What a day!

We had another awesome day yesterday...

I woke up at 8 am and all three kids were in the baby's crib. Don't ask. They weren't pinching him or laying on him, and it was cute enough. Though I did tell them that they PROBABLY shouldn't get into the crib with the baby anymore. And I didn't take a picture because I've found that encourages them to further misbehave...yeah, that's what does it, the photographic evidence of their prior bad acts.

After breakfast I did some work on the computer while the big kids played "Customer" out Elizabeth's bedroom window and the baby napped.
"Customer" works like this. Elizabeth stands inside her room and opens the window. She has no screen. It's lovely.
Dylan goes out onto the front deck and "stands in line" at the open window like a customer. Then he orders chicken nuggets and coffee. She hands him a toy from her room. He says thank you, she says have a nice day. Then they switch places.
It's quite funny.

That went on for a good hour. Ah to be so young and so easily entertained!

It's been cold here lately, high 40s during the day, so it took about an hour to find all the winter accoutrements for the kids' outfits and another half hour to find matching socks for everyone. Curse you runaway socks! Everyone is getting socks for Christmas, all the same size and all white. Then ALL the socks will match!

Finally we got into the car and headed to Elizabeth's school, late, as usual.
The boys fell asleep on the way so I ran inside without them to sign Elizabeth into class. It was like two minutes. They were fine. Don't panic.

I had a lunch "date" with some gals from my old job and some of their kids at the very exclusive and fancy McDonalds Playland. Oh yeah. I roll like that.

By the time we got there, Dylan had sweated so much sleeping in his winter coat that his hair was all wet and plastered to his head. Very nice look. He ate about 1.5 chicken nuggets, leaving the other 2.5 to be nibbled up by my pregnant friend Mandi. Preggo girls do NOT waste food.

We were at the playland for about an hour and a half burning off the pound of Hershey Kisses that Dylan stole from the candy bowl that morning running around and playing.
Then the boys and I were off to WalMart where I shopped like a lightning bolt, then waited in an interminable line. Sigh.
I had to beg the cashier lady to let me get my WIC items without my WIC folder. Anyone who has ever been on WIC knows what I mean. They are militant about that folder! Even though I had my ID and my WIC checks with MY name on them, she was like, "I'm not supposed to do this, I have to verify your signature."

I'm like DUDE, it's ME! How would I find WIC checks with my exact name on them and then steal them? It's improbable at best.

What I actually said was "Please please I need that milk and eggs! Oh please! I'll never tell!"

And she saw my pathetic begging and took pity.

After that I called my sister in law to check on my niece who had her tonsils out that morning. She was doing fine, eating yogurt.
I also texted my brother in law who had his OWN tonsils out that same morning. More on that later.

Then we went to have snack with Elizabeth's class. Here's where it gets, eh, interesting.

I'm standing there holding the baby while Dylan runs around and plays with the kids, totally normal. Then ONE of the kids in her class, the bad one who shall not be named, had some trouble making good choices right in front of my eyes.

First he laid on a kid and kicked him in the armpit.
I said "Hey 'Bad Kid' I don't think he likes that, you need to get off of him" but I WANTED to say "What the hell is the matter with you!??"

Elizabeth's little friend told me "He's really really bad. Don't talk to him. Just ignore him. He's a bad kid. You shouldn't talk to him."
I thought it was sweet that she was trying to protect me from the little bastard. Actually, I think his parents ARE married. But that's neither here nor there.

After snack was finished, The Bad Kid walked up to Elizabeth and just pushed her down. For no reason. She spilled her cup of water all over and started to cry.
So I grabbed the kid by the shirt and tossed him out the window.

No.

I said. "Hey BAD KID! That is NOT NICE! She doesn't like to be pushed down."
And in response, he looked straight at me and arm barred another little girl right behind him. Just slammed his arm right into her throat.

Then the teacher grabbed him up by the shirt and threw him out the window.

No.

But she did grab him and make him sit in her lap while she held him.
What a little freak!

There's a parents meeting tonight and I think I'm going to have to say something about this kid. I mean, how much out of control violent behavior do all the other kids have to endure before someone gets this kid out of this class? Clearly he doesn't function well in the school environment.

I feel bad for his parents, but dang, this kid is a nuisance, a distraction and frankly a danger to the other children. I'm just not sure that there's much the school can do about it.
Do schools HAVE to let violent little bastards kids who have trouble making good choices stay in class?

I don't know.

So, after that we left and my sister in law called me to tell me that her brother (who I previously mentioned had just gotten his tonsils out) was not waking up from his anesthesia and was in the ICU at the hospital. Holy crap!

I called Bob and told him to go visit his brother.
He did and reported back that yes, he was still asleep (about five hours post surgery) but the doctors said that sometimes people with sleep apnea sleep for-freaking-ever after surgery. Hmm. Interesting fact.

After Bob got home I told him about the Bad Kid pushing Elizabeth down. He got a very serious look on his face and said "I'm gonna kick that kid!"
Instead of child abuse though, we agreed that we would have to speak to the teachers about this. I know they're exasperated with this kid too, so...it's not like they aren't aware.

Then I made dinner, a lovely recipe for Tomato-Apple Chicken which is delicious. Bob opened the pan and said "Are those apples?"
"Yes."
"Apples and chicken?"
"Oh SORRY! I'll just make frozen burritos and pizza from now on!" I said, totally NOT overreacting!

"I just won't eat the apples."
Then I pouted for about an hour. It was hard work.
Then I did my football picks (AMY!) then we all got ready for bed.

We got updates from my brother in law's wife from time to time last night, basically that he was still sleeping but doing fine. This morning at 7:30 he called here himself to say that he had finally woken up at 9 pm last night, about 10 hours after surgery, and was being discharged this morning. Phew!

He said he was feeling good, but yikes! That was a bit scary for us!
Hopefully today will be less exciting!

Buh Bye Baby Stuff

There are several things going on at the Evans Homestead presently...the most apparent of which is something I like to call The Great Baby Stuff Purge!
Since we're not having another baby, we can now safely dispose of, donate, lend out and hand down ALL the baby clothes, gear and accessories.
Thankfully, fate and fortune have aligned and there are no less than five pregnant ladies who are currently in the circle of trust.
A few of these ladies don't really need the donations, and are so far away as to make it not feasible, but they are still in the circle and shall be acknowledged! Shout out to AM and Mer!

Locally we have three four! available drop off points for baby stuff...a friend of mine, a mom from Elizabeth's class (oh wait, two moms!) and our possible future SIL. Sigh.
I'm also a big huge fan of bagging up clothes and donating them to Salvation Army or Big Brothers Big Sisters (which is huge up here) and letting them figure out what to do with them.
I'd estimate that I donate 6 bags (giant trash bags) full of clothes every year. We also GET a lot of hand-me-downs. I also donate shoes and silly toys we hate or are far too loud and annoying...etc. etc. Nice tax write-off, not that I need it.

Currently in our front room are two huge gift bags full of boy baby clothes, a baby bouncer seat, a swing, a bassinet and several assorted huge baby toys for my brother in law's impending infant. Yes! We FINALLY moved Ben out of the bassinet, which he outgrew oh, two months ago. Whoops!

Also ready to be lent out is a very nice port-a-crib which is slated to go to my friend Mandi after she moves into her new house.

This is very sad to me, since giving away my baby stuff is like saying all over again NO MORE BABIES. However, all these new babies coming into the world who I can enjoy and play with and snuggle and then go home without them, I like that too.

Which leads me to...I hate these celeb-moms who have a baby and then two months later are all skinny and flab free. F-off! Jessica Alba! I'm talking to you!
I wasn't model thin before kids, nor was I perfect in EVERY way, but still. My body is a hot mess now after three pregnancies in five years. A. Hot. Mess.

This morning I yawned in front of a full length mirror...never a good look even when you are Angelina Jolie. Anyway, my shirt crept up as I stretched, revealing the sad affair that is my tummy.
Egad!
I better get a piggy bank and start saving now for my plastic surgery...seriously. That tummy is totally not acceptable.
I don't want to look 15 again (maybe I do) and there's no way I ever could...too many bones to break to put me back together that tight ever again. But crap. Could I not look like I was just run over repeatedly with a meat tenderizer? That would rock.

Ben is 5.5 months old and it's time for me to seriously get back to working out, for reals. For REALLY REALS! Finally get this 20 pounds OFF of me! Then maybe try for 10 more.
Then when I finally DO hit the lottery/win at the casino/hit oil in my yard and have my fortune amassed I'll have that much less to do in the way of plastic surgery and I can spend my dollaz on bling.

Dylan's Tonsils Are Gone

Isn't he cute in his little surgery outfit?
The ENT told me after the operation that Dylan would likely see a great deal of benefit afterwards because not only were his tonsils so large they were nearly closing off his throat, his adenoid tissue had grown over his nasal septum - virtually occluding his airway there as well. Basically, the kid's lymphatic tissues were conspiring to suffocate him. Geez!

Ben laughs, but he doesn't know, he's probably next in line. I should pre-book his operation now!

Time flies when you're totally swamped with crap to do

Sigh...
Vacation's over folks!
We came home to Arizona on the 11th. The trip went VERY well and took about 9 hours give or take. The only real snafu was just before the AZ border when Ben decided that HE MUST EAT NOW NOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And forced an unplanned pit-stop in hotter than the Devil's balls lovely Blythe, Calif.
There was gas to be pumped (at $4.47 per gallon, for REGULAR! ugh) and then Ben ate his lunch. Then I moved the car to block off the women's restroom door so I could run in and pee real quick. That went incident free...I am NEVER traveling with three kids alone again...at least not without adult diapers and the feeling of freedom to actually use them. Just for No. 1s. I don't allow anyone to go No. 2 while we are driving. It's just a law.
After a brief chicken nugget stopover at the Blythe Mickey Ds we were back on the road to Arizona. Ten minutes later we had crossed the Colorado River and were back in the land of cheap gas, evidenced by the fact that regular gas was a still ridiculous mere $3.87 at the Love's in AZ. Gah!
Damn money wasting baby!

The rest of the trip was A-OK fine. The kids LOVED driving the 202 Loop through Tempe and Mesa because it's right in the flight path for Sky Harbor, so every two seconds there's a jumbo jet right above your head. Pretty nifty.

Ben, as per his contractual agreement with my mother, began getting fussy once we crossed into our county and really kicked things up a notch at around Heber-Overgaard...aka about 40 minutes from home. NO WAY am I pulling over 40 minutes from home dude!
Oh, I forgot...my total mileage for the whole trip...everything between pulling out of the driveway and pulling back in...was just over 2,600 miles. All that driving in a month! Wow.
Also, all that incident-free driving! No crashes, no dents, no nothing...until...
About 45 miles from home we were following a work truck and I'll be damned if that dang truck didn't somehow kick up a cinder that landed on my windshield with a "CHINK!!!" that was the unmistakable sound of doooooooom when you have a $250 deductible.
Gah!
Soooo, yeah, I was pretty freaking pissed that I drove ALL THAT WAY and it wasn't until Forest Lakes that my car was damaged. There's a lovely cross shaped ding in my windshield now right behind the rear view mirror. THANKS WORK TRUCK!!!!!!

We got home fine though, and though Bob swore he had cleaned the day before, I couldn't see it.
So I started cleaning immediately. After nine hours of driving. Yeah, I'm a bit insane.
No wait...I'm not insane. There were plates and silverware out on my front deck and soda cans strewn about the house from what I can only imagine was Tropical Storm Dr. Thunder.
No, I'm not insane.
Though the floor was vacuumed, but I later found out that he had our niece vacuum soooo....
Eh.

PS this is my 11 year old niece who is now TALLER THAN ME. Fuck the world. That's just rough.

Anyway...The next day (Tuesday) I discovered in the huge pile of mail (thanks Bob) the letter from the ENT scheduling Dylan's tonsillectomy FOR THURSDAY! Do the math, that was two days away!
Yipes!
So I had to whip up an action plan real quick for that. What we ended up doing was sending Elizabeth to a slumber party at her Aunt Amy's on Wednesday night and the boys and I woke up at 0'DarkThirty on Thursday morning to head to the Surgical Center and get the proceeeeeedure.
All went well, Dylan did better (waaaay better) than Elizabeth with the anesthesia. He woke up like easy like Sunday morning, where she woke up like midnight on Halloween and the ghosts are breaking into the house...if you catch my drift.
Though the anesthesiologist did mention that Dylan has a heart murmur...here we go again. So we have to keep an eye on that, even though it's probably an age-related flow murmur, blah blah blah....We've never heard about it before, so it's likely not a major problem and he'll probably grow out of it, literally.

Now we're in day five Post Surgery and he's doing well...except for at night when he wakes up crying out and tries to get in bed with us to cry in our faces. No thanks. After the night his crying woke up the baby, and sent Bob cursing to sleep on the couch (he wakes up at 5:30 am) we've been trying to keep Dylan in his own bed. It worked last night so, yay!?!?

In between the tonsillectomy and yesterday was just cleaning, cleaning, cleaning...putting away our clothes, more cleaning, laundry, laundry, cleaning and more cleaning.
I made an apple pie from scratch. MORE cleaning.

Yesterday evening was the orientation for Elizabeth's preschool! Yes, my dear angel (ahem) is going to start preschool next Tuesday. I was surprised to learn that it was a four-day a week program, so she'll go Monday through Thursday from noon to 3ish. Not bad. Except that the school is 15 minutes away from home and I have to drive her, so, it's gonna be interesting to see which days I end up spending the whole three hours in town and which days I go back home for two hours and turn around and come back...
Thank GOODNESS that gas prices are FINALLY starting to really drift downward here!
When I left town in July, gas at the cheapest station was $4.07 for regular. Blech. Now at that SAME station it was $3.53 on my way into town last night at 5 pm and dropped to $3.47 on my way OUT of town at around 8 pm! Yay!
So we've gone down 60 cents in a little over a month. Keep going!!!! I'll be happy when it gets back to $1.65 per gallon (is that ever happening??)

Anyway...today and tomorrow we're doing a whole lot of nothing. I'm making spaghetti sauce, cleaning and cleaning some more. The kids will be right behind me making new and exciting messes for me to clean I'm sure.
Then Thursday is Elizabeth's dental checkup (to which the WHOLE crew will be going, fun!) and then Friday is Dylan's post-op appointment, which will take me a half hour to get to and get us all inside, then another half hour to get back home, all for an approximately two-minute long appointment. Sigh. House call?

I wonder if they are the source of all his powers of chaos?

Dylan has been informed that he will have to lose some weight.

Approximately 20 grams of weight.

Yes, that's right.
Dylan will be getting his tonsils out next month!

Since Elizabeth has already undergone this procedure, I'm fairly well versed in what it all will technically entail. But Elizabeth is Elizabeth and Dylan is the Tasmanian Devil in disguise.

I love him, he's my oldest son and still my sweetboy but God help me the kid has energy like you wouldn't believe, a horrible temper and a scream that can scratch diamonds.
Though he is a little maniac, he's also eager to please and be loved so he's FAIRLY cooperative, but we'll see how the whole "let's put this needle in your arm, make you go nigh-night and take out 20 grams of lymphatic tissue from inside your head little boy" thing goes.
Bwah ha ha!

Of course, they don't say THAT to the kid...they talk up the ice cream buffets he'll be having and the popsicles! My lord the popsicles!
But I know that with the popsicles and ice cream buffet comes pain and pain and more pain. And Tylenol with Codeine! And smelly breath!

When Elizabeth got her surgery she was just days from turning 4 years old. Dylan will be just over 2.5 years old and thus significantly less able to comprehend what is going on.
I think this time around there will be less explaining to him beforehand what's going to happen and a whole lot more babying him in the aftermath. And more TyCo. And more Kamikazes, for mommy.

Three is the Magic Number

Going into Ben's birth, we knew that we would not be having any more babies.
Bob and I had decided that the best thing would be for me to get the tubal ligation while I was already in surgery since it would add no recovery time and no distinguishable pain to the procedure.
Knowing that number three would be my last baby made this pregnancy all that much more poignant...at first.
By the time I was 36, 37 and 38 weeks pregnant I was saying to myself (and others) "Thank goodness I'm not doing THIS again!"
It wasn't that I had lots of problems or complications, or even pain. It was just the discomfort, the getting huge, the having to wear funny pants.
Ugh.
I was glad to be done, and done for good.

In the morning before the surgery, my OB asked us if we were SURELY sure we wanted the tubal. We were.

As I was wheeled into the room, they asked again. I was sure.

When Ben was born and I saw his precious angel face for the first time, my OB asked me again if I was certain he would be my last baby. And though Benjamin was definitely the most perfect baby that *I* had ever seen, I was still sure he would be the last for me.


As it turns out, the decision wasn't ever mine to make.

When my OB started the surgery, so soon after Ben's birth that he was still in the operating room, he almost immediately said to Bob and I.

"I think you've made a smart decision to do this."

He told Bob to peek over the surgical drapes, which he very reluctantly did.

"Do you see this right here," my OB said, as he unbeknownst to me pointed out the bottom portion of my completely exposed uterus. "This should be about this thick."
He motioned the thickness of about an inch and a half to Bob.
"Your wife's uterus is only *this* thick," he indicated about a third of an inch. "I would have had to advise you not to have any more babies after this one. So this is good that you're doing this."

That somehow lifted some of the sadness I had been feeling about choosing to not have any more babies.
I felt sad that I was determining that I would stop when so many women were wishing that they could decide to have just ONE baby of their own.
I wasn't hoping for 18 kids or anything, or even six, or maybe not even more than the three I had, but making the choice to take the choice away was weighing heavily on me.
Now that I knew that somehow the choice that we had made was totally in line with God's plan for us, it took away a lot of those feelings and thoughts.
No longer did I feel like I was turning away from what might be the path I was intended to take. I felt like I was finally turning down that path -- with my three, just the three, perfect babies.
That's a good feeling.

Last Day as a Preggo

Tomorrow I give birth to the final member of The Triad.
Was The Triad good or evil on "Charmed"?**
I can't remember...eh, either way. Everyone switched back and forth on that show so much...
Anyway, can you see how my brain is working lately, as in to say, not working at all.

My mom is here and today for my ultimate Mother's Day present she kidnapped not only my children but also my husband and made them go shopping! Ha!
I am supposed to be resting, packing my bag for the hospital and making guacamole for their return home. Yes, I make great guac.

Instead, I caught up on my e-mails, closed out my craft shop for my new mother hiatus and read celebrity gossip online.
In that order.

As for the impending birth, I am nervous. Nervous both because egad ANOTHER life I'm responsible for is joining the world AND doing so via a giant gaping hole in my belly.
Surgery freaks me out. I know it will be fine and I never have to do this again, but it still freaks me out. I will have to force myself to sleep tonight. I had MAD trouble sleeping last night and ended up dreaming about being married to Adam Sandler. Oy vey. Niiiightmare!

Where was I going with this?
Oh, I have no idea.


I'll have someone snap a final preggo pic and post it tonight for the most official "before" pic possible. You will not get a picture of me at 5 am heading into the hospital. That's just not going to happen. What little pride and dignity I have left won't allow that to happen.
The lighting is not great, but here is the last pic!

And then tomorrow evening, the baby update will be up! Wow! Tomorrow!!!!!!!!!
Yipes.

I better go clean something, just for good measure.


**You know me, I can't live not knowing something. Google reveals The Triad are evil demons.

Decisions decisions...

Next week when I go in for my OB appt. I will be 33 weeks preggotastic!
I will be scheduling my C-section, probably for my 38th week, giving me RIGHT NOW less than six weeks to get ready for baby.
Anyone want to come over and help me sort baby clothes? Fold diapers? Beat children Feed children?

I have SOOO MUCH left to do.
The aforementioned clothes sorting and folding. I still don't have a dresser for the baby's clothes, which is sort of OK, since I have no place to put one ANYWAY! Argh.
I do have plastic drawers, which will have to suffice.

The bassinet is already set up in my room. I do have to do some rearrangement of things. All my craft supplies (yarn and fabric and such) are all over the place on MY side of the room. I have to relocate ALL that into my closet and make room for baby's things and clear a spot right next to the bed for the bassinet to live.
Right now one of Elizabeth's baby Cabbage Patch dolls is sleeping in there. It was actually my brothers Cabbage Patch doll when he was a kid. Yes. MY brother had Cabbage Patch Kids. Two in fact.

I still have a lot of sewing to do for the baby. So maybe I'll focus on relocating the yarn stuff first. I have waaay too much yarn. Seriously. Too much. My mom is sending me more wool yarn that she found at her parents house in NJ too, so I'll get even more. AWESOME. I'm addicted.

Last night I made some of those easy cut and tie fleece blankets for the baby while I rewatched the Gauntlet III reunion. Those people are mean and like to curse!
This afternoon I'll be sewing diapers and diaper cover pants while Dylan naps. Fun! Actually, it is fun for me. Isn't that sick?!?!

Oh right, but that's not really the point...
Der! Preggo brain!

Next week when I schedule my C-section they are going to ask me whether or not I want to schedule a tubal ligation for the same time. Meaning they birth the baby and before they stitch me up, they take away my reproductive abilities. :( Sad.

Bob votes yes. I'm undecided. I'm still not sure how much weight Bob's vote has. I mean, yes it matters, of course. But you know, my tubing, my choice. Right?

Right NOW I don't want to have a fourth kid, but who knows about two or three years from now? But with two crazy boys...
And I'm ALREADY having surgery so I might as well...rather than have to go in for more surgery later if I decide to get it done later.

I just don't know. I think three kids is enough, but what if I'm wrong?

Whatever I decide, I have to make the choice next week.

The more I think about this....

....the more mad I get!!

I just got off the phone with the ENTs office because they needed a good talking to...

Rewind...

Yesterday afternoon it occurred to me that we had not been given any prescriptions. No antibiotics, no pain medication...nothing.
Our discharge paperwork says we should give Elizabeth alternating doses of Motrin and Tylenol every two hours (pretty standard kid dosing for high fevers). I figured, they must have filled her IV with antibiotics during the surgery so she doesn't need any now.
You know how sometimes you can get a shot of crazy potent antibiotics and save yourself the 10 days of nasty medicine...

Anyway. Not satisfied with my own explanation, I called the surgery department at the hospital to have the nurse look in Elizabeth's chart and tell me if they did or did not give her antibiotics.
They did NOT.
Then the nurse (who was otherwise wonderful post-op) told me that she didn't think the doctor regularly prescribed antibiotics to his patients post-op and that he definitely did NOT prescribe narcotic pain relief to children. But, she also said that I should call HIS office to make sure since the prescriptions would have been called in from there ahead of the surgery.

Of course, I did that.
The gal at the ENTs office said that YES they HAD called in prescriptionSSSS for Elizabeth the day before her surgery. I said thanks and asked Bob to pick them up for us.
He came home with a GIANT bottle of amoxicillan and another even bigger bottle of Tylenol WITH CODEINE <=== THIS IS A NARCOTIC PAINKILLER PRESCRIBED TO MY CHILD! That nurse was totally full of shit.

I was miffed at first, then ruffled, progressing to annoyed, angered and finally downright spitting mad!
I called up the ENTs office again this morning and explained the situation to them. How I thought it was potentially dangerous for the post-surgical nurse to discharge patients with incomplete prescription information AND to later tell patients that antibiotic prescriptions following tonsillectomy are not routine. Uh, that is just stupid.
If I was less informed about medicine and illness, I may have just signed off on that nurse's explanation and NEVER GOTTEN MY CHILD ON ANTIBIOTICS FOLLOWING SURGERY!!

That is so, so very dangerous. Especially when INFECTION is like the No. 1 post-operative complication associated with this type of surgery. Hello! The wounds are inside your mouth! The dirtiest place on Earth!

Anyway, I believe I adequately conveyed my dismay to the gals at the ENTs office who said they would be getting in touch with the surgical staff at the hospital to let them know that YES antibiotics are prescribed following ENT surgery (ya dumb hos) <= My addition.
I made a point to name names also and told them exactly which nurse gave us completely incorrect and dangerous information. Sorry broad. Maybe you should think before you talk??

I feel very bad for those parents who also had their kids in for surgery that morning, at least four other kids, who may NOT have been as proactive as I was and made sure that they knew EXACTLY what was going on post-operatively.

The surgery staff is supposed to call today to check in on her progress and you can be damn sure that I will give them a good stern talking to as well.
I'm no shrinking wallflower by any means and I certainly won't back down when it comes to my kids' health and wellbeing.

I'm also planning to inform our regular pediatrician about his since his office proffered the referral in the first place. Dr. B is awesome, a great advocate for kids and parents and I know he would be very upset to know that pediatric surgery patients are being discharged from surgery with inadequate post-op instructions.

I should mention that Dr. B took care of Dylan during his RSV hospitalization (which resulted in us being transferred because of the stupid uninformed staff at our local hospital). When he found out what had transpired to cause the staff to call for our transfer to the pediatric hospital he was INCENSED and held a meeting with the staff to correct the mistake. He then changed his policy to admitting pediatric RSV patients straight into the ICU where the nurses are less weenie-rific.

Good lord, even after getting all this out, I am still SO STEAMING MAD. Like I want to go slap a ho mad. Grr.

It's Over!

It's done! We're home! She's fine!
Pics to follow!

Pre-surgery

Still pre-surgery, but POST-drugs...
Drugs are bad...mmmkay...


There are no pics of her in recovery. Recovery was rough. Very rough.

Post surgery in the post-op room

Talking to her publicist/dad.

This is post pukeage.
All dressed, ready to go, munching on sherbet.
Warily accepting a wagon ride to the parking lot.
In the car on the way home! Yay!
She's just chilling on the couch now, accepting phone calls from her biggest fans.

The tonsils come out...TOMORROW!

(I hope you channeled Annie for that post title if not, go give it another shot)

Tonight we pack and prepare.
Tomorrow we rise early and head to the hospital for Elizabeth's surgery. Whoo ha.
I'm nervous, of course.
She doesn't really know yet.
We keep telling her she's going to see the doctors and stuff, but she's not getting it. She LOVES her regular pediatrician. I don't really know if she understands that she's not going to see Dr. B, she's going to the big girl serious hospital with different docs in funny clothes.

We are set to check in at 7 am, with surgery scheduled for 9:15 am now. Apparently a kid even YOUNGER than Elizabeth is having surgery as well and they put the little ones first. Probably so they have a longer time to monitor them post-surgery, or something.
Anyway. Surgery starts at 9:15 am and it's set to take one hour with 2-3 hours of post-op observation following. If all goes well we could potentially check out as early as 12:30-ish or as late as whenever the heck they feel like letting us go.
Of course, I'll be prepared for either option!
This will give me a great opportunity to use the backpack Elizabeth got for Christmas. It's huge.
Send us good thoughts and prayers and wishes and messages in bottles.
Also, send some of those good thoughts to poor deluded Bob, who will be taking charge of young Mr. Dylan for the day...
Bwah ha ha ha.
Sucka.

ENT Visit, UPDATE!

This morning was Elizabeth's consult with the specialist. She was psyched to meet yet ANOTHER new doctor! She's a crazy one.
Bob stayed home with Dylan, THANK GOD! One less thing to worry about.

OK, the visit...
The whole exam took about 2 minutes because as soon as he looked into her throat he said, "Oh yeah, those are very big."
In fact, the ENT said that when Elizabeth sticks out her tongue, the tonsils come together so much that they virtually occlude her throat entirely.
So it's a surgery for us.

They are going to set up the time at the hospital (it will be soon) and let us know when to show up.
It's still 50/50 whether she'll have to stay overnight or not. Either way is fine with me.
He said her symptoms and her large tonsils are "classic" sleep apnea.
In the meantime, her breathing at night is terrible. She snorts and snarfles. She wakes up in the middle of the night. This TOTALLY explains all her bad dreams!
Hopefully all that will be over once the surgery is done. At least, that's the idea.

And, just for contrast, I peeped Dylan's tonsils the other day...
Huge.
This may be a family trait! Sigh.