Life of a stay at home wife and mother of two boys!!
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Laughter
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Football!!!!
Well it is officially Football Season!! My favorite season. The Gators started last weekend and the NFL started their season this past Sunday on the 10th anniversary of 9/11. My mom has season tickets to both the Gator games and Jaguar games and decided she would buy extras for the first Jaguar game so we could all go. I always go to the Gator games with my mom so its nice when Mike gets to go to some football games too. She was nice enough to watch her grand babies on Sat night so The Hubs and I could go to the Gator game together.
Well last year she had won a cabana to use for a tailgate before the Jaguar game. The Cabana had all you could eat and all the Bud Light you could want. We weren't gonna turn down that opportunity. So Sunday we all got ready and went to the game. This would be Kalen's third football game and Lucas' first. We were hoping that the lovely Fall weather would stay around for our weekend of football, but no such luck. It was a nice hot day for us. Kalen seemed to really enjoy himself, he pretty much ate an entire watermelon and spent the morning running all around the cabana and people watching. We went into the game early so we could watch the 9/11 tribute before the game. My Mom and I took Kalen to the seats so he could see the Flyover that was going to take place. We didn't get out there to see the whole thing because a Marine surprised his family on the field, they thought he was still overseas. I'm sure I would have been a Hot Mess if I actually saw that. The tribute was really nice they started out by showing a man in uniform playing Taps on the Jumbo tron. I am a sucker for Taps and I pretty much cry every time I hear it. I guess its the history of Taps and is usually played at Service (military, police, and firefighters) Funerals. Taps is played to indicate that its "Lights Out." This was really neat because they played it at all the stadiums at the same time and they showed live shots of all the other teams while Taps played. I had already heard it the night before at the Gator Game so I was well prepared for it on Sunday. After that they had service members bring out a giant flag that covered the entire field. A family friend was a part of the ceremony. Charice (from Glee) sang the National Anthem and did a wonderful job and then the Fly Over by two F-15s. After that we headed inside (because my mom upgraded to Touchdown Club tickets) Thank Goodness!! So we were able to watch the game in A/C. They did more at Half time as well.
Inside they had couches in front of 6 TV screens (so we could watch all the games that were going on) and we pretty much took over the whole couch. Kalen befriended the guys sitting next to us and was having a good ole time. Lucas took nap, haha. I was grateful that we had these tickets because it was a scorcher outside and I do not think Kalen or Lucas would have lasted very long and I doubt I would have either. We left in the middle of the third quarter because Kalen was starting to get more adventurous and would venture further and further from our couch. Before we left we stopped back by our Cabana so The Hubs could get some more free beers and cookies. No worries I was driving home. I was really proud of Kalen since the football game was during his nap time and we never had any problems with him.
Well last year she had won a cabana to use for a tailgate before the Jaguar game. The Cabana had all you could eat and all the Bud Light you could want. We weren't gonna turn down that opportunity. So Sunday we all got ready and went to the game. This would be Kalen's third football game and Lucas' first. We were hoping that the lovely Fall weather would stay around for our weekend of football, but no such luck. It was a nice hot day for us. Kalen seemed to really enjoy himself, he pretty much ate an entire watermelon and spent the morning running all around the cabana and people watching. We went into the game early so we could watch the 9/11 tribute before the game. My Mom and I took Kalen to the seats so he could see the Flyover that was going to take place. We didn't get out there to see the whole thing because a Marine surprised his family on the field, they thought he was still overseas. I'm sure I would have been a Hot Mess if I actually saw that. The tribute was really nice they started out by showing a man in uniform playing Taps on the Jumbo tron. I am a sucker for Taps and I pretty much cry every time I hear it. I guess its the history of Taps and is usually played at Service (military, police, and firefighters) Funerals. Taps is played to indicate that its "Lights Out." This was really neat because they played it at all the stadiums at the same time and they showed live shots of all the other teams while Taps played. I had already heard it the night before at the Gator Game so I was well prepared for it on Sunday. After that they had service members bring out a giant flag that covered the entire field. A family friend was a part of the ceremony. Charice (from Glee) sang the National Anthem and did a wonderful job and then the Fly Over by two F-15s. After that we headed inside (because my mom upgraded to Touchdown Club tickets) Thank Goodness!! So we were able to watch the game in A/C. They did more at Half time as well.
Inside they had couches in front of 6 TV screens (so we could watch all the games that were going on) and we pretty much took over the whole couch. Kalen befriended the guys sitting next to us and was having a good ole time. Lucas took nap, haha. I was grateful that we had these tickets because it was a scorcher outside and I do not think Kalen or Lucas would have lasted very long and I doubt I would have either. We left in the middle of the third quarter because Kalen was starting to get more adventurous and would venture further and further from our couch. Before we left we stopped back by our Cabana so The Hubs could get some more free beers and cookies. No worries I was driving home. I was really proud of Kalen since the football game was during his nap time and we never had any problems with him.
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| Kalen and The Hubs with some Cheerleaders |
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| Kalen waving Flags |
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| He Loves the USA |
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| Carrying out the Flag, our Friend Johnny is in the Fireman at the Front in the Yellow hat |
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| Giant Flag |
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| Lucas ready for some Football |
Upset Tummy
It all started on a Friday night as we were leaving a friends house. We were putting everything in the car and then went back inside to get Kalen and Lucas. Lucas was screaming bloody murder, never had we ever heard him scream like that before. We didn't know what was wrong with him. We put him in his car seat and he was still screaming, he wouldn't take a bottle or binky. His poor little face was turning bright red and he had these huge tears rolling down his face. We had no clue how to help him. Nothing was calming him down. We leave only to pull over on the side of the road still in their neighborhood because Lucas was not letting up. We pulled him out of the car seat and tried to feed him again, but nothing. The Hubs started to freak out, wondering if something had happened to Lucas while we were outside. I told him if anything had happened they would have told us. The Hubs called anyways and they reassured us nothing had happened, he just started screaming. We figured it must be a combination of him being overly tired and hungry. So I just kept patting his back and talking to him to try and calm him down. All of a sudden a huge burp came out of this little man. He instantly calmed down. Poor thing had this huge gas bubble stuck in his belly. We were able to get him back in the car seat and head home. He started fussing again in the car ride, but this time I was able to give him his binky and I rubbed his head and continued to talk to him. The whole ride home he never took his eyes off me, like he was afraid I might leave him. The next day the same thing happened and continued all weekend. We couldn't put him down and it became a fight to feed to him. He was only comfortable in your arms and you had to stay standing, he wouldn't even let you sit down and rock him.
What had changed? What was causing all these problems? Where did our happy little man go? I started doing some research online and it seemed he had all the symptoms of being Colicky. Screaming uncontrolably for more than 3 hours a day, not wanting to lay on his back, screaming without any real signs. But most babies start to get over it around 3 months, they don't start at 3 months. So I began to look at his eating schedule. He had started getting more formula than breast milk lately because my supply had started going down and he had upped how much he was eating in each sitting, so it was hard for me to keep up with his demand. But he had never had a problem with the formula up to this point. He seemed to get the most fussy after downing a bottle of formula rather than breast milk. So I started to pump more often and began to take some supplements to help create a bigger supply for the little man. I also know that breast milk is a lot easier to digest than formula. So maybe he was having a hard time switching all day long. We decided to feed him breast milk in the morning until it was gone and then he would have formula the rest of the day. Hoping this would help his little tummy. We tried to make the switch after he naped. He also has never really ate well off the bottles we had. So we figured he might be swallowing too much air while he was eating, so we decided I would get new bottles.
I have heard a lot of good things about the Dr. Brown's bottles so we decided we would try those out. We had been wanting new bottles since Kalen was about 6 months old because the ones we currently had would leak all over the place and that was just extremely annoying. I didn't really want the Dr. Brown's bottles for Kalen because they have all these extra pieces and parts and other than the fact that they leaked he never had a problem with them. It was clear now that it didn't matter if I had to clean extra parts if it meant that Lucas would feel better and stop getting these giant gas bubbles. Well the extra parts are supper easy to clean and it does not really add much time to the regular washing of the bottles. While I was at the store I picked up some gripe water as well, which is suppose to help alleviate gas pains. So we have been mixing it in with his bottles throughout the day. We can tell the difference when it has been a while since he had a dose.
Fast forward to the first time we use them. Instant success. He is eating so much better and I could tell he wasn't swallowing air. All of our efforts seem to be working. Thank Goodness. He still has his bouts of crying and not wanting to eat, but that seems to be when he gets over tired. (He doesn't like to nap)
What had changed? What was causing all these problems? Where did our happy little man go? I started doing some research online and it seemed he had all the symptoms of being Colicky. Screaming uncontrolably for more than 3 hours a day, not wanting to lay on his back, screaming without any real signs. But most babies start to get over it around 3 months, they don't start at 3 months. So I began to look at his eating schedule. He had started getting more formula than breast milk lately because my supply had started going down and he had upped how much he was eating in each sitting, so it was hard for me to keep up with his demand. But he had never had a problem with the formula up to this point. He seemed to get the most fussy after downing a bottle of formula rather than breast milk. So I started to pump more often and began to take some supplements to help create a bigger supply for the little man. I also know that breast milk is a lot easier to digest than formula. So maybe he was having a hard time switching all day long. We decided to feed him breast milk in the morning until it was gone and then he would have formula the rest of the day. Hoping this would help his little tummy. We tried to make the switch after he naped. He also has never really ate well off the bottles we had. So we figured he might be swallowing too much air while he was eating, so we decided I would get new bottles.
I have heard a lot of good things about the Dr. Brown's bottles so we decided we would try those out. We had been wanting new bottles since Kalen was about 6 months old because the ones we currently had would leak all over the place and that was just extremely annoying. I didn't really want the Dr. Brown's bottles for Kalen because they have all these extra pieces and parts and other than the fact that they leaked he never had a problem with them. It was clear now that it didn't matter if I had to clean extra parts if it meant that Lucas would feel better and stop getting these giant gas bubbles. Well the extra parts are supper easy to clean and it does not really add much time to the regular washing of the bottles. While I was at the store I picked up some gripe water as well, which is suppose to help alleviate gas pains. So we have been mixing it in with his bottles throughout the day. We can tell the difference when it has been a while since he had a dose.
Fast forward to the first time we use them. Instant success. He is eating so much better and I could tell he wasn't swallowing air. All of our efforts seem to be working. Thank Goodness. He still has his bouts of crying and not wanting to eat, but that seems to be when he gets over tired. (He doesn't like to nap)
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Migraines...
About two weeks ago, on a Monday everything was going well. Kalen was paying with his toys and Lucas was taking a nap, when Reggie needed to go outside. So Kalen grabbed the leash and we took Reggie outside. Everything seemed fine then we came back inside and Kalen needed his diaper changed. All of a sudden he started screaming and crying and squeezed his eyes shut. He started rubbing them and little tears made their way out of his clinched shut eyes. I didn't know what was wrong so I quickly tried to change his diaper. He couldn't and wouldn't open his eyes. When he tried to open them I could only see the whites of his eyes. Needless to say I started freaking out. I didn't know if something got in his eyes outside or what. So we grabbed his blanket and we left his room. I took him to the living room and he sat on my lap, still not opening his eyes, but he was no longer screaming. I tried getting a hold of The Hubs (because he happened to have the car seats in the truck, of course this would happen on a day that I couldn't just throw the kids in the car and go to the Dr). No such luck. About 10 mins had passed and Kalen has since calmed down and was slowing beginning to open his eyes.
Once he finally opened them I was checking to see if there was anything in his eyes. Nothing. They were red but, that was due to him rubbing them. He finally got off my lap and walked to the fridge, so I opened it up to get him some milk and he closed his eyes and ran away screaming. What the heck was happening to my poor Kalen. He was just running around laughing and playing 15 mins ago. He began to play again and wanted to go out on the porch with Reggie. As soon as he went out he clamped his eyes shut and came back inside. That's when I really started feeling bad for him. It was the light, he all of a sudden became sensitive to light. At that instant I realized what was going on. I was immediately brought back to the first time I got a Migraine and that was my first symptom, sensitivity to light.
I called the Dr to make an appt for him. After I explained what happened to him we decided I would bring him in after his nap (Sleep for the most part helps rid you of the migraine). I finally got a hold of Mike and he would be coming home early so we could go the Dr.
The whole time he napped I looked up Migraines in kids. There isn't much research on kids dealing with Migraines so I didn't get a whole lot of answers other than the fact that they are pretty rare. I sat in shock he is only a year and a half old, I was 13 when I got my first one. He has a 50% chance on inheriting them from me, but they usually do not start until puberty when hormones start going crazy in the body. How could my little mister be getting them already. In my research I found that often times kids start out by just getting the Pre-symptoms without actually getting a migraine headache. They could gets these for years before getting the headache or get the headache the first time. I prayed that if this is what was happening that he wouldn't develop the headache. I felt so bad how would I be able to know if he got any of the other symptoms or the headache. He can't talk yet so its not like he could tell me the light hurt his head or that his head felt like it might explode.
When he awoke from his nap the light still seemed to be bothering him, but it was tolerable. So we put a hat on his head and gave him his sunglasses for the car ride to the Dr. His pediatrician was just as baffled as I was. She did a full body scan to make sure he was okay and then she wanted to check his eyes. She wanted to make sure he hadn't scratched his eye or that something had gotten in his eye to irritate them. Nothing, she said his eyes were perfect and nothing ever went in them that day. He had become a lot more tolerable to the lights being on, but while she was checking his eyes with her flashlight thing (I'm sure that's the offical medical name for whatever it was, haha), Kalen would clamp his eyes shut. So clearly he was still having some problems with the light being that close. So it took her a little while to get a good look at his big beautiful eyes. She told me she had another child the same age as Kalen who started getting migraines and that the child's parents actually took him to Chicago to get testing and be a part of a study for children with Migraines. There isn't much you can do for children because no one wants to give children a daily medication to prevent migraines and I don't want Kalen to have to take some sort of medicine everyday. (Most likely a quarter of the same pill that adults get, who knows what kind of affect that would have on his body.) An most of the medicine is made for adults, even when I was 13 I had to take half of a tablet that was made for an adult. I really can only give him a little bit of ibuprophen if I suspect he has the headache.
When we got home I wrote down everything we did the day before including what he ate all the way up to the point in which the first symptom showed up. I have no idea if he had any of the other symptoms, i.e his arm or half of his face going numb, if he had nausea (he never actualy threw up, but his stomach could have been bothering him), if he got the headache, an aura, if he felt depressed, weakness, or anything else. If he is truly starting to get migraines he could have an attack at anytime he could not show symptoms for months or even years again. I am now keeping a journal and if I suspect any of the symptoms I can write down everything before his first symptom showed up to see if any one thing is triggering it.
Two days later while in the car he began screaming when I had the radio on and he would only stop if I turned it off. I am assuming he had some sort of headache if not the actual migraine headache. He has since seemed to be fine. In the mornings he seems to have a sight sensitivity to light, but I think that mostly has to do with being in the dark and then having a bright light on.
I am hoping and praying that this was just some weird occurrence and doesn't happen again or that it isn't something worse than migraines.
Once he finally opened them I was checking to see if there was anything in his eyes. Nothing. They were red but, that was due to him rubbing them. He finally got off my lap and walked to the fridge, so I opened it up to get him some milk and he closed his eyes and ran away screaming. What the heck was happening to my poor Kalen. He was just running around laughing and playing 15 mins ago. He began to play again and wanted to go out on the porch with Reggie. As soon as he went out he clamped his eyes shut and came back inside. That's when I really started feeling bad for him. It was the light, he all of a sudden became sensitive to light. At that instant I realized what was going on. I was immediately brought back to the first time I got a Migraine and that was my first symptom, sensitivity to light.
I called the Dr to make an appt for him. After I explained what happened to him we decided I would bring him in after his nap (Sleep for the most part helps rid you of the migraine). I finally got a hold of Mike and he would be coming home early so we could go the Dr.
The whole time he napped I looked up Migraines in kids. There isn't much research on kids dealing with Migraines so I didn't get a whole lot of answers other than the fact that they are pretty rare. I sat in shock he is only a year and a half old, I was 13 when I got my first one. He has a 50% chance on inheriting them from me, but they usually do not start until puberty when hormones start going crazy in the body. How could my little mister be getting them already. In my research I found that often times kids start out by just getting the Pre-symptoms without actually getting a migraine headache. They could gets these for years before getting the headache or get the headache the first time. I prayed that if this is what was happening that he wouldn't develop the headache. I felt so bad how would I be able to know if he got any of the other symptoms or the headache. He can't talk yet so its not like he could tell me the light hurt his head or that his head felt like it might explode.
When he awoke from his nap the light still seemed to be bothering him, but it was tolerable. So we put a hat on his head and gave him his sunglasses for the car ride to the Dr. His pediatrician was just as baffled as I was. She did a full body scan to make sure he was okay and then she wanted to check his eyes. She wanted to make sure he hadn't scratched his eye or that something had gotten in his eye to irritate them. Nothing, she said his eyes were perfect and nothing ever went in them that day. He had become a lot more tolerable to the lights being on, but while she was checking his eyes with her flashlight thing (I'm sure that's the offical medical name for whatever it was, haha), Kalen would clamp his eyes shut. So clearly he was still having some problems with the light being that close. So it took her a little while to get a good look at his big beautiful eyes. She told me she had another child the same age as Kalen who started getting migraines and that the child's parents actually took him to Chicago to get testing and be a part of a study for children with Migraines. There isn't much you can do for children because no one wants to give children a daily medication to prevent migraines and I don't want Kalen to have to take some sort of medicine everyday. (Most likely a quarter of the same pill that adults get, who knows what kind of affect that would have on his body.) An most of the medicine is made for adults, even when I was 13 I had to take half of a tablet that was made for an adult. I really can only give him a little bit of ibuprophen if I suspect he has the headache.
When we got home I wrote down everything we did the day before including what he ate all the way up to the point in which the first symptom showed up. I have no idea if he had any of the other symptoms, i.e his arm or half of his face going numb, if he had nausea (he never actualy threw up, but his stomach could have been bothering him), if he got the headache, an aura, if he felt depressed, weakness, or anything else. If he is truly starting to get migraines he could have an attack at anytime he could not show symptoms for months or even years again. I am now keeping a journal and if I suspect any of the symptoms I can write down everything before his first symptom showed up to see if any one thing is triggering it.
Two days later while in the car he began screaming when I had the radio on and he would only stop if I turned it off. I am assuming he had some sort of headache if not the actual migraine headache. He has since seemed to be fine. In the mornings he seems to have a sight sensitivity to light, but I think that mostly has to do with being in the dark and then having a bright light on.
I am hoping and praying that this was just some weird occurrence and doesn't happen again or that it isn't something worse than migraines.