For the most part she’s doing pretty well…but there are times she just looks so tired and pathetic…
Then she fell asleep holding the wipes.
Category Archives: Health & Well-Being
She’s still a happy baby…
…even sick AND with pink eye.
Katie’s turn.
Aaaaand Katie now has pink eye. At least we already have the drops (and a standing refill, thanks to the PA). She’s also congested, stuffed up, and coughing.
I don’t like this sharing sickness thing we have going on here. Whose bright idea was it to have two kids anyway?
🙂
The sick whining.
He woke up from his nap crying and by the time I got downstairs to him, he just couldn’t seem to stop. Everything I asked him just seemed to make it worse. 🙁
He obviously doesn’t feel well but doesn’t know how to express it—and isn’t used to it since he’s never been sick like this before.
It just breaks your heart. Grandparents, you might not want to watch. 🙁
Cute sick napper
He’s sick but still cute when he naps.
Poor kid.
Feeling icky is no fun.
Sick kids are no fun.
Owen has been sick for the past few days…basically just running a fever and being cranky.
And on the topic of running a fever, how annoying is it that I can’t get a good reading? I have taken Owen’s temp three different times/places (with the doctor-recommended temporal artery thermometer) and it varied from 101 to 103.5. Seriously? I even tried one with a normal digital thermometer and that didn’t help much, either.
- First temporal artery (forehead) was 103.5.
- Second forehead was 101.5.
- Behind the ear was 101.
- Armpit was 103.5.
- Under the tongue is nearly impossible so I didn’t even try.
WTF?! I guess I could break out the rectal if I was super worried.
So anyway…he wasn’t acting like he had a 103 temp which was the only reason I didn’t really freak out (and my mom friends told me that apparently 104+ is the new temp to worry about with kids these days as long as they’re acting okay and drinking okay—which he was). You’d think that with an almost 4-year-old I’d be well-versed in how to deal with a sick kid…but he’s only been sick like once before!!
The worst thing, I think, is that he HATES to take medicine in ANY form. He starts freaking out and crying at the mere mention of needing to take medicine. And even if you give him the choice of how he wants to take it (meltaway tabs, liquid from a cup, liquid from a syringe), he will still vomit it up every time. Well, most every time, but close enough to every time to say every time. 😐
When we were at UNC we had him try and take a melting tablet (seriously, it’s like a Sweet Tart—super yummy and sweet—that melts in your mouth in about 10 seconds) and he freaked out. Flat refuses to swallow. This time, he held it for like 5 minutes at which point he spit most of it out. Then he continued refusing to swallow until he had to say something. So all he got was about 1/4 of one pill, so 1/16 of the recommended dose. And of course he’s a whining snotty mess the whole time, like we’re sticking him with a hot poker. We did get lots of empathetic glances, though (we were in the children’s wing of UNC).
When we got home I thought I’d be sneaky and crush up a tablet into his yogurt. Ha. That was a laugh. After one bite I had grape juice vomit halfway across my living room. I think he’s just so aware of textures and changes to his regular foods that he just KNOWS.
It’s just SOOOOO frustrating.
Genetic Testing Results
Today we went to UNC Chapel Hill to the Pediatric Genetics clinic to get the results of Owen’s (and Tom’s) genetic tests explained to us. (This was from when Owen had his blood drawn back in April—it takes a month or so to get the results, and then Tom and I had to get ours done and wait another month, and then it took a few months to get into the specialist.)
Previously, all we had been able to tell from the greek-to-us multi-page results was that both Owen and Tom had the exact same markers (Owen’s and mine didn’t match at all so I basically got no results for me). But the thing with genetic testing (that our developmental pediatrician told us) is that there are MILLIONS of combinations of things and the science is still so new that they maybe only know what (for example) 50,000 of the possible five million results mean. So while they can tell you something isn’t right, they can’t tell you exactly what effect that might have.
So today we got to talk with a genetic counselor who gave us more information. She still couldn’t really give us any more information on what effect the gene mutation has (like if it’s the direct cause of his autism or autistic tendencies) but she was able to tell us enough about the mutation that we can pretty much rule out it being anything serious.
Let’s see if I can explain this.
Basically, the part of the gene that has the mutation is in the middle of the chain—which is better than at either end where two chains connect (if it was at either end, it would definitely cause much more noticeable issues). So my brain worked it out as “It would be like origination and destination points of your trip are set in stone, but the route is variable. If either end changes, the whole thing changes, but if the route changes, it’s not a big deal.” She agreed it was an apt correlation.
Also, the other good point is that he isn’t MISSING anything on the strand—he actually has an extra set of something (his own plus the double set from Tom for a total of three instead of the normal two). And the set of three is fine—if there were four sets it would be a major problem. And lastly, since Tom has the identical genetic mutation and had absolutely no issues growing up (or today), it’s very unlikely (statistically impossible) that it is causing Owen’s issues.
So taking that and all his background (and our family’s backgrounds) into consideration, she didn’t see any reason to think this mutation was the cause of the autism and said we really don’t have anything to worry about. She will research it more to see if she can find anything, but she doesn’t expect to find much. She said the only time we will likely need to think about it again is when he hits the teenage years and/or wants to have kids—in case they have come up with a defining characteristic of that specific mutation or if it will have any effect on his own kids. We were told not to worry about getting Katie tested at all unless we started to notice any issues.
So basically everything scientifically is good…now I just have to get the in-home therapy started so we can work on his minor issues.
Sick kids suck.
Why does no one warn you that sick kids refuse to take medicine, and if they finally do try taking it, they make themselves vomit?
Owen was an absolute CHAMP taking liquid Tylenol this morning. So when we tried after his nap? He took it, but refused to swallow it…just swishing it around in his mouth, with it slowly dripping out. I kept telling him he needed to swallow it and to NOT spit it out. So of course he started crying, which led to barfing…every single thing from breakfast six hours before—including whole chunks of bagel that he apparently didn’t chew.
Ugh.
I caught most of it in a blanket, but he still hit the couch and it was all over him.
So he had to take a bath AND take the medicine again. The second time he opted for the dissolvable candy-like pills (I always give him an option)—and he STILL looked like he wanted to vomit except he was completely empty.
Sick kids suck. (And I’m hoping the fever is directly related to the pink eye and he’s not actually sick because tomorrow we head to Chapel Hill for his genetics appointment and Friday Tom and I have an event to go to with friends).
I guess this is the payback I get for him never being sick when he was little.
It’s going to be a long day.
My mom-hearing kept me on alert most of the night…Owen has been frequently getting up/whining in the middle of the night, and 2/3 of the time I end up going to his room to resettle him (Sunday night was 10:45, 12:15, and 4:00) so last night I was expecting it—especially with his yucky eye—so every little sound woke me up. Most of them were actually Tom snoring or his nose whistling, but mom hearing apparently can’t discern that too well from a half-asleep state, which then requires me to wake myself up more to REALLY listen. 😐 Then Tom’s alarm went off at 4:30 and I haven’t been able to fall back to sleep…
I think I’d be better off if I shut our door and just didn’t hear anything…except then I’d feel bad missing Owen if he was having issues. 🙁 (Oh, and his door stays open now because he DOES NOT want it closed. So I’m hearing more of his normal nighttime noises anyway…)
Diagnosis: Pink Eye
Yep. Owen has pink eye. 🙁
We noticed his left eye looked a little bloodshot Saturday but didn’t really think much about it. We noticed it Sunday as well…and this time there was a little extra “sleep” in the morning. I watched it all day and it wasn’t getting better—but he wasn’t itching it and he didn’t say it hurt and there wasn’t any discharge. Until this morning. His eye was pretty crusty and there was discharge. Ugh. We got an appointment at 2:15 where pink eye was confirmed by a lovely PA.
The poor kid looks so pathetic (I told Tom his eye looks drunk) and he HATES the eye drops (I wish he could understand the drops are the lesser of two evils—the cream would be even worse to apply) but he’s a trooper.
And he was AWESOME at the clinic. It was a bit of a wait—15m early for new patient paperwork, 30m to get into a room, 30m waiting to see the doctor, and probably another 10-15 with the PA—but he kept busy and was in good spirits. He let himself be weighed without complaint. He let himself get measured without complaint. And he even was pretty good with the blood pressure!
Weight: 56#
Height: 44.75″
BP: 100/65
Then when the PA was examining him, he was great with her looking in his ears, listening to his chest (and taking deep breaths!), and shining light into his eyes. He was SO good he earned a toy!!
Magical B
After a long day, I was laying on the floor trying to stretch out my back. I was moaning and groaning because a) it hurts and b) of all the fat on my body why is there none on my tailbone so I can lay flat on my back without pain…where was I? Oh yes, Owen hears me and says “Mama, you okay?”
I say “Yes, Owen. Thank you. Mommy’s back hurts.”
He throws his B on top of me and says “Here, a B will make you better!”
Then he went and got his other B and came and laid down next to me.
Katie’s four-month appointment
Weight: 15 lbs. 15 oz. (was 13 lbs. 4oz.)—between percentile 75 and 90
Length: 25-3/4″ (was 23-1/2″)—between percentile 75 and 90
Head: 16-1/2″ (first measurement that I have)—between percentile 50 and 75
I prepped her with Ibuprofen this time…and it seems to have helped overall (no bouts of screaming once we got home). However, at the time, it was a different story. First, strangely, she absolutely FREAKED OUT when the doctor checked her ears. Screaming like she’s never screamed before. The doc said everything was fine, so then it was off for the immunizations (another room at the clinic)…where she started screaming as soon as I set her on the table. And then boy did she scream. BOY DID SHE SCREAM. Probably twice as loud and horrific-sounding as when she was getting her ears checked. It definitely made me grateful for what little crying she actually does at home. Then it was over and she stopped crying by the time I had made her next appointment and we were walking out—and she fell asleep by the time we walked to the car. Good baby. 🙂
Just for comparison, at four months, Owen was 16 lbs. 1 oz. (so only 2oz different—and they were using an old skool scale (vs. digital) so it may have been off just a bit) and he was 1/4″ taller…so they are almost identical!
Good thing the couch is comfy.
Tom has been sick for a few days which means he’s been snoring a little extra at night. Sometimes I can stand it (if I happen to fall asleep during a lull) or sometimes I try to sleep (which ends up to be crappy tossing-and-turning-and-waiting-all-night sleep)…so last night I just gave up at the start and went to sleep on the couch. The first time in 11 years of marriage.
It’s a good thing the couch is pretty comfy.
Helping, Camping, Playing
Owen was a big help getting Katie inside for my doctor’s appointment today.
It was an OB appointment so I didn’t really want Owen there (the kid certainly doesn’t need to be traumatized like that!), but he’s been a little sick so I couldn’t take him to daycare. Luckily there was a curtain which I turned into a tent and camping experience—which he loved. Phew! Now he’d hopefully be occupied and not see me in the stirrups. 🙂 And he liked peeking out at me.
And of course afterwards he had to play around…
His cough hurts.
Oh no. Owen just said his cough hurts. That’s certainly a cute way to describe what I’m guessing is a sore throat, but I really hope it’s not. Stay tuned.
Heaven help me.
So as you know, Owen pitches a major fit about taking the liquid medicine. So when his temp was still around 101 this morning, I knew I had a fight ahead of me. 😐
And no amount of cajoling was working, so I had to use the syringe because he FLAT OUT refused to take it. He didn’t love the syringe and actually could have made it impossible, but we did it.
So then I remembered we had tiny dissolvable allergy strips (tabs?) that he took really well, and I asked on Facebook if such a thing existed for non-allergies and ended up running to CVS to get some. Except they turned out to be huge chewable tablets and not the tiny super fast dissolving ones (my bad for using the drive-thru and having the pharmacists pick something off the shelf instead of me looking at EVERY option).
Yeah, you can see where this is going…he refused to take those, too. Yes, they look and taste like candy…but he apparently doesn’t like that kind of candy. SERIOUSLY?! But really, I shouldn’t be surprised.
So it was another fight, with me telling him he had to pick one or the other. And he chose the liquid!! And it was still a fight. With tears and snot and drool and the whole nine yards (including lots of I’m not happys! thrown in for good measure). And as soon as it’s over, he’s happy and laughing like nothing ever happened.
Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.
Owen is still sad.
Owen seemed to be doing better after his nap and was enjoying playing games with daddy. His temp was still hovering around 100 so we decided to wait and medicate him at bedtime.
He had a light dinner of toast with peanut butter and yogurt, and things seemed fine. Then it was time for medicine…which is always a bit of a fight. It took some time and cajoling and a bit of mess, but he finally took it. And as Tom was in with him washing his hands (I did say it got messy!) he barfed up everything.
Whether it’s psychological and he hates taking the medicine so he throws up…or whether him fighting us on it riles up his stomach…or whether the medicine itself actually makes him queasy…it’s not the first time it’s happened.
Of course, his response was “I’m sad.” 🙁
After that, however, he seemed perfectly fine and was running around like normal. We did make him take more medicine (since he threw up literally 60 seconds after he finished taking the last dose, he obviously had nothing in his system) and that stayed down.
We’re hoping tomorrow goes better.
Sidenote: We reconfirmed that I deal better with poop and Tom deals better with vomit. We make a good pair. 🙂
Someone is sad.
So Owen was eating a snack of apples and peanut butter and I was on the computer when I hear him say he needs a wipe. Okay, fine. That’s normal.
I go out there and he has thrown up his apples and peanut butter all over the place—on himself, his B, the blanket he was sitting on, a stuffed animal toy… He was just sitting there looking totally dejected and says “I’m sad.” 🙁
I hadn’t heard any ruckus, so I asked if he had choked on the apples and he said yes. He didn’t seem totally confident, so I asked if his stomach hurt and he said yes. So who knows what really happened.
He felt warm so I took his temp: 101.7. EEK! Talk about feeling completely clueless…he’s only been sick like twice so I didn’t really even know what to do! He seemed fine overall so I just let him lay on the couch and drink water. I waited a bit and took his temp again because I figured he might have just been hot and sweaty from throwing up (I know it happens to me—and I was using one of those forehead thermometers and it said if you were sweaty it might misread). I took it like 20 minutes later and it was down to 100.
Poor kid.
Doctor Owen
Tom wasn’t feeling well so went to lie down in the bedroom.
Owen: Where’s daddy?
Me: He’s laying down.
Owen: Why?
Me: He doesn’t feel good.
Owen: He hurts?
Me: Yes.
Owen: I need to go give daddy a band-aid.
Awwww.
No, but awwww.
Today I was a zen master.
Or maybe I should say a zenpoop master? Or a poopzen master? Whatever you want to call it, I was it.
I was calm.
I was cool.
I was collected.
I promised Owen I wouldn’t yell at him again.
I told him it was okay if he pooped in his underwear (but I’d still like him to try to poop in the potty).
I told him he wouldn’t be in trouble.
You see, in talking about this whole ordeal with my mom friends, I came to the conclusion that the Miralax might actually be making it harder (in a sense) for him to poop successfully—since if it was making the stool too soft, he might not realize he had to poop and then OOPS before you know it, it’s there. And if he really isn’t able to control it, then OHMYGOD do I feel guilty about getting mad at him, you know? As a friend pointed out, he’s still learning what it takes to poop—especially since it’s different than pooping in a diaper, we’re guessing he had constipation and possibly pain issues, and now with the drugs it’s a different feeling/experience yet! Ugh, talk about mom guilt. 😥
Hence the zen master.
Luckily it was a pretty easy day so I wasn’t REALLY tested…but we still went through (I think) five pair of underwear. But there were no HUGE disasters, which I think can be attributed to A) him pooping quite a bit over the past two days and B) decreasing the Miralax dose (I’m hoping to hit on the magic amount that will make pooping easier but not create a holy mess).
Please keep your fingers crossed.
Big boy medicine!
Owen had a bit of a runny nose so I wanted to give him some allergy meds to hopefully dry it up. And if you recall, he does NOT take medicine well…but I wanted to try anyway. I figured he was old enough to drink from the little cup instead of being squirted with the syringe…if only I could get him to do it.
It took some cajoling and a promise of chocolate…but he did it!! YAY, OWEN!
Owen, why are you up so early?
I happened to be up really early this morning—it was one of those times I woke up at 4 and couldn’t fall back asleep. I turned on Owen’s monitor about 6:15 and I saw (what we joke are) his rat eyes so I knew he was up. I waited a bit, hoping he’d fall back asleep. When he didn’t, I went in.
Me: Owen, why are you up so early?
Owen: My nose is stuck.
Hee.
Ugh. I lost my shit today.
I do feel bad for yelling but OH MY GOD…he pooped a huge poop IN HIS UNDERWEAR and didn’t tell me. So when I discover it and pull his undies down (in front of the toilet), it falls out on the carpet AND HE STEPS IN IT. So now it’s ground into the rug and in between his toes—and he does NOT like to be dirty so he was having an absolute fit. (No, I don’t understand why—if he doesn’t like to be dirty—he tolerates a poopy butt.)
And then I see he has poop smeared all up and down his legs, not even mentioning the five wipes-full still in his butt. All the while Katie is screaming because she’s hungry and I can’t do anything because I have to take care of him. About 30 wipes later (baby for him and cleaning for the bathroom) it was off to the tub because I just couldn’t get it all off with wipes. And then I had to clean the carpet. And wash poop out if his underwear. Then clean the sink.
The only cute part was him saying “Me and Katie are crying. We’re not happy.” I told him mommy wasn’t happy, either. 🙁
I am SO over this. I know I wanted him potty trained, but at this point I really wouldn’t care if he’s in diapers until high school. This is THE biggest pain in the ass and I hate it. HATE IT.
Of course, after the heat of the moment, he was fine and I was fine…but of course I felt horrible (and I did apologize to him for yelling).
I know I’m not a bad mom—and I know I shouldn’t have acted as I did—but after you’ve been dealing with this for this long (going on a month) it gets really old. And frustrating. And sometimes you just lose your shit.
All you can do is hope tomorrow will be a better day.
Privileges lost
Owen just lost all privileges of playing out of my sight.
He was upstairs and I assumed he was playing nicely. Ha.
Well, at first I heard some loud noises, but it sounded like his golf balls rolling around in the tub so I figured he was just playing in the tub which was fine. Then it got quiet and I got a little worried…but Katie was sleeping on me so I let him be and kept my fingers crossed.
Then he came down the stairs and I see he had taken off his pants and underwear—which worried me because that’s what he’s been doing when he has to poop. So I put Katie down (which wakes her up, of course) and go over to him…and notice poop hanging from his butt.
Ugh.
So I make him stand there until I can go grab a wipe to take care of that so it doesn’t end up in the carpet. Then we head up to the bathroom and OH MY.
Where to start? I couldn’t take it all in at once.
- There was a pair of underwear in the toilet.
- His underwear and pants were in a pile next to the toilet.
- The tub was full of toys.
- The hand towel was in the sink.
- The mirror had water drops splashed on it.
- The shelf above the sink was covered in water and toothpaste.
- The countertop was covered in water and toothpaste.
- There was poop smeared on the counter.
- The toilet seat was covered in poop smears.
- His shirt was drenched.
- There was toothpaste on the countertop.
- I lifted the towel from the sink to discover two toothbrushes—completely covered in a combination of toothpaste and liquid soap.
- I noticed his kiddie flossers in the sink and on the counter—which meant he got up into the second shelf of the medicine cabinet (where I put things to keep them out of his reach).
UGH.
Needless to say he got a time out…and he lost TV privileges for the day.
Overall I know it could have been worse, but I was still livid. This is the kind of stuff I just do NOT have the patience for…and what I worried about long before having kids. And I have to say that if Owen was acting like this earlier (at a younger age, like the Terrible Twos that we missed) I would have seriously debated having a second.
Dresser climbing, anyone?
While I was outside running the garage sale and Tom was busy inside with Katie…Owen tried climbing up on his dresser and knocked it over!! Thankfully he wasn’t hurt (there’s not much room for it to fall since its super close to the bed) but still. OMGWTFBBQ!!?!? He’s NEVER tried anything like that—ever—so it was a BIG surprise. Ugh. And of course it had a partially-filled humidifier on it…so everything was drenched. 😐
We missed the terrible twos but apparently are getting the terrible threes instead.
Parenting Tip #53
Never schedule a doctors appointment for the day after you get back from a vacation.
I was still so apparently out of it that I forgot to pack extra underwear for Owen at daycare (though he did have pull-ups) and I forgot an extra bottle for Katie (though I did grab the bottle with the leftover 2oz from her last feeding). Then I wasn’t really paying attention to the time and I left about 15 minutes too early (not the end of the world, but why sit in a doctor’s office with a baby any longer than necessary?).
It all worked out okay in the end (Owen didn’t need the extra undies and Katie was happy with the 2oz) but it could have just as easily gone south.
Heaven!
Both kids in bed by 9, clean sheet night, my own shower, freshly shaved legs, and my own king-sized bed. Ahhh…
3000 + 14 = 0
So…3,000 miles in 14 days (6 long days of actual travel) and I’m done. I think that was the last of our road trips for a loooooong time. I hope everyone got their fill of us!
Katie’s 2-month appointment
Weight: 13 lbs. 4oz.
Length: 23-1/2″
She did just fine at her well-visit…but the immunizations were a different story. Poor kid needed four—three shots and one oral. She actually did okay considering she got roughly poked three times (I know there’s not really a great way to give shots, but the guy seemed really rough…and he completely missed the spots where he had pre-applied the band-aids).
And we learned that apparently the way she deals with shots is to completely CRASH for five hours and then wake up screaming bloody murder and refuse to be comforted for 30 minutes, then CRASH for another nap, then wake up screaming bloody murder and refuse to be comforted for 30 minutes. Fun!
So, the next time? Tylenol BEFORE the shots. I didn’t do it this time because I wanted to see how she was going to react. Thankfully it wasn’t worse.