My health scare

Wow...what an interesting week it has been.

Two weeks ago, I started having this pain in my lower abdomen.  I thought it might just be gas, but it didn't go away after a few days.  One Sunday night I texted my friend Heather, who is a nurse and asked her to please tell me what she knew about appendicitis and to please tell me I didn't need surgery.  Well, other than the pain (in the wrong place) I didn't have any of the other symptoms.  She said I should have it checked out anyway.  I did, but my usual doctor was off last week so I had to see his partner.  She was nice but didn't really do anything.  I was also in a conference last week and had to work long days so I just figured I would see how it went and if I didn't feel better this week I would go back.

This weekend was awesome...we went to the park, played outside and went to the zoo.  More on that in the next post.  On the way to the zoo this past Sunday I started having lower back pain.  It wasn't something I couldn't deal with, just not right.  I called in to the get an appt on Monday and they couldn't fit me in with my normal doctor.  I told them I didn't care, just wanted to see somebody.  When I got there they put me with my usual doctor b/c he was available after all.  We talked about all my symptoms and he immediately ruled out hernia.

He sent me for a CT scan right away and nobody explained what that entailed.  To prepare for the test, you basically have to sit in the waiting room for two hours and drink some nasty concoction every 20 minutes.  Let's just say I sat 10 feet from the restroom.  Two hours later they came and got me, had me lay down and gave me an i.v.  They shot this dye into me, called contrast and it was supposed to make me feel warm.  I didn't feel anything until the test was over and my left eye started to itch.  I asked if I could scratch it and told the CT lady that it was probably allergies.  And then my right eye started to itch.  And then we both became suspect.  I got up and right before she took the i.v. out she noticed my left lower eyelid starting to swell.  She immediately got a doctor and he said I needed some Benadryl.  It was like going from sober to drunk in 15 seconds.  I had to be put in a wheelchair and moved to the urgent care section until the swelling went down.  I took a little snooze and when I woke up they already had my results.  Turns out I have a gallstone and the next day I would need an ultrasound.

Tuesday I went in for my ultrasound.  I have been to several of these when Brig was pregnant, but I didn't realize how "thorough" the tech would be.  It took 30 minutes and when she was done she called my doctor.  She rattled off some medical jargon, but it seemed like much more than just a gallstone.  Based on the results, my doctor wanted blood work.  Yay...more needles!  I knew I wouldn't get the results until yesterday, so I patiently waited until my appt yesterday afternoon. 

It was a really long 24 hours.  I played out every bad scenario in my head.  What did they find?  Is it a tumor?  Cancer?  Would I need surgery?  Worse?  I thought mostly about Brig and Owen.  Would I be here to see him grow up?  How would we explain this to him?  I was also mad at myself for eating bad food and not exercising enough.  I thought if it was good news I wouldn't be going in at all.  Surely they would tell me that over the phone.  I was just praying that it was only a gallstone.

And that's all it is!  A gallstone that I can live with...that requires no surgery.  The ultrasound tech saw some other stuff, but once the radiologist read it, he deemed it nothing abnormal.  And my blood work came back completely normal as well.  My doc said I could resume normal activity and I was released...and relieved!  

Happy Valentine's Day

We finally got Owen to start calling today Valentine's Day instead of Thanksgiving!?  Don't know how or why he thought all the hearts we see everywhere remind him of turkey day, but he does now distinguish between the two.

This is part of the conversation I overheard last night when Brig was getting him ready for bed:

B:  Owie, will you be my valentine?
O:  No, I'm a boy.

He's big into labels!

Owen and Brig also did a little baking over the weekend and I was on hand to lick the bowl take some pics.  He had his share of batter and icing too, way before the final product was ready.  You always need a taste tester right?

What we've been up to

Last week I had to make myself sit down and clean off the memory card.  We keep a copy of all the pics in files on my laptop and also burn them to a cd for backup.  Well, the cd reader on the laptop is temperamental and it took me several hours just to backup a few months worth of photos.  I am not patient with technology so I gave up just short of throwing the computer out the window.

Anyway, Owen's black eye got much worse, but is almost better now.  This pic is from two weeks ago.

We have booked the place for his birthday party, so now I need to start working on the invitations.  Last spring at the preschool auction, Grandmama bid and won us a gift certificate to Celebration Town.  Can't believe our little man is almost three!

This week he figured out how to open the frig/freezer doors (boo!) and get on our bed by himself (yay!).  He is really into games and floor puzzles.  Somehow he always wins at Hi Ho! Cherry-O and Zingo.  He's also really into his train table, costumes (referenced above) and Play-Doh.  

It's so funny to us when he discovers a new word.  Lately it's been "totally" and "actually" and he uses them correctly.  He's known his birth date and our street address for a while, but he's learning the difference between right and left when we're in the car.  He's also counting on his fingers and starting to identify letters and numbers.

He is still singing Christmas songs and picking out Christmas books to read.  Since we are painting his room, which was much easier before he was born, half of his stuff is in the office.  He found all these baby books so he has been picking those for nap time/bedtime which is driving us crazy. 

Speaking of nap time, a few weeks ago we thought he was done with that.  We weren't thrilled, but had accepted it...well...he fought it for three days and then he crashed...hard.  He was pitching a fit one night (from being exhausted) and I picked him up and attempted to calm him down.  We rocked for a second and he was out cold within two minutes.  It was 6:00 pm and he hadn't had dinner or a bath.  We managed to get him dressed for bed and he hardly opened his eyes.  He is not napping for three hours a day every day like before, but is still sleeping for at least two hours every afternoon.

Bruiser

Owen got his first shiner today during nap. He says he hit the bed rail reaching for a toy.  He won't get out of the bed without us in the room so I guess he was being creative and it backfired.  Poor little buddy.

While I was taking pics of his boo-boo, he asked me to take this pic of his hair ball.  Just keepin' it real...

Sing me a song, tell me a story

Brig captured Owen in a (rare) still moment today and he actually sang a few songs for the camera.  He's also into making up stories and "reading" books to us.  Please forgive his room...we are in the middle of painting and changing out the window treatments.

 

Fall/Winter photo session

I waited to post these until after Christmas because two of them were presents to the grandparents.  We took them on a really nice day at the park.  Owen was pretty cooperative, much more than the last time we tried this.  I don't think I posted those pics because there wasn't a good one in the bunch.

Of course there were plenty of outtakes, but I thought this one was especially funny...

Stuff Owen says

1.  Tuesday was my first day back at work, and when I came home Owen said, "Daddy, I'm so glad you're here."

2.  "Good tidings we bring, to you and your kin cat."

3.  Owen said, "Thank you mommy, thank you for bringing my big boy bed.  Brig said, "But I didn't bring it, Santa did."  Then Owen says, "But I couldn't tell him thank you b/c I was sleeping when he came."