Lists and Nonlists

In spite of having two children who sleep reasonably well, I am unreasonably exhausted.  But my children are also wonderful and deserve to be documented, so here we go:

Walter

• The other night, he sang a "Daddy, I love you!" song, while flailing his arms and legs and poking Sean with a fork. This is pretty much what being two is all about.
• He says "Sally" now instead of "Tally." 
• Last week he started asking "Why?" He's been asking "Why not?" for quite a while.  I don't think he's entirely clear on either of those concepts, though.  Still, it feels like a milestone. 
• The day after Thanksgiving we broke out the play dough and he played for two hours straight.  He would have played longer if we hadn't stopped him and made him go to bed.  It was amazing.
• He loves to cook and bake with us.  He loves to dance and sing (at daycare he evidently spends a lot of time dancing and singing in front of the mirror) but he's also still quite shy (and, annoyingly, camera shy ... not a lot of good video lately.) He loves books and blocks.  He's kind of off puzzles, for the moment. His imaginative play is getting more and more creative; lately, he's been imagining all sorts of interesting scenarios involving cookies (cookies stuck on the ceiling. cookies being baked by spinning on the ceiling fan, etc.)

  

  Walter's amazing playdough flower

• He's constantly singing, either real songs or songs he's making up or fabulous itsy bitsy wheels on a happy birthday bus mashups.   He likes speaking nonsense language and making funny noises.  One of our favorite games is when I say, "Baby Sally says ..." and Walter imitates one of her noises (usually "Ah!")
• I spend a lot of time with Sally, so we're always on the lookout for ways Walter and I can have time together, just the two of us.  Walter calls this a "date-venture."
• Walter is incredibly bonded with Sean.  When he leaves the room, Walter runs after him saying, "Daddy, where are you?" 
• We decided to go low key on the potty training for now, because of all the transitions and upheaval in Walter's life (new sister, Mama who's been recovering from surgeries, etc.)  He's wearing pull-ups during the day and pees in the potty quite often at school and at home.  Not sure when or how we'll make the jump to big-boy undies.
• We've all had colds, off and on, the last few weeks.  Walter's had the worst of it, with very bad coughing fits at night.  But when I took him to see Dr. L, both tubes were out of his ears and both ears looked great ... no tubes and no infections.  This could mean he's grown out of his chronic ear infections and won't need tubes put back in.  Moreover, Dr. L said "You're doing an amazing job with him.  What a sweet boy!" He is indeed. 

Sally

Sally with her Aunt Nicole, standing 

The list format doesn't work well for Sally ... she just doesn't "do" as much as Walter does. But she does everything a three month old should do, and then some. She holds her head up, sits up (with some propping, of course) and jumps and stands while we hold her (she has amazingly strong legs.)  She rolls from her belly to her back and from her back to her side. 

She doesn't spend much time at all in the bouncer, so last night I tried putting her in it to see what she'd do.  She immediately figured out that she needed to kick the monkey or the toucan to make the lights and sounds turn on.  Tonight, while Sean was holding her, he made a whistling sound through his nose and she reached up and grabbed his nose.  She also reaches for her toes, and for my watch and my wristband, and most especially and fervently, my hair.  She does a lot of grabbing and pulling of my hair. It's wonderful. I love feeling how strong and persistent she is. 

I worry that we're not actively working with her on milestone type-things the way we did with Walter. But she seems to be progressing pretty normally and well.  What we lack in age-appropriate stimulation I think we make up for in adventures (more toddler than baby appropriate, usually, but she seems to really enjoy looking around and seeing new places and people) and lots and lots of face time.  She gets held and talked to a lot.  And cuddled a tremendous amount.  Any baby that gets cuddled this much is going to be just fine. 

She gets cuddled a lot at day care, in part because she doesn't eat while she's there.  They've made some progress on getting her to like and want the bottle, but still no actual drinking yet. I've been going in midday to nurse her and/or leaving work early so we can start the evening nursing early.  It makes me crazy with worry but everything seems to be fine: she's reportedly quite happy at day care, she's growing, she fills diapers.  She even sleeps through the night.  So we're OK, but I'm hoping she starts taking a bottle soon.

A friend asked recently about Sally's personality.  Again, it's hard to say, because hers is definitely evolving on a different level than Walter's.  She's very, very sweet.  She's snuggly and overall very happy.  She gives big smiles (no giggles yet, but I think that's coming next.) She's talkative and has a huge range of incredibly expressive sounds.  She startles easily when she's awake but can sleep through just about anything (this is a very good skill for a baby in our house to have.) She's curious and doesn't mind being held by new people, though she still has a preference for me (I'm the only one who can feed her, currently, so this preference makes a lot of sense.)  I feel very deeply connected to Sally, like she's still doing handstands on my left hipbone. 

The rest of us

• Hank is doing well.  He's mostly with us now after staying for quite awhile with my parents after Sally was born. His quality of life is much better when he's staying with them: more walks, more dog park, more on-time meals, fewer small children to fret over.  But he seems to love us, and God knows we love him.  Our house is sad and lonesome when he's not here, and Walter asks about him all the time, missing him.  He's a good dog. 
• Sean is tired, stressed out about our finances (two kids in daycare ... it is not a good thing, friends) and still managing to be the most wonderful parent and husband the world has ever seen.  Tonight I played with Walter so he got to hold Sally for awhile, which I think helped with the stress. 
• I am tired. I'm stressed, too, but more about having clothes to wear to work and less about finances. I'm surrounded by bins of clothes, hand-me-downs from my mom, which I could potentially wear if I ever have the time and energy to go through them.  I need to go shopping for some basic things and haven't had a chance to, yet.  And I'm not on great terms with my body.  I had a terrible gallbladder attack a month ago that sent me (and Sally, and a good friend from church) to the emergency room late at night.  That was followed by gallbladder surgery, which took place right after Sean's parents came to visit, we threw a big 2 year birthday party for Walter, and hosted a big celebration for Sally's baptism.  I found out that narcotic pain killers make me depressed (a fairly common thing, I'd imagine, for a depressant to do) and also that having an infected incision which then becomes an open wound in the middle of my chest does not help with the depression.  Today the wound is mostly healed and I am mostly feeling better. Depression is an odd thing for me, these days. I am full of happy hormones from nursing and general happiness from my interactions with my wonderful family and congregation and friends.  I laugh a lot, I genuinely enjoy myself.  But I can't shake the tired feeling, even when I get a good night's sleep.  And I feel ... frumpy.  Physical activity is probably the answer, and now that my incision is healing up, I'm thinking about ways to work on feeling better.

Key to the feeling better plan: spend as much time as possible with these goofballs

Tubes Part II: The Re-Tubening

In late April or so, the tube in Walter's left ear made a break for it. This is completely normal and expected--ear tubes often fall out after about 9 months in the ear. What stunk about this particular de-tubing was that, as soon as it came out, Walter immediately got a bad ear infection.  Also, the tube in his right ear stayed put and was draining perfectly.  That made the decision of what to do next a little trickier, because ideally you have one surgery to replace both tubes, rather than two surgeries to replace the tubes one at a time (or no replacement at all, if the Eustachian tube has straightened out enough to drain on its own.)

We weren't very pleased with the Ear, Nose and Throat experience at our local clinic (the doctor who forgot to show up for Walter's first tube surgery retired, and the doctor who prescribed the never-used-on-kids antibiotic after that surgery that Walter had an allergic reaction to wasn't really an option we were excited about.) So we decided to try the only pediatric ENT in our area, even though it was an hour drive and it's harder to get an appointment with her.  She's totally worth it.  Dr. S. immediately shot up into the pantheon of doctors beloved by Walter, formerly only populated by Walter's pediatrician Dr. L. and Dr. Coconut, Walter's macaw puppet.  When his ears hurt, Walter immediately asks to see Dr. S., and is very relieved and pleased when we tell him he's got an appointment.  He trusts her to make things better.  We do, too.

Dr. S's first recommendation was to wait on replacing the tube in the left ear.  Warmer weather usually means fewer colds, and fewer colds fewer opportunities for ear infections.  The longer we held out, the more likely it was that we could do both tubes at once if needed (or decide we didn't need them anymore, at all.) When he saw her, Walt's ear infection had gotten better, so we were hopeful.  And Walt was healthy ...

... for less than a week.  Then another ear infection hit--again, just the left, non-draining ear.  Dr. L.the pediatrician was not amused.  "You've got to go back to Dr. S. and get the tube back in," he said.  Dr. L. usually leaves more room for discussion than that, so I knew he really meant it.  He put Walter on what ended up being a 20 day course of Augmentin (we'd just finished a 10 day course less than a week before that, too.) Augmentin is the least tasty, most awful-smelling, most effective oral antibiotic we've used with Walter. We eventually developed a really good medicine giving and taking routine: Dada gives Walter a hug (holds his arms down) while Mama gives Walter the medicine in a syringe.  Then, Walter gets a glass of milk and a small cookie. With medicine twice a day every day for 30 days, we went through a lot of milk and cookies, and Walter got very, very good at taking his medicine.

And, with the help and blessing of Dr.'s L. and S., we set a date for surgery to replace the tube in the left ear.  When he finished his Augmentin, Walter was so healthy we wondered again if we were doing the right thing.  Then we realized he'd only been healthy for two weeks, and that our perspective on what constitutes a "healthy stretch" has gotten a little skewed. Dr. L. and Dr. S. agreed: it was time.

On Monday I got the call that Walt's surgery had been scheduled.  As we expected, it was today (Wednesday the 17th of June.) Unexpected, though, was the time ... check in at 10 am, surgery at 11. No food after midnight on Tuesday.  One cup of clear liquid allowed before 8 am on Wednesday, but nothing by mouth at all (not even water) after that.

*Kaboom* went my head as it exploded in a pure mama bear rage.

I didn't express any of this rage to the nice surgery scheduling person on the phone, thankfully.  I kept it together. I did say, pleasantly, "Wow, that's really late.  I thought young children were supposed to be scheduled first thing in the morning?" She reminded me that Dr. S. is a pediatric ENT, and Walt was scheduled as early as he possibly could be ... there were just even younger kids getting surgery ahead of him that morning. I asked about switching the surgery to another, less-busy day, but Dr. S.'s receptionist assured me that 10 am was a good time for a 20 month old in their practice, and that changing the date could result in an even later check in time.  I took a deep breath and took the appointment time as it was, and started making plans for how to get through the morning with a hungry, thirsty Walter.

Walter, as usual, had his own plans.  After a big dinner of his favorite foods (pepperoni pizza from Polito's and ice cream from Dairy Queen) Walt went to bed at about the normal time, woke up crying at 11:45 and drank some water, and then slept until we absolutely had to wake him up to get him in the car and drive to Marshfield. He was actually awake when we went into his bedroom; just chilling out calmly and quietly in his big boy bed.  He's been doing that every morning this week.  It's fantastic.  It was especially fantastic because Sean and I couldn't think of anything we could do to keep him occupied without eating if he'd woken up at his former usual wake up time: 6 am. Take a bath? No, he'd drink the bath water.  Go to the park? No, it's a ridiculously hot day, and he'd get dehydrated and need water. Go grocery shopping? No, he'd get hungry and want cheese from the deli. Play quietly inside at home?  That would work for maybe an hour.  We also thought a stroller ride around the block with Hank might be OK.  Watching TV was our emergency back up plan. But we didn't have to enact any of those plans, because at 8:45 Walt was up and dressed and cheerful and we were out the door and on our way to Marshfield.

On the long drive there, Walter played with one of his "hellos" (in this case, a leap frog music player that was a gift from Aunt Andrea, Uncle Jimmy and Cousin Casey.)  He sang along with the toy and on his own; lots of ABC's, some good counting, some Old MacDonald.  We looked for and spotted many cows, horses, trains and trucks.   I noted that the cows were brown, white and black, and Walter said, "Blue cow?" and then laughed to let us know it was a joke.  We joked about all kinds of unlikely cow colors for awhile. At one point, he asked for water, please. I took a deep breath and explained that none of us could have any water until after we saw Dr. Stone and she fixed his ears. No water or food for Mama, Dada or Walter until after the surgery.  He accepted it immediately and didn't ask about food or water again (until after the surgery.) Walter is amazing.

Walter's Mama, though, can be a little crazy when she's worried about her boy. In the waiting room I got upset because people were eating and drinking in front of Walter (he didn't notice, or noticed and didn't care.)  I nearly bit the hand off a 5 year old boy who tried to steal Walter's Elmo doll out of our diaper bag.  We were in the waiting room for 30 minutes before we could go back for pre-op, and I was sure that meant everything was going to be late and delayed all morning long.  It wasn't.  It just meant Walter got to play and run around for 30 minutes instead of going crazy in a pre-op bay for 30 minutes. The surgery was right on time.

When I heard we were still expecting surgery at 11, I started to calm down a bit, but was still wound pretty tight.  I asked the intake nurse if we could "slip him some C-R-A-C-K" during phase 2 of recovery.  Sean pointed out that we probably shouldn't ever give Walter any C-R-A-C-K. Exasperated, I said, "C-R-A-C-K-E-R-S! I stopped spelling because she knew where I was going with it!"  Then I looked a the nurse and realized she probably hadn't known, and probably was genuinely wondering if I was on C-R-A-C-K and planning to slip some to my toddler in the recovery room.

Before 

Right after that, the intake nurse remarked on how good Walter was being.  "He's doing great," I agreed.  "He's doing much better than I am."  Saying it out loud made it real, and immediately I relaxed and regained perspective.

Pre-op is pretty much a parade of people asking the same questions and explaining the same things over and over, which sounds annoying but is really comforting and reassuring before a surgery. We talked to the anesthesiologist and the nurse anesthetist. Dr. S. came in and Walter was thrilled.  A really nice nurse, Nurse K., came in and bonded beautifully with Walter. He talked to her right away, which is pretty unusual for him.  She brought him a bunch of stickers, which he put on himself, on me, on Sean and on Nurse K.  Nurse K.'s patter with Walter during the sticker-giving was based largely on gender stereotypes and almost set my teeth right back on edge. I started writing a protest song in my head titled "Even Though the Baby in my Womb is a Girl, Her Brother Can Give Her A Car Sticker Rather Than a Barbie Sticker (The Shoop Shoop: Stop Your Gender Norming Song.)"  Then I realized that Nurse K. was awesome and in a short time had built actual trust with my son, who was going to need to leave us in the pre-op bay and go by himself to surgery soon.

The plan had been for yet another nurse, Nurse H., to take Walter to the OR, but when the time came to go Walter asked Nurse K. for uppaday and wouldn't let go, so she got a mask on and took him in.  They often give a sedative to kids Walter's age about 15 minutes before surgery so they don't struggle when leaving their parents or while being put on the operating table, but Walter didn't need it.  Dr. S. said he was scared for two breaths and then the general anesthetic kicked in.

Less sedation meant a shorter recovery time, and before I could update my Facebook status the surgery was over and Walter was ready to see us.  Dr. S. reported that the right ear still looked great and healthy, so other than taking out some wax she left it and the tube alone.  The left ear drum was thick (a bad thing,) but with no infection and just a little mucus trapped behind it.  The thick eardrum scared me a bit, but Dr. S. said she found it reassuring: "If the ear had been perfectly healthy, I would have wondered why we were doing the surgery.  It's clear he still needs the tubes."

After

In recovery Walter was thirsty, hungry, "owie" and a little crabby.  Mostly he wanted us to put him down and let him walk out of the clinic. The post-op nurses discouraged us from letting him do this. But they didn't keep us too long, and on the way out Walter got to ride in a big red wagon and pick out a beanie baby to take home (he chose a very nice little yellow duck, which he told us later belongs to his Ernie doll.) We went straight to Perkins, where Walter drank some chocolate milk and didn't eat very much muffin or pancake, but did enjoy some bacon (way to jump back onto the solids train, Walter!)  By sheer force of will he stayed awake the whole ride home, and once in his bed settled in for a very nice three hour nap. He woke up bright-eyed and a little silly. We went grocery shopping and then home again for chicken taco dinner.  He had good phone and video calls with family, played wonderfully with his Sesame Street puppets and Dr. Coconut, and went to bed with some (short-lived) reluctance and a dose of Advil that we hope will see him through the night.

The first time he got tubes, Walter had a raging double ear infection that continued for months after the surgery.  We were just starting to see the benefits of the tubes when the left one came out.  I'm hopeful that, because his ear was relatively healthy already for this surgery, Walter won't have any ear infections this time. When I go back and read old posts and realize how much of his first year he spent sick, I get pretty sad.  He had a great first year in spite of it, but life is so much better when he's healthy.  So, here's praying and hoping for 9 months (at least) of a healthy-eared Walter Paul!

Today is Tubesday

When we got back from our Michigan road trip/vacation, the day after Walter finished a course of antibiotics for an ear infection (his fourth) he started getting sick again.  As we geared up for the fifth ear infection and another round of antibiotics, we started talking tubes.  Our pediatrician was all for it, as was the ENT.  Even when he was ostensibly healthy in the few days he had between infections, Walter's ears did not look good. We scheduled the surgery to happen right away, a week after our appointment with the ENT (today.)

And then ... Walter got sick again. We called the ENT and got another course of antibiotics prescribed, hoping to head the inevitable infection off at the (very small, not very well-draining) pass. We spent four days nervously (and goopily) awaiting today ... and it all went really, really well.

Walt's Easter lamb assisted with surgery

Sure, there were rough spots. Walt had to fast after 2:30 am, which is kind of hard to explain to a 10 month old who loves to nurse upon waking.  Getting him up at 2:15 to nurse actually went really well, and getting him up again at 5:30 to go to the hospital was bad but not too too bad. He listened to his beloved magic lullaby cd from Aunt Audrey and Uncle Curtis and clung to my hand and arm which got us through the ride there.  Curiosity and stranger anxiety kept him occupied for a little while during the pre-op check in, but soon he started getting insistent about breakfast, which was after all right there in front of him.  After an hour or so he started to angrily pinch and claw at the skin on my neck and chest, at which point Sean pried him away and took him on a tour of the pre-surgery area.  We'd arrived at the hospital at 6 and surgery was supposed to start at 7 ... but the ENT was late.  He'd slept in/forgotten/thought it started at 7:30 (kind of depended on which nurse was delivering the news).  It was just 30 minutes but that makes a difference for everybody: hungry hungry Walter and his increasingly desperate parents, the four year old who was scheduled to go into surgery after us and had to wait even longer, the surgical staff who were then running late all day ... no good.

But for us, it was mostly OK.  As we walked down the hall with him to the OR we worried about the handoff at the door ... until the door opened and there was an especially pretty nurse standing there, smiling at Walter and holding out her arms.  He practically leaped.

We were in the family waiting room long enough for me to drink a small decaf coffee and not long enough to finish a sudoku. The ENT came in and told us Walt's ears were full of pus and really inflamed.  Four days of antibiotics, started right when he was first getting sick, and he still got a raging ear infection. The tubes, they were a good idea.  They drained the pus and put the tubes in with no trouble.  The ENT prescribed antibiotic ear drops to keep the tubes from getting clogged up.  4 drops in each ear twice a day ... he's done that twice now and has been incredibly brave and good both times.

Speaking of brave ... Sean and I did great.  The only point where I started to lose my cool was when they told us he would meet us back at the pre-op room and when we got there he hadn't arrived yet.  I knew he was fine, but I wanted him right then and no later.  A nurse came into view wheeling a bed with his things on it ... I completely ignored that nurse's friendly smile and wave and strained to see the nurse coming in after him, the one holding Walter.  The friendly nurse turned out to be one of our neighbors, and once I had Walt in my arms and registered that I was very grateful indeed to know that a kind neighbor had been taking care of Walter.

After nursing and some vitals checks we got to take him home, arriving around 9:30, greeted by a rather worried dog.  We gave him his medicines, nursed some more, and got him (and us) to bed until he woke up at noon, famished again.  We'd been warned about crabbiness, but for most of the day he's been very happy and chatty and active (and hungry.)  He got a little sad around 4 ... we figured his pain killers wore off about then, gave him some Advil, and he perked right back up in time for dinner and a polka or two at the Polish festival.

Our boy loves, loves a good polka.  For the rest of the night, he'd start dancing again randomly, keeping time to a polka beat I can only assume was stuck in his head.  On the way home from the festival I gave him a serious case of the giggles/snorts/hiccups and kept making him laugh until I realized it might make him lose his cabbage roll.  As strange and sometimes difficult as this day was, it was pretty wonderful to spend it together, and pretty wonderful to think of all the laughing, learning and growing he'll do more fully now with fewer ear infections.

Look out, world.  Here comes Walter.  He walks, he sings, he polkas, and his ears are draining.