Emotional Week

Chocolate Gravy mess

It has been an emotional week for me. I have assumed for a while now that Brian had issues with his eye sight. Primarily his colors. Wednesday that was put to the test when we were faced with the strong possibility that he is color blind.

I started my first call to the eye doctor. They cannot test him fully until he can recognize his numbers. My next call was with his school, his teacher said, ' my assistant and I have been concerned and watching this aspect for some time now, he does not know how to respond when we give instructions leading to color chairs, circles or anything with color, he mainly looks confused. He pretty much relates to everything being black or sometimes blue.' I spoke with his occupational therapist, which has been seeing him since he was 6 months old, she had the same fears. With her, he always shied away from or rebelled against anything dealing with colors.

Shane and I are still going to work with him on his colors, as we would Bralee and Joseph, which mind you know every color in the book, but practice makes perfect. This just answered a lot more of our lingering questions as to why Brian would/will pretty much never even look at a TV and until just recently look at a computer.

All this took place Wednesday before Shane left for work. I was pretty emotional before he left. Because with all this on my plate I knew when I woke up the next day it would be Thursday and I had to take Brian back to the Ear, Nose and Throat doctor over his ears/hearing.

So Thursday afternoon, we meet up with who else, but Nana. She takes Bralee and Joseph to Tyson Park to play. After I unlock them from the car. Yes, I got all the way up to the dr. office and had locked them in the car and Nana out of the car.

Their were no changes in his hearing. He has no activity in his right ear. He tested just a little below normal on the overall hearing test in the sound booth. Bottom line, he is right ear deaf.

Setting Examples

Lately Shane and I have been exercising every day except for Sundays. It is funny the kids come in and out of the room during our 60 to 90 minute workouts and join in, or just sit and watch for a bit.

We have cut out all junk food, except for Cheetos of course (the messiest snack). Now Brian and Bralee eagerly reach for fruit and carrots. We no longer even have soda or caffeine in our household anymore. All we have to offer a stray guest is water, milk, or juice. Shane and I, each drink about a gallon of water daily. The kids primarily drink milk and very little water. I hope to increase their water or juice intake this summer, mainly their water.

We have also started implementing prayer at every meal, regardless of where we are. It is nice to hear them say to one another: "hand, hand, pray please!" They sit and bow their heads, close their eyes, and even repeat what pray is being spoken. We have not started the prayer at bedtime yet, as bedtime is me doing it solo and can get VERRRRY crazy. We are hoping and praying that Shane gets to 1st shift soon, then we can be NORMAL.

Spring in the air

It is finally here...the sun and the warmth that goes with it.

The kids are doing great. We had a great time while Shane was away. Yes, we missed him, but it was a great way for me to realize I am a strong mother. I can handle and do more than what I put myself out for. I was able to keep up with all their stuff, house work and cooking. I would just wake every morning and tell myself, 'it is going to be a GREAT day!' In the midst of all this I have been doing 60 to 90 minute/day, 6 days a week workouts, whewwwww.

I am ready to take the kids outside. Get their parking garage out of my house and put it back in the yard...all their riding toys, balls, and other outside toys, well, they just need to be outside again.

Bye Daddy

Brian always knows when something is different or changing. He managed to camp out with us on Sunday/Monday morning, keeping Shane and I both awake for the most part. Shane was scheduled to leave back out for Alabama Monday at 4am. Brian was sure to see his daddy off, then he went into a hard sleep. Once I woke him at 7:40, he made a mad dash for the front door asking for his daddy. I informed him that Daddy was gone to work and would not be back until Friday...I am sure I will be repeating this A LOT!

After dropping them off at school, grocery shopping, and running by the bank; I finally made it back home to the sound of running water in the bathroom. Uh oh! The toilet was running, not running over, thank goodness, but still running. I worked on in it the best "I" knew how with no avail. I decided to turn the water off and just think on it. After about an hour I went back to it and got it to working somehow. With me having gotten it back to working condition, I know it will have to be repaired once Shane gets back home, but at least we have a working toilet. Yes, we have 2 bathrooms, just 1 of them is STILL under construction, UUUGGHHH!

Minor Difficulties

Sorry for the absence. Our computer got sick. It is better now. The kids are doing great, though.

Joseph went to a Speech Pathologist yesterday, we will be continuing speech. She graded him with a mild to moderate delay. He is still only making 2 word sentences, with a lot of jibber/jabbering (jargon).

Yesterday all 3 had a visit to the Physiatry....Brian will continue with Occupational Therapy. He has to work on his focusing, aggression with other children, and self aggression. Bralee will be continuing with Occupational and Physical Therapy. She is still right side leg weak, which will be requiring a special booty. She is also still having texture and tactile issues with her hands. Joseph will be continuing with Speech and Occupational Therapy.

Monday I decided to take away all "lovies" (pacifiers, blankets, and pillows), they (we) are all having to get used to sleeping without them. It is hard, but harder in the middle of the night. They seem totally lost in the middle of the night without their "lovies".

Nana 2 the Rescue

I will start off by stating, I have no pics. Sorry. Shane and I have been ran ragged, I am not even completely sure as to the location of my camera.

Thankfully, Mom watched the kids Friday night. Shane and I were running on little sleep. You can guess it, we have been sick. Funny how a cough can disrupt a entire household. I ended up leaving Brian only, Saturday night as well. Shane and I were so tired, we could still hear Joseph jingling his blankie and sucking his fingers, feel Brian rustling in our bed, but they were not even at our house.

Today, I had a bad feeling about his breathing and decided to take him on in to the doctor. Good thing, he was retracting. They automatically gave him another breathing treatment. I had just given him one 2 hours prior. We are now on steroids, also. The kicker, they asked that we limit his activity....too funny. Brian goes at 99 mph, 99% of the time and even though he is sick it is no different. He was crackly and wheezing and still running full force.

The plus side to this. We are building up immunities!

Finally some SNOW

Loved this photo of Bralee

Good shot....show how much taller Brian is than the other 2!

Yeah, they like their BOOTS!

Joseph

Brian

Brian

I bundled her up...snug as a bug!

We finally got some snow. I went out, not really wanting to, but I tackled the grocery store that dreadful day. I was coming in the doors of the grocery store, as people were angrily exiting "there is no milk!" My first stop was the milk, forget bread, I do not want to hear 'milk, Mommy, milk' and not have anything in return to that request. We go through about 1 gallon per day. Guess what...sitting there on the milk shelves, was milk, may not have been the kind the, for mentioned wanted, but it was milk and in my house milk is MILK!

As I am getting a couple of other items, I was asked by someone, if I needed both gallons of milk? I sadly replied, yes. I was not purposely being greedy, but here in the valley of East TN you never know what the weather will throw your way!

The weather started off with sleet that turned into an ice layer. Then we got some beautiful "hard" not soft and fluffy snow on top of that, about 3 to 4 inches. Although, we needed a little bit more sleet and ice on top of that, as it melted a little.

This all started late Friday evening. Early Saturday morning (3 to 4am early) we were debating which hospital to take Bralee to safely. We ALWAYS use our local children's hospital, but the weather, combined with the roads was not ideal for commute. We decided to use the closest hospital to us, noting that we would not allow them to take extreme measures. If need be we would just have them transport her by ambulance to the children's hospital.

Crazily and luckily everything worked out for the best. I suppose the weather kept everyone at home. Shane was in and out of the ER in record time 1.5 hours. They were great for that episode.

We have a follow up with Pediatrician tomorrow. Crazily, we were more exhausted than she was. She still has terror episodes, but doing great. We allowed them about 20 minutes in the snow.