Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving with your families!
30 November 2010
Giving Thanks
It was just a quiet Thanksgiving here at our house this year. I cooked for the four of us but made enough food to feed 14 or more. The leftovers were good while they lasted! The kids watched a little bit of that big parade in NYC and decided to make up a marching band of their own. It was stinking cute watching them build instruments and then march around the house.
Around 2:30 after hours of cooking, we sat down to eat our delicious meal of turkey, dressing, potatoes, green bean casserole, rolls and homemade cranberry sauce. Not really trying to toot my own horn but I was proud of myself for making everything from scratch. Well, except for the rolls. I was not going to take time to do bread. I thank Pills.bury for doing the work there!
We spent the rest of the day watching football, talking to family on the phone and eating dessert. It was nice to spend our last Thanksgiving as a military family by ourselves. It's hard to believe that this time next year we will be back in Indiana having Thanksgiving with family there.
Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving with your families!
Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving with your families!
22 November 2010
Pain
I haven't been myself lately. It started about 3 months ago or so and has progressively gotten worse. I brushed it off at first and when it began to get worse, I chalked it up to the changing seasons. The weather was getting cooler and thought my stiffer joints was weather related and once I got acclimated to the cooler temps, I'd be OK. How wrong I have been. I'm still hurting and the pain is getting worse.
So let me rewind a little bit. A few weeks after we returned home from our 2 1/2 weeks in IN visiting with family, friends and Eriks attending camp I started to wake up with sore, stiff feet. At first I kind of thought maybe my plantar fasciitis was back since it hurt to walk. But the pain wasn't in the muscle(s) on the bottom sides of my feet where plantar fasciitis occurs. The pain was more in my toes, my ankles and the tops of my feet. After a week or so, the pain subsided so I thought it was gone, whatever it was. Then on random days I'd wake up again with stiff feet. Then I began to think that maybe I was positioning my feet in weird ways while I was sleeping. I am a rather awkward sleeper who puts herself in strange positions while I sleep because for me they're comfortable. Also after having my sternum cut in half twice to have heart surgery, finding positions that support my chest while I sleep have been key. It's amazing how not being able to put weight on a rib cage that has been wired shut when you sleep has you finding interesting and comfortable ways to sleep. I still can't sleep full on my chest it hurts and the wires are still wrapped around my sternum. It will take years and years for them to disintegrate. I actually use a small travel-size pillow to support my chest when I sleep.
Not long after that I started waking up with a stiff neck, shoulder and back pain. Luckily this has gone away for the most part so I'm not really sure they are correlated. However, there are days from time to time that I wake up with back & neck pain so severe it causes migraines. Luckily it's been a few weeks since the last time I had the back & neck pain.
Fast forward to 3 weeks or so ago. The foot pain has gotten worse. At the end of October or early November there was about 2-3 days straight where the pain was so intense in one of my feet that it was radiating up my leg to my knee and my hip. I was hobbling on it severely. Sleeping was nearly impossible and after 2 days of very little sleep, I just broke down. It got a bit better but in my left leg the pain is constant in my foot, ankle and knee. Sometimes my hip gets bothered. It varies from day to day. The right foot and ankle are sore but so far, no extensive radiating up the leg. When all this happened I also began noting pain in my hands when I woke up. It was stiffness and not easy to grasp my fingers into a fist. Well the stiffness in my hands has not gone away at all. I'm trying to spend less time on the computer but it seems as though almost everything I do requires me using my hands. Opening things with lids has become difficult. And of course my husband has to close everything tightly so there are times it's really difficult for me to open things. I'm finding when Lane is home, I'm handing off more and more for him to open. Why cause pain when I don't have to.
Since the pain has gotten worse and I'm realizing it's not going away, I finally called the doctor. Bad news is I can't get in until Dec 7th. So I have about 2 weeks until I can get seen. My best guess is that I've developed arthritis. But that's just a guess.
Being in pain really stinks. I don't think anyone, Lane included really knows how much I hurt. I've been hiding it. Unfortunately, the pain has caused me to become really impatient. Especially with the kiddos and I hate it. I don't want them to see that I hurt. I don't want them to see me wince as I go up and down the stairs. I'm really cursing the 2 story house we're renting because of the stairs and because the idiot who designed the floor plan made the stairs extremely steep. I've always cursed the steep stairs but even more so now.
When I have my answers, I'll post them. Just send lots of patience my way so I can get through the next few weeks.
So let me rewind a little bit. A few weeks after we returned home from our 2 1/2 weeks in IN visiting with family, friends and Eriks attending camp I started to wake up with sore, stiff feet. At first I kind of thought maybe my plantar fasciitis was back since it hurt to walk. But the pain wasn't in the muscle(s) on the bottom sides of my feet where plantar fasciitis occurs. The pain was more in my toes, my ankles and the tops of my feet. After a week or so, the pain subsided so I thought it was gone, whatever it was. Then on random days I'd wake up again with stiff feet. Then I began to think that maybe I was positioning my feet in weird ways while I was sleeping. I am a rather awkward sleeper who puts herself in strange positions while I sleep because for me they're comfortable. Also after having my sternum cut in half twice to have heart surgery, finding positions that support my chest while I sleep have been key. It's amazing how not being able to put weight on a rib cage that has been wired shut when you sleep has you finding interesting and comfortable ways to sleep. I still can't sleep full on my chest it hurts and the wires are still wrapped around my sternum. It will take years and years for them to disintegrate. I actually use a small travel-size pillow to support my chest when I sleep.
Not long after that I started waking up with a stiff neck, shoulder and back pain. Luckily this has gone away for the most part so I'm not really sure they are correlated. However, there are days from time to time that I wake up with back & neck pain so severe it causes migraines. Luckily it's been a few weeks since the last time I had the back & neck pain.
Fast forward to 3 weeks or so ago. The foot pain has gotten worse. At the end of October or early November there was about 2-3 days straight where the pain was so intense in one of my feet that it was radiating up my leg to my knee and my hip. I was hobbling on it severely. Sleeping was nearly impossible and after 2 days of very little sleep, I just broke down. It got a bit better but in my left leg the pain is constant in my foot, ankle and knee. Sometimes my hip gets bothered. It varies from day to day. The right foot and ankle are sore but so far, no extensive radiating up the leg. When all this happened I also began noting pain in my hands when I woke up. It was stiffness and not easy to grasp my fingers into a fist. Well the stiffness in my hands has not gone away at all. I'm trying to spend less time on the computer but it seems as though almost everything I do requires me using my hands. Opening things with lids has become difficult. And of course my husband has to close everything tightly so there are times it's really difficult for me to open things. I'm finding when Lane is home, I'm handing off more and more for him to open. Why cause pain when I don't have to.
Since the pain has gotten worse and I'm realizing it's not going away, I finally called the doctor. Bad news is I can't get in until Dec 7th. So I have about 2 weeks until I can get seen. My best guess is that I've developed arthritis. But that's just a guess.
Being in pain really stinks. I don't think anyone, Lane included really knows how much I hurt. I've been hiding it. Unfortunately, the pain has caused me to become really impatient. Especially with the kiddos and I hate it. I don't want them to see that I hurt. I don't want them to see me wince as I go up and down the stairs. I'm really cursing the 2 story house we're renting because of the stairs and because the idiot who designed the floor plan made the stairs extremely steep. I've always cursed the steep stairs but even more so now.
When I have my answers, I'll post them. Just send lots of patience my way so I can get through the next few weeks.
15 November 2010
Been a Few Weeks
Not much has happened within the past few weeks so that's why I've been MIA. The weather for early November has been glorious. Our temps have been in the low to mid 70's for the most part. Today however it's 55 and rainy. But I can't complain about the rain. We have a severe shortage of rain for the year. From what I know we're in the neighborhood of 8-10 inches behind in the precipitation department. The rain that will fall today and tomorrow is very, very welcome.
Emi is getting more into role playing. She's spending more time cooking at her kitchen, rocking her babies and playing with her dollhouse. It's so cute to see her cover up her babies and put her finger in front of her mouth in a shushing gesture. Then she makes the sign for sleep. Emi is also into everything! Her latest is she's gone onto our desktop computer and renamed a bunch of files that we now have to figure out what they are. The result is that our computer is now password protected so she can't just climb up, jump on and start clicking away. Never underestimate the intelligence of a 2 yr old. We didn't have this issue with Eriks so we didn't think Emi would cause trouble either. WRONG!
We have one really great piece of news to share. It involves this:
On Saturday, Lane received his acceptance letter for law school. He'll be starting next fall. We're moving back to Indiana next summer definitely now. We were about 95% sure but of course nothing was final until we got word that he got in. Now we're house hunting. Scary! After a 15 yr absence, I'm going home next June. It's definitely weird to know that we won't be moving every 3 yrs anymore. In the 40 some years Lane has been alive he will no longer be a nomad. He grew up a military brat and then joined after college. Even in college he was a nomad because he was in a work study program splitting his time between TX & NM. The kids, well at least Eriks because Emi doesn't quite understand yet, are excited. He's ready to be with his cousins and grandparents.
Can't believe Thanksgiving is next week. Emi's up from her nap. Time to go get her!
Emi is getting more into role playing. She's spending more time cooking at her kitchen, rocking her babies and playing with her dollhouse. It's so cute to see her cover up her babies and put her finger in front of her mouth in a shushing gesture. Then she makes the sign for sleep. Emi is also into everything! Her latest is she's gone onto our desktop computer and renamed a bunch of files that we now have to figure out what they are. The result is that our computer is now password protected so she can't just climb up, jump on and start clicking away. Never underestimate the intelligence of a 2 yr old. We didn't have this issue with Eriks so we didn't think Emi would cause trouble either. WRONG!
We have one really great piece of news to share. It involves this:
Can't believe Thanksgiving is next week. Emi's up from her nap. Time to go get her!
01 November 2010
Halloween 2010
Emi & Eriks had a blast this Halloween! Last year Emi was just about 20 months when she went trick or treating and really wasn't super sure. This year she started out slow and wasn't super sure what to do for the first 2-3 houses but caught on super quick. It was funny to watch her chase Eriks up to the door. No matter how much we told Eriks to slow down and wait for his sister he wasn't having any of it. So Lane had to go to the door with her. My mom came down this weekend so she stayed at our house passing out candy while we took the kids around the neighborhood. It was nice since it was the 1st time EVER we've both been out with our kids. Next year we'll be back in Indy and we'll be able to take the kids to my parents house for trick or treating.
Digging through her treats for more candy!
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