Oh where do I begin? I feel like without having the opportunity to blog; the harder it will be to remember the good stuff, the bad stuff and the in between stuff of life. The last 3 weeks have been all of that.
January 7th--my first day back to work (on top of my photography business). I get in my car to observe the check engine light flashing. "Wonderful," is my first thought. As I drop off Harrison at daycare I barely chugged the rest of the way to work. (I mean come on, is this a sign or what?) I called Doug immediately and he phones the dealership. The dealership advises me not to drive the car as it may cause further damage (apparently a flashing check engine light is worse than one that just stays on all the time). 3 hours later, my car was loaded on to a flat bed truck and delivered to the repair shop (thank goodness for warranties). Happy first day back to work...right? At least I have an amazing co-worker that plastered an obnoxious amount of MISSED YOU signs in my office along with delivery a bag of welcome back goodies. Did I ever need that pick me up.
Overall the first day was filled with pure catch-up. I was busy into my 100s of unread e-mails when these arrived...
Thank you to my amazing husband that filled my day with happy tears.
Since then work has been survival mode. The work itself hasn't been overwhelming...and like I mentioned, I have some amazing co-workers and a new boss---which makes the transition to the return of work and learning my new position since I was promoted. However, the 8+ days at work are draining, especially on the days I work out of our main office which is an 1 hour a way from home.
The struggle between needing to work and wanting to be home with the kids is very overwhelming. There is a lot of sadness, maybe more so now than just with one child. At Miles age evenings can especially be challenging. I am talking about what is known as the "Witch Hour." All day he is a happy baby but the evenings he is fussy and has high demands. Some days when I get home from work it feels like I just get the crabby baby. I know this is a phase (Harrison had a period of the same thing) and we will both make it through it, but frankly this transition period sucks.
Evenings go by way too fast. Harrison should be in bed by 8/8:30, but most nights we are lucky if it's 9/9:30. Why? I am still retraining myself back to this work routine, but that can be fully blamed. The real reasoning? I miss this kid...MISS HIM. By the time we walk in the door between 5/5:30 in the evenings, it's cooking dinner, dishes, prepping for the next day (I get everything we need together the night before, like clothes picked out, lunch made, bags by the door), play with toys for few minutes, bath, story, then bed. The time you have to enjoy your kids are so limited by the clock. It also doesn't help benefit us since we are in the middle of winter, sub-zero temperatures we can't even get outside. This means Harrison watches a lot more t.v. especially the nights (most nights) I come home from work I am so exhausted all I want to do is sleep.
And sleep...I am pretty much convinced I've never been this tired in my life. I can't get out of bed in the mornings until I have hit the snooze button more than 4 times or when Miles lets out a cry saying, "feed me." Like I already mentioned above I am practically listless in the evenings. Doug has been more than accommodating to let me spend the evening napping. I went to bed at 8:30 & 7:30 pm a few days. but with that said getting more sleep takes away time from the kids (even going to bed earlier, I am still just as tired too), especially when they are so young and need me the most. One day, I'll close my eyes and open them and and they will be teenagers. A lot of these lack of sleep struggles I first visited in the first 6 weeks after Miles was born, knowing I'll somehow make it through it eventually.
Sickness has swept through our house. Harrison is struggling with ear infections again. After 14 ear infections I thought we were done, but add two more for a grand total of 16 infections in three years. Harrison went almost a year without a single infection, but since his tube fell out this past fall he has had two infections in two months. What this has meant for him are sleepless nights, fever, vomiting and behavior I just can't explain. The last infection I didn't know what I was going to do with this child, he was seriously out of control. Not only was he defiant, he was aggressive, throwing things, being mean to the animals. Honestly it's like someone took our kid and replaced him with someone we don't know. I remember telling Doug when he got home from work one day, "I don't know what is wrong with this kid, he is out of control." That evening Harrison spiked a fever over 102. The next day it was New years we spent nearly 3 hours at urgent care to confirm the ear infection and order an antibiotic. Mid-way through the week Harrison still wasn't seeming better. Again, another trip to urgent care (keep reading I am sure we have already met this year's deductible). Harrison's ears were examined again and the doctor confirm the ear infection (but rather than just in the left ear as first confirmed, infection was in both ears) was still active, but very slowly healing. There was a lot of pus and fluid still present (yuck). The doctor also made and observation that 2 other doctors missed. One of Harrison's tubes was stuck inside his ear canal. During the appointment the doctor tried to fish out the tube, but was unsuccessful in doing so. This prompted me to call his ENT doctor to discuss. The doctor wanted to see Harrison a couple weeks later, waiting to give the infection time to heal and fluid to go down and to remove the tube and re-check his ear health over all.
We had the appointment yesterday. When we arrived at the clinic and parked in the ramp Harrison asked, "Momma, why are we at this car place?" I guess it's been a while since we parked at a ramp. Harrison did pretty good at the appointment, I think he would have done better if the nurse and doctor did a better job explaining what they were going to do rather than just holding him down. At one point I did interject and said, "You know what if you would talk to him and tell him what you are doing, we will be more cooperative." You would think they would be pros at talking to kids since it's their profession, not so much I guess.
I got to see his ears up on the big screen. Harrison's right ear looks healthy and normal. The tube was removed from his left ear and also unveiled a large amount green thick fluid---I don't candy coat anything as you can clearly see. There isn't an active infection, but the fluid isn't healthy and can interfere with his hearing. Next we discussed options. Option one, wait 6-8 weeks to see if the fluid dissipates on it's own (or he gets another ear infection), option 2 place another set of tubes, option 3 remove his adenoids and replace the tubes. After 2 ear infections in two months without tubes, waiting the 6-8 weeks didn't seem like the best option. That left us with options 2 and 3. Option 3 the removal of the adenoids involved a breathing tube and more sedation. My immediate response was, too scary after everything we have already been through with him. We went with option 2, just to replace the tubes, If this set of tubes are unsuccessful we will have no choice to but to move to option 3 or possibly option 4 removing both the tonsils and adenoids and another set of tubes.
And the weird part is, the nurse handed me a paper clip with Harrison's tube on it on our way out. Not sure what I am going to do with it. Tube surgery is February 1st.
Rewinding now back to Monday, January 14 Harrison was back at urgent care with a fever (low grade between 99-100) and what we suspected as another ear infection. Instead of an ear infection we got a confirmed case of influenza. The test was vague in determining if he had strain A or strain B. The doctor said Harrison had a mild case and was actually on the mend and would be fine in a day or so... 4 days later his fever finally broke. A total fever for 6 days. Doug and I were starting to place bets if he was ever going to wake up fever free. Despite the fever, despite having the flu, Harrison did amazingly well and for the most part played and acted like himself, just more flushed and snotty.
Since Harrison tested positive for influenza he wasn't able to go to daycare/preschool for the entire week. But really Friday would have been the only day he could have gone. There are several cases of confirmed cases at his daycare/preschool, I am convinced he carried the bug home from there.
I have to give a great big shout out to my friend Amanda for taking a week off of work to not only watch Miles (we are still in the transition phase before he starts daycare) but she cared for Harrison all week as well. I seriously don't know what I would do without this girl, my boys are so lucky to have her in their lives.
Fast forwarding back to later in the week, specifically yesterday January 18th. Doug woke up with 103 + temp. Sounded like influenza to me. Doug was in denial. After he arrived 20 minutes before urgent care opened, he found 10 people a head of him in line.
Influenza confirmed. Type A. I guess from what Doug told me, they haven't seen strain A for a while. What's been happening this flu season is that they are seeing a large number of people back in the flu twice. If they had strain A, they are getting strain B and vice verse. So this flu stuff isn't anywhere near over.
Doug's onset symptoms were caught fast enough to receive Tamiflu to help lessen the symptoms. Tamiflu was also ordered for not only me, but also Miles. Unlike Doug he takes Tamiflu twice a day, Miles and I only take it once a day. The hope is by getting Miles and I going on Tamiflu, if we do get the flu, we will be a head of the game is the hope, I kind of get the feeling someone should just place a big bag over our house that says, "Enter at your own risk." Doug and I had to cancel last night's black tie Chamber Banquet which I was really looking forward to having a reason to dress up for and claim a date night (our New Year resolution is to go on more dates, do more things as a couple).
And if case your wondering Doug and I got the flu shot, Harrison the mist and Miles is too young to receive the flu vaccine. Despite the vaccination it's running ramped through our house. It really makes you second guess if the vaccination is even 60 % effective like they say it is.
I haven't been nearly diligent enough to get the camera out like I should. I feel bad...Miles has about 25% of the photos we had of Harrison at his age. I haven't even taken his 3 month photos yet (that's on my to do for today). It's like he is getting the shaft and that's totally not fair. My friend Krisit's New Year resolution was to take 1 picture a day for the entire year. What an awesome resolution, I might have to add that to mine.
For now here are the bits and pieces of the last 3 weeks---
