Grandma

It feels like the last few years have been non stop for both Ken and I. There is a good amount of Good and Bad but as I look back its pretty much equal. We both feel like we can never catch up though. there is no time to catch out breath and just relax. After I had Kaylee it took about 11 months for life to feel settled and we felt relaxed in our new normal but ever since I found out I was pregnant with Michael life has been going full steam!! This has been extremely hard for me because I like to plan and organize and so far nothing has gone as planned. Which I understand and half expect. These past few months have been the hardest though. I have hit my max point and there is still no break in sight. 

This past week grandma ended up going to the hospital which was scary and when we first got there she was really scary for me and to top it off my aunt Janet was out of town.  Luckily the found out what was wrong with grandma and was an easy fix and she will be going home today. I am still not ready for her to die.  Lewis and I were talking the other night when she was first admitted and we both feel she is our last parent alive. Its bad enough that both our parents dropped the ball and did not raise us and both died so young we are going to be lost without grandma. We both have our own families but we think of her as our home and safety net. For me I can call and talk to her about anything and she will listen. Plus she is my only help with Michael and Kaylee. On Sundays after church she will watch one of them so I can do my shopping or anything else that needs to be done. During the week she helps me so much with Michael. She works with him in PT OT and Speech a lot. Sometimes I think more then I do. These past few months she has been working on pointing and he is slowly starting to do it more and more. She also helps me when he has his appointments. I make them at the girls nap times so I can just take Michael.

I think Grandma being in the hospital affected Michael the hardest though because he spends the most time with her especially one on one. The last few days he will take a book to grandmas chair and complain and it anyone tries to sit in the chair with him he throws a fit. i wish there was a way to explain to him what was going on. He looked for her all over the house yesterday and cried a good 5 or 10 minutes when he could not find her. 

I am just happy she is going to be okay but this just reminded me that she is almost 92 and that she could die much sooner that I am ready for. But I am also reminded that I am so blessed to have had her in my life and for this long. I am also thankful that she got to meet my children and I know for sure Kaylee will remember her and I hope that Michael can too.

Michael

Michael 18 month photo

This past week I finally took the time to do a lot of research and reading into stuff for Michael. I am feeling frustrated with a lot of stuff medically and developmentally with him. I am not happy with his GI specialist and his OT doctor at Kaiser. I keep getting dismissed and told he is a picky eater and was sick as an infant for so long he is just delayed and will catch up and I am doing everything right for him. I think his pediatrician is on my side but the people she reefers me to are not. Just before he turned one she refereed us to Kidango for a mental health evaluation. http://www.kidango.org/
 We have been working with Stacie since the beginning of September 2014. She did a 6 week evaluation and noticed a few things and she then refereed us to a program called early start.
Early Start is for O.T., P.T., Speech, and Sensory issues. This program is done through the school distric and took a long time to set up and to get going. They had me fill out endless amounts of paperwork and did a 2 hour evaluation with Michael. http://www.dds.ca.gov/EarlyStart/home.cfm
We then started working with Monica in January. Each of these wonderful women come to our home once a week and work with Michael and show us how to work, help and understand Michael. Both have mentioned concerns about his:

Oral Motor Skills

Sensory Processing

Sleep issues

Talking

Blank Stares

GI issues

I have talked with his SPECIALIST and both have dismissed me. They say he is a picky eater and will catch up soon enough and I have nothing to worry about. I talked to his Pediatrician and reefers me to a new one and I hear the same thing again. His Pediatrician did say that he is really young for him to be diagnosed and help with any of these issues!! But everything I have read says that is they are diagnosed young it is all the better for them. So extremely frustrated I went to Parents helping Parents and started reading anything that seemed to be related to Michael's issues. I found 3 books that have been very helpful but the one I like the most is called:

Food chaining 

By: Cheryl Frank, Mark Fishbein, Sibyl Cox and Laura Walbert 

http://www.amazon.com/Food-Chaining-Feeding-Problems-Child%C2%92s/dp/1600940161/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1460486068&sr=8-1&keywords=food+chaining

The best part is that it tells you how to talk to your child's doctor and what is important for you to explain. It helped me start a new log more detailed long book for Michael. I now keep track of his eating, drinking, sleep, moods and what he did in a day. its a lot of work but I am starting to see how much helpful this will be. I have about 2 weeks until his 18 month appointment and I am going prepared! Thanks to both Stacie and Monica I have a list of items to talk about and I am now educated in the basics of all of them. 

Stacie also refereed us to an  Occupational Therapy clinic. At San Jose State. http://www.sjsu.edu/occupationaltherapy/ot_clinics/ Michael is on a waiting list but I am hopeful. it will be nice to get a second opinion other that Kaisers. I will never stop fighting for my child but I never knew how much it took to fight. Michael's spirit is so full of happiness and life I never want it to diminish. He and Kaylee will do so much good for this world and I can't wait to see what they will accomplish!

Being a mother is the best thing that I ever had to do in my life. I knew that it would be a job that I would have to commit to for the rest of my life. I went into motherhood thinking it was going to come easy to me and that I knew pretty much everything I needed to KNOW. Well that was so not true and I am learning all the time and it is much much hared than I thought it every was going to be. But the love and joy is also so much more than I ever thought or even imagined possible. I am so bless to be a mother and even more bless that I am the mother of these to wonderful children.

Recovery and a few other things.

Last week I received a phone call from my surgeon with the pathology results of my uterus Fallopian tubes ovary's and surrounding area. Great new no cancer or precancerous cells anywhere else!! they did find as she put it A rare pathological entity I had something called an Uterine Hemangioma!http://www.archivesofpathology.org/doi/pdf/10.5858/arpa.2011-0078-RS She was extremely surprised to find it and was amazed that I had to full-term pregnancy with no sever complications. I reminded her that after I had Kaylee I continued to bleed for almost ONE YEAR until it finally stopped. Shortly after I talked to her my OB that I have been seeing for the last 5 years e-mailed me and said she was amazed to here about the the pathology report. She also apologized for not listening to me more about my pain and amount of bleeding. My whole life I have had really heavy periods that lasted really long like 3 to 4 months which were really painful. They always dismissed me about the amount of bleeding and my pain. They said it was do to my P.C.O.S http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/pcos/basics/definition/con-20028841 so I believed them. I am happy that I am done with my periods and that there is no more cancer!  I will have to have my ovaries removed at or after menopause but that is about 10 years down the road I hope. For now I will see my OB once a year and do blood work every 6 months.

As far as recovery I have been surprised how long it is taking me to get back to full strength. I get so tired so fast and if I push myself I get nausea and throw up. Pain wise i think I am doing okay. I hurt a lot more on my right side then my left but I am hoping it will be gone soon. I am taking mostly Tylenol do to my tummy upsets. I the hardest part is Michael and taking care of him. No lifting is hard with a 18 month old. I am not quiet 2 weeks in and I am not sure how I am going to make it to 8 weeks. Plus with Michael he fights me with almost everything so I am holding pulling lifting with him a lot. Kaylee is super helpful most of the time and can do almost everything for herself! I get to start driving again on Monday and I can't wait. 2 weeks no driving has been so very hard.  I have been home mostly and to grandmas a few times. Ken goes back to work full time after next week and I am hoping by then I will have most of my strength and energy back. 

I have been doing a lot of thinking since this whole health scare started and if I live as long as my mom and dad did (they both died at 65) I have lived more than half my life right now at the age of 34. I really don't want to die that young. I am going to start really exercising a lot more and taking better care of myself. My regular doctor wants to run a few more tests with my lungs but after that I should be okay. I want to see my children grow up and live full lives and I want to be healthy while I am alive. I do not want to spend the last years of my life in a nursing home like my mom or go blind in my mid forty's like my dad. They both lived the last 5 to 10 years of their lives in pain and unhappiness. I am going to be different and the one good thing that I have is Ken who will help me, push me and encourage me all the way. 

I have also had the time to do some research on stuff for Michael since all I do is sit around. Michelle took me to Parents helping Parents http://www.php.com/ The people there were so helpful and I got a lot of info and a few books to start reading. I am coming up with a game for his 18 month doctors appointment. I am going to be a little more pushy with his doctor and I will be a lot more educated on what I want for him.