I'm tired darn it!

My mom is back on this kick that I have to get up at 5:30am before she & my dad leave for work. UGH! She forgets a)I'm a night owl and b)I have insomnia! Again, UGH!

So today I got up at 5:30am and folded some laundry and then played on facebook for a bit. I have a very unhealthy obsession with Frontierville going on. Then I took a nap. now I'm almost feeling human.

Yesterday was another day of general chaos because of this new medical issue Princess Bear (PB) has going on. PB & I had to be at my sisters early (ok 9:15 but in the summer that's early for us!) to watch my nephews. That is an interesting adventure under the best of circumstances. I would not saying yesterday was the best of circumstances! lol Everyone was alive & well when I left & the kids had fun so I guess that's the important part right?

While I was at my sisters I called PB's Dr's office since I had some questions after having some time to absorb the Dr's news. I also needed to talk to the Dr since PB's endocrinologist has left the Children's hospital in St. Louis. I asked the nurse what the TgAb number for PB was. 1034 now to give you some perspective the normal range is 0-20. My daughter is at 1034! My mom was like no they had to have read that wrong call back. I called back- check this (honestly its times like this that I think my life is a secretly taped episode of Punk'd). I told the nurse that I needed to get a test result number for my daughter because I was sure I'd written it down wrong or misunderstood it. The nurse actually says "No I'm pretty sure you didn't if its the result I'm thinking of". Ok now you have to understand that the peditrician group that PB goes to is HUGE! There are 10 providers and its one of the biggest practices in town. This nurse remembers me calling back 4 hours later because the test result is SO abnormal- yep thats always a good sign- NOT!!!!!!!! And yes folks I had the number right the first time. This morning I was on the phone with the endocrinology dept at St. Louis Children's hospital as soon as they opened. Their first available appointment is.........

Are you ready for this?



December 19!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh yes I always treasure the thought of a 3 hour Midwestern drive (each way) less than a week before Christmas. The scheduler told me that this appointment was open because of a cancellation otherwise we'd have to wait until February. UGH!

Ok since I'm just done at this point I'm going to sign off. I'm going to go look at my garden. I can't really check it because we're obviously in the middle of monsoon season here in Illinois. I never really knew we had a monsoon season here but we're having rain daily and the high today isn't even 70. PB keeps asking when she can go swimming- its looking like next week baby girl! The rain is of course helping the garden but its also flooding the walkways between the aisles so unless I want to be ankle deep in water and muck I just look at my garden from a few feet away!

Trying to remain calm

Ever have one of those moments you just want to sit down and cry or go outside and scream or trade your life in for the one behind door number 2? I'm so there at the moment.

Issue 1
I found out earlier today that my former best friend is pregnant. I never thought she would keep me shut out of her life like this & at this point I don't know if I'm hurt or pissed. I feel a bit like an island.

Issue 2
Princess Bear (PB) has been complaining of being cold a lot. Since this is a child that has issues regulating her body temp regarding heat this seemed a bit weird. My mom finally said that I had to take PB in for a blood test. That was last Thursday. I've been going a bit crazy waiting for the results of the sleep study but didn't think there was much to be concerned about. Well, the Dr. looked at the rash PB got from the adhesive used in the sleep study and said that its an allergy waiting to happen and we need to treat it like an allergy. That means no band aids or anything sticky. This might make future tests & surgeries very interesting. Then he ordered a TON of blood work focusing on her thyroid. That freaked me out a bunch of different ways since we basically just got my sister healthy. At this point thyroids make me a bit nervous. The Dr. called with the test results on Friday and said everything looked great. I thanked him and went on my merry little way. Since then there have been several occasions that PB complained of being cold. I was talking to my mom about it and she thought I needed to call the peditrician to see if we should go back to the endocrinologist in St. Louis & touch base. Ugh- not my idea of a good time but ok. We got home and there were 2 messages. PB's best friend called and the peditrician left a message asking me to return his call that they had the last of the blood work in. My dad & I just looked at each other & shared an "oh shit" look. The Dr. called back and explained that PB is testing positive for thyroid antibodies which means although her thyroid is ok now it will fail at some point in time. He wants me to get an appointment in St. Louis ASAP. I really had hoped with PB's growth issues seeming to level out that we had escaped the threat of having to have PB put on growth hormones. Now that is a front and center reality again. How much more is my poor baby going to have to deal with????

Now I'm off to make her dinner and then I'll try to decide between screaming and crying.

No more birthday parties!

Princess Bear (PB) turned 8 last Saturday. I'd been on a housecleaning binge for a week because we were having her first birthday party at home in 5 years. I sent invitations to the kids in her class (there 8 kids including PB), invited a friend of hers that used to go to her school, my friend Maria's 2 kids and my nephews. Its awfully hard to plan a birthday party when you have absolutely NO idea how many kids are coming! Although the invitations had RSVP only 1 child from class did! There was also talk between PB & her friends that it was going to be a pool party. Um yeah- I don't think so! So I even sent a note to the parents saying that it was not going to be a pool party & it had my number on it- still no RSVP's! The day of the party was somewhat chaotic mostly due to my mom's usual toxicity but that was to be expected right??? I had asked them for very little help prepping the house & managed to pay for almost all of it. My mom paid for the balloons to get inflated and the birthday cake. I covered everything else. It was a horse/cowgirl theme because PB is obsessed with horses- big time! One child showed up 20 minutes early. That wasn't too bad except my mom totally freaked. I had several crafts for the kids to do since the physical abilities of the kids greatly varied. Note to self: NO CRAFTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The mom's wound up doing the crafts! It did get a bit crazy with kids all over and chowing down on cupcakes. About 2 hours in I told my mom that we had to have some way to wrap it it because I was going to go crazy.

I then spent time on Saturday and Sunday finishing planting the plants we had purchased into the garden. We're at 23 tomatoes, 3 watermelon, 2 muskmelon, spaghetti squash, 7 fairytale eggplant, 4 various peppers, 4 broccoli, 2 cabbage and various herbs. I think I need to get some more herbs. PB and I also started pole beans, sunflowers and 2 varieties of pumpkins the other day.

PB also had a sleep study test on Tuesday night. That is a post of its own so check back!

Summertime, Summertime, Sum...sum...summertime!

Yes, folks summer is almost upon us!!! WOOHOO!!! Now for those who know me and know I'm not a fan of the summer in general might be scratching your heads and pondering a bit but why should I ever make sense???? Now my biggest grip with the summer is the heat & humidity that is ever present here in the midwest. It is oppressive! Now there are a lot of things about the summer I really do like- having Princess Bear home (for the most part!), gardening, swimming, sleeping in, gardening and swimming. A few things have happened at home this past week to make things seem a bit better! My dad was finally able to work the dirt enough to till it. I'm hoping to set up a permanent bed/mulch border with floral border thing in the next week. I've also got PB's swimming pool set up! Its filling with water as we speak! Its plenty big at 15' so mommy is going to be floating on a raft reading some magazines! Ugh....I hear strange sounds coming from the kitchen- more to follow! :)