Urologist #2

I thank each of you who prayed for us today. #1 Ian's reports were faxed to his new doctor on time, and #2 the kids did pretty well during our long road trip. The only time Nadia cried was when I turned off the DVD around 12:15 and insisted she take a nap. She had a VeggieTale marathon, lol. Ian did very well on the way down. He played happily, slept, played happily, and slept some more. He played for awhile on the way back, slept, and then cried for the last part of the trip. We left at 10:30 and got home at 6:30. We were at the doctor's office for about 30 minutes. If we hadn't made any stops, the trip would have taken 2hr 45 min. We stopped for gas and for lunch at Wendy's on the way down. On the way back we had dinner at Denny's as I didn't want to eat fast food twice in one day. I kept Ian up until 8:15pm to try to compensate for the fact that he had 4 naps today. Hopefully he'll sleep until at least 5:45am.

The best news was from the urologist who said that #1 Ian's first surgery was done well, #2 Ian is healing well and most of the skin that was left hanging off will be usable in the next surgery (if there's not enough they will use skin from his mouth for the reconstruction of his urethra), and #3 Ian's urethra is not as bad as the first doctor said it was. He said the size of Ian's urethra is completely normal (which is quite different from what the first doctor said) and that even if there was a problem with the native urethra, it can be fixed (which the first surgeon said was impossible). What a relief!!! He said that he would expect to use a size 6 catheter on a baby Ian's age (whereas the first surgeon said that size is only used for newborn babies). The surgeon we saw today said that robotics is his specialty. He took pictures of Ian to show his colleague whose specialty is reconstruction. He said that patients from all around the world come to see his colleague for reconstructions -especially if their first surgery wasn't done properly. He said Ian's first surgery was done properly but that still it would be best if this other surgeon did his next surgery. He thinks it should take place in February and that there is only a 5% chance that a third surgery will be needed. Today we went to Exton. He said the next appointment would be in King of Prussia in a month or two and that the surgery would be done in Philadelphia in three months. I'm not looking forward to making the trip two more times, but it's worth it so that Ian can see one of the very best pediatric urologists.

Time

Nadia's understanding of various concepts related to time has dramatically increased lately. She's very focused on what the schedule is for the day. I think she's going to take after her Mommy in that regard as schedules and calendars and to do lists are not Paul's style. She's always asking me who is coming over, etc. Although the kids are now being watched in our house again, she still asks "who's going to come get me?" Today she kept saying that Beth was going to come over after her nap, and then "Daddy will come get me," which means Daddy is the one coming home first. He'll get home at 5pm whereas I won't get home until about 8:30pm tonight. She always wants to know what's happening next.

She also asks many times a day "what time is it?" meaning what should we be doing right now. This morning she insisted it was time to go to the park, and had the weather been as nice as it was lately, I would have taken them there. I opted instead to take them to the basement for the first time. I brought in the little slide from the patio and also brought down her scooter and tricycle. I want to organize the basement more so there is more room for her to ride around during the winter months. The hard part of that organization will be deciding what to do with all the baby stuff. Ugh. I wish I didn't need to deal with that stuff yet, but I think honestly it would be hard no matter when I did it, and it probably would be hard even if we did have another baby. I am guessing that for many women that whenever they stop having kids there is a bit of grieving involved.

Two of Nadia's favorite time related words are "later" and "morrow" (tomorrow). If I suggest something and she doesn't want to do it right then, she'll say "I'll do it later" or "I'll do it morrow." I was chuckling as I was thinking about this yesterday in Sunday School as our lesson for the day was on procrastination (by Dr. David Jeremiah). Procrastination can be learned at a very young age!

Time won't possibly go fast enough for the four of us tomorrow. Neither child does that well with long road trips. Usually one or both of them throw up. I am planning on bringing extra outfits for both of them as tomorrow they will both be in the car more hours in one day than ever before. The doctor we are taking Ian to see tomorrow is almost 3 hours away from our home (one way). Tomorrow I don't care how many DVD's Nadia watches in the car if it will keep her from throwing up. I figure there's no good scenario for Ian. Either he'll sleep in the car, which will make the ride more pleasant but then he likely won't sleep well tomorrow night, or he'll be miserable in the car and it won't interfere with his sleeping at night. He only slept 9-10 hours on Friday night and Saturday night, but last night he was 15 minutes shy of 11 hours (7pm to 5:45am). Nadia still hasn't fully adjusted since the time change. Her naps have (most days) been a lot shorter than usual, and she's also getting up a bit earlier than before in the mornings. I would love to see us do away with DST.

Today I stopped at the hospital where his first surgery was done because his records hadn't been sent yet. The medical record office said that the urology office goofed this up. I am praying that they will fax them to the doctor in Exton before our 2pm appointment. I also hope that we don't have to go out there again until the day of Ian's next surgery. Tomorrow is going to be a very long day! I am grateful though that the 2nd best Pediatric Urologists are only 3 hours away from us. #1 is in Boston, and #3 is in Indianapolis. I am glad we only need to go to Philadelphia.

11 Months Old!

My baby boy is almost one year old. I am feeling rather emotional about that. I think it's harder this time around because before Nadia turned 11 months old I knew I was pregnant again. One of my students gave birth recently to her third child, and when I saw the picture of her 3 week old son last night the ache for another baby was very strong. Here are 11 facts about my sweet little 11 month old:

1. He now weighs 20.75 lbs, which puts him at the 29th percentile. I assumed he was over 21 lbs by now, but he only gained 1/3 lb over the past month.

2. He's gone from being scared of animal sounds two months ago to finding them to be very funny.

3. Boisterous is a very good word to describe him. No matter what he's doing, he does it with great vim and vigor!

4. He still won't eat truly solid food or even baby cereal, but he's doing a LOT better with stage one or two fruits and veggies. His favorites are apricots, peaches, squash, carrots, and sweet potatoes. The apples and strawberries I've been feeding him the last couple of days cause him to make a really funny face. You'd think they were sour, lol!

5. He LOVES to stand. He can now pull himself up from a sitting to a standing position while holding onto the walk and ride lion. He's also cruising along the windowsill and the music table.

6. He often goes down on his belly when I sit him on the floor. He can travel quite a distance scooting on his belly, particularly on the wood floor, although he doesn't go forward that much (mostly backwards or in circles). I really want him to crawl before he walks. We shall see if that happens.

7. He still nurses once a day. This week we've started mixing a little 2% milk into his bottles. I did the same with Nadia in the weeks leading up to her birthday so it was a gradual transition from formula to 2% milk. His bottles are quite the concoction right now since we still add baby cereal (rice or oatmeal) to his bottles as well. Over the next month I want to work on transitioning from a bottle to a sippy cup. Hopefully it will be easier for him than it was for Nadia.

8. He loves mirrors, balls, and wheels. These three give him great delight along with random things like an empty Kleenex box, lol.

9. He doesn't always object, but sometimes he does cry when Nadia takes away what he's holding. Previously he made no objections although I always said something to her when I saw her do this. Sharing doesn't come naturally!

10. He's doing much better sleeping at night. Wednesday night he slept from 7:45pm-6:30am, and last night he slept from 7:00pm-6:00am. Eleven hours is a BIG improvement. When it comes to naps though he's extremely inconsistent. Over the past 10 days he had two long naps; last Friday's afternoon nap and this Wednesday's morning were each 80 minutes long. All the other days both of his naps were each between 15-35 minutes long. Yesterday his morning nap was just 15 minutes and his afternoon was 35 so he slept for less than one hour between the hours of 6:30am and 7:00pm. Today he actually didn't take a morning nap, and his afternoon nap was only 20 minutes long. I think he's allergic to naps.

11. He loves to be held. I think both children are the kind who love to snuggle, hug, kiss, etc. This plus the fact that he's now aware of strangers is I think what led him to be kicked out of daycare. I still struggle with that somewhat. It did however lead to the decision for me to stay home next semester, which hopefully will be a good thing for all four of us.

Airfare Purchased!

This morning I was able to cross one more thing off my to do list as I bought 5 airline tickets from Baltimore to New Orleans. It will be the first time Nadia gets her own seat on an airplane. Ian, the sixth passenger in our group, is still able to fly free. We are flying Southwest as their fare was the cheapest even before you factor in the fact that they don't charge for luggage. Each item that's completed toward that trip (last month it was getting Ian's passport in the mail) makes the trip seem more real. We're excited about going on our very first cruise! I still need to book our one night hotel stay in New Orleans and also plan our excursions for the 4 places we are visiting. None of us have ever been on a cruise before, and I'm the only one who has ever been to New Orleans. One question I have would be whether or not to bring car seats for Ian and Nadia? If we take a taxi from the airport to our hotel, do we need car seats for that? I would rather not bring them if we don't have to.

The temperatures aren't supposed to get quite as high today as they were yesterday, but it's still a very pretty day for November. I have work this afternoon so we had to go this morning. We had a great time at the park! Ian still loves the see saw. Tomorrow I have faculty meeting in the afternoon and Saturday I'm speaking at a conference in the afternoon. Thankfully the conference is being held only about 30 minutes from our house. I guess if we want to go to the park we'll have to go in the mornings again the next two days. I wish we were experiencing the temps that those in the midwest have been having lately in the 70's. Wow that's really nice for November! Yesterday was the first day since September 29 that the neighbors watched the kids. Hopefully this arrangement will work until December 10. Paul can watch the kids the 3 nights I go on campus to give final exams the week of December 13.

Last night there were definitely some empty seats. I felt badly that a few of my students missed out due to not having a ticket as there was definitely room for them. He lectured for an hour and then opened it up for questions. I was impressed with the questions a couple of my students asked him. I was shocked at how many of those in attendance left as soon as the lecture was over (didn't stay for the Q&A). I have to say I felt better about the fact that the students seem to want to leave class ASAP. If they want to dash out when Dr. Gardner is speaking, it's no wonder they are wanting to dash out as soon as they think Dr. Kennedy's class is over. I can say with assurance from my experience teaching in Beijing that if Dr. Gardner were speaking in Asia that no one would have left until the event was totally over (about 40 minutes after the time when many left).

EOB's

I learned recently that I actually have no idea what the total bill was for our time in the NICU in 2008 and 2009. It turns out the letter the hospital first sends out doesn't necessarily include all the charges. I figured this out because the letter we got from that hospital last month stated that Ian's surgery cost $22,901.48. The insurance we had from August 2004-June 2010 didn't send out information regarding how much they paid for anything except if they were declining a charge (IUIs, embryo transfers, egg retrievals, etc.). Blue Shield sends an explanation of benefits (EOB) regarding every payment they make on our behalf. So this time I added up the totals and the total cost of Ian's surgery was $41,031.48. The hospital accepted Blue Shield's payment of $13,305.47. It's so confusing how they charge one amount but accept a much lower amount. If we did Ian's next surgery at this hospital, we'd have to pay 20%. Would it be 20% of $41K or $13K? That's a big difference! Thankfully PSU's insurance will pay 100% of the surgery if we have it done at Children's Hospital in Philadelphia. I am anxious to hear what they'll say at Ian's appointment next Tuesday.

In terms of when the kids woke up this morning (a little before 6am), it seems they have made the DST adjustment. Nadia asked for lunch at 10am so I'd say they haven't totally shifted. Ian took a long nap on Friday, but since then all his naps have been between 20-35 minutes long.

Two weeks ago Ian had a good week in terms of eating stage one baby food. Last week eating didn't go very well - maybe because I mixed some rice cereal in his squash one day. Yesterday he amazed me by consuming almost an entire stage 2 container of apricots in one sitting. Yay, Ian! Today he ate half of a container of stage 2 strawberries and apples at lunch. As long as he has toys to play with, it's going much better than in the past. I used to have to hold his head in place.  It's not such a battle right now.

DST

  

Sometimes I wish PA didn't participate in DST. That's not enough motivation for me to want to move to Arizona though. The last two nights the kids were put down about one hour later than usual (8pm for Ian and 8:30 for Nadia), and the last two mornings they've woken up an hour earlier than usual, which means they lost about two hours of sleep each night. Not Fun. This morning I let both of them cry and didn't get them until 6:25 (Ian) and 6:45 (Nadia) since that will be 5:25 in two days. I hope their bodies adjust soon in terms of what time to wake up or they'll be starting their day around 4am beginning on Sunday. The good news is that Ian's afternoon nap was long today (80 minutes). WOOHOO! My friend, Cheri, whom I hadn't seen for a couple of months came over to visit from 12-2, and I really enjoyed chatting with her while they napped. Both kids woke up before she left (even though Nadia slept for 2 hours) so she also got to see them a little. This picture (at left) is another that my sister, Wendy, took in Maryland.

As you can see from the pics in yesterday's and today's posts, Ian really enjoys playing the piano. You can see from this pic (at right) that he plays it VERY boisterously. I keep thinking he's hurting his hands due to how hard he's banging the keys, but he just laughs and squeals with delight. Yesterday he was laughing so much that both Nadia and I joined in and were laughing with him.

Mixed Emotions

Tonight I really enjoyed teaching my graduate language arts class. I conduct nine debates over the course of the semester in that class. The two guys defending the negative side did a really good job tonight. It also hit me during my office hours that I feel badly that my advisees will have to switch to another advisor. I have about 60-70 advisees each year. I do really enjoy my job. There are moments when I don't want to quit. Of course there are aspects I won't miss like the rejections involved in the process of getting articles published and spending so much time grading. When I feel badly about walking away from my job, I am reminding myself of how hard it is to leave Ian and Nadia at Bobbi's house when Ian is screaming and I know Nadia is about to watch tv for two hours. I know I won't regret the decision. My kids are my top priority. I'm looking forward to having more time to spend with the kids and also more time to do other things like attend the entire choir rehearsal, join a ladies Bible study, start reading books again (other than ones such as Are you my mother?), etc.

Schedules

1. Ian finally has a feeding team appointment. Unfortunately it's for January 7th, which is 4 months after the referral was initiated. He's on their cancellation list so I'm hoping someone else cancels, and he can be seen sooner than that. I tried some cereal yesterday (mixed with squash), and he gagged. Another reason I hope the appointment is sooner than that is I am not 100% sure yet when my health insurance at the university will be cancelled.
2. I called another local pediatric urologist yesterday to find out if he'd feel comfortable doing Ian's next surgery. He said "no" and gave two names that he recommended - one in Hershey and one in Philadelphia (Children's Hospital). I made an appointment with one in Philly today. I was surprised that they said I could come tomorrow. I opted for Nov 16, which will be almost exactly one month after his first surgery. The clinic is 97 miles away. I chose a 2pm time in the hopes that naps will take place in the car.

3. I decided not to resign quite yet. I don't want to make a hasty decision, plus this way I can still teach the online class next summer. I just put in a request today that my leave for the spring be FT leave instead of PT leave. I'm still going to keep cleaning my office as if I won't be returning, but this gives us time to make certain before I give up my tenure and promotion. Plus it adds a little bit of money to our budget if I teach one online class next summer.

4. Nadia took a 3 hour nap on Monday, but yesterday for some bizarre reason she didn't nap at all. She was falling asleep in the car on the way home from the flu shot appointment (about 11:30), but I jiggled her and kept her awake and fed her lunch and put her down. She played in her crib for 3 hours but never slept. That was a first. What made it even more of a first was that Ian took a one hour nap in his crib during that time span. Yes, Ian napped more than Nadia yesterday. What a shock! Today after 45 minutes she woke up crying. I went up and told her she needed to sleep more. She cried some more and then fell back asleep. Ian fell asleep on the way home from gymnastics today (at 11:20) even though he'd just gotten up from his 30 minute morning nap at 9:30. I didn't count it as his nap and put him back down at 1:15. I am not sure why Nadia has had trouble napping yesterday and today. She usually doesn't give us any troubles.

5. Ian slept through the night last night!! I must give the boy credit for sleeping from 7:30pm to 6:00am. WOW! We put Nadia to bed at 8pm and she got up at 7am; I am hoping this trend will continue in light of the clocks changing in 4 days.

16 More Trips

  

Well it seems that my career as a professor will be ending sooner than I expected. Next month I will be finishing my 8th year as I began teaching at the university level in January 2003. Last week I had given Sarah the list of 13 more dates to see when she was available to watch the kids between now and December 10. I had been surprised she hadn't already given the list back to me. Yesterday I asked her about it because I didn't have any arrangements for next week yet. She told me she can't do any of them because Ian demands too much of her attention. She said she has to hold him all the time or he cries. Usually there are other kids there for at least part of the time. I was stunned as I had no idea that she has been holding him all the time. I certainly don't hold him all the time, but I know he did cry a lot for my in-laws when they watched the kids when Paul and I went out on Friday night. Maybe he's going through the "stranger" phase now. She said she was hoping that Ian would "settle down," and that she could watch them for us in the spring. My immediate reaction when I got in the car, called Paul, and told him the news was that I don't want to teach next semester. The kids have been going to three different babysitters this semester. In our opinion Sarah is by far the best of the three. I feel badly for Nadia as she loves playing with Abbey, but at least she'll still see her on Sundays at church. Our newest babysitter, Bobbi, has been our least favorite. Our chief complaint is that she uses the tv as the babysitter and allows them to watch shows I don't want them to watch.

This morning I wrote another list of the same 13 dates and took it over to Beth (our neighbor) to see if they could do any of them. She told me she thinks her daughter can do them all, and that Beth will watch the kids until Gabby gets home from school (as I leave before the school bus brings her home). It was weird as I was conducting my office hours yesterday to be thinking that I'll only be driving to this campus 16 more times (Paul can watch the kids when I go to give 3 final exams). I was supposed to be attending a meeting at another college in 2 weeks, but I emailed the woman at PDE last night and told her I don't have a babysitter for that day - which is true. It was to be an all day meeting. I am grateful that I already had begun the process of sorting through books and files. I had no idea that these tasks would need to be completed by Dec 16 (the last day I'll be in my office). I am not looking forward to telling my department chair tomorrow. I am glad that the farewell isn't going to be as long and drawn out as I thought it would be. I am grateful that Paul and I are in agreement on this. Previously he had still been leaning toward hoping I would continue to teach part-time, but he had the same reaction yesterday that I just need to stay home with the kids.

As I've been going through my books at school, I've gotten really excited about homeschooling as I've been setting aside quite a few books that I think will help me in planning my lessons. The lowest grade I taught was 5th grade, but I have many early childhood books in my office because I've taught several ECE courses. It's funny because from the time I was a child through a few years ago I always assumed my children would attend a Christian school. I attended Christian schools/colleges from 1977-1992 and then I worked in Christian schools (teacher then principal) from 1992-2003. Paul attended public school until part way through high school when he transferred to a Catholic school. From his experience he had decided that he wanted his children to attend either private school or be homeschooled. Let me say here that I think it's a personal decision that each family needs to make for their own children. I think there are some wonderful public school teachers, Christian school teachers, and homeschooling parents. I also think there are some awful public and private school teachers and homeschooling parents. I don't think you can say any one of those choices is always the right or the wrong choice. As we were dating, Paul always mentioned homeschooling. In  my mind I was leaning toward Christian school with homeschool as the second option. In all honesty my ranking of those two only switched in the past 2 years, and this has become further cemented in my mind now that I'm giving up my tenure and promotion to stay home with the kids. If they were in private school I could see myself continuing to work (at least part-time) outside the home. Anyhow although I don't have any personal experience with homeschooling (although one of my sisters homeschools and my mom did homeschool my brother) and although I've always assumed I'd send my kids to a private school, I am really, really, really excited about homeschooling my children. I have no idea how many years I'll homeschool them. Time will tell, but I am really excited about starting preschool in January. I am grateful the textbook companies have sent me books even on subjects like art. When I received those books I'd think, why did they send me this? Now I am planning to put those books to good use! I am really excited!

Candy and Corn

Nadia's first Halloween took place about a month after we moved into our current home. I got her a pair of bumblebee pj's at Walmart, bought some candy at CVS, turned on our light, and waited for the kids to come so I could show off my bumblebee and give them candy. No one came. I later found out that in our town all of the trick or treating takes place downtown. I guess a portion of the town buys the candy for everyone. There are quite a few kids in our little development. I'd much rather take the kids trick or treating in our neighborhood than downtown where we don't know anyone. Our church had a "trunk or treat" event yesterday evening, and the plan to have another one next year. I feel guilty when looking at Facebook today that I haven't taken my kids trick or treating the past 3 years (although I know some abstain for religious reasons). Either I'll work something out with the neighbors or we'll do a trunk or treat next year. Nadia didn't eat any pieces of candy yesterday, but she did have fun decorating a sugar cookie with frosting and such at the Fall Fest at church yesterday afternoon. I'll have to keep the weather in mind when choosing an outfit for her as she would have been soooo cold in her princess outfit if she was wearing that outside last night. I got that costume last year on clearance at Toys R Us more for a dress-up outfit than Halloween in particular. Her first two "costumes" were pjs, and actually she still wears her penguin pjs. I plan to go to Walmart tomorrow and check out the Halloween clearance for costumes for the future or just stuff the kids can use to dress-up in (dramatic play as they'd call it at a childcare center).

Ian has made improvements with eating baby food lately. I'd say that he's now at the typical stage of a 6 month old. I haven't tried baby cereal again, but I plan to do so this week. Last Tuesday he ate an entire container of stage 1 squash in one day. Today I tried a container of stage 2 squash plus corn and it didn't go quite as well, but still it's not nearly the battle that it was to get him to consume a few bites. I have tried Cheerios and sweet potato puffs again, and those still make him gag. A couple of weeks ago I tried a piece of candy corn. With Nadia I was so strict about no sugar until she turned one, but with Ian since he just won't eat I was curious. He has refused things like a dab of whipped cream, but he loved the piece of candy corn. I was so excited! I never thought I'd be excited over my child wanting a piece of candy, but it was the first truly solid piece of food that he liked. Don't worry, I haven't given him any more candy corn. He's only had one piece. It did give me hope though that maybe some day he'll like eating solid foods more than he does now. Over the next 6 weeks I'd like to see a big shift in terms of the ratio between solid foods consumed versus milk. We shall see how that goes! I also have to give Ian credit for sleeping in until almost 7am this morning! He screamed for awhile around 4:50am, but he actually went back to sleep. Usually he doesn't go back to sleep. It would have meant a great night of sleep for me since I went to bed around 9pm , but Nadia woke up with a bad coughing fit at 5:30am so she was in bed with us from 5:30-7:00am. So I have been awake since 4:50. It seems like the kids take turns. If Ian decides to have a good night, then Nadia has a bad one. LOL!