A good thing after a lot of craziness!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We got the results from Molly's sleep study!  Molly is now officially off of supplemental oxygen at night.  That means we get two tanks taken out of our house and no more visits from the oxygen guy "Tank."  His real name is Mark.  We call him "Tank" because when we said good-bye to the third tank we did have..... he said that she is going to think my name is tank!     He has been "Tank" ever since! =) That was about 4 months ago.

Molly will now have humidified air at night just to keep her moist and her trach from plugging off.  This is such a blessing, because we can go somewhere and not have to arrange with her homecare company what time, where and how long we are going to be somewhere.  We can just pack up and go.  Of course it would take me a week to figure out what exactly we would need for supplies, but that is a whole other story!

It is weird to think that she is getting to be such a big girl.  I had some pictures printed from my traditional camera vs. my digital.  Wow she is so big.  One of the rolls had last summer on it and one had the other day......she has grown up so much since last summer.  She is sooooo much taller. I think she still weighs the same but she is still on the charts.  She had lost some weight because of being sick and her tonsils out......but she gained a pound since last week and is close to where she was before we started. Alleluhia! 

I will be 30 weeks tomorrow.  He should be about 3 pounds and about 17 inches long from head to toe.  By next week, he will have gained another 1/2 pound.  It is hard to believe that if he goes the full 40 weeks ......we only have 10 weeks left before he is here and we get to meet him.  We were just talking about what he will look like.  I can't imagine but it would be nice if Molly and Jonah look somewhat alike.....that way they can't deny each other! =)  Another thing that is weird to us is the fact that we know what he would physically(size) look like if he were already here.  We saw Molly at 23 weeks and he is 7 weeks further along than she was.  It is hard to imagine that that living being is inside of me and he actually fits! =)  He has been really active today.  I think I actually felt a foot on my side today.  That is a really crazy sensation.  I am also having trouble with my belly button being so sensitive.  It drives me crazy when anyone touches it.  A lot of people forget or don't realize that this is all new to me.  I only felt flutters with Molly....not full out stretches inside of me!  I wasn't showing very much with Molly and now I feel like a house, barn and the shack out back! =)  I also never felt the sensation of my belly getting tight and uncomfortable.  We were also wondering if we will need two monitors or will Molly not use hers after her trach is reconstructed.  If so, maybe he will be in his room instead of the bassinet at that time and we won't need to buy one.  Who knows.

I am also having trouble sleeping.  I am really tired.  I want to sleep, but as soon as I lay down, my mind starts wondering and thinking about all the stuff that needs to be done. I would love to share that list, but we only have so much time and it would take days to share. let alone do it all.  I would love to lay down and fall alseep and stay asleep for more than a few hours.  I have to pee all of the time at night.  I want to fall asleep and wake up in the morning.  I am going to gripe a moment.......forgive me.  I would love to just ask a nurse to put sunscreen on Molly when they go outside, but they have to have a DOCTOR'S order to do so.  I would also like to change her food and not have a DOCTOR'S order.  I feel like she is still someone else's kid because we can't make simple decision or ask a simple request without having a doctor say "yes you may."  What happened to that is my kid and I will decide?  It has been that way since she was born.  We have put our foot down sometimes, but it is crazy to have to have an order for the nurses to put hydrocortizone cream on a bug bite or an itch spot.  I HATE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I am tired of keeping up with doctors and making sure they are getting all the paperwork they need and everybody is communicating with everybody else.  The doctor today who d/c the oxygen had to fax the order to Molly's homecare co., her nursing co., and the doctors in Cincinnati.  I am sure that when we get to Cincinnati next month, they won't have it and have to wait to receive it.  Keeping up with her therapies, doctor's appointments and meetings for 1st steps and medicaid are a full-time job.  I want to be able to sit down(of course this would be dreaming) and read a book or return emails that people wrote me about 2 months ago. I would love to actually have a floor that doesn't disgust me.  I can't tell you when I cleaned the bathroom last and I am grossed out by my house.  If I can't keep up with it now, what makes me think I can do it with 2 kids around?  How do moms with lots of kids do it?  I think all of this is coming from pregnancy hormones because I wasn't this gripy before being prego.  I cry at the drop of a hat. I am anxious about things that wouldn't have bothered me before.  Hopefully my attitude will change once Jonah is here and Molly's trach is out.  The first of the two will come much sooner than the other. 

On another note.....how do Mom's find time to do their quiet time with God?  I am in a Bible study and can never find the time to do the lessons.  I truly enjoy the time and would love to get into God's word more.   My issue is that I can't seem to find a time that no one is asking me questions.  I wish our bedroom had a door, so I could shut everyone out for a while.  I am three weeks behind on the study and want to be able to contribute more insight other than what I think at the moment.  I know God has a lot more to say to me, but I am not quiet long enough for him to talk to me.  I can't even use the bathroom without a little person knocking and fussing outside of the door.  I know that is a kid thing but sometimes I just want some peace while I pee.

SOrry this is so long and so gripy. I hope that you are all having a good day and that you keep smiling!

Here are some pics of the house after the storm...

This was still in the window of our front porch after the storm ripped out the window behind it.



This is the new view inside the barn!

This is the tree that fell on our house.  Yes..there is a house behind it!


This is the destruction of one log that broke off of the tree out back.  It catapolted into the side of the house and took out the side of the roof at the same time.  This one caused leakage in the attic and waterspots on our bedroom ceiling.

My body finally decided that it had had enough.  I started feeling off on Thursday morning.  I went to my o.b. and they admitted me for an overnight observation stay.  Oh well.  I did miss Molly and Joe but it was nice to not think about the house or anything crazy!   Jonah looked great on the ultrasound.  My cervix and placenta were doing just what they are supposed to be doing........supporting Jonah.  He got an 8/8 on an ultrasound panel.  He was moving soooo much that they couldn't get his heart rate for more than 15 min. in one spot.  They had to keep moving the monitor.  I have A- blood type so they gave me my Rhogam shot early.  I would have gotten it in a couple of weeks anyway.  One less thing to do later.  I was released early Friday morning.  I came home to tree guys all around our house taking care of the mess.  They did a great job of cleaning up.....it is just hard to look out the window because there are very few trees left.  It was hard to find a place to put one of Molly's playsets that survived.  We wanted to put it in the shade but there isn't any left.  We will have to play in the morning.  We can't play in the back until the yard it regraded and the tree is trimmed.  I don't want any limbs falling on us or our toys!  She already lost her swing set.

My job now is to rest and relax.........like I will be able to do that!   I will try my darnedest to be good.  My doctor didn't put me on any restrictions because she knew it wouldn't help.  I just need to sit when I need to and follow the list of things to help prevent pre-term labor.  One of our friends is sending one her kids over two time a week for play time with Molly. The two kids will take turns...one on Monday and one on Wednesday.  They will stay for about 2 hours while I sit.  That will be wonderful.  Molly is nonstop from the moment she wakes up to the moment she crashes for a nap or night time.  I will also have some time when she had therapy so that will help keep me off of my feet.  I have really been trying to take a nap when Molly takes one so that I am rested like she is.  I will just have to let the house take care of itself every once in a while!  

We met with the adjustor today to see what will be covered and what won't.  We had thought about tearing down the house and starting over but we know think that that is not an option.  We will be able to do some of the extra work that we didn't have the money to do before.  We needed a couple of new windows, new siding, replace all the insulation in the attics, new septic, and we were going to add on a new bedroom for us onto the back.  It will be nice when everything is finally complete but that will take a while.  We are also going to get a new roof and new soffits.  I don't know what else will happen.  Whatever happens we will be taken care of.  God is soooooo good!

      

O.k. this is how I looked about 2 weeks ago!  I was just at the point where I had Molly. 23 weeks. Only this time....I am a lot bigger than I was with Molly!  Jonah is going to be a big boy!

 

This is my niece Ella in Joe's hat! 
    

Molly was helping Daddy do the maintenance on the mower.  She loves the mower.  She signs mower like more because they sound alike!  She will learn more about it later.  Now she knows that it cuts the grass and it can hurt her if it is on and she gets too close.     
    

Molly getting her first haircut.  Hef hair is getting soooo long.  The fine baby hair in the back was getting so tangled that it needed a trim.  Our friend Autumn cut it for us.  Mommy got her hair cut first, so Molly could see that it didn't hurt.  She has gotten blood taken so much that she was a little frightened at first.  Then she loved the pampering.  I always spray her hair to style it in the morning, so that eased her mind when Autumn sprayed hers to get it ready to cut.
 

I will post more later but I need to go to lunch........cookout with homemade ice cream!  We can't be late for something as special as that! =)

O.k.  One of Molly's friends...Parker.(Thanks Suzanne!)....has a website.  His mom put this on his site and I cried!  O.k.  I am sure some of it is hormones from the pregnancy, but I can truly relate to some of this and as a special education teacher other parts hit home.  Enjoy..

Mothers Lie

By Lori Borgman

Expectant mothers waiting for a newborn’s arrival say they don’t care what sex the baby is. They just want to have ten fingers and ten toes.

Mothers lie.

Every mother wants so much more. She wants a perfectly healthy baby with a round head, rosebud lips,
button nose, beautiful eyes and satin skin. She wants a baby so gorgeous that people will pity the Gerber baby for being flat-out ugly.

She wants a baby that will roll over, sit up and take those first steps right on schedule (according to the baby development chart on page 57, column two). Every mother wants a baby that can see, hear, run, jump and fire neurons by the billions. She wants a kid that can smack the ball out of the park and do toe points that are the envy of the entire ballet class. Call it greed if you want, but a mother wants what a mother wants.

Some mothers get babies with something more.

Maybe you’re one who got a baby with a condition you couldn’t pronounce, a spine that didn’t fuse, a missing chromosome or a palate that didn’t close. The doctor’s words took your breath away. It was just like the time at recess in the fourth grade when you didn’t see the kick ball coming, and it knocked the wind right out of you.

Some of you left the hospital with a healthy bundle, then, months, even years later, took him in for a routine visit, or scheduled him for a checkup, and crashed head first into a brick wall as you bore the brunt of devastating news. It didn’t seem possible. That didn’t run in your family. Could this really be happening in your lifetime?

There’s no such thing as a perfect body. Everybody will bear something at some time or another. Maybe the affliction will be apparent to curious eyes, or maybe it will be unseen, quietly treated with trips to the doctor, therapy or surgery. Mothers of children with disabilities live the limitations with them.

Frankly, I don’t know how you do it. Sometimes you mothers scare me. How you lift that kid in and out of the wheelchair twenty times a day. How you monitor tests, track medications, and serve as the gatekeeper
to a hundred specialists yammering in your ear. I wonder how you endure the clichés and the platitudes, the
well-intentioned souls explaining how God is at work when you’ve occasionally questioned if God is on strike. I even wonder how you endure schmaltzy columns like this one-saluting you, painting you as hero and saint, when you know you’re ordinary. You snap, you bark, you bite. You didn’t volunteer for this, you didn’t jump up and down in the motherhood line yelling, “Choose me, God. Choose me! I’ve got what it takes.”

You’re a woman who doesn’t have time to step back and put things in perspective, so let me do it for you. From where I sit, you’re way ahead of the pack. You’ve developed the strength of the draft horse while holding onto the delicacy of a daffodil. You have a heart that melts like chocolate in a glove box in July, counter-balanced against the stubbornness of an Ozark mule. You are the mother, advocate and protector of a child with a disability. You’re a neighbor, a friend, a woman I pass at church and my sister-in-law.              
You’re a wonder.

Lori Borgman is a syndicated columnist and author of All Stressed Up and No Place To Go

****************************************************************************

I will try to post more when I get a chance.  The puree diet is a rocky road.  We are trying to figure out what consistency (right now we are dealing with the consistency of peanut butter) to mix so that she doesn't spit up.  So far, no luck.  She still spits up and now that there is real baby food involved, it really stains the carpet. Oh well.  Please pray that we can figure all of this out because we are getting really frustrated.  So is Molly! Trust us.  We can't do anything about her airway until she doesn't spit up anymore.  Our prayers are so that her stomach will be healed.  Her main issue is that the stomach doesn't empty very quickly and the muscle at the top of her stomach doesn't close even at a resting position.  aaaahhh!  Not a very good combination.  Talk to ya'll soon!

I finally got Molly's tonsils and adnoid appointment for her surgery to remove them scheduled.  She will have that done on June 13th!!!  Yeah I know it is a Friday.......oh well.  She has had other surgeries or procedures done on Friday the 13th before.  Yeah.......they will also be scheduling her oxygen level test sometime in the next two weeks.  (This one won't be as bad because they will come to our house and set up their equipment here.)  Alleluhia.  I don't think any of us could have handled the sleep test we did last time.  After that we can call to schedule another bronch in Cincinnati.  After that bronch, Dr. Cotton will fill us in on the rest of the process.  Once that is determined, they can schedule her reconstruction.  We would like to have some of it done before we have Jonah.  I really don't want to travel and stay in Cincinnati with a newborn.  Plus he won't be able to be on the hospital floor with Molly because of health issues.  That will be a chore to feed him on the outside and still be with her on the inside.  aahhhh!!!!! I know that whatever happens will happen and I can only make my suggestions.

On another note.....we are going to start the pureed diet on Friday.  Hopefully it will work.  Molly is still spitting up and they erythremiacin is giving her a yeast infection.  AAHHH!!!!  It is more work for me but not more than cleaning up all of her spit ups.  That is really really getting old.  Even though I am past my first trimester, I still get nauseous when I have to clean it up.
Ta ta for now!