they say bad things happen in threes

today wasn't such a great day. i am not sure how many of you remember this, but it happened again. when galena got sick last time we knew it was possible that it would come back, despite modifying her diet and giving her metamucil everyday. for more than a year we were doing great, but then this week things turned again. she didn't throw up constantly this time, but she did stop eating and using the litter box. she just wasn't herself. so today we were off to the vet to find out that she was heavily constipated again which meant general anesthetic and a colon irrigation to the tune of $800. i know that sounds crazy (probably because it is) and there was much debate about whether or not we would do it this time. the thing is, i think she is going to start doing a lot better at our new house. being free to frolic outside and having more space of her own away from a tantrum throwing toddler (even though she is great with cohen) is just what she needs. so we chose to do it. i am not sure we will make the same choice if it happens again, hopefully i won't have to make that decision.

despite the stress of that, there was a bright side to the day, we went and signed the lease on our new place and got to see it again. it felt even better to me this time. i think it is going to be great for us. as promised there are pictures here. so, what do you think?

turns out it isn't an early bird after all

just thought i would check in with a quick update. no baby yet, and as was probably predictable i got cohen's sickness, so right now we are a pretty pathetic sight. my limbs feel weak, my fever has me extremely hot and then shockingly cold in the same 10 minutes and my throat is like sandpaper. the plus side is that i have been eating lots of popsicles, and cohen has shown some serious improvement so hopefully i will be next. i have also decided to ship cohen out to grandma's tomorrow night for a couple of nights, he hasn't been in three weeks and she misses him terribly (and who am i kidding, i need a break). so if you don't hear from me it is simply because i am lying on the couch, or reaching into the freezer for more supplies. if there is any news on the baby front i will let you know.

stopping and starting, then stopping again

today has been an interesting day. i woke up this morning around 4:30 with fairly strong contractions, well strong for the beginning of labour. i tried to ignore them and fall back asleep but i couldn't, it was too uncomfortable, so i came out into the living room and put some tv on the computer to pass the time. i started timing the contractions and they were coming fairly steadily, about 5 minutes apart, so i thought maybe this was it? after an hour and a half i put a heating pad on my back to help with the pain, and laid back down on the couch. i guess the heating pad was doing the trick because the pain lessened and soon the contractions were getting farther and farther apart, and so i fell back asleep. when i woke up i thought maybe things would still be happening, but all day they have been sporadic at best. we went out for a decent walk to see if that would help, so far though, nothing to report. there was talk of having cohen go to grandma's tonight in case they come back in the wee hours, but in the end we decided he should stay here because he is sick, oh so very sick.

it is the strangest thing, last night he ate well and seemed in good spirits, no sign of sick at all, but when he woke up this morning he was a droopy mess with a whooping cough and a startlingly scratchy voice to go with it (when he said "mom" he sounded like a ninety year old man who smokes 2 packs a day). he slept a lot today and when he wasn't sleeping he was leaning heavily against one of us on the couch while he moaned. earlier in the afternoon we thought he seemed warmer than your average fever and took his temperature, it was 39.3, which is cause for concern, and so we gave him some medicine. tonight as the medicine was wearing off we took it again, 39.8 (gulp). he just had a luke warmth bath (which he wasn't so crazy about) and some more motrin, hopefully it will have let up come the morning. it got us wondering, if we do have the baby in the next couple of days will it be okay for cohen to see him/her? i guess we will cross that bridge when we come to it.

for those that read the blog regularly it may seem like cohen has been sick much more than usual lately, and i think that is true. for his first year i don't even remember him being sick. after some thought on the issue i have come to the conclusion that he is picking up viruses from the playgroup we go to at the community centre. it is like an open gym for toddlers where dozens of little people run around on mats and play with every variety of toy available. it is a great social activity for cohen, which is why we go, but i am wondering now if it is worth it. we hadn't been in a few weeks (last time he got sick) and then we went last monday. oh well, i guess it is all part of being a kid.

so will tonight bring more contractions? hard to say, but i guess we will know soon enough.

we are all still under the weather over here. there has been frequent trips to the bathroom and much moaning while lying on the bed, marko and i pushed to the edge with cohen spread out in the middle. cohen is on the mend and is much better than he was 2 weeks ago, but he still isn't himself. i thought i was over it a few days ago, but it turns out i was just in between viruses. marko has it the worst right now. it is all a very sad sight to see. ahhhhh life with kids!

on the plus side, i have been having tons of braxton hicks contractions in the last two weeks, with more than a few actual contractions where my belly tightened and i had to sit down. i never had any before hand with cohen at all, so it is nice to think that my body is getting ready, especially early on. i also went to the doctor today and she said that the baby has made a huge drop and is fully engaged now. i would have put an exclamation point on the end of that sentence, but i am trying to not get my hopes up. to be honest since finishing work i have had a lot more energy (despite being sick) and don't feel in any hurry to get the show on the road, i haven't even pulled out the baby clothes yet. i guess i should do that this weekend.

i wanted to talk more about silvija's visit and show you some of the great things she knit, but it will have to wait, the couch is calling me and it is an offer i can't refuse.

happy birthday! and other such things

there are two excellent reasons to celebrate today, the first is that it is my mom, jessie's, birthday. that is her up there in the class picture, she is second row from the bottom third from the left. i love these old class pictures of hers that i have. silvija was quick to point out that there are 8 boys and 21 girls in the photo, those are some good odds for the boys. this picture was taken 54 years ago and she still looks just as cute today. so cheers to you on another birthday, i hope you have a great year!

the other reason to celebrate is that today is my second to last day at work or better put, tomorrow is my last day. everyone keeps asking me if i feel excited, but i don't think excited is the word. relieved is closer to the truth, relieved to be taking a little bit off my plate (well a lot actually) and to finally get a chance to sleep in past seven and relax more. things have seemed so hectic lately. as for the spending more time with cohen part, well i guess that would fall under excited, i can't wait! still it will be strange to leave all my co-workers behind and begin my life as a full-time mom, we'll see how it goes.

as for things not worth celebrating today (cause the good always comes with bad), cohen has been quite sick since last friday night and as a result i have had very little sleep and am now starting to feel sick myself. we have been pretty lucky so far with him and sickness, but this one has really knocked him off his feet. i joked the other day that it was the first time i think i have ever seen him without energy, and it is true. lying around on the couch all day whining, sipping his juice, and refusing to eat, he is a ball of sadness. tonight he ate dinner for the first time in 5 days, let's hope he is on the mend.

the worst of times

it looks like i have may have spoken too soon. it started on tuesday night when he threw up his dinner all over the place and then went on to have a 39 degree fever. it didn't compute with me at first, we were thinking flu maybe? it was on wednesday morning when the fever was still there and his eyes were as droopy as his limbs that i realized, it was the MMR shot. the statistics are there, a certain percentage of kids (around 20%) will see a fever reaction 7-10 days after the shot. marko stayed home with him for the day and they relaxed, we hoped that would be enough.

thursday morning he still wasn't himself though and so i elected to stay home. i am glad i did, his temperature was up and down all day, he wasn't really interested in food, slept 3.5 hours for his morning nap and then had two bouts of diarrhea. he was a grouchy melting down mess all day, but by the evening he seemed to have come back around and was acting himself. we thought we were in the clear.

this morning we woke up once again to a fever only this time it was accompanied by the rash you can see here. it is another side effect, this time prevalent in around 5% of kids who get immunized. they show signs of the illness itself. so cohen has little red measles like bumps all over his face, chest, and back and only this evening have they spread to his legs. there is a patch on his forehead where he keeps scratching and so it is raw. i feel so bad for the little pooper, he just isn't acting himself, so many fits and tears and so much frustration (from both of us).

i hope it passes soon and that all is ok in the end. i'm sure it will be. right?

eleven months

cohen is sick, i was going to say sicker than a dog, but once again i have to ask, what does that mean? so let's just say sick, liquid goo covered face, limbs limp, whiney sick. i guess it started sometime last night and has slowly progressed.

this is his first cold, and the truth is that cohen is quite cute when he is sick. so clingy and non-active. he cuddles into me, clutching tighter and tighter until i start to loose circulation. he rolls around the bed with his eyes half open moaning a song to himself. sure it isn't pretty, and it certainly isn't his usual self, but it is nice to be so needed. for him to be so docile. i say this today, i am sure by tomorrow (after what will probably be a sleepless night) the story will read different.



so today is eleven month day. unfortunately there were no great adventures to report back on, mostly just a lot of moaning and sleeping. i did make a strawberry/blueberry shortcake though, in preparation for the one year cake. i figure if we practice now by the time june 16th rolls around he will be ready to eat the whole cake himself. for today though, he settled for one piece, whipped cream and all.


happy month day to you!

good night, sleep tight and...

today went so much better than expected. we were in and out at the hospital. they were incredibly busy and there was some concern by the nurse to have cohen exposed to all the germs for yet another day so she called the pediatrician right away. he came and spoke to us in the waiting area so no need for a room. it turns out cohen does have an infection but a very minor one. still we were sent home with a prescription for antibiotics and will be getting a call as to when to come in for the ultrasound. if that turns out ok then it will be clear sailing. everyone expects that it will. best of all cohen has been fever free since friday and the fussing has disappeared.

tomorrow marko's brother milan is here for a visit. he lives in new york and will be meeting cohen for the first time so we are all getting excited about his visit. hopefully i will get out the camera a little more this week so that i can get some new stuff to share on flickr. this photo was taken tonight just before bed, as you can see he wasn't exactly sleepy. he is still chatting to himself in the crib as we speak. i wonder what it is he talks about in there? it won't be long now before i know the answer to that and many of the other mysteries that are cohen. for now i will listen to the babble.

we be illin'

sometimes when it rains it pours, thankfully though most times it just trickles. this week though i needed a very large umbrella and even then the rain leaked through.

on friday cohen still had the fever and i hadn't heard back from my doctor with the lab results so i phoned and sure enough the indication was a urinary tract infection. i naively thought this would mean a course of antibiotics orally and perhaps a follow up. if he was a year older i would have been right but given his age it meant a trip to the emergency at children's hospital. to be fair it isn't quite as dramatic as that, it wasn't an "oh my god" emergency. you see, there is a pediatric call group that works out of the hospital and it was one of them that we needed to see. i thought, again wrongly, that having someone expecting us and only using the er as a vessel to communicate with that party would mean that i wouldn't have to wait for hours. yesterday i got to the hospital at 12:30. we finally went home at 7:30. it wasn't such a great day.

the bottom line is that we don't know for sure yet if he does or doesn't have the infection. we drew blood for testing and inserted a catheter (not so much fun for cohen) to get a clean sample (as the previously tested sample could have been contaminated) and then we began a course of antibiotics intravenously (just in case, as it is important to start aggressive treatment as soon as possible). it took five attempts, two nurses and nearly fifteen minutes of screaming from cohen to get the iv in. i had to leave the room after about three. you may think you are tough but that, well that was a true test of strength and i just didn't have it in me.

then we were told to come back today and that it would be quicker, that there would be test results and we would know the further course of action and that likely he would have more antibiotics. so we went and again we waited, nearly four hours, in the waiting room before being taken in to a room and told that the lab wasn't back, his iv had fallen out (they send us home with it at night so that it could be reused) but that he could take some medicine orally that would produce the same results (ummm what!?!? he suffered through all that for NO REASON?) and that we have to come back and do it all tomorrow. when i asked why it took so long again today the nurse sheepishly replied that there was a "mixup" with our chart but that tomorrow would be better. i wish i could get that in writing. in the end todays total time tally was five hours.

so how has cohen been through all of this? so much better than i would have ever imagined possible. the nurses were all calling him a flirt, which is a tall order when they are poking and prodding him non-stop. and despite having to sit and do almost nothing for hours at a time he hasn't complained or thrown a fit once. he doesn't seem sick and if i didn't know he had been having a fever i would swear there was a mistake. i know it sounds like i am complaining a lot but i don't mean to. i wish we didn't have to endure the frustration but i never forget how lucky we are to have him, all of him, even his sickness.

so tomorrow we will find out more and if it is a uti then we will give a third course of medicine and then we will schedule an ultrasound to make sure everything is in good working order with cohen's insides. we will also need to follow up with the pediatrician (thankfully in his office) a few times over the next month to make sure it isn't coming back. hopefully, like galena, this was a one time thing and next week it will be a piece of our past.

this hasn't been such a great start to the year. i hope that means the rest of it is going to be perfect, although as long as i have my family then how could it be anything but?