Happy things

Today I cried. That was not happy, but I needed it. My son, not even two years old, came over to hug me and pat me on the head.

Later, I was cuddling with my son under a blanket on the couch, watching Curious George before his bedtime. Both of the dogs came up, Gilly lying down between my and the kiddo with his head on my shoulder, and Trip behind my curled legs. Cuddles with all 3 of my babies at once. Doesn’t get much better,

Even later. Trip snuggling next to me, sarm, his fur so soft, his paws smelling like Doritos.

Mom’s Sick Day

Last week, we experienced one of the inevitable side effects of taking our son to daycare– his first cold. This wasn’t too terrible, honestly, as he only had one day where he seemed really unhappy, and everyone says it’s better for him to get the germs now and build immunity, rather than be exposed to everything at once in Kindergarten. I am lucky enough that my work allows me to take sick time to care for my sick child, so the one day I had to keep him out of daycare, it was okay. It was actually not bad at all, because he slept pretty much all day– just what his little body needed to fight those germs, I’m sure– so I got to have a semi-relaxing/productive day at home. I could have even worked from home, but I didn’t clear that ahead of time, so I didn’t. I’m sure we are in for worse sick-baby days in the (probably near) future, but I felt pretty confident with how we weathered that first little storm. I was kind of worried about the first cold and how tough it would be; turns out I didn’t need to be so worried about (at least) the first cold.

What I should have been worried about was the first time I got sick with a young baby! Two nights ago, my throat began to feel sore. Later that night, the body aches started… pretty soon, the dreaded influenza was full on, complete with fever, chills, and headache. (Luckily I was spared any gastrointestinal discomfort.) But what the crap? Didn’t I get a shot to prevent this?? It’s been awhile since I had the flu, and I’d forgotten how much it can suck. And of course, the baby, who normally is a pretty good sleeper, woke up at 3am alllll sweaty, so I had to change all his clothes, which woke him up thoroughly and made it harder to get him to go back to sleep. Rocking him, trying to get him to sleep without getting him sick(er), was agony. I felt like hell. So I called in sick to work.

I don’t know if I got sick from my son or if I got something else entirely (the symptoms seem to be different), but I hope I got it from him, because I really don’t want to give him what I have! I also don’t know if you’re supposed to bring a kid to daycare if he’s potentially been exposed to the flu from a sick parent… but I didn’t really have any choice yesterday. My body and head hurt so badly that it was all I could do to get him dressed and drop him off at daycare (dad had to work at 6:30 and our daycare doesn’t open until 9, so I had to be the one to do it). I contemplated stopping for a coffee on the way home from the drop off and decided not to– and those of you know know me well know that almost nothing can keep me from my coffee! I drove home, kept the dogs confined, ate half a banana, and went up to bed. I slept until about noon when I got up to feed the dogs, eat something, and pump, then I went back to bed until almost 3. Still felt like crap all evening and went to bed early.

When I woke up at 3 to feed the baby, I felt maybe not quite as bad as the night before. Still, I decided to stay home from work again, seeing as the flu is generally contagious for the first 48 hours, and I figured I could use some more rest.

Today was a little different from yesterday. I got the baby ready for daycare, dropped him off, and then… I got coffee! A better start already. At that point, though, I should have gone home to rest and recuperate. But no, I didn’t. Here’s what I did:

-Made a “quick” Target stop to pick up paper towels, take advantage of a good sale on diapers and formula (for supplementing), and pick up some prescriptions.
-Ended up taking a lot longer than I thought, because I realized we needed some clothes for our family photo shoot on Saturday, so I purchased a couple of shirts, then I picked out a swimsuit suitable for my post-pregnancy body, and picked out Father’s Day cards for all fathers involved.

-Got home just in time to meet the guys who came to tune up the furnace and air (even though they were supposed to come between 4 and 6)

-Fed the dogs and let them out

-Folded laundry

-Wrote Father’s Day card for my dad

-Let the dogs in

-Washed baby feeding implements

-Pumped

-Ate lunch

-Let the dogs out

-Watched 1/2 hour of TV while doing Target survey in hopes of winning a $25 gift card (I didn’t)

-Let the dogs in

-Tried to take nap, couldn’t sleep

-Let the dogs out

-Vacuumed

-Put blankets in laundry

-Gathered paper and plastic bags to recycle

-When the spouse got home with baby in tow, loaded up baby and went to Menard’s to pick up a new filter for the furnace

-Went back to Target to recycle plastic bags and pick up a couple things I forgot

-Nursed baby

-Put dinner in oven (okay, it was a frozen meal from Let’s Dish– thanks, Mom and Dad!)

-Fed dogs and let them out

-Put cloth diapers in wash

-Ran dishwasher

-Showered

-Ate dinner

-Nursed baby again

-Put baby to bed

-Chased down dog who had escaped from the yard

-Turned mattress and hanged sheets on bed

-Emptied dishwasher

-Washed non-dishwasher-safe dishes

-Washed baby feeding implements again

-Checked to make sure baby was still sleeping (he wasn’t)

and finally

-Nursed baby again and put him back to bed (which took like half an hour)

So…. yeah. So that happened. 😀

My throat is still sore, but tomorrow I better go to work. I’ll get more rest there.

/mom

In-home Medical Treatments

Well, here I am at almost 37 weeks pregnant. I kind of can’t believe that in about 3 weeks, our son will be born and I’ll have my body back to myself. But I can’t wait!! Aside from finally meeting our baby, I am so excited to be able to tie my shoes, wear my wedding rings again, wear normal clothes, not snore, eat sushi, drink wine, and be comfortable when I sleep. 

Between now and then, though, I’m getting iron treatments by IV to get my ferritin (iron stores) up. My doctor informed me that they were extremely low, and I was taking about the maximum amount of iron by oral supplement that a person can possibly absorb in a day. And my body apparently wasn’t absorbing it well enough. Therefore, the IV infusions. I have to get 5 infusions over the course of 14 days– two are done already. I’m actually glad to be doing it, because I was having a hard time taking all that iron (it’s hard on the stomach), and I was feeling pretty drained a lot of the time and having crazy restless legs. After 2 treatments, I already feel more energetic, and the restless legs seem to be a bit better too.

The thing I don’t care for about the IV infusions is that for some reason the nurse comes to my house to do it. I don’t know why– I’m certainly not homebound, and I would actually prefer to go to the clinic, but I wasn’t given another option. So a stranger comes to my house, brings a bunch of medical equipment, and puts an IV in my arm. 

Now, getting the IV isn’t exactly pleasant. The first time, I almost passed out. I think because she first had to take 2 vials of blood, and well, being anemic already, that made me a bit light headed. Once I got over that, the treatment was fine. My second treatment was better– she didn’t have to take blood and I didn’t almost pass out. She had to put it in my wrist because the doctor had just taken blood from the inside of my elbow that morning, and the IV hurt a bit more in the wrist than in the arm. But even the IV isn’t the most unpleasant part of this treatment.

The worst part is having a stranger in my house, making my dogs crazy, spreading her shit out everywhere, and requiring me to make small talk while the IV drips. Ugh. The first treatment was especially bad, because my spouse was sleeping, so I had to try to keep the dogs quiet… which didn’t work. For my second treatment, my husband was home and he took the dogs with him to the basement, which was much better. Also the first treatment was longer, due to my almost fainting and the fact that she had to do a bunch of paperwork for me. Finally, she brought all the stuff over on the first visit, and there was medical shit eeeevvverywhere. I did not care for that. Especially because she evidently dropped/lost a bag of caps or something that go to the IV. My husband found it and threw it away, but what if the dogs had found it first? And what if it was needles!!

Luckily, the second treatment went much better. The dogs were less annoying with my husband there. It wasn’t nearly as long of a visit, which meant less small talk. And we didn’t have to small talk the whole time, because she was doing some work on her computer while I was being infused. And she’d left all the pertinent medical crap at our house, so it was all contained in this one bag and wasn’t spread out everywhere. So as far as having a stranger in my house for an extended amount of time goes, it wasn’t so bad. But still. I’ll be glad when the next 3 treatments are done!

2013 in Review

I’ve seen several posts on Facebook about how terrible 2013 was for many people. I’m very sorry for everyone who had a rough year… but mine has been great! 2012 was more difficult for me, and I guess the first half of 2013 was a bit trying as well, but oeverall, the good definitely outweighs the bad.

January

On New Year’s Day, I turned 32. At that time I was undergoing fertility testing after 2+ years of trying to get pregnant with no luck. This was not very enjoyable. Fertility testing is painful, both physically and emotionally.

A good thing that happened in January was that we got the band together! I’d been wanting to try to form this group since Fest of 2012, and in January it finally came together, and I’m very happy it did!

February

In February we had our first practices with the band, and Rob and I took a trip to Mexico.

Being romanced by a pirate in Mexico

March

In March, Rob had a surgery that was designed to improve our fertility. I was pretty optimistic about the success of the surgery, but it was also difficult because it definitely was not guaranteed to help, and both of our doctors were already implying that IVF might be our best hope, which made it difficult to maintain my optimism. I was so proud of Rob though– he underwent the surgery very willingly and without any complaint.

In March my BFF also revealed to me that she was pregnant. Although I was of course really happy for her, I couldn’t help feeling simultaneously sad for myself– a most unpleasant state of affairs.

April

In April, we adopted our second dog, Gilly. I’m happy to report that things are still going great with him! Trip was jealous at first of his new little brother, and he still gets jealous over toys and cuddle time with us, but every day they are becoming more and more like a pack. They haven’t quite reached the point where they will cuddle together, but Trip will now tolerate Gilly being right next to him on the couch. He also gives Gilly kisses on the nose, which is pretty sweet. We’re still working with Gilly on his mouthing and jumping, but overall he’s a pretty well-behaved pup, and he is only 2, so he’s still a young thing.

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New Dog, Take II

After the debacle we had with our first second dog, I’m happy to report that things are going great with our second attempt at a second dog. Gilligan is a great boy. He’s about a year and a half old and came from a shelter in Alabama or Arkansas or somewhere in the South, and he hasn’t had a whole lot of training, so he does have a couple of bad habits. He’s still learning what he should and should not put his teeth on. (Should: food, dog toys, Trip– in play of course; Shouldn’t: shoes, furniture, people.) But luckily as far as chewing goes, he’s really only chewed up one of my shoes, and a corner of our ottoman, which was on its last leg anyway. He hasn’t chewed on any other furniture. And while he does still mouth at us in play sometimes, it is clearly in play and he never bites hard enough to break the skin, like Odo did. He also responds to us telling him “No bite!” unlike Odo, who was impossible to control once he started biting.

 Trip has also taken to Gilly a lot more than he ever did with Odo. We’ve had Gilly for about 3 weeks now, and they have been sleeping in a proper dog pile for at least a week– something Trip never did with Odo. By the end of his 3-week stint with us, Trip still only reluctantly got up on the couch if Odo was already there. But Trip seems to have accepted Gilly as part of the pack. 🙂 And how could he not, look at that face!

A Day in the Life of an Introvert

This is an account of a fictional but pretty typical day.

7:40 am: 

I stop for coffee on my way to work. Since I stop there frequently, I know the baristas.  At least, I know them by sight, and they know me (and my drink order!)– as far as I know they don’t know my name. I walk in and see that it’s the dark-haired girl making drinks. I only know her name because randomly they wore name tags for a couple of days. The dark-haired girl’s name tag read “emily.” I like her–she’s nice.

But do I rejoice that I will get to talk to her? Nope! Instead, all kinds of thoughts are running through my mind: When should I say hello– right when I see her? She looks busy. Should I say my drink order at the register, or do I assume that they remember it when I hand them my reusable mug?

I overhear another patron asking emily about her vacation. Do they know each other outside of the patron-barista relationship? How, in interactions that last a few minutes a day, did they get to the point where they know about each other’s lives? I don’t know how to do that– I can make conversation, but it’s restricted to the niceties and talk about the weather. Which, granted, in Minnesota is actually an interesting topic, but still.

At any rate, I have cordial but superficial interactions with the dude and the dark-haired girl as I go about getting my coffee. They make excellent coffee, which is an introvert’s best friend.

8:15 am:

I get to work and get settled in, and open up my email. There it is: a message from Auto Forward, with the subject line “Fwd: (612.XXX.XXXX) 01:18 Voice Message.” It’s a voicemail. Oh, crap on a cracker, I think as I put in my headphones to listen to it. As I listen, I evaluate whether I can justifiably respond by email instead of calling the person back. Maybe the caller will leave an email address in their message, thereby giving me permission to respond by email. No such luck. Or, maybe it’s one of my students, who has questions that require web links or attachments?  Nope, it’s a parent–strike two. Even worse, they don’t specify their questions in their message– it’s just “I have some questions about the Montpellier program.” So there’s no chance I can just call and hopefully leave the answers on their voicemail. No, there is simply no way around it– I am going to have to have a phone conversation.

As I pick up the phone and dial the number, I can feel my heartbeat speed up and my body temperature rise. Why! I know I will have the answers, and more often than not, the parents I speak to on the phone are pleasant and thank me for answering their questions. This is the case today– the mother I speak to tells me I’ve been very helpful and thanks me for my time. There’s no rational reason to be nervous, but there’s just something about this method of communication that causes me stress. It’s infuriating.

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Mexico

We just got back from a vacation in Mexico. Neither of us had ever been there, and it was definitely different than anywhere else I’d ever traveled. I’d never been to a place that caters SO MUCH to American tourist. We stayed on Cozumel, and we couldn’t even find an ATM that would dispense pesos there– we could only get US dollars. Usually my travel advice is just to get money out of the ATM in local currency instead of bringing cash and paying exchange fees, but in this case that wasn’t the wisest idea– it was expensive to get money out of the ATM, and everyplace took US dollars anyway. Also sunscreen was super expensive! We didn’t bring any because we didn’t check luggage, but we considered buying it at the airport in Dallas inside security (where we had a layover), but thought it would be more expensive there than in Mexico. Boy were we wrong– it was like $15 for a normal-sized bottle– and in 5 days we nearly went through 2 bottles. So those are my two pieces of advise for anyone (Americans, anyway) traveling to any of the tourist meccas in Mexico– just bring a bunch of cash and plan to use US dollars, and bring sunscreen!

Aside from those two small inconveniences, the trip was great. We have a lot going on right now between my husband’s work issues and corresponding emotional distress, trying unsuccessfully to have a baby, etc, and both of us needed this vacation like we’d never needed one before. I feel amazingly rejuvenated.

Our first afternoon down there, Tuesday, it was a bit rainy, so instead of going to the beach or pool or anything, we went into the town, San Miguel, on Cozumel. Our hotel was about 10 minutes’ drive outside of town, and we did end up renting a car (we got a roped into a time share presentation, but it did get us a good deal on the car– $50 + 90 minutes of our time for the week). I liked the town a lot. My husband thought it seemed a bit unsafe, because outside of the tourist area it looks a little bit run down. But I reminded him that we weren’t in the US, and when we went on our excursion to Chichen Itza the next day, our tour guide, Mitch (who my spouse had a bit of a man crush on, haha), reiterated that. He told us the island is very safe, even though we might feel like it’s unsafe because places that look how parts of the island look would be considered slums in the US. Sad but true. Anyway, it reassured my spouse, which was good.

One of the first things we saw was these dogs standing on the roof in San Miguel and barking. It was awesome.

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We no longer have 2 dogs

This is both sad and a relief. We had several incidents of biting; both my husband and I got bit several times, with about half of those breaking the skin. It was really scary because he didn’t give any warning signs like most dogs do… there was no growling, bearing of teeth, or snarling before he went in to full on biting mode. The first bite happened the day after we got him, when my husband was home alone with him for the first time. We have no idea what set him off, and it didn’t seem like aggression really, but my husband received 3 bites that day. We called the rescue that we got him from, and were informed that we had every right to surrender him back to the rescue… but that their policy is to euthanized dogs who have bitten a human. We both felt strongly that we didn’t want that to happen, and that since the obedience classes were starting in a few days, we’d at least give it a bit more time.

All was relatively well after that until Christmas day, when we were at my parents’ house and the smoke alarm went off. That set Odo off, out of fear I’m sure, but I received a bite on the arm (not a bad one, but it did break the skin slightly) and my spouse received a pretty bad bite on the chest. A few days later, he bit my husband again, luckily no skin breaks, but then the next day (New Years Eve) he came after me, again, with no discernible trigger. I received a bite on the leg (my jeans protected me and that one didn’t even leave a mark), on my breast (didn’t break the skin but there is a bruise) and on the arm (broke the skin in several places and looks pretty nasty).

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New Dog

This past week has been very busy. We brought home a new puppy (pit bull/American bulldog mix) last Sunday, and man, I’d forgotten how much work a new dog can be! Our new puppy, Odo, is not even that young—he’s 7 months—but he and Trip together are kind of a handful!

The week was also difficult because, as is not unusual during times of stress, my spouse and I had a big fight. But we talked it out, and ultimately I think it will be good to have 2 dogs. Odo and Trip play really well together—they love wrestling, running in the yard and playing tug. One of the main reasons we got the second dog is that Trip has soo much energy (even though Odo’s the puppy, Trip is usually the one instigating the play!), and we just can’t take him to the park every day, which is the only thing that really tires him out. So far, it seems like Odo will help with that! Trip is still not sure about accepting Odo as a member of the pack, especially sharing cuddle time with him, but I think he’ll get there. It’s hard being an older sibling.

Odo’s a cutie pie. He loooves cuddling, and will immediately jump up on the couch next to me or the spouse when we sit down, curl up and go to sleep. (Trip doesn’t like that because he’s usually not fast enough to get a spot by the human, if there’s only one of us on the couch, or if we are both there, he seems to want his choice of human.) Odo also likes to cuddle under covers—we’ve been letting the dogs come up in our bed with me when the spouse leaves for work this past week, so we don’t have to re-kennel Odo or worry about them chewing stuff up downstairs. Odo jumps up into bed and tries to wiggle down under the covers . I’m kind of afraid he won’t be able to breathe, but it doesn’t seem to bother him.

Fest 2012! Opening Weekend Recap

Fest 2012! Opening Weekend Recap

I’m finally getting around to recapping Opening Weekend.

It was good. Really, really good. We had amazing weather (mid-70s and sunny), and things went remarkably smoothly for opening weekend. Yes, there was a huge CF at the entrance Saturday morning, and yes, we were a bit rusty with some of the harmony parts and also remembering repeats, so there were a couple of mishaps with music. But by the end of the day Saturday, we were getting back into the groove, and there weren’t really any major problems within our group or with Fest management. Amazing!

I did have a garb malfunction on Saturday—one of the straps on my bodice came unsewed, and when I went to get my needle and thread to repair it… I couldn’t find my needle. So I had to safety pin it for awhile. But later I happened to randomly find my needle, so I shored it up for the rest of the day and reinforced it Saturday night when I got home.

Besides my needle, I also managed to lose my site pass and my fan on opening day. Crikey! Luckily, some kind soul had turned in my pass at the information booth, and the front gate people know our group so they let me back onsite without the pass until I could retrieve it. Yay! I never did find the fan, but out of the 3 things I lost, that was the most expendable at the time.

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