well, hello, march

To be honest, I expected the month of March to start in a crazy way. This past weekend, the husband was heading to ChiTown for a big ol’ boys weekend, so I knew it would be four days of straight up cray cray while I ruled the roost at home. What I didn’t expect was for it to be quite as cray cray as it’s been.

Friday started out pretty awesome. My girlfriend and her little guy had been here for a sleepover and we had a blast. Then they left. It was naptime and things went down hill. I’ll spare the gory details but, Eva’s nap didn’t go well and it had to do with potty issues. The end. We ended up managing a decent nap and I thought all was well.

However, after that, things got weirder and weirder as she started refusing to pee and screaming and clawing at me when I tried to make her go. It got worse and worse. She spent the afternoon crying and telling me her bum hurt. By 5pm, I figured she had a UTI and it was time to head in to the ER. Thankfully, the Aunties were coming for dinner so M came with me and L stayed with Gwennie. We managed a record ER trip, there and back in an hour, including the 15 minute drive each way. And, by the grace of God, we were able to get a sample at the hospital. And only 3/4 of it ended on my lap and Eva’s pants. Anyhow, it amazingly came out negative for infection but we expected her to get worse overnight. She did not! She woke up the next morning fever free and feeling fine, able to pee again. I assume everything was related to the initial nap incident.

The rest of the weekend went by okay, except that Gwen didn’t nap longer than 45 minutes and was up 5-8 times each night, until Sunday afternoon when I started to feel iffy. I was willing it away, telling myself it was just in my head. But by the time Evan got home around 9pm, there was no denying it. I had the flu. I was able to sleep but woke up at 3am when it hit me with a vengeance. And it all went downhill from there. Again, I’ll spare the nasty details but it was bad. And when my poor Gwennie woke up at 6:45 it didn’t take long to figure out she had the bug too. Thankfully, Evan was able to stay home with us. Not sure what I would have done without him as I didn’t even have enough strength to hold the baby.

Our saving grace is that this bug has been quick. It’s vicious, but doesn’t last long and Gwen and I are on the road to recuperation. Unfortunately, the Daddy-io came down with it last night and is struggling today. Evalyn is the only one left standing so I’m walking on eggshells waiting for that ticking time bomb to go off. I am praying fervently that God will spare her from this.

Add in to this some other, ahem, issues of the female variety, the fact that I washed all my clothes in hot water and shrunk my jeans and that I got a nosebleed that was reminiscent of the red sea, and I am starting to say, “Okay, March, what gives?” The start of the month has been a little different than planned. I haven’t yet had a chance to review how February went and set any goals for this month, think about Gwen’s 8 month update or dig myself out from the mounds and mounds of pukey laundry. All in time, all in time.

I know the saying “In like a lion, out like a lamb” is supposed to refer to the weather, but I’m hoping it also holds true for the way this month goes for our family.

Here’s to a calmer remainder of the month!

Some things

Leave it to me to all but abandon this blog and then randomly pop in with the world’s most scattered, incoherent brain dump post.

We’ve reached the point where getting Gwennie changed is worse than wrangling a wild zoo animal. So that’s fun.

Hardwoods throughout the entire house + crawling baby = also fun.

Whenever I’m out, be it shopping or at a restaurant, or any public place, really, and I see a baby asleep in a car seat or stroller, I have to stop myself from staring with my jaw on the floor. Honestly, this really happens? My babies do not do this. Ever. Aside from very early infancy, neither of my girls have ever stayed asleep in the car seat. Sure, they’ll sleep in the car but as soon as we stop (even at a red light sometimes) awake. And to even consider falling asleep while riding in the stroller? Impossible. Evalyn did it once, around 10 months old, on the hottest day in the history of the world at the zoo. For 15 minutes. So yes. Babies sleeping in public places. Foreign world to me.

Evalyn has her first ear infection, well, make that double ear infection, of her life. In other words, this was highly warranted today.

We’re almost halfway through the month. How? I have no idea. I had a great old list of things to get done this month and so far that seems to be flying out the window.

As of yesterday, I’m obsessed with spring footwear for my toddler. Toms? Converse? What’ll it be?

Sleep talking is funny. Last week, when Evan came to wake me up to tell me the baby was up (seriously, I think him waking me up instead of my body waking up to the sound of the baby crying totally screws me up). I told him: “Bring the shelf in here. Let me dust it, that’ll help”. Then the next night, he woke me up at 2am and said “I think by tonight we should be ready for the wall prep”. And last night, I stood outside of Eva’s door and listened to her telling her baby a big old story about something. Who knows what.

I am tired.

That’s about all that’s inside my brain today.

The Second Night Away

On Tuesday night, I spontaneously spent the second night away from my baby. Or at least most of the night. Unfortunately, this night away wasn’t nearly as relaxing and luxurious as my first night. This time, the hotel I stayed at was a little less comfy. A little more white. A little more sterile. A little more medical. This time, the hotel I stayed at wasn’t a hotel at all. It was the hospital.

On Tuesday at lunch, Evan picked up sandwiches from a bakery down the road and dropped one off to me for lunch. He went back to work for the afternoon and I went on with my day. Around 4, we met with our realtor. During our meeting, he leaned over to me and said “I feel like I’m going to be sick”. When we were done the meeting and in the truck, he said he was feeling really rotten. Once I got thinking about it, I thought I didn’t feel very good either. But I figured I was imagining it because he said he wasn’t feeling good.

We got home and started to think about supper. Neither of us wanted to eat. So I quickly put together some dinner for Evalyn and started feeding her.

By 6 pm, I was haulin’ booty to the washroom to toss my cookies. By 6:15 pm, Evan was doing the same. We spent the next few minutes tag teaming until he finally took Evalyn upstairs to the landlords for a little while so we could vom in peace.

At bedtime, we were back to tag teaming. He quickly gave Eva a shower. I quickly put her PJs on and threw put her in bed. We both climbed into bed and the rest is a blur.

Between that time and about midnight, I figure I threw up about 16-20 times and also had some other, ahem, bodily functions taking place. Evan didn’t throw up as much as I did but he was definitely still spending a good deal of time on the toilet.

I was very worried about getting dehydrated, for the baby’s sake, so I kept trying to force myself to take tiny sips of water. But my tummy was rejecting it. All of it.

Finally around 12:30, I was getting very shaky, dizzy and lightheaded and felt like I was going to pass out while puking, we decided it was necessary to head to the ER.

Thank goodness we’ve got a bunch of those “call any time day/night” kind of people in our life and within minutes, Evan’s aunt was in our house ready to stay with Evalyn so we could go. Of course I didn’t want to leave my baby but ya know, I’ve got two babies to think about now and at the time, I needed to get myself hydrated.

We got to the ER where I had multiple more vommy episodes while I waited to be seen. Thankfully, it wasn’t too long before they had me in a bed and hooked up to an IV. I still cannot believe how quickly gravol via IV goes to my head. I swear, I could feel it working it’s magic as the nurse pumped it into me. It knocked me out and I was able to sleep while 2L of fluid was injected into me. In the meantime, my poor husband, bless his heart, who was also feeling rotten, went out to try to stretch himself out and sleep in the truck since I was first just on a tiny cot. When he came back into the hospital at 4:30, I had been moved to a bigger bed so he was able to climb in and snuggle up with me. How sweet, right?

By 5:30, my IV was complete and the other tests they had done were back and I was sent home.

We climbed in bed and thankfully, oh so thankfully, Eva was kind and slept until 7:30 – which doesn’t happen very often these days. After much deliberation, we decided to go ahead and send her to daycare as planned. All signs pointed to food poisoning and if it were a bug, she would likely have been sick already. At daycare, they offered to keep her for the full day even though she was only signed up for half. And we were thanking our lucky stars for that because neither of us would have been much good for her.

We spent the day in bed, going between sleeping, watching movies, and trying to rehydrate ourselves. We both were able to start eating a bit and by the evening, I was feeling better. The dude was still feeling rough because, as I reminded him, he didn’t have fluids pumped into him at the hospital and needed to make sure to really get some water into his system.

Last night, we both crashed almost immediately after Evalyn went to bed and somehow, I woke up this morning feeling so completely normal. Like nothing ever happened. And for that, I am glad because lemme tell you, I would not wish that experience on my worst enemy.

 

P.S. Today marks 18 months of motherhood for me! Happy 18 months to my little girl. A full update will come soon once I’m caught up after losing a day of work yesterday and once I have her 18 month stats.

Plans

Today I had plans to write a 15(.5) month update to document my girl’s stats since we had her check up yesterday. I had plans to make a trip to Walmart to do some returns and pick up a few necessities. I had plans to do some research for work. Plans to head outside for a walk. To do some house cleaning. To make a nice dinner for my family. To do some work on the books for the business.

But then last night happened.

And as we were up every 1-1.5 hours, with a lovely stretch of awake screamy time from 2:30-5, I was reminded that my 15 month old still has the ability to take my plans and squash them right beneath her tiny little feet.

So instead of all of those wonderful, productive things I had planned for today? Instead, I will stay in my PJs all day and prop my eyelids open with toothpicks. I will wish that my pregnant tummy could stomach coffee. I will continuously wonder how it’s possible that Evalyn can shake her booty like there’s no tomorrow while I struggle to stay upright. I will let her call the shots. I will cuddle on the couch. I will watch cartoons. I will wipe a trillion gallons of snot on the sleeve of my hoodie. I will (try to) nap when she naps.

Today, thanks to the little creature who spent most of the night sprawled across my bed saying “Hi Dada. Hi Mama”? Today, I will laugh in the face of my plans. And be thankful I have the flexibility to do so.

You Know You Have A Sickie Babe When…Lessons from a first time mother.

~ you find crusted snot on various parts of your body on a daily basis. Your legs, your hands, even in your hair.

~ when you go to sleep after your baby gives you a wake up call around 10:30, you are so excited when you realize that you’ve made it all! the! way! to 12:30 without her waking up again. Then you spend the rest of the night praying that you get at least one hour of sleep at a time.

~ your house looks like a mild tornado passed through.

~ you do your baby’s laundry only to have to do it again two days later because you realize every single sleeper that fits her is dirty again … already.

~ you do your own laundry and have to do it again two days later because you realize every single pair of track pants is dirty again … already.

~ your baby starts to freak as soon as she sees you coming near her with anything that may be considered a nose wiping weapon.

~ you consider buying stock in Kleenex because it would probably be more financially efficient than spending thousands (okay, not really) of dollars on tissues.

~ speaking of tissue, you can know find a tissue anywhere in your house within arms reach because you have strategically placed them in various locations.

~ you have become very well acquainted with how your thermometer works.

~ you have attempted to “sleep” in the chair in the nursery, with your baby curled up to you in bed, sitting on the floor beside the baby swing, and other locations around the house.

~ you think it’s cute that your baby has learned to give kisses but kinda wish this development took place during a week when she didn’t have goobers all over the place, so you could avoid getting a snot facial with every single kiss.

~ you miss the almost constant laughter of your super happy baby because it’s been replaced with almost constant whining.

~ you are tired. Your baby is tired. And you just wish for health to be restored.

** Just to add – these are things I’ve discovered over the past two weeks, but Eva is feeling quite a lot better. Definitely on the road to recovery. I appreciate everyone’s comments/e-mails/tweets/texts etc asking about her.