just crap… – Page 3

I think it’s time

I think that it’s time to get a new gate.

He’s such a cheeky little monkey.

Miracles Can Happen

Well, yesterday was a day worth noting!!!!

My son….my baby – I’ve moaned about the fact that he doesn’t sleep during the day. Being just totally honest he’s not been the most amazing night time sleeper either, but he does go to bed around 7:30pm and pretty much stays mostly asleep until 6:30am the next morning. He might wake up once or twice (or three of four or five times), but he just wants to cuddle and nurse and is really not even awake!

I’ve been incredibly frustrated at the fact that this sweet boy of mine naps for 10 minutes at a time. Pretty much rendering my day, useless. He is slowly starting to play with toys a bit and can either be entertained by the kids or entertain himself for short periods of time, but for the most part…he wants to be held.

Just recently, I’ve tried putting him to sleep in strollers and reclined high chairs and while I might squeak out a 20-25 minute nap, which is nicer than a 10 minute nap but it’s not been a life altering as I’d hoped for. He’s cute though, isn’t he? He’s such a big boy!

I love that he wants me and at the same time – there is SO MUCH GOING ON AROUND HERE! And I often feel incredibly frustrated at all that I’m not able to accomplish. Today, we had some family photographs taken by Tania from Red Handed Photography. I’ll share more about that in a bit, but basically Judah fell asleep as soon as we put him the car seat and then woke up 10-15 minutes later after we parked the car. That was his morning nap….awesome eh? As least he didn’t wake up grouchy – that would have awesome, no?

I really wasn’t sure what he was going to do for the rest of the day sleep wise and he was pretty cranky. I tried twice to put him down and nope – he wasn’t having any of that business. Finally, at 3pm Jon just walked with him for about 10 minutes and BAM! He was out. Jon put him in his crib and the little darling slept…

HE SLEPT FOR AN HOUR!

I got SO MUCH DONE! It was amazing! Jon took the other boys to the park, Xani had gone swimming with a friend and Geli was visiting my mom….so it was just me trying to plow through as much house crap as possible before everyone came back…

It is so nice to feel like you’ve accomplished something. It’s a lovely feeling!

And now I must go and attempt to accomplish more….so I shall leave you with just a quick video.

Judah wants to tell you something!

Verbal Diarrhea

I’m not sure what the deal is, but today…….I’M TIRED!

I would give just about anything to be able to crawl back in bed right now, but that’s not an option and so instead of feeling sorry for myself – I’ve got to somehow give myself a shake and carry on with my day.

There is so much that I really should be doing and none of it that I really want to do….how’s that for incentive for ya?

Jon and Judah up at Harrison Hot Springs! Love his hair!

Geli had her second dose of Chemo for this round this past Friday and she seemed to handle it a bit better than the week before. It could have something to do with how we’ve managed the meds/nausea, but she felt less sick that the previous week. This is the first “off of the steroid” week and while she didn’t feel as nauseated, she was in quite a bit of pain.

I mentioned before that when she is coming off of the steroid, that her joints can end up hurting quite badly. She didn’t feel bad enough to want to take the codeine or morphine but the constant pain is wearing…..She felt that the pain level reached a 4 out of ten, on the pain scale level. Which I think is enough to have taken something, but she didn’t want to, and so she didn’t.

Fortunately, the pain from her joints has mostly subsided and aside from the random wave of nausea and the odd headache, she is doing quite well. She was at school part of yesterday and has gone again today. Our Doctor figured that she may be able to attend quite a bit of this month, which is a nice bonus as we figured that her counts would be quite low for most of this round….but hey, we’ll take the higher counts as it means more protection from her immune system – YAH for that!

I’m extremely frustrated with Judah….he is the WORST day time napper that I’ve ever had. He might go down for al of 10 minutes and then he’ll wake up crying and screaming. I know that he’s not ready to wake up and yet…..he doesn’t want to settle again and ARGH…..A cranky, crying, overtired baby is not fun!

Neither is a cranky, crying, overtired mom…..

We have a meeting tomorrow at Jeremy’s school to talk about him, and really – there is a lot to that part of the story and I don’t have the time or the energy to get into it….and so, I’ll just say that we are still moving forward with Jeremy and that it’s a tough journey at times, but man, if he isn’t just a lovely little boy with such a gentle spirit. I sure love him!

For the most part, Xandra is doing AMAZINGLY WELL. We took her to the pediatrician about a month ago, I think? and he is treating her for ADD/ADHD and the difference in her is UNBELIEVABLE! She is looking and acting and producing work a lot more like the Xandra from years gone by…….It’s frustrating that this all came about at the same time as Geli’s diagnosis and treatment and I wish that we’d been more on top of things because I believe she went too far down a road that she never needed to go on. We could have caught things sooner. I’m not sure if I mentioned this before, but ADDD presents itself differently in girls than in boys. Typically, girls are diagnosed around 12 years of age when organization is a bit more complicated (as in when Grade 7 teachers start to train the kids to be able to handle the High School organization structure). For us, we were not sure if Xani was just stressed about the Cancer stuff or the family stuff or school stuff or how much of all of the different things played into her stress levels, but to give her some medicine so that at the very least, she can organize and structure her life better……it has made a HUGE difference. Xandra is a very bright little girl and has always done extremely well in school. This year, she has not shown even a part of how capable and intelligent she is and we just wrote it off to the chaos and stress (which I’m sure are contributors) but in the past couple of weeks since putting her on the meds…..her marks have come up drastically and she is better able to plan out her work load….it’s made a drastic difference in both her schoolwork AND in her stress levels. And we are SO thrilled that she is doing better.

The Teen Oncology Group is having another function tomorrow night and they are probably going to Theater Sports. So, Jon and I (and Judah) are headed into town for Wednesday evening. I’m not sure what Jon and I are going to do……any suggestions? We are looking at being there probably around 5pm and having to pick Angelica up around 8:00pm.

If you are local or know Vancouver, what is your favorite thing to do?

Oh Man….

well, life just keeps on flying by and I keep thinking I should post something and then, I have no energy to do so….

In bullet points:

– Geli started Chemo on Monday
– She got chemo shots into her thighs on Tuesday
– She went back to school on Wednesday (hopefully for a good portion of the next month)
– Jeremy is LOVING the newest Robot Camp
– Jeremy will do ANYTHING for a Lego mini fig (He cleaned the kitchen spotless is less than 15 mins and that is basically a Christmas Miracle)
– Xandra caught up on ALL her homework (because I bought the latest Maximum Ride Series Book and wouldn’t let her read it until everything was up to date)
– Geli is ALMOST caught up on her homework but she was really, REALLY behind.
– Geli is having a hard time adjusting to a “normal schedule” (She’s finding it hard to get to sleep at night and as a result is overly tired in the morning making mornings a bit tougher than they should be)
– I saw the psychologist at BCCH yesterday and cried too much (now I’m just trying to process everything and trying to figure out what I’m going to do moving forward)
– We are contemplating our living arrangements and trying to figure out is there is a better room allocation that would work for us.
– Jon’s scheduled appointment to give blood is tomorrow morning.
– Megamind comes out on DVD today and we are planning to watch it tonight as a family.
– Baby turned 8 months old yesterday and his cousins came to play and I have a bazillion photos to plow through today.
– I love my sisters. Am thinking of them lots today. They are AMAZING!
– I am having too many “I should be doing…..” thoughts and it’s wrecking my life….I need to think through and just “DO” and not get so caught up in what I should be doing. It’s harder to do than it might seem.
– About the previously mentioned room allocation….would you consider turning the basement into the “master bedroom”? Why or why not? Any thought?
-And with that I’m out….I’ve got a mountain (5 large loads) of laundry that I need to fold. Ick!

Here and There

Well, while my family is split up for the next little bit, we decided to send each other pictures of what we are doing so we feel a little less separated and a little more involved.

Here’s what Geli and Jon are doing at 9:46am. They made Eggs & Toast and are eating them in the Kitchen on 2B….We are so thankful that they are on 2B (the 2nd floor of the oncology ward) with access to a kitchen so that they can eat good food and not be stuck with the hospital food. While the hospital food is not “HORRIBLE”, it’s not “DELICIOUS” either.

Here at home, we had sent the kids off to school and were thinking about putting the baby down for a nap. But instead, we took a picture on the stairs.

This was my view at 11:41am…..I’m working on this post, Siah’s watching a movie and Judah’s just chillin’ and eating some steamed taro root cubes.

11:49am and Jon& Geli are up on 3B (the main Oncology ward) and are playing a little air hockey. Jon is WHOOPING Geli’s butt!

They’ve discontinued one of Geli’s Antibiotics. She was on two different ones and now she is only on the broad spectrum one. The cultures that they’ve been doing have all been negative since the 4th day in. Now we are just waiting out this round of antibiotics before she can come home. Aside from feeling a bit “off” first thing in the morning, she’s feeling fabulous. Her counts are still really low. For example, the number that indicates the amount of infection fighting “soldiers” needs to be over .5 for her to even consider going to school….as of this morning, that number was at a .08….so she really has almost no ability to fight anything off right now. We are praying for her numbers to come up quickly. She can’t even start her next round of chemo until that number is at a .75…..we got a ways to go before she hits that.

12:50pm Sometimes, this whole toilet training business is harder than it seems…. He called me to help him and this is how I found him…

1:13pm Judah’s playing with the Shadows on the floor. It’s so nice to see the sun out.

1:18pm Aunty Chelle and the Cousins visit. It’s so nice that they can visit when we can’t…..

1:47pm Geli and Brianna playing a game……

2:17pm This is what over tired, a sore throat and teething looks like….

2:31pm Sleep…..Sweet Sleep!

2:47pm Playing Air Hockey with Baby Zach (with a little help from Aunty Chelle)

I’ll be updating this post with the rest of today’s pics as they happen……

Oh, and if you haven’t yet, would you go here and help me out? Huge thanks to all those who’ve already left your suggestions, I love hearing what you all have to say!

Yo Help a Girl Out!

My Kitchen is in horrific need of a cleaning and it appears that I am the only one capable of getting that job done right now.

But, Here is where you could help me out…..

What are your favorite TV series? I’m looking for some new (to me) ones to check out….and please don’t say Jersey Shore – you can just keep that your little secret.

Are you local (to me) and do you have an amazing dentist? We need someone and I don’t know where to start looking?

What are your plans for Valentine’s Day? It’s not just for lovers, but for kids or friends or family…..it’s a day to show love! In my mind anyway!!!

Alrighty, hit me with your thoughts and I’ll catch you later…..

Sunday Night Ramblings brought to you by our iPhone(s)

Well, it’s Sunday night at 7:45pm and I’m looking at a ton of random photos from both mine and Jon’s phone…… These pictures sort of highlight the past few days of our family, both here at home and at the hospital.

Seeing as I’ve managed to get the 3 kids that I have at home down, I thought I might try to throw them up into a post along with some of my random “brain thingys……”

This was Jon’s chair bed……..and then he got upgraded to a cot, but it was horrid…all lumpy and wires and bars sticking up and out and totally uncomfortable…..

This is actually the lumpy nasty bed………..

He then took a few test rides on some of the cots in the empty rooms on the floor that Geli is on and ended up with a deluxe bed…….that pretty much looks exactly the same as the picture above. In fact, you’d never be able to tell the difference. And this is where you all start with the “Princess and the Pea” jokes for him right about now…….Ha Ha HA!

It’s amazing how the dynamic in the house changes when you add or subtract people and right now, we are 3 people short over here and Xandra and Jeremy actually “played nicely” on Saturday morning. Here is the Lego maze that they created. It was supposed to be a game board…..Not sure if they actually played a game or not?

We went for a walk on Saturday afternoon. Like I mentioned earlier, Siah’s been staying at my mom’s because he’s been a coughing, snotting, germy mess…..He’s missing us and I’m missing him dearly and so my mom suggested that we go for a walk and hopefully with all the fresh air, we wouldn’t pass the germs around.

What??????? Don’t you take your Lego robots for walks with you?

While we were playing and walking and doing a bunch of other boring stuff, Jon and Angelica slept in FOREVER and then they had some DELICIOUS hospital breakfast…….

Later, they got in a little exercise……you can see that she’s really going fast…look at the blur that should be her legs…

After a little clean up (cause riding a bike can be sweaty, sweaty work) they headed down to the kitchen to play some Monopoly. Geli must not be feeling a hundred percent because Jon KICKED HER BUTT! Like really, REALLY badly, and she ALWAYS wins! So Weird!

Meanwhile, we walked and walked and walked and walked…..you know, the whole theory that if you tire the kids out, then maybe they’ll sleep really good….ya doesn’t always work for my kids. SUCKS! Along the way, my strange kids were kinda creeped out by these Alien Pods – but I have no idea where they got that idea from….none at all!

But, we finally made it to the park….

The kids played and climbed and went on the swings and up and down the slides and onto the monkey bars and we only had to yell at them to avoid all the other children a half a dozen times…..by that point, the parents were just high tailin’ it outta there anyway…… (okay, all of that was totally made up…..There were ONLY 4 other pre-teen boys “hanging out” there and they only had the rescue Siah “once” from climbing up the tallest part of the tallest play structure…That child is seriously part goat and the other part is monkey….he’s amazing!)

We managed to deal with Little Master Siah McSnotterson. This way, you only have to deal with the snot once as opposed to blowing his nose a million times, and it totally saves the jacket from needing a wash too. Come on! You parents know what I’m talking about….if there isn’t a kleenex around the slug slime goes from one wrist up to the shoulder on both sides. BLECH! I’m shuddering just thinking about it.

Judah had fallen asleep while we were there, and it was so nice to just sit on the park bench and to not have to “do” anything. After we had been there a while, I loving asked Josiah, in the softest most gentle voice that I own to not do something that he was doing…..and Judah woke up. You’d think that it would take something more like a yell or scream to wake that kid up……you might be right? At least he wakes up happy, eh?

As we walked home, the kids all needed to express their inner Jackie Chan by doing “maneuvers” on the fence…This is Jeremy’s best shot of the “Despicably Crouching Tiger” Amazing, isn’t it? Such skill and finesse!

Xandra dropped a mean “Flowering Stork” on us…..

I tried to ask Siah which maneuver he was pulling off and the best I can gather from what he was mumbling behind those trailing kleenex’s was that he was really working on the “Dangling Walrus”. It’s a two person move as you can tell by the picture and my mom very graciously offered to stand in for him.

These pictures are really just bonus pictures just because I love them and they make me smile……..

This is a picture from before Geli and Jon went into the hospital, but I’m putting on here anyway. I love that its blurry cause he’s moving so fast, but you can see his two little front teeth sticking out and the nerdly glasses combined with the swooshy hair….this picture is priceless to me!

This picture CRACKS me up. The look on Geli’s face is amazing. You can almost hear her saying, “Huuuuuh?”

And in this one it looks like Judah’s trying to figure out who is ‘in” the phone.

Well, I ate a million gluten free oatmeal cookies with a cup of almond milk and called it dinner….I figure it’s exactly the same as porridge, right? Well if that’s the case, why do I feel SO GROSS! Yuck! Time for a millions cups of water and possibly an early-ish bedtime…..if I’m smart!

And with that…..I’m off! Hope you’re weekend was a good one! Care to share what the highlight of your weekend was?

I need someone to hear my voice

I asked Xandra if she would like to write a post and she said yes. Here are her words explaining some of her feelings……

So… My mom wants me to write a blog post. At the moment I really don’t know what to write about. Here we go. Well when we found out about Geli having to go the hospital I surprised myself. I didn’t cry or pout. I was fine. I did have trouble sleeping by looking at my clock. If your wondering why, it was because of the lines that make out the numbers.. I counted all of the lines for each number and well yeah. But the next night I cried and cried and cried and cried and cried because I found out that my Dad and my sister wouldn’t come home for 2 weeks, and until I get over this cough I can’t see them (Please pray for my throat)!!! It’s difficult to not know anything that’s happening to my sister. Yes, I do know that she is in the hospital, that she HAD leukemia and she is getting chemotherapy so she doesn’t ever get it again. I’m just not informed of what the side affects are for each medication or when she is going into the hospital for what drugs or procedures. I have talked with my parents about this and really they say they are going to get me something that I can read to know what is happening but they haven’t gotten around to it yet.
Something else to talk about is school. I love school and what there is to learn but during this season I’m finding it a little difficult. All I mean by difficult is that I have trouble bringing in my homework on time. I try I really do but it just doesn’t happen. That’s all for today

I love you all, Xandra

After she wrote and titled this, I asked her to answer three questions for me…..

1. What is hard about your Dad and Geli being in the hospital?

Having them be so far away. Not seeing them. I’m just used to having dad tuck me in at night and praying for me.

2. What is the worst thing about all of this (the Leukemia, the Chemotherapy, this past 7 months? everything)?

Well the worst thing is that Geli feels crappy lots of the time. It cinda makes me feel upset.

3. What is something good in your life that is happening right now?

Something good that is happening is that (I’m don’t mean to be selfish) everyone comes to see us to support us when Geli is in the hospital. It makes me feel loved.

What a Blur

This week has just flown past.

Not in a good, awesome, I wish it would have slowed down so we could have enjoyed all the wonderful goodness that we could possibly get, but more like a….I’m so tired because no one in this house is sleeping and the days have now run into one ginormous blur and I just want to be a bear so that I could hibernate for an entire winter.

Eating and sleeping….that sounds about perfect to me, right about now.

Jon and Geli have gone into the hospital to check her levels as we suspect that she may need either red blood or platelets….or both.

So Today could be a LOOOOONG boring day for them, but if she does get blood and/or platelets, it might help her to feel better. She’s been feeling really off and I believe it has to do with the Ara-C. I am SO incredibly thankful that she only gets 2 weeks of that drug as opposed to the 4 weeks of it, last time around. I don’t know how she would do if she had to take another 2 weeks of it. It’s a pretty hard core, nasty drug. We believe that she’s hit the bottom of the valley and it headed back up the mountain – figuratively speaking, but she’s still feeling like she’s stuck somewhere in a foggy, dark valley and it’s hard when you can’t see the light or the top side of the mountain….if ya know what I’m saying.

Basically, she’s tired. This is a HUGE and LONG fight and she’s very tired.

Judah’s been acting like….like…..well, like a baby and waking every couple of hours in the night. I’m waking for him to cycle back out of this nasty stage and back into the “only waking once a night” stage. This current stage sucks and I much prefer to get “actual” sleep.

Do you know how fast a family of 7 can take a house from clean to “not very tidy”? It’s pretty much instant! Boooo – and that is why I HATE cleaning!

I’d really like some chocolate or a cookie or something else that I probably shouldn’t have……You know, something with gluten or dairy and sugar.

And, that’s all the time I have for today as the baby just woke up from his incredibly short nap……..SUCKS!

Oh well, I’ll try to find some rest and joy and I’ll meet ya back here later.

Christmas is Coming & other updates…

Well, the baby is playing on the floor, the boys are watching Despicable Me; and the girls (and Jon) are in town to get Geli’s third dose of chemo for this round.

We went and got her blood work done yesterday and her numbers are quite low. Not “freaky scary hole up in the house for a week or two” low, but “avoid mostly everyone and stick to just family members” low. We should hit the “wrap her in Purell coated bubble wrap” low by New Years Day; and really, we are praying to avoid any trips to Children’s between today and January 11th…which is the next scheduled chemo dose. If you are the praying type, we’ve love some prayer that she (and we) stay healthy and protected between now and then. We are really looking forward to some nice quiet, calm peaceful days and nights between now and then.

When Angelica went for her 2nd dose of chemo last Thursday her white blood count was on the extreme high end of normal. This was a bit unnerving for us as the last time they were anywhere close to high was when we found out that she had Leukemia, BUT….this time, it was only an indicator that she had a virus and that she was fighting it off. This was FABULOUS news because her body is trying so hard to do what it was created to do and in the middle of all of this assault of her body – that is wonderful.

She successfully fought off that virus (after it tried quite ridiculously hard to kick her butt – she did have a rough couple of days and we weren’t sure if it was the chemo or the virus or both) and only has the slightest bit of a cough right now. The rest of us are steadily taking our vitamins, avoiding the throngs of people out there and trying to do everything that we can to boost our immune systems so that we don’t get anything, and so far it seems to be working.

With everyday that passes uneventfully, I can feel my family starting to breath a bit deeper, starting to relax, starting to act less strung out and this is such a good thing. Josiah is starting to go to bed more calmly (he was screaming hysterically for more than half an hour at bedtime regardless of what we did to encourage, console or help him to sleep) and he’s actually been sleeping through the nights (as opposed to waking every hour or 2). The not sleeping was just making EVERYTHING worse and so to have that not be as HUGE of an issue is so nice.

We are hopefully working through the issues with Judah. <>

We’ve not seen a lot of blood in his poop recently and so we are hoping that things for him are on the upswing. We’ve gone from 15+ bloody diarrhea diapers in a day to about 4 or 5 more normal-ish looking jobs. He’s throwing up WAY less and seems less like he’s in pain and is waking less in the night.

It might take some time for his intestinal tract to heal but I believe that he’s on the mend. I still feel quite a bit of stress about him, but it’s less now that he seems to be getting better as opposed to getting worse.

I feel like we are definitely headed in a more relaxed, peaceful direction, and yet I feel a bit like I’m holding my breath. I would desperately love for things to carry on as they are and for nothing to upset this delicate balance that we’ve got going on. It’s a reality that I have to be prepared for that Angelica could end up in the hospital between now and the New Year. It’s not a certainty, nor is it even “likely” but I cannot ignorantly walk around with my head in the clouds thinking that nothing like that could possibly happen to our family. For who I am, I need to at least be a little bit “prepared” that it might happen and then I can be ever so pleasantly delighted when it does not happen (positive speaking, right?). Having that thought in the back of my head, does bring it’s own level of stress and I hate that. I hate that I feel like an elastic that is wound too tight, but as long as I can hold steady everything is okay. If there is one more twist, then I might snap.

I don’t actually believe that I’ll snap, but to have things go chaotic again seems like it would very much upset this fragile balancing act that I’ve got going on. I do feel a bit more grounded with every day that passes, but I still feel like I’m trying to get back to a position of strength, not like I’m working or operating from that position of strength.

Being that kind of person that I am……it sucks to be in this place.

Other than my stress level – things are carrying on as usual. We are almost ready for Christmas. Siah is SO excited. I forgot how much fun it is to have a 3 year old for Christmas. I think 3 is the perfect age. He can’t wait for Christmas to come and his Holiday Cheer is so infectious.

We are doing well, over all, and I am so thankful that we are all together as a family this Christmas and that Geli’s prognosis is so good. We are looking forward to 2011 being an amazing year.