Cheerio Confessions

And this being my blog I am about to subject you to my theories. :) Don't you feel lucky?

Theory #1: Procreation and Fertilization
We need to evolve so that the second there is a fertilized egg that successfully implants, there is a warning. I don't care what this warning is. It could be a literal glow, like our whole belly just *lights up*. Or a light within our belly button. Heck, in keeping with the "pee on a stick" tradition, something could change with our urine. Whatever it is, it needs to be obvious. It needs to scream, "Hey you, lady! You're pregnant!" Perhaps if the pregnancy results in twins (or more) the light within the belly button could be...flashing. Something to say, "Oh and by the way, there's more than one."

Yes, I'm taking the "fun" out of finding out your pregnant. Yes, I'm making it impersonal. But you know what, if you've never struggled with the Hell that is known as "The 2ww" (The 2 Week Wait) then you don't know how much those two weeks hurt. And just how much all of those pee sticks cost! Besides, this is my crazy, messed up list of theories. :) lol

Theory #2: Notification of Sex

No. No. No. I do not mean a notification that you are going to have sex or have had sex. Hopefully you already picked up on those signals and they resulted in Theory #1.

I mean that the sex of the child (fetus/embryo - whatever) is determined at fertilization. Therefore it's perfectly reasonable to want to be notified as soon as possible as to the sex. (For those of you who wish to be "surprised" - sorry surprises have no room in my theories.)

Oh, I know! The light! (Or the urine, whichever option you went with. If you went with urine and you have boy/girl twins then your urine would be purple.) The light will be blue or pink depending upon the sex of the child. And if it does happen to be boy/girl twins it would flash pink and blue, alternating of course. Yes, that's perfect. The light is directly tied to the sex. (And for those of you who don't like "blue for boys and pink for girls" - again I'm sorry. These are my theories and it's just easier to have blue = boys and pink= girls. Nothing sexist about it. It's all about convenience.)

There now we have it established that not only am I pregnant, but the sex and number of fetus(es). The next problem to arise with pregnancy, is naming the child.

Theory #3: The Naming

As some of you know, naming a child can be HELL! Sure, sometimes it works out all nice and neat...You open that baby name book to exactly the right page at that exactly right, cosmic moment and the stars align, the angels sing and the name literally jumps up off the page and does a little jig for while screaming "ME! ME! ME! I'm the perfect name!"

Well, to those of you who are lucky enough to have those moments...pfth on you! :p

The rest of us spend hours upon hours, reading every baby name book ever written (no matter how obscure), searching websites, checking meanings, popularity, spellings...the list goes on and on. We find a name and it feels "sort of right" but not quite there. Kind of like your second favorite pair of jeans. The pair that are your first choice only when your favorite pair is dirty and in the wash. They fit. They feel okay. But they just aren't perfect! So we keep looking. We re-read the baby name books, the websites. We ask friends, family, the telemarketer that dared to call, and the cashier at the grocery store what names they like. We consider every name ever known to man. Literally. No name is too off-the-wall for a brief period...

Cosmo, Tallulah, Nevaeh...the list goes on and on. Just look at the celebrities! Do you think they wanted to name their children "Pilot Inspector" or "Fifi-Trixiebelle"?! No! Of course they didn't. But they couldn't decide. It came down to the wire. Their children were going to have blank birth certificates and go through life as "Baby Boy" or "Baby Girl", which honestly may have been preferable to the chosen names but that's neither here nor there. Now those poor children are saddled with horrible names! That's a lot of pressure on a parent!

There has to be a way to find out what our children are destined to be named without the hours of reading and stressing. Let's see...for the religious (or non-sci-fi inclined) we could go with a dream. A divine intervention if you will. You go to sleep (having already had your pink and/or blue light warning) and the child comes to you and tells you, "My name is..." There you go, problem solved. In the time span of a week tops, you have managed to not only discover that you are pregnant but also learn the pre-destined name for your child(ren). At this point you breathe deep sigh of relief and focus on enjoying your pregnancy. (Ah, life is good.)

But...wait...what's that? You aren't the religious type and don't really believe in "divine intervention dreams"? Okay, fine then. Let's see...we could go sci-fi? Something along the lines of "Battlestar Galactica". I mean we have colored lights in our belly buttons so why not run with that, right? So, you've had you light experience. You now know you are pregnant. You also know the number of fetus(es) and the sex(es). At that point, your body is kind enough to spit out a print out. I'll allow you to use your imagination as to where this print out comes from. (Get your mind out of the gutter! Shame on you. Honestly, this is a family blog!) I was thinking along the lines of mouth, ear, or slit from behind your ear. Whatever. with the name destined for your child.

Either way, you now have the fact that you are definitely pregnant, the sex of the child(ren), and the name(s). Life is good. Life is peaceful. And that's one less thing to stress out over for the next 9 months. Besides think of all the shopping you could get done from the get-go! (Ah, shopping, I miss you so.)

Theory #4: The Warning System

For those of us prone to high risk pregnancies and even for those prone but blissfully unaware of what's looming on the horizon, there should be an advanced warning system. I honestly don't care what it is. A letter from God in the mail would work. Another divine intervention dream. Or in keeping with the light theory, the light could change to RED. Bright, nearly blinding red that simply screams "WARNING". This light would also activate if at any point something goes "wrong" allowing the mother-to-be to know that, "Hey, we need to book it to L&D!" (I can't tell you how many times I've begged for this warning system over the past 6 months.) This warning system would also serve double duty, it would also serve as warning for the OB as well. That way there's no question. It's not the mother-to-be being over-protective or worrying too much. It means there is something off that needs to be explored.

Theory #5: Labor & Delivery

When it comes time for "the big day", again there should be warning. Some of us are lucky enough to have our water obviously break in the very beginning. Thereby forcing us to stop and say, "Uh oh, it's time." However, most of us never get that warning. So we spend hours and days and sleepless nights trying to time contractions and judge on a ridiculous scale of 1-10 what our pain is. (I hate that stupid scale.) When we should be resting. Or not worrying because it's false labor. Or hauling booty to L&D because "it's time" was actually 12 hours ago, which means you are rapidly approaching the land of no return. Other wise known as, "the land of NO EPIDURAL"! (AH! The horror! And for those of you who prefer natural childbirth, bravo for you. However, if God had intended for me to go naturally he would have seen fit to have me born before epidurals were discovered. As I was not born then - at least not that I can recall - I choose to go with the beloved epidural.)

So there needs to be a warning system here as well. Let's see...it can't be the same as Theory #4's warning system. That would be entirely too confusing. So let's just make it completely obvious, shall we?

On the religious/non-sci-fi front, we could yet another divine intervention dream. It's a simple dream. A timer is all we need. So you close your eyes. Go to sleep. And all you dream is a rapidly counting down timer telling you that you have X days, X hours, X minutes, X seconds before "it's time" becomes "Happy Birthday".

For the sci-fi inclined, rather than a dream we still get the timer. (X days, X hours, X minutes, X seconds) Only it shows across our belly. No denying that warning now is there. Either way you have an idea of how long before the end, which gives you plenty of time to haul booty to L&D and get that beloved epidural (if you so choose). Or to wait it out at home before calling your midwife and having a baby.

There we have it. Pregnancy from start to finish. No muss. No fuss. No questioning. No second-guessing. Just in and out, "Pregnancy in a Can" if you will. All the convenience of fast food without the calories! ;) lol

Ah, if only life were so simple...

It worked! I finally got my MP4 videos to upload! Yippee! :)

So here's Elliott Richard washing his feet...

That's right! I said it!

WE'VE GOT SNUGGLING!

As y'all read in Rob's post yesterday Elliott Richard nearly got an elbow to the head for simply touching Gavin and sort of trying to snuggle with him then.

So this morning while Elliott Richard was watching "Finding Nemo" (for what I'm sure is the 100th time this week) and Gavin came downstairs for a bit, I was shocked to see this! :)

It started with Elliott coming up behind Gavin and hugging him. When Gavin didn't throw and elbow and sat on the floor, Elliott went for broke and curled up in his lap! :)

I just love this picture of them together! Okay so Gavin has a pained expression on his face but work with me here. I love how Elliott is snuggling him and looking up at him.

Heck, I just love the fact that it happened at all. Pained expression or not. :)

Today may actually turn out to be a pretty good day. *crosses fingers* God willing.

This is the "Throne".

We just got it out the other day and are still trying to get Elliott Richard used to seeing it, sitting on it etc.

As you can see, he currently thinks it's a really neat place to hide stuff. (lol) While we know we'll have to put a stop to that, for now, while he's "getting to know the potty" we figured it was ok. (I'm sure this will come back to bite me firmly on the butt very soon. lol)

We're pretty certain it's time because he's started hiding when he poops and then he'll tell us when he's done that he pooped. If he pees, he sometimes tells us right afterward and asks for a dry diaper. He's interested in others going potty (which is perfectly normal from what Dr. H (his ped) says). And some nights he stays dry. Some nights he doesn't. But he's definitely going for long periods of time during the day dry. So I'm relatively certain that it's either time now, or it will be very soon.

Now keeping in mind that we haven't had to potty train anyone in...what...nearly 5-6 years I'm very open to any and all tips, tricks and whatnot that y'all have figured out. I honestly don't even remember how we introduced Gavin to the potty. (lol)

Curls, waves and flips...oh my!
The bed highjacker returns to the scene of the crime...again!
He's now taken to scooting up and sitting in my pillow anytime I get up off the bed! (lol)
Elliott Richard washing his feet.
I love this one although you really can't see what's going on. He climbed up onto my bed, pointed to his feet and said "sticky". (He had spilt his juice and walked through it before we got it mopped up.) So I handed him a wipe and he went to town for a good five minutes, washing his feet. I have a really cute video of it...if I could get blogger or photobucket or someone to post it! Argh.

I love my job. I love being a stay-at-home mom, which then affords me the time I need for my other job as the President of the PTA at Gavin's school. It kills me that I can't be at the school everyday doing the simple things like checking my mailbox. (I have a mailbox, how cool is that?! lol) I love working with the staff. I love talking to them. Hearing what they need help with. What sort of things the PTA can do to make their jobs easier. I love the staff at his school. I've said it before and I'll say it again, they are all angels. No one else could do what they do with the style, flair and love that they do it.

It's funny though. Maybe it's because in high school, I wasn't the most popular or the prettiest or the most outgoing (I know, who would have thought! lol) and so I don't see myself as any of those things. I never had a lot of friends. Just one best friend and few acquaintances. Maybe a boyfriend. So when I think of the staff at Gavin's school, I think of them as my friends. All of them. The principal/director, Laura, the teachers, Sensei, each and every one of them have become my friends in my heart and mind. But I just kind of figured that they humored me. (Granted, I can be a humorous girl (haha) but that's not what I meant.) I guess I always figured they talked to me, they laughed with me and then when I was gone they either forgot I was there or were like "thank God, I thought she'd never leave". These are my issues not theirs. I know that. But for better or worse, it's how I feel. I would appear that I am wrong.

I email with a few of the staff every once in a while. It's nice. To "talk" to them outside of school. To hear about their lives. To honestly get to know them as people beyond my child's educators. Well, yesterday I was reminded and shown just how wrong I truly am.

Rob went to school to pick Gavin up and help his teachers with some techno-issue. When he returned home he had a surprise for me. :)

This picture was made and signed by Gavin and his classmates. The flowers are tracings of their hands that they cut out and rolled to make flowers. (How stinking adorable is that?!)

Between my flowers and the collage I was crying like a baby. It was all so sweet.

I feel truly blessed to have so many wonderful, caring people involved in our lives. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.

Ice!
This was the only way I could get fluids down for a week straight. I had no idea I could cough my throat that raw.

Lip balm
My lips have been dry this entire pregnancy, no matter how much I drink. But that was nothing compared to how dry my lips were with all that hacking, which does not feel any better when your lips are cracked and bleeding. Just for the record.

And that my friends is how I managed to come out on the other side. :)

47 down ~ 88 to go

I've been a busy girl. I decided yesterday to get some cards made that need mailing. I am now going to post pictures because I happen to like them. I will not say who is getting which card...you'll just have to wait and be surprised. :)

glitter-graphics.com

I love you, Mommy!

Oy!

Today has been insane since the yay-hoo called the house at 1:00am.

We woke up with hopes that we would get me to the hospital by 9:00am for my 1 hour Glucose Screen since I have to fast for a minimum of 12 hours before hand. (A very hungry woman is a very grumpy woman afterall!) We managed to get there after a few hiccups by 11:00am. Then the outpatient lab was crazy busy. I drank the stuff at 11:35am (why I had to wait to sit and chug flat pop in 30 seconds is beyond me) and then we hung out for an hour. We did some walking, which is technically a no-no but it felt good to be up and moving. Then they drew my blood for three different blood tests. Two were related to my Heparin injections. The third was the Glucose blood draw.

As it turns out (lucky me) my clotting factors still aren't where Dr. D would like to see them, which means another dosage increase for me. Rob thinks they will simply increase the dose and do it by adding a third daily injection. (double lucky me) I'm hoping that they don't increase the dose and keep it at two injections because that would likely mean moving the location of the injections from my arms to some place else. (yippee) I'm supposed to call on Monday and find out my new dose. Then I see Dr. D on Tuesday and find out that hopefully I'll learn that I've passed Glucose Hell.

Tiny is moving like mad today! (lol) We thought we had a name picked out. Then we changed it. Then we changed it again. Now we can't seem to decide on anything. Oy! Everyday this pregnancy seems more and more real to me. Tiny moves more. Developes more of a personality. This morning I got the snot kicked out of me because I had to fast for that blood work. Then there was some "River Dancing" going on after I was finally permitted to eat. :) And now I've got some "River Dance" going on again but I think it's just for fun. :) lol

God willing, I won't get woken up at 1:00am by the moron from last night. Hopefully tomorrow will be a less insane day. Although Gavin is home, so the jury is still out on that one.

46 down ~ 89 to go

glitter-graphics.com Today is my Mommy and Daddy's Anniversary. Sadly, I am a bad daughter and I don't know exactly how long they've been married. However, I still wish them all the happiness in the world and many more happy anniversaries to come. :)

Gavin came home today...


He wasn't home for very long before the screaming began..........
Elliott made the "mistake" of touching Gavin. That's all he did and Gavin unleashed on him.. Elliott was met with screaming and flying elbows...I had to send Gavin to his room because he was not safe to be around..Gavin then melted down for 20 minutes and was fine after that for alittle while.

It is extremely disturbing how quickly he can turn it on and off. How are we supposed to live like this. How are we going to ensure the safety of Elliott and Tiny without some type of segregation. It has become clear that Gavin and Elliott cannot be aloud to play together. How do we make a 2 year old understand that the big brother he idolizes cannot tolerate him (not that it's Gavin's fault). How is Gavin going to react when the baby gets here. We are forced to look into additional security features for our alarm system to more closely monitor Gavin. We are having to have door chimes installed on his door so we know when he sneaks out of his room at night. We are having to add additional motion sensors through out the house and smoke detectors because Gavin has been known to play with his outlets in the past. It feels like we are living in a prison...

We love Gavin and that is why this is so painful.. When it was just the three of us Lizze and I would just do whatever was necessary because it only effected us.. But now we have an obligation to ensure that Elliott gets what he needs and is safe and happy.I was recently asked about what I see for our future. The truth is I don't see a future, if that makes any sense. We CANNOT continue to live like this. Even though Gavin is doing loads better it is still a struggle to find that balance...

That's all for now. My head hurts and I'm really tired. Thanks for listening..

It's currently 1:18am. My home phone just rang?! Here's the conversation:

Me: (half asleep and physically exhausted from hacking up goo) Hello?
Unknown Male Caller: Huh? Who are you?!
Me: WHO AM I?! You call me at 1:00am and demand to know WHO I AM?!
UMC: Uh....*click*

Someone explain it to me how he calls my home at 1:00am and wants to know who I am?! Furthermore who calls people, outside of an emergency, at 1:00am?! Fine, he obviously didn't expect me to answer the phone. But what happened to common courtesy? What happened to "Hello, is so-and-so there?" If he calls back again, so help me God...

I'm off to try and hold off the coughing and hacking long enough to fall back to sleep again. Honestly...who am I?!...*sigh*

What Tiny is up to this week: Your not-so-tiny-anymore brilliant baby(about 2 pounds and 14.5 inches long!) is slowly rotating in preparation to “head out.” Obviously, this doesn’t happen overnight, but when you start to feel an unfamiliar pressure on your cervix, you’ll know you’ve got a fully flipped baby locked and loaded for the countdown to their birthday! Even now, at the beginning of the third trimester, their little lungs are already capable of breathing air while the pulmonary vascular system can provide sufficient gas exchange and the central nervous system can generally regulate rhythmic breathing as well as their basal body temperature. For what it’s worth, at this point in a healthy pregnancy a premature child (with intensive care) could easily win on the show: “Survivor: The Early Years.”

Tiny has been a busy little bee this week. I feel the kicks and elbows and flips all the time now. Tiny doesn't seem to have the hiccups nearly as often as Elliott Richard did. The kicks and punches are growing so strong now that my whole belly jiggles afterwards (not in that jolly "bowl full of jelly" way either!), which is really cool to watch. The only problem is that Tiny seems to have a way of watching me. If Tiny is moving and grooving and I uncover my belly to watch, the movement stops. As soon as I cover my belly again, away we go! (lol) In that respect, Tiny fits right in with Gavin and Elliott Richard - independant and strong-willed and already marching to the beat of a different drummer. (lol)

I am so overwhelmed, over-loaded and exhausted. I have coughed my throat and vocal cords completely raw. I can't speak above a whisper without the sensation that my throat is being slit. (At least how I imagine that feels anyway.) I've lost 4 pounds in the last two weeks. Dr. D says I'll gain it back once I feel better but what if I don't have that much time? I have to choke down food to feed Tiny. I can't taste it and I hurts like Hell to swallow. But I suffer through it anyway. I live on ice cubes right now. Trying desperately to stay hydrated because they said Tuesday I was getting dehydrated. The more I improve, the more I cough. The more I cough, the worse my throat/vocal cords get. The worse they get the worse I feel and more overwhelmed I become. I'm so far beyond my limit that all I want to do is cry. Only I can't cry because it stirs up my nose and cough, which again just exacerbates the issues. So I sit here. Feeling completely alone and cut off from the world. Trying to hold it together. Trying to stay sane. Trying desperately to eat and drink enough. Trying not to cry. Patience in my household is a thing of the past at the moment. Everyone is irritating everyone else. I feel like I have no one to talk to. I don't dare turn to Rob. (You've read his posts, he's drowning as it is.) I can't call my mom because I can't talk. And while Elliott Richard is cute, he isn't much for the deep conversations.

I feel as if I'm holding the weight of the world on my shoulders. I'm not carrying it because carrying requires me to get up and move around. *sigh* I'm holding it all and I feel as if I'm being buried alive under neither the weight of it. I'm chasing my tail...Go on bed rest. Stay down. Help Rob. But don't get up. Watch Elliott. But don't get up. Keep an eye out for preterm labor. But don't over-react. Gain a lot of weight so Tiny has a better chance at birth. Crap, I lost weight. Gain it back. Can't swallow. Find a way anyhow. Can't talk. Figure it out. Appease your friends. No wait, do what you need to do to survive. But don't forget to call them or their feelings will be hurt. I just can't take it anymore!

If I knew that it wouldn't jeopardize my health or Tiny's I would say forget bed rest. I would do the laundry, the dishes, take care of Elliott Richard, take care of my duties at school, do the shopping and the running around. I would take care of all my jobs that have been dumped on Rob and are contributing to his drowning. Then I could say forget the Heparin shots too. And that would be one less thing for Rob to worry about. I would do all the things that I always did. If only I knew that I could get away with it. If only I knew that it wouldn't be an issue. If only I knew that Tiny and I would make it out okay.

I'm here. I'm alive. Throat is swollen from coughing. Slowing coughing up the goo. Patience is running thin in our household. Will post more later.

45 down ~ 90 to go

Well I haven't done an update lately so I figured that I would do it now in between loads of laundry.

First off, let me address the story of the bug battle that occurred last night. On our way home from Dr. D's yesterday we had to stop and get some health supplies for Lizze. While there I picked on one of those automatic air fresheners because of the leaking soil stack on our house doesn't always smell good and we haven't figured out how we were going to fix it. I set up this air freshener to spray every 30 minutes. So last night while watching NCIS Lizze took a potty break. While she was gone a GIANT Centipede climbed out from behind her bed and started up the wall. I wanted to take care of this before Lizze even knew about it. So...I used my special technique (patent pending) of rolling up some tape into a ball and sticking the ball onto the insect (in this case the centipede) and the insect cannot get away because it was stuck to the tape....Normally this works and keeps my freshly painted walls free from bug guts. But on this occasion just as I was reaching up to nab this thing (it was about 3 inches long) the air freshener went of behind me. The air freshener makes a relatively loud "HISS". Well as you can all imagine I have been on edge lately so it doesn't take much. At that moment it sounded like the centipede hissed at me and it scared the crap out of me. It fell on the bed and ran behind it. It's actually pretty funny now. Anyways I caught up with it a few minutes later and it was evicted from my house.....

On to Gavin now. Most of you are aware that Gavin has been spending some time at his Grandparents as we try to hold everything together and keep him from going into another manic phase.... He seems to be doing better most of the time....When he comes home he does much better the he was. We seem to have the bi-polar under control for the time being... The autistic symptoms however are another story. He does seem to get along better with Elliott lately which is great because Elliott just wants to hang out with his big brother....Gavin normally won't tolerate him at all. This is very hard on Elliott because he doesn't understand...We are noticing that when Gavin is home Elliott won't sleep at night. He is up about every hour through out the night crying..When Gavin is not home Elliott sleeps through the night without problems. This has happened every time. We haven't figured exactly what is causing this but we do know that Gavin's behaviors are scaring Elliott and stressing him. I see Dr. R in the morning and we will discuss how to handle this. When Elliott doesn't sleep we don't sleep. So we need to figure this out.

Lizze sounds terrible but her cough is becoming more progressive which is good. Hopefully she will begin feeling better soon and things will be easier for her. Elliott seems to be feeling alittle better since the antibiotics so that is also good.
My back has gone out again. But then again it is always out so that is nothing new. But I can't remember it ever hurting this bad. Whenever this happens it take me a few weeks to adjust to the pain and get used to it. So I hope the weeks go by quickly:)

That's all for now....

PS: I also wanted to say hello to the people visiting us from EBay..Thanks for looking at our auctions......

Do you guys have any idea how long it's been since I've actually used a desktop computer? A long time. Why am I using Rob's desktop you ask? Because he's fighting (a losing battle) with a bug. So far the score is Bug:1 Rob:0. Oh...wait...he just got it and killed it. Final score is Bug: 1 and dead Rob: 1 and alive. :)

Now that the bug is gone, I'm off to finish watching my recorded NCIS marathon. :)

43 down ~ 92 to go

Lizze's laptop finally died today. She is sleeping now so she doesn't know yet. She will have to post from her phone for now until I figure something. I am passing this on so you guys don't worry if she is not posting as often. I may be able to still fix it but it will have to wait until later. I need to get her a new external usb dvd-rom drive. Her hard drive became corrupt and I can no longer boot into Windows.......I have to repair the master boot record but need to boot from dvd to do it..
.

So please don't worry she is OK.........

She can do almost anything from her phone......

Just wanted to keep you all posted.....

She is resting now so thats good...

Thanks,

Rob

Dr. D said I should feel better by my appointment next week. I'm exhausted and swollen and struggling to breathe. Off to try and nap. (Please God, help me nap.)

More detailed update later.