After a long day of swimming....

Back to the ER

We have been fortunate that our ER visits have been short-lived and have not resulted in any long-term health problems for any of our family.  Still, I hope we're done with the ER for awhile or, better yet, forever.

We had a very scary morning yesterday.  Elena had her shots on Thursday afternoon and she had a fever of about 102 degrees when she went to bed that night. She hates taking medicine and I was only able to get her to take a little bit of Tylenol and Motrin.  I've learned that if I force it down, she will immediately vomit it back up.

She was sleeping in our room and she asked for milk around 6:00.  After drinking her milk, we noticed her breathing was kind of irregular.  Then we heard her throw up.  I brought a bucket over to her and tried to get her to sit up, but she couldn't sit up and wasn't responding.  Seth turned on the lights and we saw that her lips were blue and she wasn't breathing - it appears that she was choking on her vomit.  I immediately ran downstairs and called 911 while Seth did the Heimlich maneuver.

It took him a few tries until she started breathing, but even after she started breathing she wouldn't respond.  She wouldn't talk at all and kept slipping in and out of consciousness.  By the time the ambulance got there, she was unconscious. They took one look at her and brought her straight into the ambulance.  I went along in my pajamas with nothing but my phone.

Seth's sister lives next door and had seen the ambulance at our place so she ran over and was able to take Sam so Seth could drive to the hospital right away.  In the ambulance Elena opened her eyes a bit after getting oxygen.  When they tried to give her an IV, she woke up quite a bit more (she hates needles more than she hates medicine) - enough that they were able to skip the IV for the time being.

At the ER her temperature read 105.  She chose to take her tylenol rectally rather than orally - yes, she is that stubborn.  Her temp dropped steadily, and after several tests and a couple of x-rays we were able to take her home in time for lunch.  She was lethargic the whole time and she wouldn't talk.  Seth was very anxious to hear her talk again - it was so unlike her.  She doesn't remember anything from the early morning and very little of the ER visit. What she does remember she says it seems like it was a dream.

Her fever continued for the rest of the day, but she felt much better.  We were finally able to get her to take her medicine by getting the chewables, crushing them and mixing them with a little juice. Thank you, Bill Cosby for the idea.

The doctors claim that the incident was purely coincidental and not related to her vaccines, but I'm having a hard time believing them. Especially since the Centers for Disease Control specifically lists a fever for 105 or higher occuring 1-3 days after the vaccine as a possible side effect of the DtaP.

Anyway, life is back to normal, seeming a little more precious.  I am so thankful that Seth and I were both home so I could call 911 while he did the Heimlich. I am slightly terrified of trying to rescue a choking person - I know what to do if I'm the most capable person on hand and I have dealt with minor episodes when my kids were little, but I was very relieved to have Seth there - he did a great job.

I have also never been more thankful that we let our kids sleep in our room if they are sick or having trouble sleeping.  I shudder to think what we would have found in the morning if Elena had been in her room where we couldn't hear her. 

Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers.  I'm happy to report that Elena's fever is gone and she is back to normal.

Goodbye, Natalie!

Well, this is only about 2 months late. We brought Natalie to the airport for her return to Germany at the beginning of June.  My morning sicknes kicked in on the ride home from the airport so I haven't had the motivation to write a thorough post on here until now.

We absolutely loved having Natalie as a part of our family and it was hard to let her go.  There were many tears at the airport and afterwards.  Poor Sam doesn't do well with goodbyes and he broke down several times throughout the day, saying "Why did Natalie have to go???" 

When we ask Elena if she wants to get another exchange student someday, she says "No.  I just want to get Natalie again."

Here are a few pictures from her last days here.

We made her a "German" chocolate cake for her birthday - delicious!

All the cousins have been missing Natalie as well. We had a big going away party for her the night before we left for the cities. Most of Seth's family made it so she got to have one last night surrounded by our huge family in a small town before she moved back to her huge city full of small families (she knew very few families in Germany with more than 2 kids :)

We decided to spend our last weekend up in the cities and, unfortunately, the whole family got sick except for Natalie. Doubly unforunate was the fact that we didn't all get sick at once, but took turns so it was drawn out over 3 days.  During one brief period where we were all relatively healthy, we were able to visit the brand new fire station where Seth's brother, John works.  The kids loved getting to see the big firetrucks up close.  They even got their own fire hats.  We were so worried that Natalie would come down with it on her flight home, which would have been miserable.  I guess all that hand sanatizer worked, though, because she managed to escape the bug.

Sam hopped in by Natalie for a cuddle on her last morning in the US.

The Phases of the Moon - by Sam

Sam pointed out the moon to me last week, explaining that it was a half moon.

After a minute, during which time I assume he was pondering how the moon goes through the different phases, he said: "Mom, I think maybe a rocket man flies up to the moon with a knife and cuts it in half."

I tried explaining how it actually happens with the moon reflecting the light of the sun and the Earth blocking the light.  Sam came back with, "But how does the moon get cut in half??"

I think we'll stick with the rocket man theory for now.

Our First Camping Trip of the Summer

We had our annual DeCock camping trip with Seth's mom's side of the family last weekend.  I was fortunate to have 2 days in a row where I felt pretty good and we had air conditioning in the cabins so there were no complaints all weekend.

I failed to take any pictures of the weekend, but Elena brought along our old camera.  The battery only lasts about 20 minutes and it frequently loses the pictures you take, but it keeps her happy.

So here are some highlights of the weekend as documented by Elena:

So Thankful

Sunday night I came home to find Seth lying on the couch with a terrible stomach ache.  After a couple of hours, we called the hospital and the nurse recommended we take him in.  We were lucky that I was having a pretty good night (usually I spend my evenings puking), so Seth's dad came to stay with the kids while I brought Seth into the ER.
By about 12:30, they were pretty sure it was appendicitis.  So I went home to get some sleep, while Seth spent the night doing more testing. At 8:30 in the morning, they took out his appendix, and he was discharged from the hosptial by 6:00 that night.
We were fortunate that we went in right away - his appendix was nowhere near rupturing and his recovery has been pretty quick. Normally we're the type to wait it out before we go into the doctor, and I'm glad we didn't do that this time.
It's a little sobering to know that 150 years ago, I would have been a widow by now. To say we're thankful for modern advancements in medicine would be an understatement.

8 Years!

Happy Anniversary to my wonderful and loving husband.  It's been a great 8 years and I hope we get to enjoy many more decades together. I'm too sick to write much so I'll just put up a video.

One of the things I love most about Seth is seeing how much fun he has with our kids.

  

Elena is very excited to help out when the new baby comes - and I'm hoping that excitement won't wear off too quickly.  Helping during the pregnancy, however, is apparently not as appealing to her.  I've learned that children have very little sympathy for their parents.

As an example, here's a conversation Elena and I had yesterday.

Elena (yelling from the living room): Mom, are you throwing up?

Me: Yes.

Elena: Oh......Can you get me a snack?


Seth has since talked with her about helping me when I'm sick, so this morning when I was heaving into the toilet, Elena was  much more helpful:

Elena: Can I get you a banana?

Me: No, not right now.

Elena: What would you like?

Me: Maybe a glass of water.

Elena: Ok - I'll get it.....would you like a jelly bean with that?

Me: No, thank you.

And I'm happy to say that she promptly brought me a glass of water (without spilling). Hooray!

A Memory Like and Elephant

Elena has a great memory, or "membery" as she calls it.  Like many things in life, this has both advantages and disadvantages.

Elena's lastest interest has been hearing stories from when we were little - she asks us (and any other adult) to "tell stories from when you were little."  I'm getting to a point where I'm running out of stories. 

Anyway, the other day Elena had the opportunity to ask my Uncle Paul for stories when he was little. She lucked out there because Paul is a great storyteller, and his stories are never dull.  So she heard all about how he used to go rat hunting by the garbage dump when it was set on fire each night and how he (accidentally) shot a dead man's rear end when he was 12.  The next day she was telling Seth one of the stories she remembered:

"One time, this guy took a newspaper and lit it on fire, and then he was using the fire to burn the hair off his arms.  And then Grandpa Lawrence came in and said, 'What are you doing?!!?'"

Just as I was about to breathe a sigh of relief that she didn't remember exactly what Grandpa Lawrence had said, she corrected herself, making sure to get it exactly right: "No, wait - he said 'What the hell are you doing?!!?'" 

We told her that she probably shouldn't repeat that story to her friends...

There's a baby on the way!

A couple of weeks ago we were headed to Marshall, and Sam suddenly piped up from the back seat, "Mom, I think there's probably a baby ready for you to pick up at the hospital.  We should stop by there and check."  I explained to him that it doesn't really work that we and we skipped the unnecessary stop.

I didn't even know it yet, but he was sort of right.  I was just barely pregnant at the time, and am now offically about 5 weeks along.  We don't really bother to wait telling people because in about a week, I'm going to have to explain why I'm puking all the time anyway :)

The kids are very excited, although I think Sam might start doubting that a baby is really on the way.  His first reaction was, "Let's go to the hospital right now to pick it up."  After we explained that the baby is in my belly, he came over, lifted my shirt and looked into my belly button to try to see the baby. He now checks my belly a few times a day to see if the baby has grown. Every time he checks, his conclusion is the same: "No baby yet." Elena wanted to know how big the baby was, etc. so I showed her pictures of what it looked like online.  According to Elena, "it looks like a lizard."  I reminded her that she looked like a lizard at that age, too.

Elena is convinced it's a girl because "she prayed for a baby more than Sam did." She has already started collecting pretty things to give to the baby - a boquet of flowers, shiny rocks, etc. Sam, of course, is rooting for a boy. He told his babysitter today that the baby would be a boy and he was going to wrestle with him. ("Not until he's older!"Elena quickly reminded him.) When their sitter asked Sam, "What if it's a girl?" he replied, "It won't be."