My Best Friend

Dakota at Eight Weeks Old

On January 2, 2006 we welcomed a new baby into our home. He was a six week old fur ball with big feet and an even bigger personality.

I had always wanted a German Shepherd Dog. When I was nine or ten, I’d watched a movie about a German Shepherd. I don’t remember much about the movie other than the ending was so sad, I cried for a while after. My poor mother wanted to run away I’m sure, but my love affair with the German Shepherd Dog had begun.

We’d lost our small dog the October before. She’d been with us for eleven years. With husband gone so much due to the Army, she’d been my constant companion through three PCS moves, two pregnancies, numerous field problems and two deployments. When she passed away, it broke my heart. I had dogs growing up, but I’d never had one who wanted to be with me constantly like she did. I thought I’d never be that close to another dog, but I was wrong. I just hadn’t met Dakota yet…

Husband found an ad in a neighboring town’s online paper for German Shepherd puppies. He called and set up a time for us to visit. The problem was, she only had three pups left and they were all males. I’ve always preferred female dogs. Husband said we should go look anyway, so we did. When we arrived, Mom and Dad were in a pen outside. The Dad was HUGE and made it known it was his yard.

The lady selling the pups met us outside and talked to us about the parents and then went and brought out the puppies. I bent down to pet one of the puppies when I felt a tug on my boot. I looked and there was this chubby puppy with these huge feet biting the laces on my boot. He looked up at me with the most beautiful brown eyes, shoe lace still in his mouth and just sat down. I put out my hand and he dropped the shoe lace to smell my hand and then proceeded to lick me. I picked him up and he licked my face – all the while grumbling like most German Shepherds are known to do. I knew he was the one the minute he looked up at me. I know there are things you’re suppose to do in order to find a pup with a good temperament, but I admit I did none of them. Once I had this special little guy in my arms, there was no way in hell I was ever going to let him go.

The three years Dakota has been with us have been hard years. Having him with me sure made some of the hard times easier though. He was so much company those fifteen months husband was deployed. Like Chelsea Dog, Dakota wants to be where I am. If I’m in the kitchen cooking, he’s either laying on a rug or sitting close to me in hopes I’ll drop him a bite of whatever I’m making. When I go up to get my shower or put on my makeup, he has to come along. If I’m sitting on the front porch watching the babies ride their bikes, Dakota sits keeping a watch on everything through the glass storm door. When I’m surfing the internet on my laptop, he’ll sleep in front of my chair with his head on my fuzzy slippers. And when we go to bed, he sleeps on the floor next to my side of the bed. If husband is snoring and I end up on the couch, he follows me down and sleeps on the floor next to the couch. Even when I go to the bathroom, he has to follow. He’ll stand at the door and wait for me and then follows me back to lay by my chair. Yep, he’s my constant companion.

Protesting his picture being taken

I’d sent this picture to my Dad and he emailed back asking why Rin Tin Tin was showing his teeth. Dad always calls him Rin Tin Tin. I let him know he wasn’t really showing his teeth. He either hates having his picture taken or the sound the camera makes – but either way, any time I get the camera out and try to get a picture of him, he has to do his howl/bark. This time, I caught the very beginning of the howl lol. He wasn’t showing his teeth at anyone or any thing and I’ve never seen him show his teeth come to think of it.

He is very protective though. Son started wrestling this winter. Sometimes husband and son will be on the living room floor so husband can show him this or that to go over what son learned at practice. This makes Dakota nervous apparently. He barks and sticks his nose in between them lol. Son will sometimes aggravate his sister and try to do a wrestling move on her. Big sister will then hold down little brother and commence to tickle him until he screams in between laughing. Again, my pup gets nervous, grumbles and sticks himself into the situation licking faces until they both give up and resort to, “Ughh, Dakota! Dog breath!!!! On!! My!!! FACE!!!” heh heh.

Tolerating the new kitten

And, he even tolerates our kitties. At the beginning of October, one of daughter’s friends found a kitten near her home. The baby couldn’t have been three weeks old since he still had blue eyes. The friend called daughter and told her about the kitten and said her parents weren’t going to let her keep it. Daughter found out her friend was trying to feed it wet bread and immediately came to her Dad and I begging for us to take her over to her friend’s house so she could save it. We already have two inside cats, but husband is a sucker and told daughter not to worry. We’d take her over so she could get the kitten and that’s the reason we now have THREE inside cats.

Frank, the kitten, is growing like a weed. He’s not scared of anything – including a German Shepherd. Dakota is pretty patient with the little guy…allowing him to play with his favorite bone, sniff his food and share his water bowl. When the cats get to running in the house, Dakota has to really try hard to fight his urge to chase them though.

Enjoying the Spring

German Shepherd Dogs are wonderful companions. Like any large dog though, (actually, any dog in my opinion) educating yourself about the breed prior to welcoming one into your home is a must. Each breed has positives and negatives and in order to be a responsible pet owner, you should educate yourself prior to even considering going to look at puppies. Too many dogs end up in shelters due to the fault of the moron who purchased the dog, not because of the dog.

German Shepherd Dogs shed…they shed all year long. If you don’t want to have to vacuum every day, this dog is probably not for you. They are also extremely vocal. If you’ve ever seen the movie K-9 with Jim Belushi, you have an idea of how vocal most GSDs are. Our Dakota is no different. Although I think a GSD would do fine in an apartment as long as regular exercise was part of the dog’s life, their vocal nature might make apartment life difficult with your neighbors. If I had to move into an apartment, I don’t know what I’d do about my baby. He barks for five straight minutes if we all leave the house. Yep, I’m sure it’s separation anxiety and I’m sure I need the Dog Whisperer to come Whisper us lol. The point though, is know the breed, know your living conditions and take some time to really compare your life and living conditions to the breed you’re interested in prior to bringing home any puppy or dog.

Dakota is a loving, loyal, smart and energetic friend and we’re extremely lucky to have him in our lives. Last Thursday morning, I was catching the news before taking our babies to school when the story of Lizzie, a Memphis TN German Shepherd Dog came on. She apparently foiled a burglary at her home while her human person was at work heh heh. The criminal seems to have left a significant amount of blood behind and the police will try to match the blood to the burglar. The link above also has a link to video and I couldn’t get over how much Lizzie and Dakota look so much alike. To me, Lizzie looks to be around two years old… She’s pretty narrow through the chest and Dakota was long and lanky looking until he was closer to three. This past fall, he started adding more weight to his 90 lb body. He’s really filling out and is now easily over 100 pounds. He’ll go in July for his yearly checkup and vaccinations and I’ll find out then how much weight he’s put on in the last year.

Well, this turned out much longer than I had planned. Guess that’s what happens when it takes three days to write an entry because of all the interruptions and distractions. Ughh. So, even if you didn’t make it through the entire blog-book entry, hope you at least enjoyed the pictures.

Thanksgiving

This year, our Thanksgiving was a very special occasion. About a week prior to the big day, Husband and I were talking and we realized this would be the first Thanksgiving we’ve spent together in two years. It just hadn’t dawned on us for some reason. The last Thanksgiving we were together was in 2005.

In September of 2006, he deployed to Iraq for his second year-long tour. We looked forward to being able to spend Thanksgiving together the next year, since he should have returned in late August or early September of 2007. Unfortunately, all Army deployments were extended from twelve to fifteen months right as husband neared the half-way point of the deployment. And with that, he spent two Thanksgivings in Iraq. Thankfully, he deployed in September, not October. If he’d deployed in October, he would have missed two Christmases too. Although I really enjoy Thanksgiving, Christmas was always the hardest holiday to get through when he was deployed.

The extension was an unexpected emotional blow, but I know it would have been so much worse had we also missed spending the Christmas holiday with him two years in a row. My heart broke for those families who weren’t as fortunate. Twelve months apart is hard, but for some reason, adding on those three extra months made it so much harder. So, this Thanksgiving, we all were most thankful for being able to spend the day together.

Daughter spent the morning helping me in the kitchen. We had such a good time talking and cooking together. She’s eleven, but looks like she’s a teenager. She’s almost as tall as me, can wear my shoes and clothes and she’s so mature. Sometimes I forget that she’s only eleven. Husband and son enjoyed some football and helped us get the table ready. After we ate, the men-folk did most of the cleanup saying it was the least they could do since daughter and I did all of the cooking.

After our bellies were full and the kitchen was cleaned up, daughter and I went and rented some movies. We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening watching Christmas movies and enjoying hot chocolate and the pie daughter made.

It was a great Thanksgiving and we’re looking forward to spending many more together now that he’s retired. I hope everyone else had a wonderful Thanksgiving too!

Ugh! I’m Sick AGAIN….

Good grief it seems as though I can’t catch a break.

I never did feel back to 100% after I finished the antibiotic. My cough got better though and that scary feeling of not being able to get enough air eased up a lot. I still had a little bit of wheezing sound when taking a deep breath, but the crackle was gone.

Late Friday night, the feeling of not being able to breathe was back. I used the inhaler my doc had given me and went on to bed. At 1 a.m. I woke up freezing. I thought it was strange considering I NEVER get cold at night, but after getting a drink of water I went back to bed. At 5, I woke up again freezing, my skin hurt along with my joints and I felt absolutely lousy. I knew then I had a fever, so I came downstairs and took my temperature. Yep, 102.9 – I was officially sick again and husband and I were planning on painting the damn living room Saturday and Sunday. Ughh.

Saturday I kept my fever down to around 99 to 100 with Tylenol. Without it, the fever would shoot back up. I made it to son’s football game that morning, but I only made it through the first half. I had to come home after that. I ended up sleeping pretty much the rest of the day.

Sunday, husband and I worked on painting the trim and getting all the small stuff out of there. The carpet comes on Friday, so sick or not, the painting had to be done.

Monday, my fever was still hanging on and I felt awful. I painted not quite half the room though. By 2 p.m. I felt even worse and broke down and called my doc’s office. I knew he was out of town, but thought maybe another doc in the office could call me in another antibiotic. Thankfully, they did. Husband picked it up for me after work and I’m hoping this one (Cipro) will knock out whatever this crud is.

Tuesday, I planned on painting of course. Unfortunately, I felt like I’d been run over by a Mac truck lol. When husband called to check on me after I’d taken the babies to school, he talked me into getting on the couch. I truly wasn’t worth killing.

Having totally wasted the entire day Tuesday sleeping on the couch, it left me only Wednesday and Thursday to finish up painting before the carpet is installed Friday. Wednesday morning, I was feeling better and got started not too long after taking the babies to school. Not too long after that, I was no longer feeling better lol, so I took quite a few breaks. I kept going though and was able to put the last bit of paint on the walls around 4 pm.

My plan for Thursday was to get up, clean the radiators, paint them and then paint the trim of the window the air conditioner is in and the side door. Having painted all day Wednesday, Wednesday night I was ready for bed at 11 pm. I knew the minute I got in bed I’d be asleep because not only was I tired, I was still feeling lousy and had a fever.

Of course, sleep was not to be. I swear it was like something out of the movie My Cousin Vinnie…only there were no trains, whistles or screech owls. No, what I had was a Siamese kitten in heat. Anyone who has ever heard a Siamese knows they have a tendency to sound like a baby crying. Apparently when they are in heat, they sound like a baby being tortured.

Long story short: No SLEEP. Yesterday was a bust. Not only am I sick and tired (and tired of being sick), I’m exhausted lol. I ended up sleeping since the kitten, having been up all night screaming, was tuckered out too. That left me with last night to at least get the radiators cleaned and painted. No way did I want to try to get them painted with the new carpet installed….so, I finished up the radiators while listening to the VP debate. I started around six painting and finally put the finishing touches on just as the debate was wrapping up.

Here’s a funny though. I get a call around 4 pm yesterday from the company that is contracted through Lowes to install the carpet. The nice lady says she has spoken with her installers and they have me scheduled for installation tomorrow, the 3rd. However, she has on her calendar the 13th. She says that she left me a message two weeks ago saying she had me down for the 13th and since I didn’t call back, she assumed her calendar was correct.

I thought I might come through the phone heh heh. I explained that our answering machine seems to be on the fritz and not saving every message, so I didn’t know she’d called. I told her that I hoped they were still planning on installing the carpet tomorrow because I’ve about killed my stupid self trying to get this room done before they arrived when I could have spent the past week in bed. She said the installers had the correct date down, so they would be able to be here in the morning.

Whew. Talk about wanting to come unglued lol. If they had canceled on me, when the installers and I had the SAME date and the office lady seemed to be the only one who couldn’t distinguish between a 3 and 13 on a calendar, I just might have had to use the little bit of energy I have left to smack her through the phone lol.

From what the installers had said when they came out to measure, they will move the furniture out of the living room – except for the entertainment stand. They don’t move those, which I can completely understand. Before bed last night, husband and I moved ours into the foyer. We’d planned to have the rest of the furniture out of there, but realized if we moved it all into the foyer, they wouldn’t be able to get in the front door lol.

This morning, I moved all the small stuff out of there, so all they’ll have to move is a couch, love seat, recliner and over sized chair. I’m hoping it won’t take them too long to get that old carpet (that is older than me) out and the new in. All I want to do is get my living room put back together, get comfortable in my chair and call it a week. I’m completely exhausted.

I did take some pictures this morning though. When they get the new carpet in, I’ll take some more. Sometime this weekend, once I get rested, I’ll post some before and after pictures.

Dang I’ve been sick….

Of course our babies were in school not even a week before one of them came home sick. All summer we stay healthy, but the minute they start school, they bring home some of the nastiest cold, flu stuff.

This time, it was son who came home sick. He had this terrible cough and mentioned he felt as though liquid was running deep in his ear every once in a while. Since he had tubes put in his ears last March, him feeling anything down in his ears had me worried. So, instead of waiting, I just went ahead and made him an appointment. Usually, I try to get them healthy at home since doctors these days aren’t too keen on giving antibiotics unless you’ve been sick seven to ten days, but the ear thing had me worried. Doc agreed that with his history, we shouldn’t wait on giving him an antibiotic. That was on the 4th.

I’d been feeling lousy a day or so when I took son in, but figured I’d get some good rest over the weekend and feel better by Monday. Yeah, right. By Tuesday, I was so congested, I felt like I couldn’t get enough air in my lungs between all the crackling and wheezing. If I tried to get on the couch or in bed, laying down made me feel like I was suffocating. Talk about feeling panicked when it feels like you aren’t getting enough air…just an awful feeling.

Thursday I broke down and called my doc and they worked me in on Friday afternoon. He put me on that Z-pak antibiotic which is a five day course. This past Tuesday I finished it and was still sick. It said that it’d keep working even after you finished taking it, so even though husband kept telling me I needed to call the doc back I figured I’d wait a few more days and see if I started feeling any better.

Yesterday was a bad day. I took the babies to school, got home, put the dogs out and fixed my coffee. Thought I’d get online and check my email and read a few blogs, so once I got the dogs in, I sat down with my laptop in my lap. Somewhere between taking a sip of coffee and having a coughing fit – well, I’ll spare the gory details and just say that when all was said and done, my laptop, my chair (and my clothes) was covered in coffee from me and the cup.

GREAT start to the day. Just great start.

My laptop was soaked and dead. All my pictures from our trip – plus all the pictures I’d taken over the last two years were of course only saved on my laptop and thus – gone…. I’ve mentioned that I get teary easily when I’m sick – multiply that by 4 heh heh. Sick for over a week, unable to sleep anywhere but in my chair or I felt like I was suffocating, then getting sick and ruining my computer added up to SobFest 2008. That did wonders for my congestion as you can imagine heh heh.

Thankfully, after fooling with the computer off and on yesterday, I was able to get it restarted last night. The keys were sticking here and there when I first started typing this, but they seem to have loosened up now. I took all my pictures last night and burned them onto a CD though, in case I couldn’t get the computer restarted again. So thankfully, all my pictures are safe and sound now.

Whew…

This morning wasn’t much better, but the fact that I got sick in the bathroom instead of the living room was a plus. I don’t know what it is about this cough, but somehow it flips my stomach and the puking is on. There’s no getting to the bathroom or anything when it happens unless I’m right there to begin with. This morning I was just lucky due to the fact of just having let the dogs out the back door and the bathroom is right there next to it…

So, there you go. I’ve not done anything in almost two weeks except sleep in my chair when I could. We have new carpet coming on October 3rd. Husband decided he didn’t want hardwood floors in the living room with area rugs, he’d rather have wall to wall carpeting since this is the room we spend most of our time in. I’ve got to get this living room painted before the 3rd…and with me being sick, the project hasn’t even been started. I’m hoping this weekend I’ll be feeling a lot better and can get a lot done. No way I want to paint this room after they put in the new carpet…I’m too messy of a painter for that to even be an option lol.

Hope everyone is having a great September!!

One Busy Summer

I’m sorry for not posting since APRIL. Jeez, I hadn’t realized it’d been that long until I stopped by my blog the other night. I thought for sure I’d posted in May or June.

Updates – lets see. First off, my brother and his wife came to visit us back in May. I cannot express in words how absolutely WONDERFUL it was to have them here. When it was time for them to head back home, of course I sobbed like a fool. I just hate having to say goodbye to family. Both my babies are truly my offspring since they cried too lol. They arrived on a Saturday morning and stayed until Thursday evening. I enjoyed them being here so much and can’t wait until we can either take a trip to see them in Tennessee or they can come back to Dorothy’s neck of the woods .

Husband took a job on post. I think the first few weeks were hard for him…but he’s liking it more now. OR he’s telling me he’s liking it more lol. I’m sure it will take him a while to get used to civilian life, but we’re on our way. He’s technically not “out” yet, but he will be shortly. Gotta love terminal leave I guess.

My health problems are still going strong. I could write a book, but I won’t bore you. All I will say is I feel truly blessed to have a civilian doctor now. And, one Tricare will pay for. We started out paying for me to see him out of pocket since we didn’t live outside the radius where they’d ok me to go off post. Once we had a huge influx of new soldiers to this post, I guess the system got overwhelmed and they ok’d me to go off post and have them pay for it. So now, I see THE SAME DOCTOR every single month, use the same small town pharmacy…and it has truly relieved some of the stress that goes along with having a chronic health problem.

The babies played sports this summer. Son played baseball and had a great time. He was a home run king in almost every game lol. He also just finished a football camp. Daughter played softball. She wasn’t too crazy about her coach this year, so I’ll be surprised if she wants to play again next year. I hope she will though, but it’s her decision.

The babies and I headed out to Georgia at the end of June. We met up with my Dad outside of Atlanta and spent a few days at my Aunt’s house. Then, we all RV’d down to Lake Wells Florida for 4th of July weekend. Dad took his air boat and son and I followed him down in my car. Riding in a truck does me no favors. Daughter stayed back with my Aunt. Her granddaughter is about daughter’s age – they are second cousins, so the girls rode down in their big RV. We all had such a great time – and it was wonderful spending time with family.

The Mustang – well, it didn’t do so well. I’d taken it in for an oil change right before we left and had Ford check it over. On the way down, we had water dripping into the driver and passenger floor. Guess the air conditioner drain was clogged. On the way home, we went through the WORST rain storm just south of Mobile. Twice we were hit where you could only go 25 mph on I 10. You had to have your flashers on just to see the car in front of you. We stopped just across the Alabama line at a rest stop so we could use the bathroom and get a picture of the Welcome to Alabama sign. When we get back in the car, the cruise control is out and the AC adapters won’t work to charge my GPS OR my cell phone. So, we’re on this back road in Mississippi and it’s 10 pm on a Sunday night and I know water has gotten into the electrical system somehow to crap out the cruise and the AC adapters and NOW we notice a quarter inch of water in the glove box….UGHH.

I get the freaking thing home and get it back into Ford. I have them print out the service record for the car and in less than two years it’d been in the shop 17 times. I went round and round with the local Ford dealer. We are GREAT customers – it was our fourth car we’d bought from them and they got ALL of our service work…and I felt I shouldn’t be the only one taking it up the ass on this car. Well, they wanted to act like I was wanting a brand new mustang for nothing. They broke the windshield when trying to fix the apparent leak and when we got it back it was half-ass put back in. Then they had the gooey black sealant stuck on the hood…. So, we went down to a bigger town and got a GREAT deal on an 08 GT that is a California Special. The only thing I didn’t like was it didn’t have a rear spoiler so they tossed in a FREE Roush spoiler. So, our local Ford can kiss our ass. I’ll drive the 35 minutes every three months and they’ll get my business on oil changes and anything else we end up doing to this car. This one’s interior is a lot prettier too – it has the dark charcoal gray with light gray – and it’s a five speed in the floor. Hopefully this one won’t give us any headaches….my fingers are crossed .

Whelp, guess that’s most of the updates. Just been a really busy summer. Husband finished our kitchen project of painting the cabinets. I’ll try to get some pictures posted in the next few weeks. Now we’re going to try to do the living room. Husband and I cleaned out the huge desk we had in the back of the living room Saturday and then yesterday, he ripped out this ugly shelf thing that enclosed the radiator in the back of the room and had some book shelves over it. All that gone and this room is HUGE…now I just have to clean the wall back there…fifty years of dust behind those shelves and the wall looks filthy, so I’ll need to wash all the walls before I paint them. I’ll get some pictures and update the blog as we go…

Hope everyone is having a good summer….I’m so ready for FALL and some cooler weather!!!

I Have a Good Reason…

for not posting.

Really!

It’s a long story on how exactly we came to add a Siamese kitten to our family. The short version is husband has a weakness. That weakness is our children. Daughter saw the baby. Daughter fell in love with the baby. Husband heard, “Oh Daddy, isn’t she beautiful?!” And, that’s all it took. We have a new little baby.

Here’s a picture I took a few weeks ago when we first welcomed the baby home:

Those blue eyes…gosh she really is beautiful. And what a character! She has a great personality and is so loving.

At night, she climbs up the comforter, finds her way under the covers and curls up under my neck. Purring, she and I fall alseep like that every night. Of course, when she is grown and weighs ten pounds, we’re going to have to find her somewhere else to sleep .

I’ve not been able to write due to our newest baby also enjoying the computer. As you can see in this next picture, she enjoys reading The LawDog Files too:

While she’ll occasionally find somewhere else to sleep, like on our other cat (who really needs to go on a diet):

Her favorite spot is in my lap. Laptop in the way? Ha! Not a problem for her. She makes herself right at home

As you can see, typing is a challenge .

Teaching Manners Isn’t Always Easy

Sometimes, teaching manners is interrupted by laughter. Ask any parent – your child can say or do something that deserves your attention and explanation as to WHY they shouldn’t do a certain something due to it being in poor taste or bad manners. However, you’re too busy trying to stifle laughter (so as to not encourage a particular behavior) to say anything. Even the best attempts at stifling laughter are sometimes impossible and before you can even attempt correcting them, you’ve burst into hysterics. We had such a case just the other day…

I’ll precede this story with a small fact to put everything in perspective. Friday evening, we ate at our local Mexican restaurant. While I had rice with my steak and cheese burrito, the rest of my family had beans with their entrees.

Yeah. That small fact is important.

Saturday, several times I had to remind our son that passing gas is not something you do as an attention getter – or at the table. Instead, you leave the room or if you’re at the table, you say excuse me, leave the table, go to the bathroom (in a restaurant) or in another room at home – do what you have to do and then return to the table. Of course, after he put the “leaving the room when farting” manner into practice, I then had to explain when you DO leave the table to handle your business, you do not return to the table and give everyone a play by play. The entire purpose of leaving the table is to not only shield those at the table from having to experience the aroma and/or sound effects, but to also shield everyone from having to think about farts while they are trying to enjoy their meal.

*Sigh*

Sunday night, son was sitting in his favorite spot (in the recliner on husband’s lap) while we all watched TV. Daughter and I were talking about something when we were interrupted by a small explosion from the little guy’s nether regions. Just as we’re looking over and I’m about to once again stress the importance of good manners, son, while fanning the air says, “Whew!! I’m smelling special!!”

Yep, the manners lecture was out of the question. Husband, daughter and I couldn’t stop laughing long enough to say much of anything. It’s going to be a while before I agree to another dinner at the local Mexican place though – unless we invest in some Beano first.

Our Baby Had Surgery

Since we found out in January he’d need the surgery, I’ve been a nervous wreck. I’m so relieved that it’s now behind us and that everything went so well.

We found out there was a problem when the school sent a note home this winter that he’d done poorly on a hearing test. I talked with the school and was told that a lot of the children had similar results due to all of the cold/flu bugs going around at the time and not to worry too much.

I scheduled an appointment with our doc here in town and took him in – as the note about the hearing test suggested. Our doc said he had fluid in both ears and gave him a course of antibiotics. He wanted to see him again in two weeks.

We’d noticed prior to the hearing test that he wasn’t hearing well, but he’d been sick with a cold/cough off and on for several weeks, so until the hearing test I’d rationalized it that way. After the hearing test and our visit with the doctor, I thought the second course of antibiotics a month and a half after he’d had antibiotics when he’d had the bad cough would clear it up.

The two weeks passed and I took our little guy back to the doc. Unfortunately, he still had fluid in both ears. Our doctor said we’d try one more course of antibiotics and if that didn’t clear it up, we’d need to go see an ENT doc. As you can tell by the title of this entry, the last try didn’t work and we ended up having to drive our baby an hour and a half to another town to see the specialist. This doc was the closest one to us that takes Tricare. Just hard to believe with two larger towns within 35 minutes of us, no ENT docs in our area take our insurance.

So at the end of January, we made the trek to the specialist to see what he suggested. He looked at both ears and said they were full of fluid. He put a camera in his nose and said his adenoids were taking up 50% of the space – so he suggested we put the tubes in his ears and have his adenoids removed due to son’s history. That history being – daughter can bring home a cold and within a week son not only has the cold, but he has a barking cough to go with it. EVERY TIME he would get sick, he’d get this horrible sounding cough. Doc thought removing the adenoids would more than likely help so he wouldn’t constantly be draining stuff into his ears and throat.

So, Sunday night came too quickly. Daughter spent the night with our friends and their daughter. Husband, son and I made a two hour trek to the clinic where the ENT doc performs the surgery. The clinic an hour and a half from here is new and they are not doing surgeries there just yet. Anyhow, the surgery was scheduled for 7:30 a.m. Monday, March 10th. Since it was so early in the morning, we decided to go down the night before, find the clinic and then find a hotel close to it.

We stayed in one of the Suites hotels – can’t remember now which one (yeah, I handle stress real well lol). At any rate, THE WORST beds we’ve ever slept on. They were way too soft – the kind of soft where a mattress is worn out – not a pillow-top soft kind of mattress. We were burning up on the 3rd floor, but then froze when we turned the air on. Just a miserable night. It felt so awful having one of our children with us and our other baby two hours away. I love our friends – they are such great people and their children are the same ages as our children, so our children are friends too. But, it still felt terrible without daughter with us and not five minutes after we dropped her off I think husband, son and I all wished she was with us.

Anywho, after surgery was pretty rough. The surgery itself took only ten minutes according to the doc. While they took him to the first recovery area, we go back to a little room where the doc comes in and tells us how it went. He said that everything went great. He didn’t have hardly any fluid in his right ear, but had quite a bit in the left. We asked how long until he’s hearing better and he said he should be able to notice a difference as soon as he wakes up. We ask a few more questions which he answers in great detail (we really like this doctor) and he tells us that as soon as he wakes up, they’ll come get us and we can come back to the second recovery area and be with him.

Husband and I sit back down in the lobby and about thirty minutes later they call us back. We’re taken to a long hall that has these little cubby like areas off to the left. Each has a hospital recliner in them, a blood pressure/heart rate machine and an area for a child’s size bed. Towards the end of the hall they show us into our little cubby and pull the curtain open. About that time, I see them – no, the first thing is I HEAR my baby – and then I see two nurses pushing a bed around a corner and down the hall to us. Son is laying on his side in the bed and trying to sit up – all the while screaming, “MOMMY! MOMMY! I WANT MY MOMMY!!!”

Now, you have to know my children to know how out of character this is. My babies are pretty well behaved. They say yes sir and no ma’am. Since they were two years old, I’ve not had to tell them to settle down in a restaurant – much less in a store and especially not in a doctor’s office or a hospital.

So, to hear my baby screaming in terror for his Mom, put my heart into my throat and it honestly scared me to death. I’d never seen him like that – ever. Not to mention the fact my babies call me Momma and haven’t called me Mommy since they were itty bitty…

They get him to our little cubby area and I tell him Daddy and I are right here, that it’s OK. He says gasping, “Oh Mommy, I woke up and couldn’t see you and I was so scared. Oh Mommy….” I tell him that we’re right here now and Daddy and I aren’t going anywhere. At this point, I guess it dawned on him that THE MAN was in the house LMAO and he says, “Oh, Oh Daddy…I couldn’t find you and Mommy.” Husband says, “It’s OK buddy. We’re all together now.”

The nurse asks him if he wants to sit with me and he says yes, so I sit down in the recliner and they put my baby in my lap. He still has an IV in his hand and they attach a blood pressure cup to his left arm and clip a heart monitor on his toe. He lays his head on my shoulder and doses for a minute and wakes back up and starts to get upset again, “Mommy, Momm…” I tell him that I have him and he’s OK…just to lay right here on Momma and he’ll start feeling better in a few minutes when more of the anesthesia wears off. He closes his eyes and settles back down and I keep talking to him about any and everything I can think of, just so he can hear my voice.

After about ten minutes he wakes up a little more and says his head hurts bad. The cute little red headed nurse is in there and she asks if he’d like something to drink and he says yes. Then he says, “Oh I think I’m going to be sick…oh my tummy, I’m going to throw up Momma…”

The nurse hands us a plastic hospital issue puke holder and my baby throws up blood two or three times. I tell her that I told the staff that I’m a HUGE puker after being put under and I worried he would be to. She says that they’d given him a phenergan suppository while he was under. Our body won’t digest blood though, so he probably is sick due to swallowing the blood and once he gets it up, he should be fine. He says his head really hurts, so the nurse leaves and comes back with a syringe and a cup of water with a straw. She gives him the medicine in the syringe by mouth and tells him to drink the water to help get the taste out of his mouth.

And that’s when things get scary.

He lays his head back down on my shoulder, closes his eyes and doses back off. Meanwhile, the blood pressure/heart machine starts making a funny noise. Husband, the nurse and I look at it and see that his heart rate is just getting higher and higher. The nurse walks closer to the machine, clicks a few buttons to reset it, changes toes on the heart rate monitor and it counts for a second and starts making the noise again as it registers his heart rate at 191 beats per minute. The nurse says she’ll be right back and husband and I sit there with our baby and watch this monitor count the beats and make the loud noise every few seconds.

A few minutes later, the nurse is back and she has the doctor who put him under with her. We’d met this nice lady prior to the surgery when she’d stopped in to talk with us about putting him under. She tells the nurse that we need to wheel a bed back in here (when they’d put him in my lap, they’d removed the bed). The nurse finishes hooking up a bag of saline to his IV and leaves the room. Honestly, I can’t really remember what the doc did from there…I think she listened to his chest with her stethoscope, but I can’t be sure. Husband mentions that everything was fine until he was given the medicine by mouth. That we’re not sure if that has anything to do with it, but it wasn’t long after he got the medicine that the machine started making the loud noise.

Soon the nurse was back with a bed and she reaches down and picks my baby up and puts him back in the bed. She gets some sticky round things and puts two on his chest and one one his back and hooks that up to the blood pressure/heart rate machine. The nurse had done a print out of his heart rate prior to going to get the doc and after hooking him up to the machine with the sticky things, they printed out another. The doc said to let him get the entire bag they’d hooked up to his IV and she’d be back to check on him shortly.

Son was now more awake and talking normal – without the gasping fear sound to his voice. The nurse went and got him a warm blanket and he snuggled quietly as he talked about how scared he’d felt when he first woke up. I told him it probably had a lot to do with being so groggy from being put to sleep for the surgery…that I always wake up feeling all weird and shaky from surgery. I told him it was normal and the more awake you get, the less you feel like that. He agreed and said he was sorry for yelling, but he was scared and just wanted to see us. I told him it was quite all right – that I’m sure everyone understands and there’s nothing to be sorry for. We wanted to see him really bad too .

*sigh* My sweet little boy…

By the time the bag was three quarters empty, his heart rate was back to normal. The nurse came back to check on him and said he looked really good. We asked her what had caused his heart rate to go up so high and she said she wasn’t sure. She said what had concerned her so much was the fact it had jumped up so high and he wasn’t crying or anything. Him laying quietly on me and his heart rate increasing like it was sent off the warning flags.

When the bag was empty and his heart rate had been normal for a while, she said she could take out the IV and he could get dressed. He was so good when she was taking out the IV…just quietly said, “OW, OW, OW” and then asked why the band-aid lol. We helped him off the bed after she’d removed the round sticky things and he got dressed. He said he was PAST ready to go home ha!

We arrived around 7:15 and we were out of there by 9:45. We had to drive quite a ways to pick up his prescriptions. Where the surgical clinic was located looked pretty ritzy. All the homes were in gated communities and they had high priced little stores in all the strip malls. A winery/steakhouse, no Wal-Mart, but a Super Target that I didn’t even know existed ha! Well, as we headed south towards the other hospital where the pharmacy was located, you could tell there was a BIG LINE between the rich area and the shithole area. A four lane road separated them. On the north side, you had gated communities, everyone driving $50,000+ cars. On the south side, you had land yachts with bling, beaters driving on three tires and a donut, run down dumpy houses, dirty looking people hanging out on street corners etc. I noticed something else in the huge contrasts between the two areas. In the rich area, the speed limit on the main four lane road was 40 to 45 mph. Once you crossed over to the shitty area, the speed limit dropped to 35 mph. I told husband about it and wondered if there are any statistics that show there are more wrecks in crappy areas and fewer in richer areas. It would make sense I guess – when you drive a beater you don’t care where you park in a parking lot because one more ding isn’t going to make that big of a difference (yep, I’ve driven a beater lol). If someone tail gates, you think “Go ahead hit me, I need the insurance money.” When you have a nice vehicle, you park farther down so hopefully you don’t get some idiot opening their door on your car and leaving a dent and when someone almost hits you, the wordy durds fly… Anyhow, just wondered about that.

We arrived home around 1 pm. Little guy and his Dad had some lunch and then took almost a two hour nap. I woke them up at 3pm so we could go pick up big sister from school and hit the local grocery store. We’d promised little guy he could pick out any kind of ice cream he wanted.

Other than his throat being sore when he swallowed, he said he felt fine. He also said he could hear and breathe a lot better! I hadn’t thought about how the adenoids being removed would feel to him. He just couldn’t get over how much easier it was for him to breathe when he was drinking his juice. Instead of having to put the glass away from his mouth after he swallowed so he could take a breath, now he could breathe through his nose in between swallows – and he thought that was a miracle lol.

So, although it’s been stressful these past few weeks leading up to this surgery and we’re all glad it’s over, we are also glad we went ahead and had the surgery done. Not only is he hearing better, he’s breathing better. We couldn’t have asked for a better outcome.

We’ll go back in a month to see the doc and hopefully that will be the end of any ear issues for our baby. The tubes will eventually fall out on their own, so he won’t have to go through another surgery to have them removed. I’m hoping with spring almost here, we’ve seen the last of the cold/flu season. If so, hopefully both our babies will stay healthy and give our little guy’s body time to recoup from not only the surgery, but all the bugs his little system has been fighting since October.

I’m just so glad it’s over. I was finally able to sleep last night. I think it was the first time in over a week I slept more than an hour and a half without waking up. I’m still pretty tired though. Hopefully getting a few more nights of good sleep will get me back to feeling normal instead of being tired and worn out all day every day. It’s definitely time for things to get back to normal around here…

I’ve Caught My Death…

Ok, so that’s a bit dramatic…but honestly I cannot recall being this sick in a long, long time. And to tell you the truth, I couldn’t even begin to explain what in the heck I have. Lets see – there’s the fever that is around 100.8 to 101.4 – if I can get it down below the 100.8, I don’t hurt so bad. Otherwise, everything I have HURTS. My neck hurts, my back hurts, my shoulders – even my legs and ankles of all things. Just feel like shit warmed over…. Other than the aches and fever, my nose is stuffy and that’s about it. I’ve had a cold for the past week – but starting Saturday night the fever kicked in with the body aches that feel as though I’m in some medieval torture device and being pulled apart at the joints.

Husband is doing his “get out of the Army” classes this week. So, he was home late this morning – not having to be on post until 9. So he took the babies to school. I got on the couch around 9:30 I guess. Before he’d left he said I should try to get some sleep since I sat up in the chair all night…just hurt too bad to think about laying down.

So after everyone left this morning, I took some Tylenol cold medicine, some sudafed and get covered up with one of the soft fluffy blankets we have on the couch. I almost get dosed off when the phone rings…it’s my mother. After listening to her bitch for half an hour about my step-brother – I finally get off the phone, use some nose spray and get back on the couch. I get good and asleep – apparently hard asleep since when the phone rang again, I woke up to drool (yep, I have no shame when I’m sick). This time it’s husband. I think, didn’t he tell me to go to sleep? How am I suppose to sleep with him calling? Figure if I hit silent on my phone and just roll back over, he’ll know I’m asleep and try again after lunch. So that’s what I do. Nope, just get back to sleep when the freakin’ phone rings AGAIN half an hour later….I answer it in a very friendly tone: WHAT?

Husband: You able to get any rest?
Bitch: Not with the freakin’ phone ringing every damn 30 minutes. No, can’t say I have…
Husband: I’m sorry, did I wake you? Just was worried and wanted to see how you are feeling.
Bitch: I feel like SHIT…I wish someone would take me out back and shoot me and put me out of my misery.
Husband: Well, I’ll let you go so you can get back to sleep…

Yeah, I was so friendly, but sheesh people. When someone I love is sick I try to give them some space. Not me – Mother’s problems are always more important than anything else, husband was just trying to be nice, but after dealing with my Mother – ughh.

I need a vacation lol. And yes, I called husband back later and apologized for being such an ass. Poor guy….

Of course it’s freezing here today with 15 mph winds. I got off the couch around two planning to go up, get a shower and get ready to pick our babies up from school. I pick up my coffee cup off the end table and start for the kitchen…get half way there and everything goes black. I just sat down in the middle of the dining room. I get back to my chair and sit back down. Standing to take a shower is out. I call my friend and ask if she would mind picking up my babies for me. I was so thankful I didn’t have to get out in the cold….

Now if I can just get a good night’s sleep tonight and hopefully get over whatever the heck it is that I’ve caught. Sheesh…I hate being sick…

He’s HOME – and other updates

Husband finally returned home December 4th. They flew into our state around 10 pm that night and the babies and I made the 35 minute drive to post for the redeployment ceremony scheduled at 12:30 am. Thankfully the speeches were short and we were soon on our way home.

I’m sure the weather change was a shock for all the soldiers who returned home in December. The week after husband’s group returned, we had the huge ice storm hit. Not only did it delay some of the last group returning, those who were already home had the pleasure of getting some real quality time with their families ha! Most everyone in our area lost power. Some had power off and on for three or four days – others lost power completely for the four days. Emergency shelters were set up, hotels that had power were booked solid….

Gosh you should have seen the trees we had down in our small town. It was something to see for sure. Our power was out off and on for three days. The first day, we lost power after midnight and it came back on for three or four hours the next evening. Just long enough for us to get the house warmed up again. The next two days the power was out all day for the most part and then would come back on for a few hours, cut back off, then come back on in four or five hours. It was a HUGE mess and I’m sure it was even harder on the soldiers who weren’t acclimated.

Christmas came and went all too quickly. I had waited on husband to return to do the Christmas shopping for the babies. He was returning early enough in December and I thought we’d have plenty of time to do the shopping together. Well, with the ice storm and the power out – we ended up having to rush to finish up shopping. I enjoyed every second I had with husband and the fact we were able to do all the shopping together, but it sure went by too fast because that week of the storm we weren’t able to do anything but try to stay warm and keep the water pipes in the house from freezing.

Husband’s 30 days of leave also went by too fast. He returned to work last week. A lot of folks are still on leave, so his work schedule, thankfully, isn’t quite normal just yet. We’re still able to enjoy spending some extra time together with PT not part of the schedule and him not working until 7 pm. He’s able to be home in the mornings to take the babies to school on his way to work and be home early enough to help with homework in the afternoons and sit down with us for supper.

Whelp, guess that’ll catch up the ol’ blog here with the latest happenings. Hope everyone’s year is off to a good start!