the iodine will immediately die and I will excrete them in my urine. So, basically if the cancer has gone anywhere else the pill will take care of it. Once again, this leaves me wondering why they haven't come up with a treatment like this for other cancers...
The morning of the 7th, I will take my first Synthroid, the synthetic thyroid hormone that I will be on for the rest of my life.

So, that's the plan unless there is some snafu that happens, but we're hoping it doesn't. I was so hoping that we were going to be able to do this sooner, but the earliest that this treatment can be done after surgery is 5 weeks and the 2nd would be right at 5 weeks post op. We are just praying for correct timing on this and some other things that are happening in our lives that I can't really elaborate on here quite yet. If the timing is thrown off then we are looking at some expenses that we really don't need nor are we prepared for. I think that all of us are just ready for this to be done and over.

How Are You?

2010-07-05T20:59:00.002-04:00

That's a question I get a lot these days.
I guess the answer to that is that I'm doing pretty well, considering the surgery that I've had. I'm doing everything now that I did before, changing diapers, doing dishes, doing laundry, etc, just a bit slower than I used to.
I do experience a bit of pain with my incision. Mostly, that is coming from the healing process. My doctor's nurse informed me that the twinges and itching that I am feeling is from the fibers that are repairing the area. The only thing is that when I get one of those "twinges" it stops me in my tracks and I usually jump from the feeling. It's almost as if a small electrical charge is being applied to my body. Such a strange feeling!
Something I didn't really anticipate happening was my reaction to having an incision that is so visible to the public. I am normally not a self conscious person, but I find myself not wanting to be alone in public because of the looks that I have received from some people.
My left arm is a bit of an issue as well, something that I wasn't expecting but is totally normal. Evidently my doctor needed to strip down the nerve that supplies my upper muscles (deltoid, sternocleidomastoid, etc) that allows me to lift my arm and it is one mad nerve. This presents itself as me not being able to lift my arm fully and experiencing a bit of pain from that. I have been told to make sure and use my arm in normal, everyday activities and I will see some improvement from just those movements. I have found that this is true. While in the hospital and early last week I could hardly lift my arm at all and now I can lift it just over half way. It still makes it difficult to do some everyday activities (brush my hair, flat iron my hair, shave, put on deodorant, etc), but I do those things anyway with the knowledge that it will come back.
I will go see my endocrinologist on Wednesday to get a plan laid out for when I need to complete my one radiation treatment and scan and will be pushing for that to happen sooner rather than later.
Tomorrow, Tuesday, is the first day that I'm going to be alone all day with the children and, frankly, I'm looking forward to it. The kids are so out of sorts after having people in and out of the house and not being on the strict schedule that they are so used to and crave. I am going to get them back to normal this week and then I start back to work next Monday. I guess more than anything I'm ready to get my life back and not think about having cancer anymore. It seems that's going to happen sooner rather than later and I'm so glad!

Surgery, Post op and Pathology Report

2010-07-01T13:41:00.002-04:00

On the 24th of June, I walked into the Plano Diagnostic and Surgery Center not really knowing what I was going to come out with. I was soon to find out.
As soon as I walked in, I found out that the timing that had been set just 12 hours prior was pushed back even further than where we had started. My original surgery time was 11am, but that was moved up to 10 on Wednesday. When I arrived, I found out that I had been moved back to 12. I was a bit nervous, as to be expected, but this news made me a little more nervous.
I was taken back to the pre op area and was prepped for surgery, which involved answering the same questions that I had multiple days before, putting on some compression stockings (that was a sight, let me tell you!), and getting into a gown to hurry up and wait.
After some digging around (this would prove to be the norm for my stay) for IV access, I got some fluids, made a couple of trips to the bathroom and sat and talked with my mom, dad and Jes.
My fabulous doctor walked in right around 12 and we talked for a bit and I lost it. I had been very strong through all this and had hardly shed a tear, but knowing that I was about to be wheeled into an OR and that I had cancer, but not know what they would find when they opened me up, scared me to no end. Jes let me cry for a moment and then helped me pull it together for the entrance of the anesthesiologist who promptly took one look at me and gave me a nice dose of Versed to make me loopy. And we were off...
The last things I remembered were the nurses and anesthesiologist positioning me on the table and then she started giving me meds that put me under and we were on our way.
When I woke up, the first thing I did was locate a clock and quickly determined that it read 7:22. I then puked.
I guess I don't have to remind you that I just had my neck filet'd (as Jes would say) open and I was violently puking. Now, THAT was fun!
That continued on for the next couple of hours with every recovery room nurse giving me doses of every anti-nausea/vomiting drug they had at their disposal. After a phone call to my doctor, they all decided to give me Phenegra, Zofran AND Reglan (a drug that has recently been black boxed) to me all at the same time and THAT stopped it. It also made me high and I promptly passed out.
Forty minutes later I was moved to my room where I would spend the next few days. The vomiting was under control, only happening one more time when I literally ran (well as fast as one can run just a few hours out of the OR) from the toilet back to my bed.
The nursing staff did the best they could to leave us alone Thursday night, but since I didn't get back to my room until nearly 9:30, they did need to bother us a couple of times for vitals checks and antibiotic bag hangs. Around 5am the charge nurse decided to practice his blood draw skills on me and proceeded to poke me twice, blowing 2 veins before both my mom and I asked him to send the lab up when they got in. A few hours later a girl from the lab popped in, found a deeply hidden vein and got the blood they needed in just moments.
I spent Friday just trying to get out from under the fog that is all the meds that were pumped into my body the night before. There was alot of me going from bed to bathroom, walking the halls, and making laps around my tiny room with my mom. The other thing that I really couldn't do well was swallow. I tried to take my thyroid med Friday morning and ended up letting it dissolve on the back of my tongue because it got stuck. We also had to pulverize my pain meds and mix them with chocolate pudding. Let's just say that I don't think I'll ever be able to eat chocolate pudding without tasting that nasty bitter flavoring of Darvocet again!
By Friday night I was getting ready to get home. My IV was bothering me, I couldn't get comfortable, I was able to swallow most things, and I just ticked off at being contained. So, when my doctor pulled one drain tube and asked me if I wanted to leave on Saturday morning, I jumped at the chance. We decided that it probably wouldn't be a good idea for me to go straight home quite yet since the children would probably jump on me, so my mom took me back to her house for the night. This was the 3rd night after surgery and I was feeling pretty rotten, so it was really for the best.
Sunday morning my mom drove me home and I was never so happy to see my chaotic, messy, happy house than I was that day!
My mom hung out with us through Wednesday, yesterday, driving me to and fro and helping me get everything back in order after all the goings on of the last week.
Today, Thursday, I am exactly 1 week post op and am feeling really good. I am only taking the Darvocet at night when the pain seems to be worse, especially when I'm lying down, but I hope to wean off that this next week. During the day I just take Tylenol when I start feeling not so hot. I am also able to do a bit more everyday, so I think that I'll be ok when I'm finally left alone with the kiddos on Tuesday.
We have been so very blessed by all of my friends who have come over to either watch the kids or bring us food just about every other day. On Thursday, the day of my surgery, my friend Kim was here with both of her kids until around 3, when my friend Keri's husband came over with 2 of their 3 kids to watch Caleb and Piper. When it was apparent that I was not going to be out of surgery until late and then hung out in recovery even longer, Keri came over, after a full day's work, and put the kids to bed and sat until Jes got home around 10:30. We have had so many people bring us food, or who are going to bring us food, which has been such a blessing to not have to think about. Then there are all of the people who have been praying for us. I just can't thank everyone enough! We have been put on prayer lists all over the US and we have felt it. I don't think that we would have been able to get through this with such ease and confidence without knowing that we have so many people in our corner. We love all of you and just can't thank you enough!
Ok, so I should wrap up this super long post but I want to give my pathology report too. Again, my fabulous doctor called me himself, in the middle of his work day, to give me the report. It seems that all the lymph nodes that they removed on the left side of my neck all had papillary thyroid cancer in them but all of the margins were clear. He removed the nodes in the central (middle) portion of my neck when he took out my thyroid and those were all clear with no cancer. My thyroid was Hashimodo's hyperthyroid, so all those hyperthyroid symptoms I had been having were coming from that. Since he was in the area, he took a small piece of my thymus and had it analyzed as well. It came back clean too. He looked at the margin nodes on the right side, but those all were clear and he did not extend the incision up that side. My doctor, who has done hundreds of these in his 16 years, says that if he has to assign a number then I would have stage 1 and that since I'm so young and otherwise healthy then I will be completely clear of cancer after my 1 radiation treatment. This was the best news that I could have gotten, not only because it has such a good outcome but also because there is now no question what this was and we know that it can be cleared!

Pre Op

2010-06-18T22:04:00.002-04:00

Today, I had my pre-op appointment with my fabulous ENT regarding my surgery on Thursday. I walked in the door with a list of questions, but true to form, my self-admitted OCD doctor began answering all of them right away.
Basically this is what I learned:

He is going to make an incision starting just below my left ear to remove the affected lymph nodes. At that point the pathologist who will be in attendance will prepare and confirm the cancer diagnosis.
Next, he will continue the incision to remove my thyroid, preserving as many of my parathyroids as possible so I don't have to spend my life living on calcium and vitamin D supplements.
While he is in the area of my thyroid, he is going to take a peek at the lymph nodes on the right side of my neck. If those look affected then he will continue the incision around to just under my right ear.
So, if you're keeping score I will literally be cut from ear to ear. Wonderful. The good thing is that my ENT is known for being the best in his field for this type of surgery and spends extra time at the end ensuring that his patients don't appear to be attacked by Hannibal Lector.
I will be not in the actual hospital, as we originally thought, but will be having the surgery and staying the night in the diagnostic center next door. I wasn't aware that they were able to accommodate this type of care, but apparently they are their very own hospital and even have an ER there. I will be in great care there.
The part I'm most worried about is that I will have not one, but two drains in my neck. They have to remove these and you can probably imagine how they do this. Basically, they just pull them out. Sounds like a party, huh?!?
I will be in the hospital around 2 or 3 nights, but made it very clear that I didn't want to leave with the drains. I would rather not come home with those, so I told him that I would rather stay a bit longer to have them removed there then have to come back to have it done.
The pathologist that examined the product from my biopsy is requesting that he be the pathologist on this case during the surgery. Even if it means he comes in on his day off.
All of my doctors know what is going on and my ENT took time out to call my PA at my regular doctor's office to tell her that she did a fabulous job in sending me right over and helping me to get this diagnosed. I felt the same way, but for a doctor of his caliber to call a PA at another practice and encourage her like that speaks to the amazing character that he has.
The anesthesiologist is the same one that my doctors has done all thyroid cases with for the past 16 years. She is supposed to be amazing and has more experience with this type of thing than most anyone in the field.
After the surgery, the only follow up treatment that I will have to have done is a radioactive iodine pill that I will swallow and then be scanned. Since your thyroid is the only organ to be significantly affected by iodine, this irradiated iodine will be taken up in those cells to the point at which they will die and I'll excrete them in my urine. If only all cancer treatments were that cut and dry.
My surgery is scheduled for 11am on Thursday and it will last around 5 hours.

I guess my general sentiment through this whole thing is that, for the most part, I have been put in the path of some pretty incredible medical personnel. All of them have listened to me and treated me like a person, not a case or disease, and have just been amazing.

Thank you all for the prayers, well wishes and offers of help for me and my family. Please, if you feel lead, to keep me and my family in your prayers on Thursday during my surgery. Love to all of you!

The Low Down

2010-06-13T20:38:00.002-04:00

Sorry about that cryptic post, but I just didn't know what or how to say anything else at that point. I am fully recognizing that I am quickly moving through the stages of grief and am firmly rooted, at the moment, in the stage of just being extremely ticked off at the whole thing.
I spoke, at length, with my doctor's nurse on Friday and my surgery is scheduled for the 24th, which is a week from this coming Thursday. I was initially hoping to do it this coming week but there is another, bigger case scheduled for that day that my doctor must take care of. After thinking about it and consulting my calendar, it just made sense to leave it on the 24th so that I can appropriately cancel/reschedule things and get everything settled for my students.
Oh, yes, that's a whole other issue. I just finished up the first of a 5 week semester and I'm going to have to bow out just over half way through. That should go over well with my students.
Anyway, the surgery is slated to take about 5 hours and I'll be in the hospital for around 3 to 4 days. So, it appears that I'll be there at least through Saturday, maybe Sunday. I really couldn't ask for better timing. My mom is going to be off and stay with me Thursday through Wednesday, then Jes is going to take the Thursday and Friday of that following week (as well as the proceeding one too) off so that I get a whole week of help before I am turned loose with both kids on my own.
All in all, this whole nightmare has had some definite points of light, the brightest ones being the doctors that I have had on this journey. My ENT, the one who will be doing the surgery is amazing. This is the same ENT who treated Caleb when he was in the NICU right after birth. The amazing thing is that he remembered us the moment he walked in the door at my first appointment back in February. This doctor has also called me on multiple occasions to discuss not only test results but to also make sure that I'm ok and just check up on me. I've always said that I didn't really care if a doctor had a great bedside manner, but to have one that is just amazing has totally changed my point of view. He, and all his staff and partners in his practice, have been fabulous and I know will be better than I could have ever hoped for to help us through this process.
I have a pre-op appointment with my ENT on Friday where I'm going to ask all the questions that I have about the present and future treatments that I may or may not need to have. I have 30 minutes scheduled with him and you better believe that I'll use every minute of that!

Why I REALLY Think Cancer Sucks.

2010-06-11T21:42:00.001-04:00

So.
I got my biopsy results back on Wednesday.
I have papillary thyroid cancer.
Just lovely.

Zoo

2010-06-03T21:17:00.005-04:00

This past Saturday, my mom and I decided to take the kids to the Dallas Zoo. Piper is fairly obsessed with all things animal and Caleb just down right loves the zoo, so we made the trip.

We decided to ride the train down to the zoo, partly because Caleb loves the train oh so much and also because we didn't want to pay for parking. Call us cheap. Here is Caleb having the best tme.

Piper, being my child* through and through, was not happy in the least to be on the train until the end. Here she is with my Mama, just having the best time.

*Little known fact about me, I cannot stand trains. I am not afraid of them, but I have a deep and abiding disdain for all things trains.

The zoo has a new exhibit where all the larger animals are now living. The elephants were just beautiful and majestic to look at, but the big draw was having the ability to feed the giraffes. Caleb wanted to do this, so I plunked down my $5 for the 5 pieces of Romaine lettuce that we were allowed and we went and fed the giraffes. It was an experience and Caleb loved it. Piper, in the mean time, had a visit from a giraffe, not far from us, when said giraffe decided to hit her up for food. She just calmly looked over and said, "Hi giraffe!"

We took the monorail, thinking that the kids would love to see the animals from on high, but really it was more of an exercise in trying to get the kids to sit down before they fell into the lions' den. Here are Piper and I riding the monorail. Did I mention that this was 10am, and it was 842 degrees?

Caleb and I also got to ride a camel. I can't really elaborate on that one as I came away from the experience telling myself that I could have lived without having done that. Maybe that was from the fact that I was directly on the hump. Um, ow. Caleb loved it, though and now we can both say we've ridden a camel!

At one point in our visit Caleb started complaining that he was tired, so my mom decided to rent one of these cute wagons. It seemed like a great idea until we realized that we had to pull/push this nearly 80 pounds of kid up and down fairly large hills. Next time the kid will just have to tough it out. We nearly killed ourselves!

Last on our journey was a ride on the merry go round. True to form, Piper was quite nervous about this, but I knew once it started she would love it, so I basically forced her to ride. As soon as her horse started rising and falling she couldn't help but giggle.

We had a great time and probably lost a few pounds from all the sweating. Win win!

That's Not the News I was Hoping For...

2010-05-25T19:50:00.002-04:00

This past week, I finally had that MRI that had not happened, despite my best efforts. I thought that I would hear much sooner, but I just now (literally minutes ago) got the phone call from my doctor himself.
It seems that the lymph node has not shrunk at all, but it hasn't grown any either.
My doctor feels that it is either still a swollen lymph node, a cyst, a fluid filled tumor, or lymphoma.
Well, then.
I will talk with the nurse tomorrow to schedule a needle biopsy sometime in the next week or so. If that doesn't show anything sufficient to put worry to rest, then I'll be scheduled for surgery to have whatever it is removed.
To say I'm nervous is a gross understatement.

An Unexpected Victory

2010-05-23T18:39:00.003-04:00

For some time now, I have had suspicions that there might be something going on with Caleb. After all, haven't I heard it enough from teachers and such?
In the past month, more than one person (non-professionals) has indicated that they thought he may be autistic, something that I don't believe. However, I have been wondering if maybe there are some ADD/ADHD tendencies present.
And then, I made a behavior chart.
Just this simple act of doing something visual that he can see and know what is expected of him has made him into a totally different child. I honestly did not think that it would work, but after a particularly difficult few days wherein I tearfully called his pediatrician and even a possible counselor for him, I sat down and constructed this chart. I came up with 5 behaviors that we were having a difficult time with, picked out some rewards and had him choose punishments. I'm not exactly sure why this worked, but it did. He's not perfect and still has some difficult moments, but what 5 year old boy doesn't.
Birthday parties have been an issue for us. Just the mere mention of them makes me break out in a cold sweat and we have even skipped out of some just to avoid the behavior that seems to come out during them. I would say, jokingly, but somewhat seriously, that I thought that the places of business were pumping in some sort of stimulant into the air and giving my son an extra dose, because he would just be cr-azy. This past Saturday, Caleb was invited to his friend's birthday party and I just made it very clear, ahead of time, that if he didn't act right and control himself that he would get all x's and no smiley faces (BIG time punishments!) on his chart. He was a different kid at this party, having loads of fun, but not acting like a crazed maniac.
I'm not conviced that this chart is the magic bullet for him, but I think it might make a huge difference. It has for the past week, so I'm thinking we maybe on the right track. I'm holding onto the psychologist's number though.

2010-05-21T16:02:00.003-04:00

So, hm, I've got a blog, huh?!?
Someplace to post things other than the random ramblings of our 23 month old.
So, it bullet form I'll catch up on what's been going on:

We had Caleb's birthday party at the end of March and it was c-r-a-z-y. I am convinced that the places that cater to kids and the things kids love pump some type of stimulant into the air that only the kids are sensitive to because they all go nuts!
We have finally reached the point that we have some disposible income that we can start tackling all the big projects around the house that we have been wanting to do. The first thing we have done is completely rebuild the play structure that is in the backyard. We bought a pre-made one for Caleb's 2nd birthday and after the dog chewing on it and all the weather, it was literally crumbling. So, Jes decided to build it from scratch with plans that only existed in his head. Can you imagine how exciting (read: frustrating) this was for me but we're juuuuuuuust about done.
School is winding down here, which means that all of our normal school year activities are all but over. MOPS ended and all of Caleb's friends are graduating from preschool and signing up for kindergarten. You would think that this would have no impact on us at all, but in fact, we have more playdates and fun events to attend to fill in for the events that are over.
My mom and I went to the homeschool curriculum fair a couple of Saturdays ago, picked out and purchased the curriculum. I decided on My Father's World which is a fabulous Biblically based curriculum that I'm going to supplement with a little Abeka phonics and some handwriting practice. I'm both nervous, excited, looking forward to, and dreading (just being honest here) the whole homeschooling thing, but I think it will be good.
I finished up my school year with the college and am now on break for just a couple more weeks. It was a good year and I'm sad that my students won't be the ones that I see each class day, but that's the way it is. I'm teaching all summer, from June 7th through the middle of August from 6pm to 11pm. Yep, you read that right. So, I'm trying to get my rest in now.
There have been some changes and updates to my health issues that have been going on, but I'll have to update that later because I hear a certain little girl who needs me!

Until next time. Promise it won't be another month! :)

Conversations with Piper - Age, again.

2010-05-20T19:49:00.001-04:00

Caleb: Piper, how older are you?

Piper: 10

Caleb: You're not 10, how older are you?

Piper: 14

Caleb: (laughing hysterically) How older are you, Piper?

Piper: 20

Caleb: (still laughing) How older are you?

Piper: 40

geez...

Conversations With Piper

2010-05-06T14:40:00.001-04:00

Caleb: Piper, how old are you?
Piper: onnnnnnnnne (she over-enunciates those n's)
Caleb: Piper, how old are you?
Piper: two
Caleb:Piper, how old are you?
Piper: treeeeee
Caleb: Piper, how old are you?
Piper: fou

You see where this is going.
She scares me a bit sometimes...

Some Days

2010-04-27T15:07:00.002-04:00

Some days I just feel so overwhelmed with all this health mess going on for me. Today just happens to be one of those days. I'm sitting here writing this, covered in hives, even though I have taken every bit of medication, plus the extra stuff that is supposed to clear everything up, every time I'm supposed to.
Just to give you a brief idea of the level of medication I'm on, I'm taking 360mg of Allegra, 300mg of Tagamet, and 10mg of Singulair. I also have prednisone at the ready when I need it, and I've taken it in the last 24 hours.
All this medication just makes me feel pretty crummy, for the most part, all day. And most of the time keeps the hives under control, but I know that as they get worse the thyroid issue is getting worse. I've also had some other symptoms that have worsened, one of which being a tremor that I've had for some time. I was at work last night trying to dissect out some pretty small, delicate muscles for my students to see for their upcoming test and I could hardly hold the scalpel still enough to dissect at the right spot.
Anyway, I don't have my next endcrinologist appointment until the end of May, but I think I'll be calling and trying to bump up that appointment. I also have a lead on a doctor in town who is a little more attuned to some alternative therapies too that I'll probably check out as soon as I can get in to see him.
I have a hard time asking for prayer for myself, but right now that's what I'm shamelessly asking for.

The Decision

2010-04-18T15:30:00.003-04:00

We have agonized over what to do about Caleb's education.
Do we send him to public school?
Do we send him to private school?
Do we homeschool him?
Based on our experiences in school and some of the requirements in our state, we decided very quickly against public school. This is something that we are very passionate about. I do believe we have both said that our children will not attend public school, just to give you an idea.
As I've mentioned before, we did interview for a university model school in our town. If you are not familiar with this type of school, basically the kids would go to school MWF and are homeschooled on TTh. We were really drawn to this type of schooling because it would have given us the best of both worlds, homeschooling and still getting him out of the house for a bit.
Long story short, we left the interview with the private school feeling very negative about the whole experience and were sure that they would not want us there. That was January.
A couple of weeks ago, I received a phone call from the principal at the school saying that she wanted me to take Caleb to the school and leave him for a day. Throughout this time period, Jes and I have been discussing what would be best for Caleb and really came to the firm conclusion that he just was not emotionally ready for a classroom (however, the kid is reading, writing and doing math at a pretty high level), so leaving him in this school for even a day wasn't an option.
I had a very enlightening and honest discussion with the principal in which I told her of my misgivings about the whole idea of sending Caleb there. She was very supportive, listened and even told me that she wished that she had not forced her youngest to go to school when he wasn't ready because it set him up for some really difficult years.
So, the decision is that we are going to homeschool Caleb. I have a real peace knowing that we have made the right decision for our family and for our son.
Now, we just have to find the right curriculum for him, which seems like it will be a much more daunting decision!

2010-04-12T15:59:00.002-04:00

Do you notice something awry here?

No? Well, let's just take a closer look.

Empty juice bottle. On a day when I was running out the door to make it to a meeting that I was already late to. So, frustrating.

A Typical Conversation...

2010-04-10T20:24:00.002-04:00

Me: Do you know where the remote is for the bedroom tv?
Jes: No, didn't you have it last night?
Me: At some point, yes. Was the tv on when you got home last night? (he worked reeeaaallllly late)
Jes: Yes
Me: Did you turn it off?
Jes: No, you did.
Me: With the remote?
Jes: I guess. I didn't see you get out of bed.
Me: Well, I've lost it.
Jes: (laughing) Yes, yes you have.

(Not that I have to mention this, but he wasn't referring to the remote, but to my mind.)

Health Update

2010-04-09T22:07:00.004-04:00

I've been putting off this post for awhile now simply because I just didn't want to write it. Also, I really don't like talking about myself that much, but so many people have asked about what is going on with my health and this is really the best way to answer all those questions.
I'll just start from the beginning.
In October of last year, I came down with a really nasty upper respiratory infection. It was one of the worst viruses that I had encountered in some time and was really super sick for quite a while. At this time, I had a few lymph nodes that swelled up in my neck. When they didn't go away right away I made an appointment with the same set of physicians that Jes sees and made the trip there.
As a side story, Piper, at that time, was on some antibiotics for something, which all you moms know what that does to a little one's poop. Let's just suffice it to say that she decided to do her business just as we entered the exam room. Boy was it bad. Later on during the visit, a nurse came in and gagged. Nice. This was also the same visit where Caleb ran out of the exam room while they were drawing my blood. Luckily, a former student of mine who worked there walked by and caught him. I didn't think they would allow me back...
Ok, so Carol, my fab PA, examined me and determined that it must be the illness that I had just nearly gotten over that caused the lymph nodes to react as they did. I was to come back in a month.
At the next appointment, 2 of the 3 swollen nodes had gone down and the 3rd and shrunk some but not back to normal yet. I was to come back in 2 weeks.
When I returned the lymph node was still swollen and she thought I should go see a surgeon.
Surgeons are surgeons and they want to cut and that was the first thing he jumped to. I managed to hold him off for about 3 months before I saw Carol again where she was pretty outraged that he was going to just cut me right open and take it out.
During this same time, I developed a raging case of hives. I had never experienced this before and went in to see Carol. She gave me some allergy medicine and prednisone and told me to document everything that I came into contact with and I was to see her in a couple of weeks. We were both confident that I wouldn't have this again.
The course of prednisone that I was given was 6 days long. I woke up on the 6th day with hives worse than before and my lips so swollen I looked like a duck. I made a quick trip up to see Carol who upped my prednisone dramatically and gave me the number for an allergist.
As soon as I got home I called the allergist and was able, miraculously, to get in the very next day. Dr. B, as we'll call her, took one look at me and was instantly intrigued. We couldn't do any allergy testing because that requires one to be off all allergy medication and steroids for 7 straight days and I hadn't even made it 6 while on both meds. So, her best guess was that this might be a metabolic or autoimmune issue, since I do have significant family history for those.
After 9 (!) vials of blood I waited and waited and waited. About a week later as I pulled into Chipotle after a playdate I got the call I had been waiting for: I had autoimmune thyroid disease.
Fab-u-lous.
I returned to Carol and had some follow up blood work done and a sonogram done on my thyroid that week and waited to make an appointment with an endocrinologist.
When I got the name of who I was to go see, I called right away and was told I would have to wait over a month to get into the practice. After a stern talking to with the scheduler on the phone, an appointment just randomly opened up right before her eyes for the next week (can you hear the sarcasm?). Can you also tell why some health care professionals really don't like me? I just know how to work the system... It comes from working in it...
The endocrinologist took even more blood and we did what is called an uptake and scan over 2 days. Basically, I swallowed a low dose irradiated iodine pill and the next day my thyroid was scanned to determine how much iodine my thyroid took up. A high number would be diagnostic for Graves Disease and a low number would be diagnostic for thyroiditis. We were obviously hoping for a low number.
High normal for this test is 25. My number was 37. They don't diagnose Graves until you are around 80, 90, or 100. So, we decided to wait it out. This was my worst fear because now I have hives, every day, and all the other symptoms that are coming along with it as well. None of this is impairing my life, but it sure is bothersome.
The lymph node issue continues to persist and the ENT that I saw, after the debacle with the surgeon, felt that I needed to have an image taken of it to see what it looked like. The issue with this is that they want to use contrast, which for a person with documented allergies (check) and a heart condition (check) should not use it.
As a side note, throughout this whole time going from doctor to doctor I was told on more than one occasion that I probably had cancer. To be frank, I was terrified. Many hours of lost sleep came because of these flippant remarks by various doctors. This ENT was the first to tell me that he was confident that I did not, in fact, have cancer. He made this determination after a very thorough examination, so it was not, like the other comments, made after no exam.
I went to have the MRI last week, without contrast, and they wouldn't do it because they couldn't prove that I wasn't pregnant. Even though I took a pregnancy test right in front of them. And it was negative.
So, at this point, we are waiting on the thyroid stuff to get worse or my appointment to come up again (May) and to schedule a MRI for the lymph node issue.
That's about where it all stands now.

Happy Birthday Caleb!

2010-03-26T12:51:00.001-04:00

Happy birthday to my sweet, sweet boy!

Caleb's Story Part 4

2010-03-16T16:47:00.004-04:00

As the nurse ran out of the room, I remember just seeing Caleb's little feet peaking out from underneath her arm and feeling terrified that I would not see my son again. And I lost it.

Just minutes later Jes walked back in the room and had no idea what was going on. I could only get single words out but managed to communicate to him that Caleb had been taken by a nurse somewhere because he was blue. I can't imagine what it was like for him to walk into a situation like that, but he ran out of the room faster than I've ever seen him go.

I'm not completely sure of the events of the next few hours but I do remember my mom and dad showing up again and the chaplain coming by my room. It was at this point that I thought that Caleb had died. I hadn't seen my husband or my son for hours and had no idea what was going on.

When Jes came back to my room he sat down and began to sob. Now I really had no idea what was going on. What I did find out was that Caleb was alive but under an oxygen tent with all kinds of tubes and such in the NICU. Jes forbade me from seeing Caleb at that point, I'm not really sure why even now, but something about his demeanor told me that I should do what he says.

I just waited and waited. My mom and dad waited with me and I'm so thankful that they were there because I can't imagine sitting through that time alone, even though I don't really remember a lot of it. Around 10:00pm on Sunday, I was given the go ahead to go see Caleb in the NICU and you have never seen a woman freshly from surgery move that fast. I practically ran down that hallway.

After getting all the rules and regulations, my mom and I were lead back to the area of the NICU where my son waited for me. Caleb, being a full term baby, was put in the area of the NICU where the sickest and smallest babies were, with the theory being that he wouldn't need as much care as they would. When I first laid eyes on Caleb, I knew that he would be ok, but I just didn't know what we would have to go through to see him through.

I was able to hold Caleb that night and it was all I could do to hold it all together. Thank goodness my mom was there because I would have lost my mind if she hadn't been with me. That night we were introduced to the wonderful nurse that would care for Caleb most of the time he was there and I felt confident enough to leave him and get some rest. The next morning I was the first mom in the NICU and did not leave his bed side except to pump breast milk or for shift change.

Throughout the following days we recieved very grave news from every doctor that saw Caleb in the NICU, telling us many different things but all resulting in some pretty serious surgeries that would need to be done to correct his airway issues, not to mention the issues that they thought were causing problems from his umbilical cord coming away from the placenta. At one point we were even told that he would have to undergo surgery to basically redo the whole skeletal structure of his face. Not something that you really want to hear from a doctor about your 2 day old.

On Tuesday night, I had had a particularly difficult day, getting a lot of really bad news all at once. That night as I was leaving the NICU I was really upset by the nurse on duty who I felt like was being too rough with Caleb (now I know that she wasn't, she was just doing her job), but it all just put me over the edge and I broke. That night I spent the whole night in my bed crying out to God to heal my baby and get us through this ordeal. I'm sure the nurses probably thought I had finally lost it because everytime they came to check on me that night I was weeping and or speaking out loud.

I finally just told God, as I passed out from exhaustion, that Caleb was His and that I had no hold on him or control over the situation. I distinctly remember saying, "I can't fix him, but you can. Please heal him."

The next morning, Wednesday, I awoke to sunlight streaming through my window and a sense of calm and peace in my room. This was the day that I was to be released from the hospital, without my baby. I dreaded this day but also felt in the depth of my soul that it was going to be a good day. That morning I got a visit from the neonatologist who gave us some news that we were not expecting to hear.

Just to give a little perspective, Caleb had had numerous x-rays, CT scans, MRIs, and even a scope passed through his airway and sinus cavities throughout the proceeding days, all coming back with the same information, that the skeletal structure of his face, airways, and sinuses were not compatable with life.

Wednesday morning the neonatologist told us that, after one more scope, it was determined that it was soft tissue swelling. No one knew what had happened in the course of the night, but I did. My God healed my son.

Caleb was kept in the hospital for about 48 more hours in order to complete a round of steroids to lessen the swelling, have his feeding tube removed and to get everyone comfortable having him off the monitors. He came home with me on Friday morning.

Caleb's Story Part 3

2010-03-16T16:20:00.004-04:00

I know that it's taken me longer than normal to write this part of the story, but to be completely honest, I just didn't want to do it and am forcing myself right now. This part of the story is not happy and a time in our lives that I would rather not relive, but again, I'm doing this for Caleb so that he knows later on what has transpired to get him (and us) to where we are today.

As soon as our doctor said that, Jes popped up and looked over the curtain. Truth be told, he had really just sat down after watching the incision and beginnings of the surgery. Jes was just fascinated with the process and loved watching what was going on.

As our doctor was pulling Caleb out, he discovered that the umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck, not an uncommon or life threatening issue at the point. When this happens the delivering professional just pulls it from around the baby's neck so as to avoid future issues. As the doctor did that, the umbilical cord came off in his hand, thus his comment.

Caleb was quickly delivered, wrapped up, assessed and Jes left with him to go to the nursery. There was special care to remove the placenta in tact so that the pathologist could fully examine it to determine what had happened. We wouldn't know this for a few days.

As I was taken back to my room I met back up with Jes and Caleb, thinking that all was fine. We visited with friends and family and spent time with our new boy. With both of my c-sections, I was warned of all the possible side effects of the anesthesia, but for me I shake like none other. This particular time it was so bad that even during delivery I had to physically hold on to the table to get some control over it and, after, I refused to hold Caleb for fear that I would drop him. It took me about 2 hours before I felt even remotely stable enough to hold him but I'm glad I did because I wouldn't get much opportunity to do that before he was whisked off to another part of the hospital.

It was during this recovery time that Jes and I noticed that something wasn't quite right with Caleb and his breathing. We quickly unwrapped him to look at him and discovered that he was retracting and his nostrils were flaring, two signs that he was having difficulty breathing. Jes notified the nurse and he was taken to the nursery with reassuring words that he was probably just having a little trouble transitioning.

A couple of hours later, our little boy was returned to us and we kept him with us off and on for most of the night. The next day was Easter, my most favorite holiday of them all, so Caleb, Jes and I celebrated in our little hospital room taking turns feeding him and holding him and doing all the things that new parents do. Truth be told, Caleb slept through most of it, not caring to eat or open his eyes or anything else. We probably should have been worried, but we just didn't know better.

Jes left around noon to go home, get some things for us, shower and have lunch. During this time a few friends stopped by to see me and Caleb and we had a great time visiting. Shortly after my friends left, a nurse came by and we decided that she and I would try to nurse Caleb, who at this point had eaten nothing and was nearly 20 hours old. We got Caleb to latch and she was fussing with some things in the room and with me and as we both looked at Caleb we were just horrified by what we saw. Caleb was dusky, turning blue.

The nurse picked Caleb up, out of my arms, and ran down the hall with him. I was terrified.

Caleb's Story Part 2

2010-02-26T19:00:00.006-05:00

When we last met, I was still pregnant and we had decided on having a c-section after agonizing over the idea.

Everything was scheduled and I was placed on the schedule for a c-section on my 38 week mark on March 28th. However, Caleb had other plans in mind.

Early on the 26th, around 4, a huge thunderstorm rolled through town. I should also mention that it was a full moon out, two factors that, based on the old wives tales, were prime baby having time. Thunderstorms and I don't particularly get along, I'm always awake when it gets really loud, but this time I just didn't feel well either, so I got up. I remember sitting on the couch feeling weird, like I had eaten something really bad, running back and forth to the bathroom. I'll spare you the gory details, but I'm sure that y'all can figure out what was going on during those trips. I would later find out that this, in fact, was early labor.

Jes got up around 7:30 and we decided that we would get on with our day. My parents had been at our house the whole day before helping me get everything ready for Caleb's birth, but there was still so much to do, so we got ourselves together and headed out the door. By this point, other than feeling like a beached whale on stilts, I felt pretty good, just tired from my early morning escapades.

We spent our day running (well, I waddled through) lots of errands, culminating at lunch at my pick of the day, Olive Garden. Something about my pregnancy with Caleb made me crave tomatoes to the depth of my being and I couldn't get enough of them. OG has lots of tomato based products, so needless to say we spent lots of time and money there.

At the time of my pregnancy with Caleb I was teaching chemistry at a private school about 20 miles south of our house, but less than a mile from the hospital that I was set to deliver at. After lunch we went up to the school so I could complete a test and get all my things in order for my long term sub to come in and take over that following Tuesday (Monday was the Easter holiday).
The first thing that I did was visit the ladies room because I knew that I didn't want to be running up and down the hallway a million times once I got my work started. I just wanted to get in and get done and get home. Jes was sitting with me while I worked and all at once I felt a gush. I looked at him and said the following, "Either I just peed on myself or my water just broke." To this day he tells me that that was when I started to look "different" (ie Caleb dropped) and that something just wasn't right. I immediately called my mom and asked her what to do and if she knew what that felt like, but seeing as she had delivered her one and only child nearly 27 years earlier she could not shed any light on my situation. I really hesitated calling my doctor because I certainly didn't want to bother him on his Saturday off, but after 30 minutes (yes, 30. What? I'm stubborn.) I called him and he instructed us to go directly to the hospital.

On the way to the hospital, Jes called my parents again and told them to get to the hospital because I was going in. The sweetest thing was in the background, you could hear my dad scurrying around trying to gather up all his stuff and find shoes for himself and my mom so that they could get there as quick as possible. It was just a small moment, but sweet nonetheless.

If you have ever had a spontaneous bag rupture, then you know that they have to test you to make sure that the fluid that you are leaking is amniotic (not urine, like I previously thought) and that was exactly the test I had performed after getting into a hospital gown and into the bed. Of course it was positive. And I was terrified. I just kept telling Jes over and over that this wasn't supposed to happen this way. And he just kept telling me that I wasn't in control of it.

As I was surrounded by my family and their prayers, a peace washed over me and I knew that God's hand was directly on me and my growing family, but nothing would prepare Jes and I for what would transpire in the next hours and days.

We got to the operating room around 5 and shortly before 6 we heard our doctor saying, "well, oh! That's not supposed to happen."

Caleb's Story Part 1

2010-02-26T15:32:00.005-05:00

Today is the 26th of February, which means in just a few short weeks it will be the 26th of March, Caleb's 5th birthday. For some reason I've been so nostalgic about this particular birthday, more so than all the others before it, and I just don't know why.
While I was thinking about his day I realized that I have recorded many events in his life since I started this blog waaay back in 06, but not his birth and the events that occurred just after it.
I am here to remedy that.
It will take a few different posts to cover all that happened, but I'm willing to tackle the task for the sake of posterity. I want Caleb, and Piper for that matter, to be able to look back over the events of late March 2005 and marvel at God's love for us and how His hand was on our family, Caleb in particular. So, commence the telling of Caleb's story (part 1):

I can't tell Caleb's story without telling some of the events before it, so I'll just start at the beginning.
Jes and I hadn't been married too awfully long before we started talking about having kids. Truth be known, I was a born mother and always longed for children of my own. The only debate was how many, Jes wanted 3 and I wanted 2 (oh how quickly the tides turned...).
When we got married, we lived in Tyler, Texas but moved back to Dallas after our first year, following jobs and family. The move back to Dallas was really when we started considering having kids and I was REALLY hearing that tick of my clock, but Jes was so hesitant.
One day we went to a friend's house who had just had a baby and something about me assisting the father change a particularly bad diaper triggered something in Jes's head and he told me that night that he was ready. Even though we were both on the same page we had some pretty big tasks that we wanted to complete before we would even begin trying, having a house and stable jobs (laugh!) being the two at the top of the list.
We began looking for houses and quickly decided to and signed on to build a house in McKinney, a smallish, at the time, town just north of all the Dallas action. Around this time I started visiting a new ob/gyn who did some testing and determined that I had a pretty good case of endometriosis. This, combined with a heart condition that I have, was something that would hinder greatly the ability to conceive and carry a child to term, so said the doctors.
Here's where we really started to see God working mightily in our lives.
We signed the papers for our house the last week of June, moved in the 3rd of July and I was pregnant on the 4th. Not only was I dealing with these diagnosed medical issues, but I had been on the pill for years and was, how do I put this delicately, not in the physiological state in which to get pregnant.
But I did.
With all those factors working against us.
The only explanation I have is that God had his hand on us and wanted Caleb to be with us. This is a sentiment that was expressed by many of the doctors and practitioners that we came across throughout our journey.
Needless to say, when I showed up at my doctor's office he was more than surprised. It was at that 9 week appointment when we saw Caleb's little heart beating that he was dubbed "miracle baby" by our doctor.
My pregnancy was fairly normal with me experiencing all the normal side effects of pregnancy. Around the 30 week mark, however, I started measuring very ahead of schedule. When I was 33 weeks, I measured 40, so I was tested for diabetes multiple times and had many, many sonograms to measure Caleb's size and fluid levels. For the most part, all these tests were normal with all the diabetes tests coming back normal each time and Caleb just showing on the sonograms to just be a big boy.
At an appointment around 32 weeks I had yet another sonogram and that is when they noticed that the fluid levels were trending towards too high. They weren't abnormally high, just at the high end of normal but if I had had one more mL of fluid measured then it would have been abnormal. I distinctly remember, after that visit, coming home and pouring over my books to determine why the fluid levels would be high. And I was terrified.
The next week, when I returned to the doctor, my fluid was still high and Caleb was getting so big that they could hardly fit him on the sonogram screen. It was at my 33 week appointment that my doctor projected that Caleb would weigh 11 pounds or more if I went to term. We decided that I would deliver slightly early, right on my 38 week mark. We also discussed c-section versus normal birth.
It took me some time, lots of prayer, and discussion with my family but we decided on c-section, a decision that would ultimately save both my son's and my life.

School Update

2010-02-23T23:37:00.002-05:00

I'm not sure if I've talked about what we were planning on doing for school here or not and, frankly, I'm too lazy to go back and look, so let me just start from the beginning.
When Caleb was a baby I was certain that I would homeschool. However, as time went on I came to the realization that one doesn't really know their child when they are babies because, really, babies don't have the same personality as say a 5 year old. With that said, I did want to retain some of the principles of homeschooling so I started researching University Model schools in our area.
A few mommy friends of mine had had their kids in one that was near us and I checked it out, even going as far as sending Jes to one of the informational meetings to get his take on it. We were both impressed at the school and what it had to offer us and our family, so we decided to pursue entrance for Caleb. Last year, we got into the application process and had to take a good look at our finances and decided that we just couldn't swing it. Last year would have been preschool for Caleb, so we didn't really feel like it was super important, and besides, we had just pulled him out of one where he was well advanced beyond what preschools taught.
This year, however, we wanted to see about getting him into this school for Kindergarten so that he could follow that track all the way that was possible. We filled out the paperwork, gathered up the 8 references (8, people! for Kindergarten.), and sent it all off with baited breath. Soon enough we were scheduled for our family interview (yes you read that right) to meet the principal and head master.

That appointment was yesterday.

And it was an utter disaster.

Now, let me preface this by telling you that they scheduled it for 4:30 in the afternoon. Remember guys, that we had to take both kids with us, so picture Jes, myself, a 4 year old and a 19 month old in a small office with 2 other adults who had little to no affect and you will get a small view of what went on. Both kids were tired and bored and just ill behaved in general. Caleb just could not sit still, would not answer questions or even speak to the people and just was obviously uncomfortable with the whole situation. We answered all the questions that they had honestly and openly, but there was no reading these people.
When Jes and I walked out of the meeting, I looked at him and said, "well, I guess I'll be homeschooling next year" and he said, "yep, I think you will". So we both had the same negative impression of how the whole thing went.
Now we just wait. We'll just have to wait and see what happens. Surprisingly, though, I feel relieved that it's over and out of my hands. Commence the waiting.

Stretched

2010-02-08T23:25:00.002-05:00

I live in the South, always have and (God willing) always will.
Here in the South, we tend to stay close to our family and hold tight to our values. However, the attitude and practice of excluding people because they don't happen to hold the same beliefs and or values has always bothered me.
In the past few months, I have noticed that I have been put into situations where I have been forced to spend large amounts of time with others who would fall into the category as holding a different view on life that I do.
To say that this is easy is such a backwards thought, it happens to be one of the more difficult things that I've had to deal with. It's hard to sit and hear someone bash what you believe and not get emotional.
I have, instead, tried to learn from these men and women that have been put in my path. Instead of ignoring them and blowing them off, I am trying to see where they may be coming from, what led them there and why they believe what they believe.
It's hard and many times I don't want to do it, but I think that this is supposed to be a learning experience for me.
Will I still be a Conservative, pro-life, vaccinating, circumcising, God fearing, church going, family loving Southern woman? Most certainly, but maybe I'll also be a more inclusive, loving, patient, kind, hard working, persistent, consistent, passionate person as well. And really, the world could use more of those.

Another

2010-01-27T22:33:00.001-05:00

So, if you haven't heard yet Piper has pneumonia now too. Oh, and Jes has a pretty bad head cold that our PA said could have the same results as the kids. yay.

Pneumonia Update

2010-01-24T09:59:00.002-05:00

I totally meant to post an update yesterday (or even Friday) but Caleb felt better yesterday as shown by the fact that he was acting like a raving lunatic.
I took Caleb to the pediatrician on Friday morning because he just didn't seem to be getting any better. The doctor said he could still hear the pneumonia in his lung, and that shouldn't be after an antibiotic shot in the ER and 2 full days of antibiotics. What he decided was going on was it was a bacteria that is common to asthmatics that is causing this pneumonia and the antibiotic wasn't one that would cover it. So, we left the office with another antibiotic that should knock it out.
If you're keeping count, that means Caleb is taking 2 antibiotics, steroids and regular breathing treatments. This isn't including his regular meds that we have to keep up as well for maintenance. Since he's on so many antibiotics I decided to start him on a probiotic to try to ward off the big d. Let's just suffice it to say that it didn't work fast enough and I've been doing lots of laundry that involve just bottoms. Fun.
Yesterday I had the hardest time trying to keep Caleb sitting or just not running around. There's only so much one can watch on tv, play on the Leapster, read, etc before one goes stir crazy and that seems to be where we are now. We will stay in again today and I might take him to MOPS in the morning if he's feeling better but have them bring him to me when they go play so he's not running all over.
I'm just thankful that he's feeling better and getting back to his crazy, wild, strong-willed self.

Here We Go Again

2010-01-21T23:30:00.003-05:00

Thos of you who follow me on facebook know where Caleb and I spent our night last night. Those of you who don't, well lets just suffice it to say that we got reaquanted with our old friends in the Emergency Room of our local hospital.
Here's the way it went down:
A few days ago, right about the time the weather went from a normal 40-50 degrees during the day to 70+, Caleb started coughing a bit. I thought it was just his allergies from the drastic swingin the temperatures, and am still convinced that was probably what that was initially. His cough started getting worse and worse and culminated in sounding pretty bad yesterday. I broke out the nebulizer (it had actually be put away for months, which is huge for us! Usually the thing runs everyday for months on end, but I can't even remember the last time I had to get it out.) and give him a breathing treatment. It seemed to help some, so I went to work thinking he would be fine.
I got home from work around 9 and heard him in his room whimpering, not normal behavior for Caleb. When I went to check on him he was shaking. I thought for sure he had some sort of fever but I couldn't get any thermometer to read that he did. I gave him another breathing treatment because I noticed that he was working pretty hard to breath and it really didn't do any good. So, I decided to make a call to our friendly (not!) on call nurse. She told me to take him to the ER right away and off we went.
I'm not even going to get into how put off I was by some of the staff there, treating me like I was a raving lunatic and actually telling me I had no idea what was wrong with my son, but just suffice it to say that they were totally apologetic when the tests came back positive for pneumonia. Yep, that's right, my boy has pneumonia. Again. So he's on lots of antibiotics, steroids and breathing treatments and should be good as new in a jif!

Just Add It To The List

2010-01-18T09:54:00.002-05:00

Said to the kids in the past few days:

"Dear, would you please stop kissing my rear end?"

"Could you please not ride your sister like that?"

"No dear, playing in the toilet is not the fun that you think it is."

"Please don't drink the water that you just peed in."

"I don't think that we can bring another stuffed animal into this car. Why? Because all the seatbelts are full from the ones you have here already."

"No dear we don't bite others. If you bite yourself... Well, that did hurt alot, now didn't it?"

and the madness continues...

Cold.

2010-01-08T17:01:00.002-05:00

I took this photo of the temperature reading from my computer at noon today. When I got up this morning, it was 12 with a windchill of 0. We're just a bit cold here, ya think?

Piper's First Haircut

2010-01-04T15:58:00.005-05:00

This past Saturday, I had a much needed hair appointment, so I scheduled for Piper to have her hair cut too while we were there. I figured that for a little girl, it would be best to have someone who cut women's/girl's hair on a regular basis do it the first time so that it would grow out a little more evenly. I really didn't expect that I would be taking her so soon for her first cut. I'm not really sure why, but I guess I thought that we would have to wait longer. Caleb was just 5 months old when we got his cut for the first time, but being a boy we wanted to make sure his was short. Like a boy's hair cut should be!

It ended up that Jes was able to be completely off work Saturday (a rare occurance these days) so Caleb stayed home with him and Piper and I took off for a girl's morning! My hair dresser is in Mesquite, about 45 minutes from home, but just up the street from my parents, so it was a fun trip, just the two of us.

While I was at the hair dresser getting my hair colored, Piper was able to hang out with my parents. While my hair was processing, both my dad and Piper were able to get theirs cut. Here's the last photo of her before the big moment. I was surprised how different she would look after she was done, comparing this photo to the last one.

Our hair dresser, Norma, got right to work and did a quick but very thorough job of shaping up Piper's hair and making it look more even. I really wanted Piper to have some bangs as I think that little girls are SO cute with that look and I was right that it would be super cute on my girl!

This is what she looked like when she was done. Norma was really impressed that she didn't cry or even make a sound while she was cutting her hair. Both my mom and I, at one point, had a hold of P's head, ensuring that she held it very still so that she could get the best results possible.

I took this picture today so that you could see what she loos like now that it has calmed down a bit. Her bangs are doing a little bit of a funky thing today, so that's why they look a little crooked, but all in all I'm glad that we waited long enough that this was the result that we were able to get. I think she just looks as cute as can be!

2009 Review

2009-12-31T22:51:00.002-05:00

I have been trying to decide how to formulate a post and exactly what to write about. After going back and looking at past posts, I have noticed that it was just life as usual around our house. For that, I am thankful.
There have been fewer earth shattering events than in past years, but we've still dealt with our share of "stuff". However, with all the bad stuff that has been going on in this world in the last 12 months, we have emerged at this end of the year relatively unscathed. God has had His hand on our family and we are so thankful for that. We are also thankful for the friends and family that we have around us and how much they have impacted and helped our family, in good and bad.
Our family wishes you and yours a happy New Years and pray that you will be blessed as we are!

Chatty Piper

2009-12-22T13:32:00.003-05:00

Each and every Sunday when we pick Piper up from her nursery class, the teachers comment on all the words that she knows. To us, it seems pretty normal as Caleb was really verbal at this age, but evidently she may be a bit chattier than the normal 17 month old. Here is a list, to the best of my ability to recollect, of all the words that Piper says:
Mama
Daddy
Caleb
Piper (she does recognize herself and says her name all the time!)
Mommaw
Poppaw
Puppy
Cow
Cat
Eat
Yes
No
Light
Yay
Whoa
Wee
Beep
Elmo (her fav!)
Pretty
Night Night
Please
Thank you
Bite
Out
Up
Ball
Button
Flower
Snowman
Tree (she has spent the past few months calling trees "doop", but has very recently started saying the real word when prompted)
Bow
Hi
Bye bye
Go
Mine (guess who she learned that one from?)
Book
Read
Bird
Purse
Uh oh
Bath
Potty
Poopy
Wet (notice a theme here? maybe it's time to potty train?)

She's even started stringing words together:
Don't cry (when holding her baby)
A __________ (fill in the blank, very often light)
Bite please
Yes please
All done (with the adorable hand motions that go with it)

Piper still does have her own language that she converses with others her age with, but those are the words that we understand. She tends to add to them daily, so I'm sure I'll have to update this list sometime soon!

aaaaaaaand the saga continues (cue the Star Wars Theme here)...

2009-12-17T12:37:00.003-05:00

Yes, ok, so I've lost my ever loving mind. If that title doesn't prove it, I don't really know what does.
This post is going to be about, what else, this stupid lymph node issue I've got going on here. Just warning you so you can click away if you don't want to read about it yet again.
Last week I went to the surgeon. This is the surgeon that my sweet PA, Carol, sent me to for a simple second opinion on the whole situation. This guy was everything a surgeon is, cocky and scalpel happy, but good. He did a full examination from the clavicle up to determine if there was anything else that seemed amiss and he couldn't find anything, including the offending lymph node. I had to point it out to him, literally putting my finger on it and him doing it as I moved mine. "Ah, yes, I see what you mean" is what he said. After some questions, he determined that I needed surgery. right. then. Well, then.
He also said that it was either a lymph node that is working hard or cancer. Lovely. Seeing as I have no other symptoms, confirmed by himself, I managed to get him to agree to wait another month. If this continues to improve, then we'll do nothing, but if nothing changes he wants to do surgery. I'm not too thrilled with that idea so I'm going to do a couple of things that may help: a detox and a lymphatic massage. Hopefully, these two things will shrink this thing even just a little more and I won't have to worry about this anymore...

Sarah

2009-12-15T12:40:00.004-05:00

Can I just say that I really like Sarah Palin.
I'm not one to discuss politics here on my blog and this certainly isn't anything like that, but after getting to know her (if you can call it that) via the media and reading, I just really like her. I think that, regardless of one's political persuasion, Sarah Palin is a woman that is fascinating and amazing.
Let's just look at what she has done and continues to do:
She was the governor of the largest state in the US. For a woman to achieve public office, I believe, is a minor (in some places, major) miracle. From my limited knowledge of her doings in Alaska, she did a pretty good job. I mean, the state is still there, isn't it?
She is a mother. Can I just say what a difficult job THAT is, in and of itself? And, to work on top of it? Granted, most of her kids were older (with the exception of her latest) and in school, but it still take a lot of time and heart to raise respectful, well adjusted, courteous kids these days!
She is not only a mother, but a mother of a child with special needs. Do you know the statistics of those who find out that they are carrying a child with Down's that abort? It's somewhere around 90-95%. She and her husband knew, going into this, that their child would most likely have this genetic anomaly and they chose to face the challenges head on.
She just tells it like it is. I really appreciate this about Sarah. This is a woman in the spotlight and is talked about in so many ways, but she just continues on with her life. She doesn't crumble and she doesn't feel the need to defend herself. She just goes on, knowing that she knows the truth and that it just doesn't matter what others think or say. I guess you could say that I appreciate this quality of hers the most because most of the world feels the need to defend themselves and make themselves look good for everyone else. I just find this quality refreshing.
Anyway, sorry for this random post, but I just had to get it out of my system. I'll be back later with some photos of the kids, what most of you read this blog for anyway, right?

Thankful

2009-11-25T10:47:00.005-05:00

On this Thanksgiving eve, I have been thinking of all the many things that I have to be thankful for. So, in true blog fashion (it seems I fall into this too much!) I have created a bulleted list of these things:

Caleb- While he has certainly given us a run for our money, I am thankful that he is who he is. Caleb is SO smart, so much so that often, throughout his short little life, he has scared the living daylights out of me by something that has come out of his mouth. He is also so sweet and, for the most part, is so loving toward his family. Caleb and my mom have a serious bond that is sweet to see and I love that they have a tie that nothing can break.
Piper- I love her spirit and determination. This girl has a serious drive that no one can deter. She sees what she wants and goes for it, but still always comes back to her mama. Piper is shy sometimes and I love that she looks to her dad, brother and I for comfort, instead of someone else. Piper is super helpful and loves to be in the middle of all the action. She is just so much fun!
Jes- I am thankful for a husband that provides and provides well for his family. While things are always perfect in our marriage, or even in our house, he's always here and always comes home. That's more than you can say for a lot of 32 year old men. I'm also so thankful that he works so hard so I can be at home with the kids. Because he works so hard, it allows me to be home and just have to work a bit in the evenings.
My things- Now, I know it's not really kosher to say that you are thankful for stuff, but I am thankful that I have enough "stuff" to provide a good life for my family. I'm thankful for my house, even though it sometimes feels like a shoebox, and sometimes things break and we have to fix them, but it's ours and I'm glad we have it.
My family- I am thankful that I have a family. There are some who do not, and I just can't imagine the despair that that might cause them, especially during a holiday where the tradition is to gather as one. Now, my family is far from perfect, in fact we are probably more on the end of super odd, but it works for us and it's normal for us. In the past few years we have learned to love each other for who we are, and respect each other, and for that I am thankful.
Time- I am thankful that I have lived another year. We are not promised any time, as we know that our days are numbered, and I am glad that I have been around yet another year to wipe noses and hineys, feed small children, drive countless miles, laugh, cry, cook meals, see milestones, discipline, and all the other small things that we all take for granted.

So, I guess I'm just thankful.

Fall Fun

2009-11-12T14:02:00.003-05:00

We've been having quite a good time this fall so far. The weather has been a bit precarious with all the rain and such, but we've managed to squeeze in all our fall traditions so far this year.

We managed to make our yearly trip to the Dallas Arboretum, but this year it was just my mom and the kids and myself. Everyone else that usually goes with us chickened out, but we braved the mud (it has rained quite a lot here in the past month to month and a half) and had quite a fun time! This year, more than ever, it has been quite the challenge to get both of the kids to look at me to get a proper photo. Last year, Piper was an infant and she, mostly, stayed where I put her. Now, not so much as she can just stand up and take off wherever she pleases. Poor Caleb tries to be still and look at the camera as much as he can, but there's only so much a 4.5 year old can take before something shiny or fun attracts his eye!

Caleb finished up his soccer season on the 31st of October. I am working on crafting a full post about soccer, but just to sum it up we had a really crummy coach (lots of screaming, foot stomping and fit throwing and not a lot of coaching) and the boys just had no idea what to do. The last game of the season, all the boys were given a trophy. Caleb is super proud of his! The rest of the team is signing up to play on the same team in the Spring, but we are not going to do soccer again until Fall, if at all. We will certainly be looking for a new team/coach too!

Halloween this year was more fun than it has ever been! Caleb was Batman and Piper was Catgirl. They were just two superheroes waiting to save mankind!
This year, like last, we went to my parent's church's Fall Festival event. Normally, it is held at the church, but with Halloween being during the weekend they were able to schedule it to be held at Firewheel Mall in Garland. This is one of those super popular outdoor malls with a large courtyard. The games were spread out and there were so many kids and parents there! I know that it had to have been a great success! I know both of our munchkins had so much fun playing the games, collecting their candy and riding the ponies!

Each year, since Caleb was a baby, I have taken the kid(s) to The Big Orange Pumpkin Farm, just north of us in Celina. This year I decided to go with my MOPS group but due to incessant rain it was rescheduled 3 times. The last time that we scheduled the trip was just before they were to close down for the winter so it was a now or never type thing. I had seen on the news that Celina had been getting more rain than even we had and that most of the properties there had to bring the city in to pump out all the water that was collecting. The Big Orange Pumpkin Farm was no exception. I knew when we left that day that we would be covered in mud and boy was I right! We arrived to a flooded farm with a huge lake of rain water in the center of the property. We had to park far away and be shuttled in on the hayride to get around it. It wasn't exactly the traditional hayride, but it was a hayride nonetheless! We had a great time getting dirty, feeding the animals and picking out our pumpkins. Piper was fairly clean when we went to leave (she hung out in the VERY muddy stroller most of the time), but I just stripped Caleb's and my shoes off, rolled up our muddy pants and drove home.

We are gearing up for Thanksgiving around here, which also means one more thing for me: the end of the fall semester! I have an extra class this semester which translates into more grading and while I have enjoyed it, I will be glad for a break!

Health Update

2009-11-03T22:55:00.002-05:00

Where does the time go here? I keep telling myself that it hasn't been that long since I wrote here and then I click over and see it really has.
Well, anyway I should really update on the state of my health I addressed a few posts ago.
I went to the doctor this past Monday and she did a very thorough examination of the lymph nodes in my cervical (neck) region and found that the one that was swollen on the right is totally normal now. She also found that the lymph node on the right that was so big had shrunk around 2cm in a month. It seems that she estimated it to be 3cm a month ago and that it was now nearer to 1cm. Our next step was to go to see a surgeon to see if it needed to be removed, but she decided that we should wait another 2 weeks and revisit before we did that.
Overall, I felt better after leaving this appointment than I did the last. Also, I do feel better, mostly, as I was just not well for many weeks on end. We both agreed that with all the stuff going around right now and living with two small children, aka germ magnets, that I probably have been picking up small, but certainly noticeable and bothersome illnesses all that time.
If you are my friend on facebook then you have seen my status updates about Piper. If you are not, then here's the basic rundown on what has been going on with her. Last Thursday afternoon, Piper felt warm so I thought I would take her temperature. It was high, but literally 15 minutes later she was normal. Strange, I thought. I also thought I might have caught her at a weird time, however 1 hour later she was hot again.
Now, if you have not been around Piper, you would not know that she is very much a drama queen. She has a very big personality and is very much like her mother, so to say that she was grumpy is not that abnormal for her, especially late in the day. I went to work Thursday night thinking she was teething (the girl is 16 months old and only has 4 at this point!), however when I got home I discovered she was burning up but had no other symptoms.
Thus began the next few, miserable days where Piper ran fever consistently regardless of the medication she had on board or not. Yesterday, she did not have fever, but late in the afternoon she had a rash on her torso and upper back. I, of course, called doctor and come to find out, she had/has Roseola!
Who gets that anymore? I had it as a small child, but it never occurred to me that my kid/kids would get it. Anyway, the nurse told me that the cases in our area are up and that is seems to be yet another thing going around.
I just wanted to update all of y'all who were praying for us over the past few weeks and say thank you! I so appreciate all the love and prayers!

2009-10-20T10:33:00.002-04:00

This past weekend, Caleb, Piper and I were looking back through some old photos that are on the computer and came across these old videos of Caleb. They are too cute and made me wonder where my little boy went, so I thought I would share.

If you have read my blog for awhile now, then you will more than likely recognize this first one. This is Caleb dancing to a song from a Veggie Tales movie. He is not quite 2 here and is just as sweet as I remember him. It's been no secret Caleb's deep and abiding love for Larry and Bob, a love that still has not waned. We are still watching, talking about, singing the songs of Bob and Larry and all the other Veggie Tale characters. At the end of this video, if you listen very carefully, you will hear him say, "Yay, Wawry" translated yay, Larry. So cute.

I just happened to discover this one and had completely forgotten about it. This one brought tears to my eyes. I had forgotten...

I guess I was video happy this day as this one is the very same day, just after the dancing video. Here Caleb is counting to 20, a skill that he perfected long before this video was taken. I still have no idea how he learned this, as I did not teach him this, but he could totally do it and still look SO cute at the same time.

The Goings On Round Here.

2009-10-19T20:48:00.002-04:00

I figured that I should post something a little bit more positive that that last one. Most of y'all probably could care less, but it makes me a bit crazy to leave that there knowing that's the first thing that someone would read coming here.
So, with all that said, here's what's been going on in our lives in bulleted form (since I'm supposed to be typing notes for work tomorrow):

Piper has really been growing! She's walking really well and is talking up a blue streak. This past weekend, she said her first sentence. She had grabbed Caleb's cup off his table (it has no lid as he is a BIG boy now and doesn't think he EVER needs one) and walked across the room with it. Of course, it sloshed all over her and got her shirt and upper body wet. She looked at me, clear as day and said, "I'm wet" and pointed to her shirt. Later on in the day she told me she was poopy. She can also say her name now, although she can't say her r's yet, so it's just about as cute as it gets!
Jes was gone this past weekend on his very first weekend long motorcycle ride with what I like to call his motorcycle gang. It is really just a bunch of guys, much like himself, who enjoy riding sport bikes and don't do anything stupid like wheelies or stuff like that. They get all decked out in their safety gear and off they go. This weekend they took off to western Arkansas and were able to see some pretty nice scenery as the leaves are changing and have just a great time!
Yesterday was my birthday. I turned another year older. Enough already.
Caleb has really changed a lot in the last few months. It seems that when I look back at all the difficulties he has overcome, it just seems impossible that we are at this point in our lives. He is communicating well these days and seems to have gone over the hump with regards to his behavior. Now, don't get me wrong, he is still 4 and stilld doesn't like to share and still breaks down when his tired, hungry, etc, but he's getting better at moderating his emotions. We were in the pediatrician's office with Piper for a well check up and he was getting VERY frustrated that he couldn't complete a picture on the magna doodle as he wanted. The doctor took notice of this and stopped to watch to see how he would react (we have talked extensively about Caleb and he knows him well). Caleb looked at me, on the edge of losing it and I told him to just stop, and try again. He said this exact thing, "Oh, yeah. I forgot. I'll try again." and went back to trying and succeeded. The pediatrician took note.
Caleb has been playing soccer. That's another post for another day. Suffice it to say, we won't be doing this again.

We are just living life and making big decisions that I'll post about as we go!

The Post In Which I Freak the Heck Out

2009-10-17T20:38:00.002-04:00

So, I guess it's been over a month since I've posted here, huh?!?
There have been some big things going on round these parts, most of which consume my every moment, leaving me without much to say, or the energy in which to say it, at the end of the day.
I'm sure that most of my regular readers are gone, but for those of you that are still with me, this post is all about me.
I need some prayers.
There. I said it.
I'm not normally one to ask for this, but I'm totally freaked about this.
About a month ago, I discovered a very swollen lymph node in my neck. I had just been sick and was just then getting over whatever the weird cold/allergy fusion type thing that seemed to be going around. I did not have a regular doctor, as it seems the only doctor that I had seen on a regular basis in the past 2 years was my ob/gyn. I suppose that's the case when you are trying to conceive, have become pregnant, and have recently delivered.
Anyway, I got an appointment in the office of Jes's doctor and had her check it out. She noticed it right off and found that there was another one swollen on the other side too, but not as bad. Then she said something to me that has haunted me since. She said, "Let's see you again in a month and if it hasn't gone down then we'll send you to a specialist. You'll probably have to have a biopsy."
Sweet heavens.
Guess what, I go back in 2 weeks and it still hasn't gone down.
Commence the hyperventilating.
I have since had a couple of near and honest to goodness panic attacks over this. My biggest issue is that I know more than the average person and my mind just goes there. I've been through every possible scenario on this and I've just about convinced myself that something is terribly wrong.
So, please pray that this thing just goes away. That's it. I don't want prayers for comfort, I just want it gone. Call me selfish, but there it is.

The Post Where Caleb Makes Me Feel Like The Prettiest Mama On The Block

2009-09-14T21:39:00.004-04:00

Setting: We were at the doctor

Caleb: Mama, I HAVE to draw a picture.

Me: Ok, dear, grab the Magna Doodle and go to town.

Caleb: I'm going to draw you.

Me: Hm, ok honey.

Caleb: draw draw draw. draw draw draw.
Mama, Look!

Me: Oh, honey that's great! (really it was!)

Caleb: Mama, it's you! It's the most beautiful ballerina in the WHOLE world!

Me: aww...

14 going on 15

2009-09-01T21:16:00.005-04:00

I have been putting off writing this post because I, honestly, used to dread those monthly posts and because I just haven't really had time or interest in writing. I've sort of run out of things to say, but now that things are kind of settling down and we're getting into the fall activities you'll probably be hearing a lot from us.

So, Piper. She's grown alot in the past two months and is doing maturing a little too fast for our tastes.

First off is the explosion in her vocabulary. The short list of what she can now say (and more importantly, what we can actually understand) is as follows: mama, daddy, mommaw, poppaw, nana, cow, cat, puppy, baby, uh huh (like no), night night, bye bye, hi, banana, juice, please, bubba (brother), Elmo, phone, bow, whoa, duck. The list goes on and on. Seriously, sometimes she just says something and I look at her and wonder how in the world she learned that or when.

Piper is coloring, which is totally new territory to us. Caleb never did, and really still doesn't, have an interest in drawing or coloring, but put a crayon in Piper's hand and away she goes. I'm guessing that this is a girl thing, but she thinks it is so fun, if you can keep the crayon out of her mouth!

The biggest development of the past few months is that Piper is walking now. When I say walking, I mean toddling, but you know what I mean. She took her first steps a couple of weeks ago and we can hardly keep up with her. She still prefers crawling, but will stand up in the middle of a room without holding on to anything. With the advent of crawling she also developed the ever dreaded skill of climbing. The girl can climb anything! It's somewhat scary when I turn around and see her beautiful smiling face atop something that I thought for sure she couldn't get on.

One of Piper's most favorite activities is to take a container of some sort and try to determine if things can git into it. Just today, she was crawling around with an empty water bottle trying to shove various things into it. She also loves to put things into the bathtub, the diaperbag, my purse, etc. It's always a surprise to see what I'm toting around that day!

Piper still does have some residual issues from the trip home from Oregon. We spent 41 hours total in the car on that trip home (split between 2 VERY long days) and she still gets a little miffed about being in her carseat for more than a hour or so.

Our little girl is such a source of joy and fun for us and it just seems like yesterday that she was born. We are so thankful to have her in our lives!

Photo Shoot

2009-08-23T21:51:00.008-04:00

If you are not a follower of mine on Facebook (which I know most of you are) then would not have seen these photos from a photo shoot we had done of the kiddos in July before we left for vacation. These are Caleb's 4 year old and Piper's 1 year old pictures. I can scarcely believe that I have a 4 AND 1 year old. We are truely blessed to have 2 happy, healthy and (mostly) well behaved children.

Mobile

2009-08-21T20:26:00.004-04:00

It happened around 6:30 tonight, August 21st, 2009: My Piper took her first unassisted steps. We have been watching her try and try for a few months now, but inspite of that it took me by surprise to see her just stand up in the middle of the floor and toddle right to me. It seems that she may have had some of the ability but has been holding out until the right moment and I am so glad that I was here to see it. This is a new exciting, yet somewhat terrifying chapter in our lives!

An Update of Sorts

2009-08-20T09:33:00.002-04:00

I'm not updating the blog because I have anything interesting, per se, but because I just can't stand to log on and see that picture of my grandparents with Caleb one more time at the top.
I've been working on a post/update on Piper and her development and will post that soon. It was such a relief to me when I didn't have to do those monthly updates anymore, but I have found myself missing them.
Since being back from our trip out west, Jes has been working some pretty ridiculous hours. While we were gone he got a phone call telling him that people were being let go, right and left. He was safe, but there were many people, whom he knew well, that were losing their jobs for one reason or another. It all pretty much came down to the fact that business has slowed due to the economy. However, since returning, he's had to work long hours day and night and even into the weekend. It seems to us that there may have been a rush to judgement in letting those people go (oh and did I mention the 5% pay cut for EVERYONE??). Yeah, fun times. Jes happens to be gone now on a road trip to Ruston, LA, but will be back this evening. Hopefully. We never know.
All of this week day craziness for Jes will HAVE to end on Monday as I go back to work. I've got a heavy load this fall semester with 4 class total. To put it in perspective, all full time instructors have to have 5, so I'm right at the cut off for associates. I did mention, joking of course, to the chair of my department that she should give me one more class and make me full time. She was completely serious when she told me that she would love to, but the money wasn't there. See, the economy has affected the colleges too, contrary to what the media says.
Caleb is doing well. We have started on some homeschooling things, since school is starting around here. The problem with it is that all the workbooks that I have are easy for him. One in particular is a 1st grade book and he's finished half of it in one day. The only reason he didn't finish all of it is because I made him stop. I have been hooked up with a group who is homeschooling this year and am going to meet with them and get some recommendations on some curriculum for him since I didn't get to go to the curriculum fair this year.
Piper, like I said, I will post about later all by herself, but she's just developing like she should. Talking up a storm and trying SO hard to walk. She's still a massive drama queen and we are certain that she's going to be a handful for as long as we have her. We are praying for her husband now, that he's a patient, kind, loving man who can put up with her! :)

Wanda Ward Davis

2009-07-30T23:29:00.005-04:00

I have hesitated and put off blogging about my grandmother until I felt the time was right. While I'm never sure that I'll feel right about her death, what I do know is that I need to pay some sort of homage to the woman that she was so that all of you who never knew her could catch a glimpse of what a special woman she was.

My grandmother was a tiny woman who had more energy in her left pinkie toe than anyone that I have ever met, my son excluded. Maybe this is why she and Caleb bonded so well from the very beginning of his life. She was the first we called when we found out we were pregnant and she and Caleb had some sort of bond that I will never understand, this side of heaven. The morning my grandmother had her stroke, she could clearly articulate very few words, but the one that she could always say well was, "Caleb". She loved that boy and talked incessently of him. I could never pretend to think that I know what is going on in heaven, but I have to believe that she is still talking of him, even while she is in glory.

For many people, their grandparents are more of an extended family for them, I had the privilege to grow up less than 10 minutes from their house. In fact, it was my grandparent's house, the very one that my grandfather still resides in, that I was brought home to after my birth. I spent many a day/weekend/holiday evening/night at that house with my grandmother and grandfather that I feel like they are more second parents to me than anything else. I was given the distinct pleasure to have such an important relationship with both of them, particularly her. Now, before I drown here, I wanted to list somethings that I learned from my grandmother, in no particular order:

- never try to make candy on a rainy day.

- scars are to be proud of and she showed me hers all. the. time., because I asked. See, I was screwy from the beginning! :)

- cranberry juice and sprite can fix all things

- nothing is better than having a child play with your hair, even if she insists on getting the brush stuck every single time

- everything in your house should be for enjoying, not just for looking

- installing a lock on the bottom of your back door for children to play with for hours on end is a-ok

- sewing, and doing it well, is an art form

- it's not all about what you have, but who you have in your life

- pecan pie something that anyone can make, even yours truely, a person who can hardly bake store bought cookie dough

- it is ok if you have dishes in your sink and laundry in the hamper, just enjoy your kids because the time is fleeting

- you can be blessing to people, even if you are confined to a bed

- there is no better joy than giving joy to others.

I love my grandmother so much and am still having a really hard time believing that she is gone. It is still so very hard and strange to be in my grandparent's house and know she won't ever be there again, even though she hasn't been there for nearly 2 years. She was my friend and my confidant. I am a better person to have known her and I am blessed to have called her my grandmother.

(I'm not proofing this post, so if it is somewhat disjointed and rambling, it is what it is. These were my thoughts just days after her death and I would like to just record them for posterity.)

Our Great Exit

2009-07-13T22:11:00.002-04:00

No, I have not completely abandoned our blog, we have just been so wrapped up in all things summer. My priorities just haven't included blogging lately, but I fully intend on getting back into the swing of things.
Here's what we have been up to:
Jes- He's been working really hard and some serious hours lately as business has been up. Anytime we think to complain about all the hours, we just remember all of our friends who don't have a job and are thankful again.
Shannon- I have just finished up a couple of classes for the college in the short 5 week term that is summer one. Normally, these classes would not have been so tiring but the hours were from 6pm to 11pm. By the time I got home from work it was after 11 and I was so wound up that it would take me an hour or better to calm down. This schedule just about did me in since the kiddos tend to awake around 6am every morning. It was all I could do to just make it, but make it I did.
Caleb- He finished up his swim lessons a little while ago and he went to a week of VBS at our church. He had a great time and learned a bunch, especially the music, which he still sings on a regular basis. Now I just have to find a way to get my hands on the CD of the music from that week!
Piper- Our little girl is just on the move more than ever. She has crawling down to an art and moves so fast that sometime I find myself running to catch up with her. Piper has also started standing independently for a few seconds at a time the past few days. We feel like she'll be walking in the next few months and then we're really in for it! Piper is really just the sweetest little girl, but has started developing quite the attitude lately.
Tomorrow we leave for our very first vacation with the kids. We are headed to California for a family reunion and then on the Oregon to visit Jes's parents. It will be such a fun time as we are making stops along the way at Disneyland and the redwood forest and such. The kids will have a great time and so will we! I'll try to update with pictures as we go!

Month 12, aka Her First Birthday

2009-06-30T09:29:00.005-04:00

So. Here we are. THE day. My Piper, my last baby, turns 1. It's just so hard to believe that a year has passed since we were up and getting ready to head to the hospital for the c-section so we could see our Piper. This day, a year ago, is much different than today, but boy are we glad we walked through it.

Remember this? This was taken when my boy was just 3 (he seems so little here) and we were packing up to go home. Caleb loves his sister and they have, over the last year, reached a very comfortable point in their relationship. If Piper is grumpy and fussy, she will stop as soon as Caleb comes to her. All he has to do is talk to her and she smiles her sweet smile.
Caleb is also the one person who ilicits the most giggles from Piper. It seems that anything he does, she finds funny and amusing. It is very sweet to hear the laughs coming from the other room.

We have been told many, many times that Piper is just a sweet, happy, easy baby and nothing could be more true. This past week, Piper had her first experience at VBS and I was told, not only by her teachers, but also other teachers who happened to just see her that she was the only baby not crying or fussing about anything. She is just so content, well until she is hungry, but really who isn't upset when they are hungry. Piper loves to be on the go and while returning home is a joy for her, being out in public and looking at everything is her true joy. We have learned that we have to leave the house everyday so that Piper can get her fill. It seems that I have given birth to two kids who like to be out and about alot. No complaints here!

Piper started crawling last month, but she really perfected her skill this past one. During month 11, she would crawl on her hands and knees, but would revert back to her army crawl when she wanted to get somewhere fast. During the last 30 days, however, she has since decided that all 4 is the way to go and can go fast now. Sometimes, faster than I would like... I spend most of my days chasing her around, pulling things out of her mouth. Piper has the ability to spot the most minute speck on the floor and will promptly try to eat it. I know she'll stop doing this at some point, but until then we will battle over this little "habit" of hers!

Piper is also so close to walking. She will pull up on everything and will let go at times. She will stand there for just a second and then promptly falls on her backside. It's very cute, but she gets a little frustrated at times!

I can already tell that Piper is going to be my craftsy girl, thank goodness. I couldn't, and still can't, get Caleb to participate in crafts or art projects to save my life, so I was hoping that Piper would be the one. She seems to have taken an interest in coloring and drawing a lot younger than seems normal, well at least normal in our house. Here is a picture (of course) of Piper drawing for the first time.

This past Saturday, we had Piper's birthday party. This was nothing like Caleb's first birthday party, in that we just had a small, low key affair at my parent's house with just family. It really was so much fun and I would do it again this way, should I have the opportunity. A dear friend of mine made the tutu for Piper and she had to wear it. It's just precious, isn't it?

As you can see, we had so much fun with Piper and she had so much fun eating cake (well, icing really). Here she is just as the sugar rush started. I would almost (ALMOST!) like to give her more cake just to see this silly face again. However, the crash afterward is just not worth it!

Piper has always been very curious, but this past month she has earnestly started pointing at everything, wanting to know names of nearly every object she sees, whether she's seen it before or not. We are happy to oblige!

We have had such fun with Piper this past year and I really could never imagine how much joy she has brought to our lives. It was a difficult adjustment that was at times unbearably hard and unspeakably joyful all at the same time. However, we would do it again in a moment's notice. God knew exactly what he was doing by giving us Piper, a sweet, silly, pretty, prissy (at times), laid-back, baby girl who has completed our family and us.

Happy birthday baby girl! Your Mama and Daddy love you more that you (and we) could ever imagine. We can't wait to see all the exciting things that you will accomplish and fun we will have over the next years.

My Grandmother

2009-06-22T22:34:00.004-04:00

So, I haven't posted about my grandmother in a good long time. It seems that the past few weeks have gone from bad to worse with regards to her health.
If you're not familiar with her history, here's the long and short of it. In September of 2007 she had a massive stroke where she ruptured a vessel on the right side of her brain, leaving her paralyzed on her left. We were told, that day, to call in our clergy and start making arrangements. She was not supposed to make it even to the end of the day. Defying all the odds, she completed a stay in the ICU and recovered more than we every expected to.
Shortly after, my grandmother was moved to an assisted living facility that we thought was top notch. We have since learned that no place is as good as they advertise themselves to be. In May of this year, my grandmother fell out of her wheelchair (fault of the facility for not having her strapped in and unattended) and broke her hip. Since her health is so poor, she was not a candidate for surgery and has had to live in constant severe pain ever since. Hospice was called in to help manage her pain medication, but we were warned that it (the meds) could lead to Congestive Heart Failure. And, it has. She has veen in and out of the hospital over and over again since then.
On Thursday of last week, my grandmother vomited and aspirated. She is now in the hospital with aspiration pneumonia, CHF, a blood clot from a PICC line, a massive UTI, all while in severe pain still. She is barely opening her eyes and is not communicating much, except to ask for someone to please help her and stop the pain. It's really a bad situation. We are all so tired of seeing her suffer and just tired. This stroke, the beginning of everything, has robbed her of her life and has trapped her inside a body that is slowly failing her. We are just praying that she'll be pain free and at peace. It's difficult beyond belief to watch a beloved family member suffer like this.

Where We've Been...

2009-06-14T20:29:00.003-04:00

We've been quite busy around these parts with summer stuff and fun. Truth be told, I really haven't had much time nor the motivation. Here are a few pictures of the kids (what all of you really come here to see anyway) to hold everyone over until I get back in the swing of things.

Caleb and Piper are still the best of friends, playing together at every moment, even meal time.

Caleb also just started swim lessons with our friend, Ms. Jen. He is really doing quite well, putting his face in the water at his first lesson and has a killer kick. He loves going and if it weren't for VBS the week after next we might have a serious issue with not having somewhere to go in the morning like we have been.

Piper's taken up a new hobby now too: drawing. Here's her crafting her very first picture.

And this is Caleb's interpretation of me. I'm not too keen on the hair, but love the figure! :)

Here's Piper in her big floppy hat. We had a nice conversation about how good Southern girls wear their hats in the sun to protect their milky white skin, all in the effort to try to get her to keep it on so she doesn't get sunburned. It worked. For about 5 minutes.

Month 11

2009-06-01T18:36:00.005-04:00

This month, Piper officially reached the 11 month mark. It seems that every month when I go to write these monthly update, in my mind she hasn't changed much, but as I go back and read about her the month before it becomes very clear that she's learning more everyday!

In my last monthly post, I talked a lot about Piper's hair. You will just have to excuse that, but I was SO excited about having some hair to work with and it just seems to keep coming. Neither one of our children has Jes's hair, very, very thick and very, very dark. Mine is quite fine, but there's lots of it and a medium color. Caleb is this way and Piper is turning out to be this way too. As you can see she's had more come in and I can now just stick a bow in and it will stay!

As always, Piper is still just the happiest baby ever! The nursery workers at church and MOPS always marvel at how easily she transitions into her classrooms, when most of her peers are crying. I know that my time is coming, but if she is anything like her brother, it will be short lived. Thankfully, Piper is just a laid back and easy going as her sibling.

Some of the biggest news in our household are those two little white things that you see in Piper's mouth. In my 10 month update, I mentioned that her first tooth had finally broken through, but at that point it was only one and we couldn't yet see it. Well, now she's got both of her front central incisors and she loves them, exercising them on anything that gets near them. She has already used them on yummy snacks, but also various fingers and, more recently, my nose. They work fine, friends.

In health news, Piper has had this chronic cough that I have been trying to convince her doctors is related to allergies. It seemed completely plausible to both myself and Jes that she would inherit our allergies, especially with her birth happening right before some of the worst pollen counts that our area has seen in recent years. However, each and every doctor kept telling me that she was just too young to have allergies, to which I always replied, "bull". This past month I finally conviced the kids' pulmonologist to give us a trial run of an allergy nose spray for Piper, before we had to go through a bunch of expensive imaging of her airways. Well, the verdict? It worked. No more cough, no more snot, no more sneezing. Seems I was right. Again. Doctors: LISTEN TO THE MOTHERS! Ok, enough.

Piper has also learned to clap and wave bye bye this month as well. If there is clapping going on, she will clap, but will also do it if you say, "yay, Piper" to her. She smiles the biggest smile and will clap! When she waves, she does so with both hands facing toward her. It's just about the cutest thing I've seen!

This past month, we were invited to my mom's new company's picnic. The weather was fabulous, the food was even better and the company was the best. Piper really likes being outdoors, which is perfectly fine with us, as we don't like being cooped up in the house so much either. It will get easier when she can walk, but for now her ride is the stroller,

or her doting Daddy.

So, I don't think that I have mentioned in the past about Piper's deep and abiding hatred for dolls. This began at a very, very early age when my mom and I gave her a basic doll and she began attacking it. Piper would scream, yell, bite, hit, poke, throw, and get so mad at the doll that we would have to take it away from her and physically restrain her to calm her down. She has not only done this with us, but also at church and at MOPS and everyone has commented on this. I have tried to introduce this doll in the picture to her little by little and now she plays with it more than she attacks it. Hopefully, by this time next month she won't be so aggressive toward the poor defenseless doll, but it sure is funny and a good giggle for her Mama!

This past month Piper has finally mastered the art of crawling. She will get on all fours and crawl when she is trying to get somewhere, but will revert back to the army crawl when she's in a real hurry. Here she has discovered another use for her ExerSaucer, climbing underneath it over and over. Thank you Graco for a dual use toy!

I took Piper for her first swim this month as well. We are so blessed to have a community pool in our subdivision and it's just down the street so we can well! As you can tell she feel so pretty in her new swimsuit. I hope that when she's my age she feels this good in one too!

I invited 2 of my best mom friends to come to the pool with us and both kiddos were SO excited! Between the 3 of us, we had 5 kids, totally manageable, and so much fun!

I went out and bought Piper this new float for her to ride in in the pool. I really wanted to have a float that had a shade attached to it and found this adorable turtle one at WalMart! If you look you can see that her hands are sitting in a little pool built into the front of the float. This is meant to hold a little bit of water for the kiddo to splash around in while floating. Well, our little girl decided to put her face in the water too. I predict that she'll be an easy one to teach to swim!

Swimming was so much fun, but wore Piper out so much! This is a picture of her passed out in her stroller. What I didn't get a photo of was her asleep in the float as she glided along on the water. It was so relaxing for her that we'll be sure to get back to the pool soon!

I had to get a picture of her pruney little feet... So cute!

Another huge thing that Piper is doing in our house is sleeping in her own bed! Now, she's never been like her brother, sleeping in our bed, but really just craves her own space, sleeping in a Pack 'n Play next to our bed. We decided to try her in her crib early in May, expecting a fight, as we had with her brother. However, Piper proved us wrong and has slept all night long ever since! Praise the Lord!

Lastly, Piper is officially pulling up on everything and is cruising around all the furniture. Now that she's able to get up and reach things that are higher than the floor, we are constantly chasing her around trying to get whatever she has grabbed and absconded with from her. Most often it's a piece of paper, a cell phone, or a remote that she doesn't want to give up. Sometimes I just let her have whatever it is she's after, because, really, who can resist that face?!

Conversations with Caleb- a double edition

2009-05-25T20:05:00.004-04:00

Setting: sitting in the stall at Sonic drinking our Happy Hour drinks while I give Piper a bottle.

Caleb: Mama, Mama, Mama, Mama, Mama (evidently I don't answer quick enough)

Me: Yes, Caleb

Caleb: Can you get my Nemo ball?

Me: Caleb, I can't reach it. You'll have to wait until we get home (it's in the far back corner of my SUV, no way I can get it).

Caleb: Oh, come on now. You know you can do it! (said with a huge smile on his face!)

Who knew I had such a motivator on my hands!
------------------------------------------------------------
Setting: in the car on our way to some event. Hm, there seems to be some sort of pattern here. We are ALWAYS in the car, it seems!

Caleb: I have brown eyes.

Me: Yes you do. What color are Daddy's eyes?

Caleb: Brown, just like mine.

Me: Yep, that's right. What color are mine and Piper's eyes?

Caleb: Angel. You have angel eyes, just like Piper.

Awwwww. (I know he's meaning hazel, but it's still sweet even if it's not on purpose!)

Conversations with Piper

2009-05-21T13:03:00.003-04:00

Piper: Dee, doot, boop, beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee (think high pitched squeal)

Me: ...

Piper: Dat? (pointing to shoe)

Me: Shoe.

Piper: Dat?

Me: Shoe.

Piper: Dat?

Me: Shoe.

etc. etc.

Evidently, the 4 year old in our house isn't the only one with all the questions.

Happy Mother's Day!

2009-05-10T21:03:00.005-04:00

Just over 5 years ago, this little boy made me a Mama.

He brought so much joy and laughter to our lives that I never thought I could ever love another child...

...nearly as much as I loved him.

Then we went and made him a big brother,

and got this little love bug, whom I can hardly imagine my life without.

Boy, am I grateful for these two! Happy Mother's Day to all of you!

Conclusion?

2009-05-07T20:30:00.004-04:00

On Tuesday, I had to pack up the kiddos and travel up to our local special education office to sign off on Caleb's ARD papers stating that he doesn't qualify for any services. If you don't remember what has all happened to get us to this point, here's a brief run down in my favorite of forms, bullets:

October 08- I got a phone call from the Mother's Day Out program that Caleb had been enrolled in for 3 years stating that he was having some significant difficulties and would I come to the school for a parent/teacher conference. I had a very difficult meeting with Caleb's teacher in which some very terrible problems were insinuated to be the problem and we were told to get him tested.
Late October 08- I was able to get Caleb an appointment with the special education department in our school district for some testing that was suggested. During this time period, I had been pulled aside by 2 more of Caleb's teachers (not from the Mother's Day Out program, just teachers from church) to tell me that they also thought something was "wrong with him". One actually told me they thought he was disabled...
November 08- We had our first appointment with the special ed department and it was determined that his major issue at the time that needed to be evaluated was most likely speech related. We decided to test his speech first and see if that would be an easily correctable issue.
Late November 08- Caleb had an in-class observation by one of the professionals, not a psychologist or speech pathologist, from the special ed department.
December 08- Caleb failed his hearing test that was completed by the special ed department and also failed subsequent hearing tests done by our ENT. After examination, it was determined that he had fluid in his ears, which had been a chronic, but transient issue, so tubes were recommended. We agreed.
December 15, 08- Caleb had his tube surgery and we saw results within days. We probably would have seen results sooner had the whole family not have come down with the stomach virus of death. Seriously, it's hard to pay attention to how much you or your child can or cannot hear when its all you can do to retain your bodily fluids in the compartments in which they belong.
December 08 (post surgery)- Caleb failed his post surgery hearing test that was conducted by a brand new, not yet licensed audiologist. Later we found out that his test was one of her first, so who knows what would have happened had we had a more trained individual. We were told Caleb would need a sedated ABR, a test in which he would be put under anesthesia to have his cochlear nerve (the one that transmits that signals for hearing to the brain) tested. We were referred to a pediatric ENT for just that test.
December 08- The pediatric ENT spent 5 minutes with Caleb and determined that his speech was too good for a kid who couldn't hear. He wanted his audiologist to test his hearing and Caleb passed. He was given a clean bill of health and we were sent on our way.
December 08- Caleb never went back to his Mother's Day Out class. We had decided to pull him out, due to his behavior issues that no other person had experienced with him. We were sad, but we are convinced that the stomach bug of death was God's way of protecting his little feelings by having to go back to class, knowing he wouldn't return again.
January 09- Caleb had his speech evaluation with the speech pathologist, which he passed. Surprise, surprise. I was told at this meeting that Caleb's observation was fine and he did not exhibit any of the behaviors that were expressed by his teachers. I would find out later that this was not true.
January 09-March 09- I fielded phone call after phone call from special ed psychologists who wanted to evaluate Caleb's behavior with the sole purpose of putting some diagnosis on him. It wasn't until I finally told them that we were not interested in them diagnosing our son with a condition he did not have that they stopped calling and backed off. It was at some point during this time that I was told that Caleb did in fact show some of the behaviors that his teachers were so concerned about. However, I was given no specifics and just assumed that I would get the report at some point in time.
April 09- I received a phone call from the speech pathologist stating that she finally finished up Caleb's report and wanted to email me a copy. This report contained the observation notes as well and reading it made me sick. I truely had no idea exactly what was happening until I read about it from a 3rd party's perspective. The way it is written makes my son sound like he's seriously delayed and completely autistic, which we know is not the case. The opinion in the report is completely skewed and is obviously written from the point of view of looking for something wrong instead of just observing. Not cool.
May 09- I went in and signed the papers stating that Caleb did not qualify for services at that time. The speech pathologist asked me about his behaviors and said that if we every wanted to test him in that regard then to just call. Then she said the following,"Caleb does not qualify for any speech services, however I am still very concerned over his lack of eye contact." Hm. She spoke directly to Caleb only two times with the first being while he was climbing a flight of stairs while looking for me and second while he was working puzzles. She was also concerned that when asked what his sister's name was, he responded, "Piper, P-I-P-E-R", spelling it out. If she would have asked, I would have told her that he does that because we do that. Most of the time people do not know what we are saying when we say Piper's name, so we spell it.

All in all, I'm glad that this whole disaster of an issue is done. Is this the conclusion to all this? I certainly hope so. This ball has been dropped too many times by too many "professionals" and assumptions have been made all over the place about my boy. I hope it's over.

Month 10

2009-05-02T22:35:00.011-04:00

So, here we are again. Yet another monthly post on how big my baby is getting.

This past month has been, I think, my favorite. Piper has made some huge leaps in her development, particularly motor wise, in the past month. I'll get to that later, first we have to cover the big holiday that happened since I did this last.

This was Piper's very first Easter. In our house, Easter is a big deal, seeing that it is really THE holiday of our faith and the fact that it is my favorite. Some friends of ours host an Easter egg hunt every year for all the kids and this year Piper was able to participate. I guess, technically, she did last year too since I WAS great with child, her.

Some of my mommy friend were questioning this past Easter on the whole Easter basket/Bunny or no Easter basket/Bunny. We don't talk about the Easter Bunny in our house, much like we don't discuss Santa, but the Easter baskets are so fun and really just another way for me to give fun things to the kids. Here's Piper with her swag. In my defense, it really looks like I went WAY overboard in this picture regarding all that she got, but that basket is SO small and all that is in it is a toy that attaches to her stroller tray, a pair of shoes and some hair clips. That's all I could fit in it, so the Little People Zoo and cart cover had to sit in the couch. See, I don't just get frivilous stuff, some of it's useful!

Oh, and yes, this is yet another picture of my precious daughter in her brother's old pajamas. We're in a recession here people. If it fits her, she wears it... Just not in public!

Here's Piper in her fancy Easter dress, complete with bow that she insisted on taking off at random times and waving it around at me. She likes to have her hair "done", but I think she's quickly losing patience with the head bands. As I heard a very wise woman say once, "It is a hill that I'm willing to die on" and she will wear the headbands!

Piper took her very first ride in the cart (with the afore mentioned cover, of course) at our beloved Sprouts. She had the best time bouncing up and down, swinging her little feet and just looking around at all the fun stuff to grab! Now that she's able to ride up front, and really should be out of her carrier when we are shopping, I'm kind of at a loss as to what to do when I have to shop with both she and Caleb. I guess he'll be relegated to the large part of the cart with the groceries!

This has been a month of change, healthwise, for our little P. If you remember, Piper had the flu back in February and has had some significant coughing ever since. She was put on a couple of rounds of antibiotics that should have cleared anything bacterial in nature, but was still coughing. While we were at her brother's pulmonologist check up, the respiratory therapist took a listen to her and heard her wheeze. They, obviously, squeezed her in right then and there. A couple of days prior to this, Piper's pediatrician put her on a reflux med to see if it would clear, but the pulmonologist wanted to see how she was swallowing to rule out that issue, since her brother had significant issues in that area.

I was very concerned, not about the test, but about the demeanor of our little diva. Piper rarely cried, except when she is hungry. Did I forget to mention that she could not have anything to eat that morning? Oh, and her test wasn't until 11:30. Despite all this, P was so happy and just charmed everyone we came into contact with over and over again. This picture is her in the therapy chair waiting for the test to begin, playing.

The swallow study was normal, but the doctor did see some reflux, so we'll have to reevaluate with the pulmonologist in a couple of weeks.

Here's Caleb trying to listen to her heart. Notice the perfect placement of the stethoscope. Think we do this much?

This past month I realized that Piper's hair is in the in between stage. It is really too long the way that it is, but to cut it would make her look like she's a boy. So, my solution? I started putting it into a water spout. Her hair is pretty straight and fine, so it just sticks right up in the air like this. It's silly looking (well that and the tuft of bangs in the front that are just too short), but it just makes her all the cuter.

Last month, I mentioned how Piper was starting to get in the position to crawl and made the prediction that she would have it mastered by the end of the month. I am happy to announce that my prediction was half right. She has very much mastered the army crawl, but just isn't really into perfecting the crawl on all fours type. She gets around quickly, to fast in my opinion, with the army crawl. Many times I have come around the corner and have had to ask Caleb where she went. I often find her in the cat food or under the dining room table and have to extricate her from whatever situation she has seemed to find herself in.

Here's P perfecting her Longhorn look. You know I HAD to go there!

As you can see in the above picture, Piper has started standing. She cannot necessarily pull herself up in this position anywhere but in her crib, but if you place her standing up, she will stay that way. I think that she's going to start cruising around just as soon as she's able to get all the way up on her feet. Right now, she gets her upper body up but her feet are so far away from her that she's at a perfect 45 degree angle. I have to laugh when she gets stuck, but it SO frustrates her!

Piper has also experienced an explosion in her vocabulary this past month. She has been able to say Mama, Dada and Baba (brother) for awhile now, but she has added Dat (that?), Babe (baby), and Me to her list of words. She is also proving to be somewhat decisive lately. When I'm feeding her carrots or peas and carrots (the real thing, not the baby food mush), she loves to stick out her pudgy little first finger and point to the next veggie that she wants. I, of course, oblige, but Jes swears that I'm spoiling her. I just figure that she's a girl who knows what she wants!

It's taken a couple of months, but Piper's first tooth popped through in the last 30 days. The tooth hasn't grown up enough that an average person would notice it, but I can see it and am slightly sad that her gummy smile will be gone soon. I just love that smile with the 2 bottom teeth peaking out too!

I got brave one day and decided to give Caleb and Piper a bath one day and thought it would sure be much easier if I could do them both at the same time. Piper is sitting up very well and has outgrown her infant bathtub so I decided to give them their very first tandem bath. As you can see Piper loved the water and Caleb had a great time pouring water over her head using the washrag.

It's been a really great month and Piper is just the sweetest little girl! We can't wait to see what next month brings!

Conversations with Caleb - The Teenage Edition

2009-04-29T12:47:00.003-04:00

So, around our house we have been teaching Caleb that saying yes ma'am/sir is the correct response to a request from a person who is older than/in charge of him. Here is the actual conversation from this morning, oh wait, this can be applied to most requests we make of him:

Me: Caleb please go _________ (fill in the blank)

Caleb: O-KAY !(imagine the way you, at the age of 15 or 16, responded to your mom or dad when they asked you to do something )

Me: Um, excuse me??? (trying to get him to use yes ma'am)

Caleb: Al-RIGHT!

Me: "the look"

Caleb: (in a very meek voice) Yes Ma'am.

I have a 15 year old trapped in a 4 year old body. Somebody help me.

Update- In Other Words A Post In Which I Have No Idea For a Title

2009-04-27T22:06:00.005-04:00

So, I've been SO bad about updating lately. Here is the latest in bullet form (ie the lazy way out):

Piper's swallow study came back normal. She had a few penetrations, where the thinnest fluid started to enter her airway but she cleared them herself, but they were ok with that and she was cleared to consume anything and everything in every thickness/thiness.
Piper has reached some amazing milestones this past month that I will not divulge now as her 10 month post is coming up very soon.
I have been working a lot and like every semester, we are deep into the most busy time of the semester where students are finishing up last minute work and taking tests and finals. This just means more grading for me. Last night I returned a 5 inch pile of papers back to my students and came home with a 7 inch pile. (Evidently I have a little time if I'm measuring the height of my work to be done.)
Caleb has been doing well and we are working on getting him signed up for fun stuff for the summer. I am really excited about summer starting and all the fun we will have.
I have also been doing a lot of MOPS stuff lately as well as we are wrapping up the semester and year and are all changing roles. I have decided to step out of the creative activities coordinator role in favor of membership coordinator. I just had to take a hard and close look at how my current role in MOPS is affecting both myself and my family and I decided that with the coming year and new responsibilities, I needed a job that was more administrative in nature.
Jes and I were in freak out mode for quite a few weeks there, most of the reason for my lack of posting. It's really hard to "get it together" and complete a post about whatever when you are worried about something big. What it boiled down to was my employment for the summer and whether or not I would have anything at all. While this may not seem like a huge deal, it really is vital to the structuring of our finances for the whole year. Whatever I make in the summer goes right into savings as there are months where I am working, but am not getting paid. It's strange, but it's just the way the system is set up. We just have to be prepared, so summer does that for me. True to form, at the last minute 2 classes (exactly what I needed) came up, with a little rearranging of the schedule, and they were mine.
Jes and I are also working on our vacation. What I haven't told you about our trip? Ok, here goes. We are going to California, LA area, for a family reunion and heading to Disney Land while we are there. Then we are driving up to Oregon to spend about a week with Jes's parents there. Oh, wait, we're driving all of this too. With both kids. Yes, I know we're slightly out of our minds, but we are both trying to be optimistic and are actually looking forward to seeing DFW in our rearview mirror and the adventures that we will encounter (within reason, of course!). We leave the middle of July, but I will be working right up until the day so we're trying to get our ducks in a row before then.

Hm, I guess that's it. Oh and my last post about Stellan, he was discharged and is on his way home to his big brothers, sister and daddy as we speak! I'll be back in the next day or two with Piper's 10 month post. Sniff.

The Mathis Family

Why I've Been So Quiet

Life Change

Merry Christmas!

Catching Up

Conversations with Caleb - Syllable Edition

It Finally Happened

Hearing Test - Take 2

Surgery Results

Surgery for Piper

Job Changes

First Day of School 2011

Getting Back In the Swing Of Things

Story Time With Caleb - The Three Little Pigs

Three

1 Year Ago

Dogs

Results

Hearing

The Newest Mathis Family Members

Caleb's 6 Year Appointment

Seriously?!? What Is Wrong With me???

Eye Update

Feb 9-16, 2011

Snow

Neglect

Dance

2 and a half

Half Way Through

Conversations with Caleb- Disturbed Edition

The Boy Wonder (and his Mother) Needs Your Prayers **Updated**

Pumpkin Bread Recipe

Cancer and Competition

Yearly Photos with The Boy Wonder and his Trusty Side Kick

3 Month Post Op Visits

Homecoming 2010

Thinking

Birthday

Catching Up - Health Edition

Tomorrow Is The Day

The Plan, It Has Changed. Again.

My Big Girl

Perspective

Endocrinologist Appointment and the Plan

How Are You?

Surgery, Post op and Pathology Report

Pre Op

The Low Down

Why I REALLY Think Cancer Sucks.

Zoo

That's Not the News I was Hoping For...

An Unexpected Victory

Conversations with Piper - Age, again.

Conversations With Piper

Some Days

The Decision

A Typical Conversation...

Health Update

Happy Birthday Caleb!

Caleb's Story Part 4

Caleb's Story Part 3

Caleb's Story Part 2

Caleb's Story Part 1

School Update

Stretched

Another

Pneumonia Update

Here We Go Again

Just Add It To The List

Cold.

Piper's First Haircut

2009 Review

Chatty Piper

aaaaaaaand the saga continues (cue the Star Wars Theme here)...

Sarah

Thankful

Fall Fun

Health Update

The Goings On Round Here.

The Post In Which I Freak the Heck Out

The Boy Wonder (and his Mother) Needs Your Prayers Updated