15 Months

Oh that little face. I love it so much that I can’t stand it.
You eat. You eat so, so much. You pile it in your mouth and I have to slow you down and then you voice your displeasure at me.
Your favorite foods are still banana, watermelon, and graham crackers.
No more bottles. Just sippy cups. But not sippy cups with a straw. No siree. That will make you arch your back and scream. You are very good at that. With your tantrums. On weekends you have about four a day. They are short and sweet, and mama just walks away.
You’ve started pointing and babbling to try and tell me things. You can really only say mama, datdat still and I think I heard you say yes and grandma once this weekend.
You still love to look through books.
You don’t want to sit down for baths which you used to love. Instead, you hang on your knees over the side. So fun for mom to wash you.
You love to play with the water table on the deck. You can turn the handle and put balls down the ramp. If they get stuck you start making a whining noise and I fix it for you.
You crawl lightening fast, but are still not walking. Trying to get you walking by holding one hand instead of both as I steer you around.
Your sister was sitting in your little red car and you were so angry. You launched yourself at her and screamed until she got out. It is yours!
You love that car and being pushed around in it as well as being outside. You LOVE outside.

Medical Tests (long)

As I’ve written about in the past, certain members of my family, including myself, have a genetic mutation that involves colon polyps and missing teeth. Often, I have written about my dental adventures. My old geneticist (which I loved) left and have a new one that I don’t like as well. My last colonoscopy was in 2008 (yikes) and I’m supposed to have them every two years. Ooops. I’ve been busy with four jaw surgeries, a complicated pregnancy and a C-section. So shoot me. One was scheduled a few months ago, but P had to go out of town and I need a child wrangler and driver and meal provider.

Let me tell you what it is really like.

I finally had one scheduled for a Monday which means I could do the prep over the weekend and not have to take extra days off. This is my 3rd colonoscopy and my 5th endoscopy ( upper GI tract). All week I was apprehensive. I’m a worrier  The 1st time the prep was half lytely I think and went horribly – lots of cramping and vomiting and the prep was only “fair” (aren’t you glad you know this)! But no problems during or with results. All clear. (Except for stomach polyps – which apparently are no big deal). The 2nd one in 2008 went a little better. I had a two day prep – which means a laxative on the night two days before and a gallon of GoLytely the day before. This went better than the 1st one. Still had nausea and cramping and some chills. Again, no problems before or after. Prep was “excellent”.

This time I decided to eat a low residue diet two days prior to the prep. That means no fiber and is supposed to make things much easier. That is true! After Wednesday I had no fruit or veggies or nuts. I ate very lightly. Toasts, eggs, soup. Saturday and Sunday I had no food and I was SO HUNGRY this time. I had chicken broth, watered down Gatorade, Jello. I took Mirlax on Saturday and Sunday started the Gavilyte in the afternoon. The Gavilyte was a breeze! It wasn’t as thick and salty as the first two preps and I sucked down a cup with cherry flavoring (my own) every 15 minutes for two hours. Now I was supposed to get up two hours before the procedure and take the rest but I didn’t. I drank mine and kept drinking chicken broth and water until everything was clear. Then I stopped and just rehydrated with clear fluids the rest of the night. I felt fine! I even unpacked six boxes of moving stuff that day.

The next morning everything went fine and I was a little sniffly when they took me back. Sometimes (I’ve had “twilight” anesthesia eight times before) I get a little hit of something before they take me back to relax me. I remember the nurse giving me something and the room went kind of spinny. But then I woke up. OH YES I DID. Right at the start. And I was screaming. It was painful and felt like a truck was in my neither regions. They kept yelling at me to relax and I was in and out. Apparently they gave me another Versed and Midozlam to kill a horse. It didn’t work. They cancelled the upper endoscopy. Because of the sedation problems.

When I came out I was hardly loopy. I wasn’t happy either. What happened? The MD told me that either my anxiety caused the sedation not to work (WHAT????), or that I took a drugs and/or painkillers frequently (WHAT?????) so that may have not caused it to work. I am still so angry about it. Something happened. With the IV or the drugs or something.

I’m not going back here. Now I have to worry that IV sedation won’t work. I wanted an investigation to be launched, but I haven’t done that yet. I’m pretty angry about being treated like I was crazy.

The good news is that there were no polyps and everything was fine.

14 month Update

For some crazy reason, my pictures are posting sideways. Ugh.


14 months


You still only have four teeth. I thought more were coming, but have not yet broken the surface.
You can eat though. Oh boy, you can eat! I forget you had a swallowing and choking problem. Your particular favorites are banana and graham crackers. If you see anyone eating, you hang on their chair or lap like a little dog waiting for a bite.

You refuse to pull up to a stand often. You pull up to your knees all the time. You sometimes walk around on knees. BUT YOU WON”T WALK or cruise the furniture. At all. Or walk behind a push walker. Kid, let’s get a move on. I think both you and I would be happier if you were walking. But you get around. You crawl so quickly!


You still are not doing sippy cups for me. At school they can coax you into one.

You still only say a few words that I can tell, but you babble frequently. Mama, datdat, bub bye.

You still like to hit down block towers. I am going to cry when you tire of this.

Boy, does your sister bother you. Pull on you, take things away from you. I’ll be glad when you can give her a good clunk.

This holiday we went over to P's hometown which is a resort area on Lake Michigan.   The weather was great, 75-82 and sunny every day (we were there almost 5 days).  We did several fun activities, but really different activities than what we usually do there.  Young children now in tow perhaps.  The thing that has allowed us to enjoy our vacations the most there is renting a hotel room.  We used to stay with P's grandma that for some reason, doesn't like me, and keeps a very warm house when it is hot and insists on us being home for every meal, etc.  We really are too much for her.  P's mom has a small place and not much room.   So P got a hotel right near the beach and playground.  It had a little fridge and microwave and a small, baby-proofed patio that the baby loved crawling out to.  Oh and a pool!  A great heated pool STEPS from our door.  (Yes we used it - Lake Michigan is COLD). 

The best part of the vacation was just being with everyone for five days straight.  I am missing those kids and husband so much today as I am back to work.  :( 

Here are some pictures. (yes I look bad because my hair is full of sand, chlorine, lake water, and sunscreen.

PCOS and insulin resistance

I don’t talk about it that much anymore, but I have PCOS with insulin resistance. In college, I started rapidly gaining a lot of weight. I gained over 45 lbs over 4 years. I felt terrible all the time, was upper fat, tired, acanthosis nigricans, very moody, severe acne. Ugh. I don’t even want to relive that time via memories.
SO I finally figured out what was wrong with me. By myself. I graduated and got insurance (yay!) and then found a sympathetic doctor that sent me to an Endocrinologist. My testosterone was high. My insulin was three times the upper limit of normal. He gave me the golden ticket – Metformin. Everything improved and I lost 84 lbs. I’ve felt good ever since.

But, I have never ever been able to tolerate a lot of sugar or carbs without protein. I can drink a glass of wine, with a meal. I can have a little dessert, immediately after a meal. I cannot tolerate sugar drinks of any kind, including juice, regular soda, punch, especially warm sugary drinks like coffees and cocoa. If people go to have ice cream in the middle of the day or birthday cake, I can’t do it. I makes me ill.

For breakfast before I understood this problem, I would eat a bagel. Yikes! I’d be feeling clammy, and sleepy and falling asleep (I was in my internship at this time) and it was a bad thing. After I was diagnosed, I started eating protein. I’m a bit more lax now. Typically I have one of two things – cottage cheese with berries and walnuts or a boiled egg, a cheese, a banana with peanut butter and some nuts with a little dried cherries. The last week or so I have been becoming quite ill after breakfast. Falling asleep, clammy, tired, foggy-headed. It’s awful! I had been drinking a little bit of work coffee with breakfast, and I thought that was doing it, maybe it had some hidden sugar or something. Nope. I didn’t have it today, and it happened again.

What is going on? I feel strongly it is some sort of hypoglycemic episode. It did happen with both types of breakfast, so I am at a loss there. Has Metformin stopped working for me? Should I do a drastic carb cut?  Any thoughts? I *guess* I should go see the Doctor. Ugh.

Take as a positive or negative?

Some one told me that the baby's teeth make him look like SpongeBob SquarePants.   I admit they are a bit kooky looking.  I'm hoping he will grow into them.  Should I be offended by this or not?  Opinions please. 

13 months old

* This is the silly baby climbing into my lap to eat all my beans and rice and guacamole. He is absolutely delighted.

I forgot to write down a 12 month update!  My bad.  Benny will be 13 months on Friday!  13^th months.

·         Yes, we still do call him Benny.

·         Movement:  he can crawl on hands and knees now as well as army crawl.  He will walk around (mostly lurch around) when take his hand and help him walk.  But he really isn’t interested in walking at all.  He isn’t cruising the furniture yet at all either (take your time much, kid?).  He does pull up to knees on various objects.  I’m kind of ready for the walking stage so he can wear shorts, not wear through so many pairs of pants, and to give his little wrists and knees a break.  Even through clothing they look red and irritated.  I don’t think he will be walking for at least another month. 

·         Cute stuff:  He loves to lay on the ground, turn the pages in books, and “read” them aloud.  So adorable.  He also still loves to hit down block towers that I create.  He also loves to swing like his sister, and voices his displeasure and arches his back  when I pull him out of the swing.  Hitting down block towers is still a delight for him.  He likes Daddy now.  He likes to pull himself up to his knees at the end of Daddy's chair and wave at him.  He is a good waver.

·         Eating:  We went for the evaluation with the eating therapist.  She definitely thought he had some delays.  He wouldn’t eat mixed texture things for us, nor use a sippy cup nor feed himself.  He eats stage three foods now and anything I feed him!! YAY!  He still will NOT feed himself – which is crazy, or drink from a sippy.  It will be a cold day in hell before I get him to give up those bottles.  The eating therapist wanted to send him to occupational therapy for poor fine motor and I am still considering this.