Happy Birthday My Little Wonder!

Today's Wonder Boy's birthday. He is certainly a miracle and a wonder. We are so blessed that he is a healthy happy boy.

Here is his interview-

Name: Wonder Boy

Age: 9

Favorite Color: Purple because it's Mace Windo's light saber color. (Well of course!)

Favorite Subject in school: computer lab (Future Al Gore maybe?)

What do you want to be when you grow up? A comedian/entertainer

Book of all time? "Goose Bumps even though it scares me silly and makes my bones crack. " (Typical Wonder Boy philosophy)

If you could be any animal what would it be? A dog, like a shaggy dog.

Best memory of being 8: Going to grandmas

Worst memory of being 8: A boy bullied me

Favorite T.V. show: America's Funniest Home Videos (This is what he wants more than anything for his birthday)

Favorite Movie: Star Wars Episode 6

Favorite Sports Team: St. Louis Rams ( He really just says because his big brother has a team, he really has no interest in sports.)

Favorite Athlete: Tom Brady

Favorite Movie Star: Tom Berjeron (the guy on AFV-the scary he thing is, he actually Google's Tom.)

Favorite Food: Pizza and Hamburgers

Favorite Place To Eat: McDonalds and Burger King

Favorite Place To Go: Toys R Us

Favorite Place To Go Online: Poptropica and Amazon to find stuff for my birthday.

In case you just cannot get enough Wonder Boy (why wouldn't you?) here is a few of my favorite Wonder Boy posts- Lick You Like a Momma Cat
Battery Dead? Call Eagle Auto Glass

Thoughts on Maddie

Next week Wonder Boy will be 9. Most would never give second thoughts on a kid turning 9, kids turn 9 every day. I'm thankful for each and every single day.
If you haven't read Wonder Boys birth story yet it pretty much tells all of why I feel so fortunate that he's come a long way baby. Born at 28 weeks gestation, Born with numerous breathing problems,pnuemonia so many times that first year I can't count. Then the icing on the cake, RSV which led him to be on ECMO. We honestly never knew from one day or the other if he would make it through another day. Yet some how he was a fighter and had a pretty awesome guardian angel watching over him and prayer. Now a days the kid is rarely even sick from school. He honestly hasn't been sick sick since that first year. I feel ever so humbled and blessed.





I say all of this and feel so guilty yet so blessed at the same time, when I read around the blogosphere about a precious little girl name Maddie. Maddie also was born at 28 weeks with numerous breathing and lung problems. Her story sounded almost exactly to the tee of Wonder Boys story.
Little Maddie went in for what appeared to be another issue where she was having problems breathing. This was probably almost a routine thing for their family as it was for us, granted the severity of the situation is never routine. She went in Monday morning and left this world on Wednesday. My heart was broken over hearing this. I had never actually read Heather's blog until I heard about it but I'm sure we could have related with all of the stuff she is going through.
I can't begin to explain or understand why these things happen and why Wonderboy was spared and Maddie not. I just feel assured that God has big plans for Maddie that are not of this Earth.
The blogosphere has rallied around this sweet little girl and her family and I know that they probably have never felt more blessed and loved than ever, even through this kind of unimaginable hurt. Had I even the slightest idea what a blog was in 2000 or that countless people on the Internet could be so supportive and loving to a total stranger and their family, I would have jumped on board then.
I just felt I had to send out my thoughts and prayers to the family. If you'd like to read more here is Maddie's tribute page They also have a great tribute at Blog Nosh Magazine
The blog community is rallying in full force to support the Maddies Walk for March of Dimes something near and dear to my heart.

About That Middle Son Of Mine

Hi my name is Jean and I have 3 sons, but sometimes I forget and think I only have two. Sure I set out food for the middle son. He gets clothed..barely sometimes he has to throw on his big brother's jeans because he has none that are clean, because he is the middle son and only gets hand me downs and sometimes he runs out faster. When he does wear big brothers jeans their just slightly to big but I tell him to make do anyway because really I don't have time with scrounging for a pair that actually fits his tiny waist and long legs. I wonder why can't you deal with just pulling them up constantly? Then I get a call from the school 5 minutes after I have just sat down to begin my morning ritual of cereal, e-mail and Scooby Doo, telling me that I need to bring him some other pants as his are falling down. Loosseerr baby I am. Thankfully I checked the pants and somehow the button had come off so I don't totally blame myself...ahem.

Then there was this mention of some concert that he kept telling me about. I had no clue what he was talking about. He would chime up about it and I'd say great honey just bring me a note. I need a note so I can lock it in my brain and plaster it on the fridge, if it ain't on the fridge it ain't happenin. Hearing about it is null and void. Yet he kept telling me every other day about some concert. He could never really give me exact details cause that's just how he communicates, he doesn't know any details. (Though you'd never know that cause this kid will spout off an entire movie dialogue in 5 minutes flat) Just "concert and concert and that's all I know."
20 minutes ago as he is heading to bed he says "Mom the concert is tonight!" Say who da what da? "Do you have a note?" I'm praying that maybe his days are mixed up and it's really tomorrow. That never happens does it? The oldest is even trying to soften my blow by saying isn't today the 2nd?
Sure enough on the note 3rd grade concert tonight be there or it proves that your parents are complete jerks...or something like that.
Here was the hard part. He didn't quite get that he had totally missed it and it's never going to happen again. He thought if we hurry up and go right now we'll be just in time..3-4 hours later. I have to explain to him that it's over, it's history, it's gone like the wind, it's outta there. This only makes the guilt that much harder to swallow. Ouch.
I told him, tell your music teacher that your mom is a tool and is really really sorry. He seemed to understand that.

Then I came up with a brilliant idea (in my head) and told him to put on the concert for us. A private showing if you will. He looked at me with a sweet blank expression on his face. What? ? ? ? He was totally clueless. He had no idea what songs he even sang in music class. Sigh.
My mom of the year certificate is going to be engraved with Oops I Did It Again like the music meme predicted. I'll make it a giant poster size and put it right here on the wall.

Just Real Quick..

Wonderboy is my precious little pansy. I mean that in the most loving way.

It's just that when he gets hurt he cries and makes a big deal out of it, even though there's no mark or bruise or blood. The tears just flow as if he'd been shot.
So this evening I'm just about to put them to bed, when here he comes down the stairs with tears as big as raindrops.
"Mom, the thing hurt my eyebrows." (insert sobbing)
While trying very hard not to laugh
"Oh my goodness, let me see." (this is where I see absolutely nothing but yogurt between said damaged eyebrows)

Normally when he gets this way I try to do something to get his mind off of it by making him laugh. Being the mother that I am, I start licking my thumb to smudge off the yogurt between his brows and telling him I'm licking him like a momma cat.
I at least got a smile out of him.

Nothing Like A Little Assualt To Liven Up My Day

WB(the preemie) was randomly attacked by a little girl at school yesterday. She scratched the heck out of his neck and snatched his glasses off of his face and hit him with them. Needless to say his glasses were bent to all heck. Sigh!
They called me at work and it kind of was a good thing that I wasn't able to answer the phone at the time so they called Hubs at home. Hubs is best suited to deal with these kind of situations. He immediately asked to speak with the little girls parents to ensure that they were going to pay for his glasses. Luckily the little girls parents were very cool and apologetic about the whole situation. You just never know with people anymore as some people are just jerks.
They were more than willing to do what was needed. Thank goodness!
Since I'm a nominee for mother of the year, I hadn't taken WB in to the eye doctor in over a year and his prescription was expired. The last pair we replaced were not under warranty and I wasn't about to buy another pair of glasses until we got him checked again. Since the girls parents were cool about everything we felt they didn't need to pay for them since he was due for a check up anyway. Nothing says get your butt in gear to have your kids eyes tested like an assault.
Since WB has strombosis(lazy eye) and is very very farsighted like cork goggles far sighted, it's very important that he have his glasses like yesterday. His eye doctor is the best in East Texas for pediatrics which means getting an appointment is like trying to get a date with Dr. Dreamy; it ain't gonna happen in the near future. Lucky the dear sweet appointment lady said we could get him in today with his associate. Big Relief!
Hubs obliged to pick him up this after noon to get him in, since he's so loving like that. At 2:50PM ..10 minutes before his appointment, I get a message from reception lady; You must pick up your child and take him to dr appointment since C cannot get him out of school. Hubs could not get his own flesh and blood out of school, because I didn't put my own husband down as someone who could pick him up. OOOPS! I assumed that putting him down as his father under the column that says "Father" would count. So I immediately sent a quick e-mail that I had to leave early and left work with out a trace. As you probably will know, I will never ever hear the end of that. Kudos to the school though for standing their ground on not letting him get him if he were in fact someone else.
Since my husband still loves me and forgives me for that little incident, he took the initiative and went to the eyeglasses place to see if the glasses were in fact fixable. What a relief to find they were and in perfect condition. So we saved the little girls parents money and ourselves money plus we have a new prescription to get him a back up pair.

So that's been my drama llama. Whew!

Preemie Land The Conclusion

Now that my hair woes are over, I can now bring you the conclusion to Wonderboys Adventures in Preemie Land. For my new blog party friends, I suggest you skip this post and head to Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, and Part 5 ...Don't worry we'll wait for you to catch up, take your time.
While we're waiting how 'bout some preemie pics?



Last we left off a lot of stressful things were happening; like say the birth of a 28 week preemie and then two weeks later we rush to C's dad's bedside to make it in the nick of time to see him before getting the cold hearted news of his passing from the motel reception clerk written on a piece of yellow paper, handed to us through the door.
I can visualize that yellow paper as if everthing else were in black and white nothing else mattered at that moment.
As shocked and numb as we were we somehow muddled through the next few days of funeral arrangements and family gatherings and the funeral. We also knew we had to get back to our baby 250 miles away, as one life passes on another clings perilously on.

Hard times were in store for us in the next few weeks after Wonderboys birth. We had our up and down days. One day his O2 levels and stats would be stable and the next day the docs and nurses would struggle to keep him stable. I'm not sure the number of times he had pnuemonia during his stay but it was atleast 3 maybe 4. They all just seemed to run together. It was very unnerving as we just hung on hour by hour and day by day and hubs and I would sometimes expect the unthinkable,yet try also to think positively.

The docs began to run vigorous tests to find out if there were some other cause than under developed lungs causing him such problems. We would continue this fight even after his long stay in the hospital.

The one thing that seemed to keep the little guy stable was kangarooing him. This entailed taking off my shirt and putting on a hospital gown back wards. I would then get in a very comfy recliner and they would place him on my bare chest as I wrapped the rest of the gown around him and me and then place a warmed blanket on top of us. This was the only time and way that C or I could hold him. We both looked forward to it and sometimes would have to flip a coin on who would get to go. We'd just lay there for hours if possible with him cradled on our chest. It was probably the closest thing to being in my tummy as you could get. His stats would level off and all was right in the world at that time. It was always so hard to put him back in his bubble for feeding time or meds.

I realize these are pictures of pics. It was just so much easier to take a picture of a picture than download the driver for the scanner and then hunt down the USB cord for it. Forgive me. I also had(have) no talent when it comes to scrap booking, I did the best with what I had.

Finally after what seemed like years he was finally getting stable enough to be removed from the respirator and on to oxygen. He was also getting a little chunk to him and big enough to go to the nursery. Which was where the "big" babies were. It was so wonderful to actually finally hold and feed him like a real baby despite the beeping machines and oxygen. When the babies get in this stage the big goal to reach is the 5lb mark. At 5lbs the little guy could finally come home. This was something we all wanted more than anything.
I went home maybe 3 or 4 times during that whole 3 months. I lived in the hospital/hotel the whole time. C had to go back to work eventually and was pretty much there with me on weekends or if he had classes in Big D. All this time my other baby was passed around from one grandma to the other or to whoever could take him at the time. Whether it was friends of the family or cousins or whoever. I hated being alone so much and the feelings of abandoning my one year old were overwhelming, not to mention the guilt.
Finally the time had come the doc let us know that our little guy would be ready to go home in a few days. We made a trip up to OK to get Gameboy as we wanted to all be there as a family when we all got home. That June day was like another birthday to him and me. I was joyous and scared. We would still be bringing him home with the oxygen and stat monitors. If you ever thought just juggling a baby with its carrier and diaper bag with all of just the normal baby stuff was hard, try the diaper bag, the O2 monitor, the apnea monitor and the oxygen to go with it. Yeah somehow I grew an extra set of arms. To this day I can carry a good 3-5 grocery bags in each hand along with my purse, the mail, the kids papers and sometimes a back pack all in one trip.
Hubs drove 25 the whole way, even in busy Big D traffic, he might've not been that slow but it felt like it. I was pretty overwhelmed with the machines beeping at every bump. When we made it home the home health nurse was already waiting for us. I was never so happy to see him in my life. We were very fortunate to get a full time nurse M-F. They were able to manage all of his meds and just help me out as I transitioned to being home with him and readjusting with Gameboy little Wonderboy.

Things were fairly hectic at night when I was alone. The machines literally drove me to insanity. If WB made a significant move to throw his apnea modules off kilter, it would go off. This thing is literally louder than a fire alarm. So if it goes off at 2AM it wakes everyone in the house, including baby 1, baby 2, daddy and the cows down the street. If I wasn't fiddling with his apnea monitor, it was toying with his O2. It's very important that his stats stayed at 95 or above, anything less is cause for alarm. I had to constantly make sure that it was secure on his face and in his nose. Ever try explaining to an infant that he can't grab his O2 from his face as it helps him to breathe? Don't get me started on feedings. Feeding a preemie through the smallest bottle and nipple (the size of a pin head, if not smaller) causes feedings to be a good hour. Normal sleep when dealing with an infant would have been heavenly compared to sleep with a preemie.

I hate to leave the story at this juncture, there is more to the story as I said before, his first year was pretty rocky. I'll post about the most significant at another time. Hopefully you got an idea of the life and times of a preemie. I would never leave you all with out atleast one pic of the little guy. This was probably his first or so week home. If you notice over to the right you'll see the two machines I had to lug around, and if you look really close you'll see the tiny bottle. He didn't have all of his "stuff" on at the time. Normally he would have a blue belt like band around his chest to monitor his breathing..in other words if he completely stops breathing the fire alarm would go off. He also would have his pulse ox which monitors his O2 stats and blood pressure, kind of like the little thing that they put on your finger in the hospital. This one instead is like a wired tiny ace bandage that goes around his toes. It was very hard to keep the blasted thing on. The More You Know....

Part V Will This Saga Ever End?

During the never ending wait that C had to endure, while I was mysteriously carted off to oblivion, he made a few calls. He called his dad who was pretty much fading fast on his death bed but strong enough to talk. I’m sure his dad gave him comfort and reassurance that things would be fine, but C was a bit bitter with all things hospital. His wife had undergone what seemed like an endless mis-diagnosis due to a doctor’s lack of concern and his father who was in the process of getting on the heart transplant list found out he he had cancer and had less than 3 months to live give or take. His diagnosis would have been so much more curable had his doctors undergone these tests many many months before when he made his complaints known. Needless to say C’s bitterness was justified.

C also called my mom of course, she jumped on a plane quicker than a flea on a dog and was there before I was even out of recovery.

The next morning, I felt I could get up and move around, even after just having major surgery. Mom felt I was up to see my baby boy. Nothing keeps a mama bear from her cub, not even surgery. It felt she was wheeling me to Russia as it took forever for us to descend 3 stories in the elevator and across never ending halls to NICU. I was feeling a bit woozie and not probably quite 100%, but I was not going miss seeing him.
We reached the NICU and she showed where to scrub down like I was going to surgery and put on hospital booties and the mask to go in. No germs are getting through those doors. We went in and I stood precariously up to peek in his little cave of plastic.
I couldn’t fathom in my mind what a baby at 28 weeks 2lb 10oz would look like. All I could imagine was a teeny tiny embryonic looking pig. I was quite surprised to see a long lanky tiny fuzzy baby. His face was completely masked with the ventilator only revealing his big deep dark blue eyes. He was the most precious thing I'd ever seen.

The next few days were a bit of a blur. I knew I would’t be able to hold him for awhile but I went down everyday to see him. When I was finally dismissed, I was a wreck. There’s nothing more painful than not being able to bring your baby home with you from the hospital. The other sad thing was; I wasn’t actually going home yet. Since we lived over a hundred miles away from Big D, we were graciously provided a hotel room and food vouchers, which would be our home away from home for 3 plus months. Thanks Medicaid, all those tax dollars at work.

After a week of being in the hospital we made the hard decision of leaving our baby in the careful hands of the NICU to go see C's dad.
We made it up that evening and were able to see his dad and show him the video we had made of his new grandson. He talked to both C and I individually in his bedroom as if it would be his last conversation with us. I don't think C and I had a chance to grasp the reality of how sick his dad was, no matter how much his mom and aunt told us on the phone that it wouldn't be much longer. Maybe it was because we had just seen him two weeks earlier and though he was rather weak, he was still strong enough to give his oldest grandson his first haircut and celebrate GB's first birthday. Since C's dad was a barber it was imperative that his dad be the first to cut it. Little did we know it would be his last.
We decided to get a motel room that night in expectation of visiting a few days and returning to our baby.
Later that night as we were just settling to bed, there was a rapid knock at the door. C yelled “Go away you’ve got the wrong room.” The person on the other end yelled that there was an emergency. C finally got up and opened the door and a note written on bright yellow paper was handed to him, all it said was your dad has died…

Part IV Time For Some Preemieland Drama

Part IV

The docs told me that I was on total lockdown in the hospital bed for the rest of my pregnancy. Don’t pass go don’t collect $200. This could mean I hold this kid in for the rest of the 40 weeks or I could go into labor tomorrow. It was just hard to tell. They kept me on the anti labor drugs in hopes things would stick.

The next day or so hubs and my parents came through bringing me things to keep me occupied like lotto scratch offs and crosswords. Early one morning hubs was gone somewhere, and I was alone. The meds were starting to kick in and I felt the ominous nausea coming on. I looked everywhere that my arms could reach for something, anything. I like to acknowledge my MacGyver like skills to motherhood. Us moms have to be creative in finding any kind of a barf bucket when nothing with in a 3 foot reach is near. This skill came in great handy as I called the nurse requesting assistance. In other words “IM GONNA BLOW, and there’s not a darn thing I can do about it!” Instinctively I grabbed the little bag that held my lotto scratch offs; it was about the size of a bag you would hold greeting cards in and filled it to the brim just as the nurse came running in with a bucket. Convenient I say. I think the nurse was as relieved as I was that I didn’t Ralph all over myself, because home girl knew she would have had to clean me up.




During this week in the hospital, hubs was torn and wished they would get right on that human cloning thing. C’s dad was terminally ill with cancer and was fading away quickly. His dad had requested that C come up and see him. Things had fairly well calmed down as far as my drama goes and there wasn’t a whole lot to do but sit around and wait. It was a Saturday evening and hubs and I were discussing when he should leave to see his dad. He was adamant on leaving that night and thought all would be well and he would be back in time to get to me by Monday. I must have had some kind of psychic powers going because I sternly suggested that he leave early in the morning. I, for some reason had issues with him leaving, as it seemed every time he was gone something happened. I know he absolutely did not want to leave me but knew he also had to attend to his father. He decided to stay. I can’t imagine having to make that kind of decision.




That next morning, I started feeling crampy. I woke hubs up and told I him I thought I was in labor. Since the nurses were monitoring my every move, they were already on top of things. No medicine would stop me now, it was time to go.



They wheeled me down to the prep room in no big hurry at first. They got me in there and started getting things going. My guess is they were planning for me to deliver naturally even at 28 weeks. Then the madness began. They weren't getting a reading on the fetal monitor. They brought in the ultra sound machine trying desperatly to get a heart beat and waiting on the anstesiologist to put in my epidural. Even though they were scrambling around like chickens with their heads cut off, it still seemed as if a whole heck of a lot was not getting done. I was so overwhelmed with what was going on that I didn't really have time to grasp the reality of what was happening. I just knew that something had to happen fast and I was thinking to myself, they just need to knock me out and skip this whole epidural business. At that moment, I could hear the doctor yelling from the operating room; "We don't have time for an Epi, get her in here now!"



They got me into the OR STAT and I have never been knocked out so fast in my life. From the time I got into the exam room to the OR was probably about 5 minutes, though it seemed like hours. During some point in this time frame, they handed hubs his scrubs to go change. He came back from the bathroom and I was already gone. He had no idea what was going on. Things had gone to relatively calm to urgent all in that 5 minutes he was in the dressing room. He tried finding a nurse to find out where I had gone and what the deal was and found no one. He sat in that little exam room by himself and the first thing he did was call his father...

Adventures in Preemie Land Part Tre

Sorry for the delay on this one, I actually worked for a change today, and had to pick up some strange man from the airport who just got back from Europe.

After getting settled in with my prison I call bed, a few arrangements had to be made, like what to do with GB during the day while C was either out of town or working. The babysitter graciously came to the house in the mornings to get him and bring him home at night before bed. Needless to say it was a very depressing lonely time.
Since I'm a bit hard headed in the fact that I believed I could still do some things that didn't require being in bed, I was soon convinced that I could take care of GB as well. I managed to convince cocky doc of this. Which sadly was probably a bad idea on my part. I just needed my GB with me and hated the guilt and helplessness that I felt.
Around 24 weeks something odd started happening. I was frequently wet in places I shouldn't be and was constantly changing my underroos. I wasn't sure what the deal was and thought it to be issues with my bladder as I was constantly making a run to the loo (the bathroom for you Yanks as I clearly am British-no?). I brought up the issue to the doc and he merely brushed it off as an issue that would have to be addressed after the pregnancy. I wish to this day I had a tape recorder of him mentioning this, because it was never documented in my records.

Every week I went in, I would still casually mention my "issues" to either the nurse or the doc. His normal excuse to not look into it further was he was afraid if he took a peek under the hood, that there maybe cause for infection. Finally on about the 27 th week. I persisted to the nurse that things were really really uncomfortable. I was at the point where drinking beverages only made things worse and therefore I drank very little. She finally brought the beat down on the doc and demanded he take a look.

To this very day I have issues with docs taking a look under the hood, because each time something chaotic happens. This time around was no exception. He took a quick peek and instantly knew I was leaking amniotic fluid. Oh Joy!

As you might guess my peeps were in the usual places. GB at the babysitter, Hubs in Big D, exactly where he was last time chaos ensued. I again took my jaunt to the hospital. Good ol doc cocky knew he was probably in a world of trouble and casually mentioned to me as I was leaving. "It's going to be ok, the amniotic fluid is constantly replenishing itself." Uh yeah maybe when you're well hydrated.

I called hubs and would you believe he answered! I think he learned his lesson last time. It's ok when the instructor gets an annoying cell phone call during class, because it usually is an emergency.
Poor hubs had some driving to do. I don't know how he did it in the time he did, but he managed to race back home (80 miles plus traffic) get GB, race back north of Big D to meet his mom halfway to deposit our child and then return back to East Texas to the hospital before I got shipped off to Big D in the helicopter. I think he made 4 round trips that day plus driving back to Big D way way late that night where I was at the hospital.
I can honestly say that the helicopter trip was not glorious at all. There was no mid flight snack, instead some head phones to drown out the constant droning noise of the blades were provided. Though I have to say the flight nurses were awesome and went out of their way to make me as comfortable as possible on a bumpy noisy helicopter.

I was not previously having any kind of contractions until we got going on the helicopter. It really is true that flying can cause pre term labor so I don't suggest doing it when your early in the 3rd trimester. The nurses on flight assured me that they have delivered a million babies before on the heli. Uhm I didn't ask if they had ever had delivered when the woman was sewed up.
When I arrived at the hospital, the first order of business was to remove the cerclauge. I have experienced hours of labor and totally did not enjoy that pain. The cerclauge removal was right up there with EXTREME pain. It literally felt like I was being ripped apart with a pair of pliers. I don’t think they numbed it well enough. Heinie cringe would be the understatement of the year on the pain scale.

I settled in for the night with anti labor drugs (magnesium something or other). I had a very restless night. I was warned about a few side effects of the meds. Like nausea and vomiting. One would think that due to those symptoms they would provide me easy access to say a barf bucket; though that would make this exciting post dull and uneventful. We can’t have that now can we?

Stay tuned as the exciting events unfold

WB's Adventures In Preemie Land Part 2

When we last left our heroes, I was in distress at the hospital trying to get a hold of a live human being to express my distress with. I finally get a hold of Hubs.

A sigh of relief set in after hubs had reassured me that GB was fine at the babysitter and thankfully she had extra supplies of formula. He was smart and had her number in his cell. That hubs is a keeper

The doc was puzzled as to what to do with me. A procedure called a Cerclauge can be done when a woman is between 10-13 weeks pregnant. It involves sewing up the cervix similar to a drawstring purse to close it up. The risks were a lot higher to sew me up at 16 weeks, due to possible injury to the baby and infection. They decided to tilt the bed where my feet where as high as they could go. I was literally standing on my head laying down. This was an attempt to relieve pressure off my cervix and hopefully draw everything up to allow them to sew me up easier. Fun times! I stayed in this position for a good 3 days.

Meanwhile my father got in touch with my mother. If you knew my mother you would know that she is quite the worrier. Probably more than the normal mother, maybe not. Lets just say when I got my braces on in the 6th grade she called the orthadontist office from work to check on me. I really think she hated not being there more than anything. Needless to say my parents literally dropped everything and drove the 300 plus miles up to the hospital.

Though the risks were pretty high, Dr Staples (yes his real name) felt pretty darn confident all would be well. He'd done gazillions of these cerclauges and the latest term he had done one was 18 weeks. The main concern is infection and preterm labor. One does not want to be dialating when sewn up. Just the thought of it still makes my hienie cringe.
I admit I was nervous as a cat in a dog pound. The doc decided that I should just have a spinal block when doing this procedure, since he was all cocky and confident. I'm the type of person that does not like to deal with stressful situations first hand, kind of a see no evil hear no evil type. In other words I really didn't like the thought of being awake during the procedure. If God forbid something do go wrong, I kind of wanted to awake to the fact instead of experiencing it first hand. Nevertheless Dr. Cocky was well.. cocky, so I agreed to the spinal block.

I can say it was probably the scariest thing I'd ever experienced up to that point in my life. During the whole procudure, which seemed like hours and hours, I lay there with my eyes closed praying and just trying to take myself somewhere else. I felt as if I was doing back flips over and over. I'm not sure what the deal with that was but that's how I felt. It was very intense. The doctor was stone silent the entire time, not a single peep. I didn't know what to think or what was going on. I kept thinking something is wrong for him to be so quiet. I guess he was really focused.

Finally after a good two hours, he finally finished up and said "Ok all went well." Whew! That's really all he had to say about that. That night during recovery was miserable. My legs were still dead as door nails even after several hours of the surgery. As if I didn't have enough things to worry about like hienie cringes, pre term labor and infection now I was worried I would be paralyzed for the rest of my life. There's nothing more uncomfortable then not being able to move at all and trying to sleep. The nurse finally gave me some pain meds and I was able to sleep. Yes I fully recovered by morning.

After a about a week in the hospital, I was able to go home under strict bed rest. Which is great fun when your husband travels for work and your family is 300 plus miles away and you have a 10 month old.

You surely didn't think that would be the end of the drama did you? Part 3 to come later.

WonderBoy's Adventures of Preemie Land

I promised you guys full disclosure of the events prior to Wonderboy's preemie birth. Grab some popcorn and pull up a chair, if your weird and read blogs standing.

Some may think I was a wee bit negligent in getting to the doctor for regular check ups early, after finding out I was pregnant with number 2. I admit I was a bit in denial after just given birth not 5 months before. Other factors also caused my delay-Hub's insurance. We had just moved down to Tx in July, the company at the time was rather small and the insurance they had was in my opinion a little shady. Needless to say upon signing up for coverage in Oct. they denied insurance on me since I was pregnant and claimed that it was a pre existing condition. Ahem I be thinking that is illegal but I'm no lawyer. Seeing that we were young and naive we said OK Mr. insurance guy. In all honesty this was probably a blessing in disguise.

Since they denied my claim and we just happened to still be on the po' side (which is where your poor but can't afford the or), we went through the beauracratic way of doing things and applied for Medicaid. When going through this process every form known to man must be filled out and getting to actually see the doctor takes weeks upon waiting for full approval.

At 16 weeks, I finally was able to secure an appointment with the doctor. That day happened to be Valentines day. If I remember correctly it was a fairly gloomy day. I was dreading the whole process, yet anticipating it at the same time. We were able to find someone to watch our little baby. I hated just dropping him off at this strange ladies house, but was reassured since she was a licensed sitter. I was so very tempted that morning to just take him with me, that's how much I hated leaving him. I also hated that hubs was out of town over a hundred miles away.

I didn't know anybody from adam in the small town we lived in. Population 1200 including dogs, cats and cows. If ever there were an emergency, I'd be screwed. I'd have no clue who to call. I had barely memorized hub's work number and met his boss maybe once.
I drove into medium sized city for my appointment. All was normal and since it was the first visit a pap was in order. Woot.
This was probably the only visit with a doctor I would get. He jacked me up on the table ready to go under the hood and take a look around. He barely "cracked the hood" wide enough to just see and exclaimed "I think your 3cm dilated!"

I flew up from the table about 5 feet. "What the he**!?" I've never seen such urgency from both doc and nurse. We went straight to the room with the ultrasound. He used the probe in every which a way direction a person can move and position an ultrasound. Inside, Outside, Sideways, Upside down, you name it he did it. You could see the gaping hole as big as a donut. Freaked out is the best I can explain my feelings. My mind is completely racing. What does this mean that I'm already dilated at 16 weeks? How can this be?

Doc's next question threw me for a loop. "Can you drive yourself to the hospital or should we get an ambulance and who do you need to call?" Uh first off, obviously I drove myself here, which was a 40 minute drive, and the hospital is 2 blocks away. I think I can make it.
Since this was a "emergency situation" who to call is a pretty big deal. Hubs did have his cell phone, but he was in a class teaching. I knew he wouldn't answer the phone much less have it on. Besides not a lot he could do at the moment. The only other person I had the faintest idea to call was Shorty his boss. I think I left a twenty minute message on his voice mail. I was freaking.

I drive myself to the hospital totally unsure of what the heck was going to happen next. What were they going to do? I had no idea this kind of thing was common- incompetent cervix, I think is the term. When you have no contractions yet your cervix dial ates. They get me checked in and settled. The only thing I can think about is Gameboy at the babysitter; and that I only left him a bottle or two, as this wasn't supposed to be a 5 hour visit.

Since I couldn't get hubs on the phone and my mother was at work over 300 miles away. I call my dad collect. Funny thing about my dad is he doesn't do well with automated phone calls. If your calling him collect, he's going to assume your a telemarketer and hang up on you. I would have loved to call my mother at work, but it's probably not kosher to call your mother collect at work. I tried 2-3 times calling dad to get him to listen to accept the charges for his dying daughter, maybe not dying but dang it, it was important. I finally dug around in my purse and found a calling card that I used when hubs was out of town. Sweet hallelujah, I finally get in touch with dad, an actual person and not an answering machine.

Somehow among all the franticness, hub's boss gets a hold of him and lets him know there's an obvious emergency going on. I can only imagine how I sounded on that voicemail and what the conversation was with C and his boss was like. Hub's manages to call the hospital and get in touch with me. I had never been so relieved to hear from him. All I said was you have to call the babysitter and tell her what's going on!
To be continued...

All He Has To Do Is Dream

The blog well has been running a little dry lately. I've literally sat here for the past couple of days with a blank canvas and nothing to paint. I non chalantly glanced over at the hubs and he knew that I was pressed for blog fodder. He told me to blog about a weird dream I've had. Instead I choose to tell you about Wonderboys supposed dreams.

Wonderboy has dreams that I assume he just makes up or wishes that he had dreamed up. His dreams usually always consist of some kind of cartoon character or his favorite T.V. show. The first thing he says to me every morning is "Guess what mom?" "I had a dream!"

Wonderboy told me about his "dream" earlier this evening, which I can only conclude is a dream he would like to dream. Here's the breakdown, were watching the kick off for Monday night football. The camera pans in on the Eagles cheerleaders in their skimpy cheerleader outfits or as Wonderboy calls it their "swimsuits."
"Mom, I had a dream that I was a football player." "I was running on the field and got a touchdown." "The cheerleaders were so happy that I won that they hugged me because they liked me and I was in love."

He worries me that one. I'm not sure what to make of a 7 year old on the high end of the Spectrum who lusts after girls like he does. He was in a major phase of getting down on one knee and proposing to the little girls in his class. It's really embarrassing when he does it in the presence of the little girls mother. Then there was the phase at 5 or 6 when he would only cut out girls in bikinis out of magazines. How he finds these bikini clad girls in the Family Circle magazine I do not know.

Hopefully for now all these fantasies are just that dreams that will only be formed in his imagination and never followed through to come true, at least not until he's 30 and he's not open and willing to share his dreams with his mother. You know cause some things even a mother really just does not need to know.