altarflame: (fiveheads)
A. My weird, warped self image is still continuously morphing and tormenting me. Sound melodramatic? IT IS, believe me. I find myself relating to the words and overall tone of things like Linkin Park's "Crawling". Perfectly fitting, yet over the top bitter and angry. Like me. Except not.

B. Elise and Jake both got sick, I spent all of yesterday pacing with a baby in arms or sitting with a baby in lap; usually whoever I was holding was fussing and whining while whoever I wasn't was screaming and clinging to my leg. About 8 hours in I spent an undetermined period of time just sitting, zombie-like, as they both nursed and rubbed snot all over me (sexy, eh?), trying not to cry with them. Then they squirmed and whimpered their way through a feverish night featuring me being peed on. *sigh* At least it was only a 24 hour bug, that doesn't seem to have spread around the house.




1. Things I LOVE about our house:
-it's our house
-lots and lots of windows and french doors make for tons of natural light
-really luxurious amounts of closet and storage space; Ananda and Aaron's room AND Grant and I's room have his and hers walk-in closets full of oragnizational shelving; our dining room has more; there's a whole giant walk in closet ROOM, with recessed shelves, in the hall, plus two other independant, normal linen closets - and an attic crawl space, and it's just great
-having two different fenced yards the size of what I consider a normal suburban backyard to be, plus the front yard
-having a nice sized front porch, a huge side deck, and a little narrow "alley" that we plan to convert to an adult space (Since the kids get the side yard and the backyard is functional)
-huge kitchen adjacent to large dining room
-two very big, accomadating bathrooms, with things like 2 sinks in each, massive mirrors, and my garden tub
-having more than one "living room", so that we can set up a tv totally separate from the main room you walk into

Sometimes I really just can't get over this house. It is made for us. And yet it's still unbelievable that it all...belongs to us! I love it.

2. This has been an incredible week for Ananda. First, she had a good counseling appointment. Second, she started reading a chapter book rapidly and for pleasure with good comprehension, on her own, for the first time. Third, at her soccer game on Friday night, three different times I saw her intercept the ball from her defense line and kick it OVER THE HEADS of the opposing team and way back down the field towards her own goal. She is a very unmotivated player, usually, she tends to be doing things like biting her nails and scratching her knee on her defense line for most of the game, and these are kicks I've never seen any of the other girls do anything like, so it was pretty awesome. One of them resulted in an almost immediate goal for her team, too :D It happened to be the first game of the season that they won, so she was a bouncy chipper soccer player all night afterwards.

THEN. Today, apparently, in musical theater, she actually got up and did free style dancing to Mamma Mia in front of her class :O If you know anything about Annie...it's a big deal. Ingrid (the teacher) was asking them all to do this but everyone was afraid: Ananda and another girl were talking about how they both have the album at home and dance to it in their rooms throughout the week, so maybe they could. The other girl went first. But, man. This is such a liberating sort of WOW, for her! She said Ingrid loved her moves and that after she went everyone kind of loosened up and all but one girl took a turn. She was glowing.

We also went to Brian's birthday party today, and she picked out the gift he really fell in love with and obsessed over, and wouldn't put down for the rest of the party.

I am very happy for all of this. The past couple of weeks have held a few too many really depressed days for her, so much dragging and laziness and apathy.




Apparently kids at AWANA asked A and A who their family voted for. The askers' families voted for McCain, and when A and A said Obama, the other kids said, "Don't your parents know he is for abortion?" Annie said she answered, "Yeah, that's the only thing we don't like about him."

At soccer, Aaron's best friend (who's name is also Aaron) asked who his parents voted for in an anxious way, and when Aaron said Obama he was like, "Whew! Mine too. I'm glad you're on our side".

W.T.F.

On the way home from dance and lunch with G, today, in addition to the copious normal stickers and signs everywhere, I saw what looked like an individual printing job on a bumper sticker, reading; "Obama WILL destroy us..."

Sometimes I think people need to calm the hell down.




My biggest new committment, and our biggest challenge as a family right now...is staying home. There are mountains of clean laundry not being put away, mountains of dirty laundry not being done, grit not getting swept off the floor, renovations unfinished, crafts with materials purchased but left unstarted...because we are simply never here. In our beautiful, OWN house.

Today it was dance classes and lunch with Daddy like usual, but also cousin Brian's birthday party.

Yesterday, the kids were sick so they and I were here but helpless to accomplish anything, and then soccer games.

Thursday, Ananda had counseling up in Kendall, then Laura asked us to come over for the afternoon, and then soccer practice.

Wednesday Grant and I took the gang up to Whole Foods for a couple of specialty things, and there's AWANA in the evening.

Tuesday I had two appts - the chiro and for bloodwork - and they have soccer practice in the evening, and we needed to go to the grocery store.

Everyone wants to plan a camping trip, we just got back from a vacation, tomorrow we'll be going to church and then, since the nanny will be here for the first time in over a week, G and I will have lunch and a movie or something.

When are we supposed to knit? Sew? Cook good things that aren't apples and cheese or chinese takeout? When are we supposed to have the alarm guys come fix their thing that needs fixing or plant a garden, or tend it? I hate this, but I feel like everything we're doing is important or at least beneficial and nice.

So far the only things I've been able to think of to help us stay HERE more are:

-turn Laura down on principle for the next couple of weeks (even though we're isolated stay at home moms and enjoy each others' company?)
-postpone playdates with an AWANA family I just realized is around the corner when we trick or treated, the mom of 7 who goes to the bookstore, Kristin and Michelle-mom-of-6...even though my kids are homeschooled and we'd all love it?
-use the nanny time when G IS home for double teaming home projects...instead of enjoying our shot at couples time?

This isn't working at all. I don't want one of those stereotypical always-running suburban soccer mom lives, but, well. I dunno.

I did order groceries to be delivered. I guess that is something.




EXTREME CHANGE: I, (1) figured out what was keeping me from sleeping. It's all wrapped up in my brain with the fight to stay alive last Fall, and general anesthesia knocking me out, and trying to maintain my semi-conscious haze in the ICU. I'm afraid of dying and sleep started feeling too vulnerable. Months have passed with me sleeping from, like, 5 am to 8:30 am daily. It was causing major problems. Knowing was half the battle. Then I (2) had a catalyst for change. My ear infection was so painful and so draining, and three nights in a row I went to bed on Vicodin, WAY earlier than normal (like midnight) and slept all the way through with no nightmares (!!). Since then, for A WEEK, I've been going to bed between midnight and 3 and sleeping through. Something got knocked back into place, in my head, and now I can get sleepy and get comfortable and enjoy it and lay down like a normal person again, without any anxiousness or panic or flashbacks or other hoohaw.

THE PROBLEM is that this means I'm not even up at night doing cleaning, crafting, planning, or commenting. So time has just sort of...dissapeared, for me O_o
altarflame: (deluge)
So we got all our prepping done in time: floors put down in the last two rooms, office furniture purchased, house clean.

Dama got here yesterday! It was great. It is great. We picked them all up at the airport in a rented 12 passenger van, it's so easy to talk with her about everything and anything, all the kids are having so much fun together.

The caveat: Last night Aaron threw up ALL OVER he and Ananda's room. I felt too sick to go clean it, Grant did...while I started throwing up. Several hours and many dry heaves later, I dozed and wandered around through G the nanny's shift and periodically mumbled dizzy apologies for being such a poor host.

I have got my finger's crossed in a BIG WAY for other kids to not get sick. But I am frightened. Apparently (my mother called to report) Laura and Brian have been throwing up as well, and he had another febrile seizure today :/

So. We have a lot of "plans" for this week but I guess we'll take a wait and see approach, and I'll hope for the best...


Right now Grant, Dama, Ananda, Maria, Zoe, Isaac and Luci are at AWANA. I was far too unstable physically to pilot a 12 passenger van. Jake and Elise are behind me doing something that involves grapes, dried apricots, cups of water and peanut butter, and it's just fine with me (whatever it is). Aaron is sleeping it off in my bed.
altarflame: (MeandJakesleeping)
We've been hibernating with severe illness. The oral virus struck me just as predicted. There is always something really sweet about being sick together. I suppose that sounds ridiculous, but I love it when I see Ananda dripping in sweat because her fever has broken, red-faced and miserable with her own sudden heat, and I can come put a cool rag on her head and watch her wolf down a plate of cold watermelon chunks. That relieved, slightly disoriented smile kills me. I love it when I'm shaking with fever of my own and about to lose my mind from the teeth-rattling internal freeze, and Grant suddenly appears out of nowhere, swipes away my blankets, and drops a new one fresh from the dryer on me. I swear I moaned and instantly fell asleep.

Last night I was sitting up on the couch, with Elise sitting in my lap asleep and Jake laying next to me asleep. I was dozing off and on and she squirmed her way onto him - they woke each other up, face to face. I was ready for sick-kid hysterics, but instead they freaking looked at each other and grinned, and then commenced to do things like stroke each others' cheeks and give sloppy kisses for about 5 minutes before Grant ran over with the video camera. They were sitting up at that point, her leaning back against him and his arms around her.

Saturday was not any kind of ok...G had to work 12 hours, I hadn't slept much and I had to watch Aaron crying and shaking with pain and fever :/ All while very ill myself. I was feeling like my arms weighed 100 pounds each, so imagine my..uh...we'll call it "lack of amusement" when I realized the solution to his dilemma was to drag the portable hammock he's in love with out to the super warm sunshine in the yard and let him lay in the fresh air.

Anyway, it worked O_o And since then "sick with help" has been a nice contrast to "sick here by myself", particularly when I'm napping or eating something G's cooked.

I was also rather validated when the huge pot of from-scratch chicken noodle soup I made for everyone was actually universally well-received. The last time we were sick and I spent hours making stock and chopping things, nobody ate it but Grant and I. Big improvement.

This "oral virus" is really weird, btw. I was drooling so much in my feverish sleep the first night that I kept waking up all wet. Not acceptable. Apparently (according to the pediatrician) my sister and Brian have such deep-rooted systemic yeast problems that their immune systems are shot, so basically anytime Brian gets sick, he mutates it into something way worse and then passes it along. Which is right in line with TWO incidences now where his little play group had a mild, 24 hour illness that landed Brian in the hospital and then got my family ultra sick for days. I think we are going to have to institute a week long quarantine on him from now on, from whenever he "seems better".




While we all wallow about with blankets and bottles of C-Boost and Gatorade, time is playing tricks on us...Grant and I's anniversary was yesterday. We had plans to make plans, but, well, yeah. I could barely lift my head for parts of it, so we're tentatively talking about using it as an excuse to celebrate belatedly...

And Elise will be 1 in 8 days.

And we'll be closing on a house "on or before" 14 days from now, assuming nothing drastic happens.

G and I kind of looked up suspiciously, earlier today, realizing all this in the midst of our haze.




My diastasis is HORRIBLE from 2 days not wearing my support thing (I just haven't had the energy to put it on, or the will to deal with wearing it) and the nonstop coughing. Everytime I cough, the whole big lump of drooping, hanging muscle (it's right above my belly button) enlarges drastically and jumps. It freaks Grant out big time to see. It HURTS, is my thing...and yesterday afternoon it woke me up hurting so intensely that I was really afraid, almost frantic - it was VERY intense pain. I felt around that area and actually pushed something back through, and then it went back to normal "Oh man this sucks" everytime I coughed. I mean that's what herniation IS is something (fat, organs, anything) coming through a muscular separation, and I've been warned that this thing is itching to herniate, but yeah. Alarming nonetheless.

G approached me today about going in for the whole reparative surgery. I look 6 months pregnant right now dressed, deformed naked, and hate my body desperately, but he is most concerned about having to rush me to the hospital again for some emergency procedure or other when I get something strangulated in there. After clamming up, getting nauseus and generally feeling like I would cry over the terror of more surgery, we agreed to talk more about it another time...I've sort of, semi-resigned myself to possibly going with some sort of "wear my thing as much as possible now, and have a consultation to see if it's actually really dangerous, and then plan to get this done when Elise is weaned and Ananda is over the trauma of me dissapearing to hospitals" plan...which would allow me to lose some weight, which would make the surgery less complex/dangerous and more aesthetically good.

Mostly I'm still shuddering. The last time I had surgery, I woke up in the ICU with a face full of tubes. The time before that, they left a sponge in me and it nearly killed me. And all that after I was willing to do ANYTHING to avoid more surgery just from the screwed up experiences before...

Whenever I think of what it would actually BE, I seriously almost have a panic attack. I have to consciously shut down and just NOT think about it anymore.

Even before and after pictures give me the fucking willies...I look pretty cut up already, but nothing compares to that uneven, winding river, hip-to-hip red slice people have after a tummy tuck :x I feel like I'd start shaking everytime I saw my belly in the mirror and run from the bathroom.




Money.

What the hell.

Ok, so, we have everything all worked out, right? All of our debt paid off, all of our tithing done or mapped out, 2nd car purchased, house due to close. We've got necessary renovations, furniture we're missing and a buffer for our first year living there budgeted in, along with a few other things.

I got a bill in the mail today.

For $190,000.

One hundred and ninety thousand dollars!!

It's from Brigham and Women's, for Elise's NICU stay.

How in the world is it even legitimate for me to be just getting this bill for the first time now, when she's about to turn a year old? She was discharged at 3 1/2 weeks, and during her stay we met with the social worker and care coordinator plenty about their hassles with getting Florida Medicaid to pay the bill...and I remember the relief, albeit through layers of mind-numbing stress, when it was all worked out and taken care of. One less thing to worry about, awesome. So why now are we getting this bill? They've had my contact information all along and I've been communicating with them often, it's definitely not as though they just found me. Aside from legal stuff we dealt with, I've talked with her nurses and the care coordinator plenty to update them on her progress, and this has never been mentioned. And I received and paid some of my own bills that Medicaid wouldn't cover, for pathology and things. MANY MONTHS AGO, like last summer.

They're trying to act really generous in the bill, saying that if I pay promptly, they'll take off 20%. Yeah, I don't have that much either. Not unless we back out of a legally binding contract with a bank, forfeit a $22k deposit and take the loss of the cost of inspectors and surveyors. Not to mention, NOT GETTING A HOUSE.

I'm calling them tomorrow and trying to see what I have to do to fight with Florida Medicaid and get them to pay this, from my end. I mean, come on, they were SO good to Elise, and I DO want them to get paid, I am forever grateful to that NICU on about a million levels, but damn. I'm already negotiating a $111,000 hospital bill down here for my ICU stay last fall. Which was THEIR FAULT. We got a big sum of money dropped on us, yeah, but it's seriously just enough to set us up to live on G's income with a budget, independantly, debt free, and having given 10% (which we both felt was really, really important, especially after all the help WE received from total strangers last year...). We aren't in the Riviera on our yacht or anything, we're buying some tote bags from etsy, and once it's gone it's gone - with some new little cushions like life insurance that we never had before. The first thing we had to do was write check after check to doctors and labs and ERs and neurology departments, for 3 days, when we got it. The "writing year" with Grant not working was a pipe dream when we sat down to figure it out, and I'm "settling" instead for flying down some friends of mine that I'm dying to see.

Anyway, yeah, sudden year old but presented as brand new $190k bill that I was told was taken care of by insurance = not ok.




Elise is wonderful. Some of her new tricks include saying a consistent two syllables that she clearly thinks means "pick me up", and getting up on the dining table and my desk whenever people forget to push in the chairs.
altarflame: (Default)
Night before last, I decided to clean the bathroom before I went to bed. I was REALLY, really, really tired already, just deliriously tired, and it was SO late, but the bathroom was horrific like only a bathroom that three little boys use can be. Jake had squeezed a whole tube of toothpaste out all over the top of the toilet, Isaac had been playing in the sink for a long time and gotten water everywhere that then mixed with someone's pee, and Aaron had used soap and water to "clean" the mirrors...this sort of scene can happen within a single hour here, but this time it even involved the full trash can getting knocked over - YUCK. And having stumbled around running laundry through, sweeping and mopping and scrubbing the dining table and doing more dishes til 3 am, I forgot about it until I went in there to brush my teeth before bed. UGH.

I don't even remember falling into bed, but then the next morning - yesterday morning - I woke up earlier than usual because my stomach was hurting TERRIBLY. I went to the nice clean bathroom that nobody had been in since I left it last and was just crampy, gassy, it was horrible pain, but I couldn't go to the bathroom. Then waves of nausea hit. Then I started puking.

I was remembering my surgeon telling me that if my intestines become re-blocked, there won't be any lead up, it will come out of nowhere like a sudden afternoon thunderstorm and I'll know. I was sitting on my bed scared half to death, crying and miserable while Grant tried to calm Elise and Jake down without me nursing them, thinking I would be back in the hospital in a couple of hours and just, you know. Am I going to die, those bastards got off cheap with this settlement, I can't deal with this, all that sort of thing. I actually got far enough to be thinking, damnitt I can't die before the life insurance kicks in, how will Grant take care of the kids? And I won't ever get to do my writing or live in the new house. Please remember that the last time I felt nauseus, I felt it for an entire month and was right that I WAS dying, and that the last time I puked was right before I went to the ER and was rushed into emergency surgery...

I prayed for a sign, and...haha, this is sort of funny in retrospect but I started having torrential diarrhea soon after that and was like, ooooh AWESOME THIS IS JUST A VIRUS!!! Hallelujiah!!! I love not being dead *Barf*

Really after a few more hours it was more like *moan* *struggling to keep head up* this isn't hell...it can't be hell...the hospital would be hell...this will be over soon...really... with a puke bowl in my lap.

You haven't even heard the gross part yet. Everyone else has been getting sick, but they all have the oral virus Brian had last week. Coughing, sore mouth and throat, high fever. Totally different. I was thinking, what did I eat that nobody else did? Nothing I could think of...

And then I had this horrible flashback to half-remembering cleaning the bathroom the night before. So that I could brush my teeth. I realized that in my sleepless state I didn't wash my hands at all. I just cleaned it all up, nasty full garbage trash can mixed with pee and water and tons of old toothpaste and all sorts of bath toy dampness, and then brushed my teeth, cupped my hands under the faucet to catch water to rinse my mouth with. And woke up with serious stomach problems a few hours later.

*headdesk*

SO DISGUSTING!!! How could I be so stupid?

Let me give you some interesting further details of this still-unfolding story:

-Because I was totally incapacitated to do anything but nurse Jake and Elise yesterday, and that barely, and Grant was really sick too, the house was so trashed by today that I spent hours and hours cleaning it...and at the end of it, the bathroom is a total disaster again. Isaac somehow overflowed the (poopy) toilet within 10 minutes of Jake squeezing out some more toothpaste, all right after Ananda and Elise got out of the tub (leaving bath toys everywhere). I've done the initial cleanup (towels on the floor, toys in the tub) but still have to do the rest. And it's 2 am. Rest assured I will wash my damned hands.
-Now Grant's GOT to go to work tomorrow no matter what, and I'm getting the oral virus. I've been coughing for a few hours and now I have a fever.

Believe it or not, I am still happy and grateful to not be in the hospital. And a little bit bitter and frustrated that I'll never be able to just wallow in a stomach virus without some kind of initial terror followed by gratitude again, for the rest of my life.

I am also screwed up enough that I can sort of see the silver lining of this situation jump starting my weight loss plans.


I had a really great day, before cleaning the bathroom the other night. It is ironic actually, because it was also about the whole hospital sponge fiasco - I found a spiral notebook I'd forgotten all about, that I'd been writing in during the weeks before I got admitted. Just a lot of "I actually feel mortal, which I never have before - it's less scary than unrealistic fears of dying, but a LOT more sad" and "I'm waiting for biopsy results and ultrasound results, to know what this unidentified mass in my abdomen is, and I don't understand why I can barely lift my baby and why I wake up feeling like there's no hope everyday". It just made me feel that happy to be alive feeling again, in a big way, and the kids and I were on our way up to Michael's that day on funny craft errands...we were thinking of how Grant can't ever keep track of his hat or sunglasses, the only time they're safe is when they're on his head. So maybe we could have someone else wear them whenever he isn't, like Aaron said maybe we could hire someone to wear his hat and sunglasses in the evening. I said that was way too expensive and finally we arrived on the obvious solution - to make a fake person. We're thinking round, painted styrofoam head with ears and nose carved out of other styrofoam pieces and held with toothpicks, all resting on milkcrates that are wearing a trenchcoat. Or farmer's clothes. We aren't sure yet.

Three things that make me really happy:
-These two sleeping together:




-Posting a picture of my siblings looking like fools at my wedding reception on the internet:


-My across-the-street-neighbors giving us a great used playhouse for free:



Things That Do Not Make Me Happy (other than illness and thoughts of death):
-My kids having visible injuries. Right now Elise has the last of a fading black eye because she was sitting by the tree we have a wooden swing hanging from, and Jake went to swing. "NOOO, JAKE, YOU'LL HIT ELISE!!" yelled Aaron, as I ran to grab the swing. Jake was holding it about 4 feet out from it's normal resting place, where Elise was sitting. "Let it go, now!" Aaron went on with the best of intentions...and Jake did. And it banged her right in the face :/ He felt so bad. She was fine after about a minute of crying, but when it puffed up purple soon after it sure broke MY heart. This was a few hours before they were all roughhousing around with Grant, dogpiling him, and G's fingernail somehow caught Isaac's forehead in a way that left a nasty looking scratch. And he was NOT fine a minute later - he's cried about it a dozen times since, often hysterically and out of the blue...that's just Isaac for you. So for three days now I've been carting around some banged up kids and getting dirty, suspicious looks everywhere I go. No, I did not give my baby a left hook, people. Sheesh.
-Our STUPID PHONES. We have three different cordless phones in this house. Two of them randomly shut off mid-conversation with no warning of any kind, when the indicator says the battery is still half to all the way charged. The other one is lost, and dead, so we can't page it O_o It has been lost and dead for several days. Then there is my cell phone, which is no longer recognizing my charger but instead says "Unauthorized" everytime I try to plug it in (?). All in all I'm getting a little bit tired of this whole deal. Yesterday Grant Sr came in saying Teresa had been trying to get ahold of us for almost 24 hours, and when we managed to get a phone working we saw that my mother had also called - NINE times. It never rang. "You have all that money, you can't buy a phone that works?" is what my sister tells me everytime I accidentally hang up on her. We did! It's lost! Damnitt!
-Speaking of Lost. We're at the beginning of Season 3 now. And it's irritating that I can't seem to avoid spoilers no matter what I do. If I end up surfing late night tv as I try to nurse Jake to sleep, people are talking about it. If I go into TOTALLY UNRELATED comment threads, people branch off talking about it. When I check out at the grocery store, there are teasers on the magazine covers, with photos of actors advertising Season 4 which means that, obviously, they are still around, so that takes out some of the suspense, eh? It didn't seem like the world was on fire for this show before G and I started watching it.

Well, it's really late, so I should go and (tone of misery) clean the bathroom. As an advertisement, though:
Anyone who is local should go to Spellbound Books open mic night tomorrow night. If they want to see my sister singing full on Christina Aguilera gospel, that is. For real, peeps. I think I and/or Mindy may be there reading poetry, too. Shaun comes sometimes and does his...alternative folk songs? You can't really classify Shaun. Other than the lot of us and the owners and their kids and employees you can usually count on at least two aging hippies and a small gaggle of middle schoolers. Come oooooooooooooon Melissa and Alex you know you want to come and I know I want to see you. I'm also absolutely certain there are lurkers reading who live nearby, not least of which because one of you brought me some diapers at LLL once!

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