MckMama Giveaway!!

I love reading MckMama's blog! She writes about everything, is funny, honest and I love her tips on photography (she takes beautiful pictures!!)

She now has a page for all of her giveaways, so head on over for a chance to win an awesome Kelly Moore camera bag. This bag can also be used as a diaper bag, book bag or a laptop bag - pretty much whatever you want it to be!!! So hurry over and get yourself entered for a chance to win! Here is the link:

http://mckgiveaways.blogspot.com/2010/02/kelly-moore-camera-bag-giveaway.html

Getting by...

Wow....let me just tell you this is going to be the longest 5 weeks of my life. I knew it was not going to be easy having my jaw wired shut by I NEVER imagined it was going to be THIS hard. I am such a picky eater to begin with so with this there are about 3 foods that we can actually get liquified to go through the syringe that actually taste good enough that I will eat. Now I can still do shakes and carnation drinks and juices but I am not much of a "sugar" person to begin with and this is overload in its finest so I have to do this in moderation and its hard when I don't have much to choose from. And the weight loss, well I am trying to watch it, it has been about a week and a half since my surgery and I am already down about 7 lbs...not good for me so I try to make sure I am drinking plenty of water and staying hydrated, this is really hard!

Now the other hard parts of this are I still have some swelling and numbness, not much but just enough to bother me. Yesterday I felt pretty good but this morning I woke up swollen and feel awful, I will be heading home 1/2 day today from work to get some rest and apply some ice to the swelling again. Also the "good side" of my mouth which is the right side doesn't understand all this trauma and it tries to "jerk" open and it is the MOST painful feeling in the whole world, almost brings me to tears sometimes. They say this is a normal reaction to my mouth just wanting to open like normal. So its really hard to get it to just relax. And the metal brackets they used to wire this bad boy shut - oh my...they are SHARP! I have some wax on there but have to be careful not to put to much then I can't talk, not that I do that very well to begin with so I just try to make sure I have a full tube for chapstick with me at all times!!! I just say my prayers that the Lord is going to carry me through this because I know I need his strength to get through it.

I go back to the oral surgeon tomorrow for my post-op appointment, I am curious to see what he has to say. Please keep me in you prayers, I need all I can get to help me over the next several weeks!!!

On another note, baby boy turned 9 months old on 5th of this month...where has the time gone. He has been one busy busy boy. I will get a post on him up soon...maybe a picture or 2 as well, but I will take them down soon so you will have to pay attention to when I post about him!!

Okay, off to do some work before I head out for the day for some rest. Hope everyone is staying warm, we just got several inches of snow and are looking to get more this weekend!! Come one SPRING!!!

Surgery

Well, I had my surgery on Monday. It went good, but I am so swollen and sore. I have to eat through a syringe for about 5 weeks at least and then hopefully soft foods after that. My lips look like they have went through the meat grinder and are really sore but hopefully nothing a bunch of chapstix can't cure!! Talking is pretty hard and something I am trying to get used to, so for now I try not to do alot of it! The hardest part for me is that I am on a weight life restriction, nothing over 10 lbs, which means I can't lift my son!!! So I have to have alot more help than what we initially realized I would need, I am so thankful for family and friends! Now my son this hasn't seemed to phase and I am so glad, but he doesn't understand when I can't pick him up and he does get frustrated with that, other than that I just sit on the floor and play with him and I can do everything else I just have to have someone pick him up and put him where I need him to go!

Okay, off to try and get some more nutrition in me, that is hard to do too because I can eat just a little bit before I feel full, but I have to be careful not to get dehydrated! And onto more pain meds...ahhh! Tomorrow is a new day, hopefully some more of the swelling has gone down, seems to be each day so that is good, said that should peak in a few days and be gone so I sure hope so!

Colts are Superbowl Bound!!

Awesome game tonight!!! So proud of our Colts!!! Can't wait for the Superbowl...now just waiting to see who we are going to play!!! Its a toss up... I would like to see the Vikings win because I would like to see Brett Favre be in the Superbowl....I know I know....but then my husband would like to see the Saints win because Drew Brees is from Purdue......only time will tell!

GO COLTS!!!!!

TMD Surgery

Well, I got the wonderful news about a month ago (Dec. 4th) that I have to have jaw surgery - boo! Now the day I was in there I told them to go ahead and send the letter to my insurance so that we could get the pre-approval for my surgery so we could get it scheduled hopefully before the end of 2009. Now let me just fill you in on a few things: (1) I am in SO much pain that I can barely open my mouth to get a spoon in it; (2) my mouth often "pops" and feels like bones breaking or cracks - NOT a good feeling at all; (3) my insurance deductible was met for 2009 therefore my surgery would have been covered at 100% - did I mention it would be covered at 100%; (4) my surgery is going to cost $25,000 - WHAT!!, yes I have insurance, but still, $25,000!!!; (5) we are paying back our adoption loan, so we really don't have extra to pay for a surgery too!

Now I started calling my dentist exactly 1 week after being in there office, so the first call was on Dec. 11th. She said "oh, no its only been a week, way to early to know anything." Well to make a long story short we finally got the insurance everything the needed by December 23rd. I call the insurance to see when they might approve this hoping to maybe have my surgery done the last week in December! I get this extrememly RUDE woman who informed my by law they have 15 days from the time they last receive the informatio they need to approve it. I go on to inform her that I can barely open my mouth let alone hardly even eat solid foods and I can't start my liquid/soft food diet now because I am going to be on it the way it is for 2 months after my surgery! AGAIN, she tells me by law they have 15 days. Well lets just say its a good thing she was on the other side of the phone, I have never been so mad in my life!!!

So here we are now almost 2 weeks in the new year and my dentist just called yesterday to say they FINALLY oked my surgery! BUT there is good news and bad news, they approved part of it and denied part of it - ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME! So now we are not only going to have to pay our portion of the surgery after insurance pays their part but now we have to pay for the brackets in full and she is guessing they are going to be about $1500.00 - yeah not sure where this money is coming from..... And they were originally going to try and schedule it for Jan. 18th and now they can't get me in until Jan. 25th - this is went from bad to worse!!! All I want is to feel better and to be able to open my mouth without any pain!!

And to top it all off I am SO stressed out about the surgery in the first place I just want it all be over! Then all this has just sent me over the top! The risks are pretty scary for this surgery: (1) you have several tiny nerves in the area they will be working in and there is a high likelihood they could be severed and if they are I could loose feeling in my tongue and lower chin forever - this is VERY scary to me, but my pain is so great that I have to have the surgery done and (2) there is an 80% chance of the surgery working, I thought this was a good success rate and again with my pain I have to try it. My only other option is pain managment and I refuse to be on meds for the rest of my life!

So there you have it.... bottom line - I am really scared to have this surgery done (and I have had several surgeries in the past). So prayers would be appreciated! Okay, off to do something productive....

7 & 8 months oh my....

My baby boy is growing so fast! We have been so busy with him I totally missed posting about his 7 months....with Thanksgiving and Christmas thrown in there we just ran out of time! Here are the many new things he is up to these days:

• started army crawling the middle of November
• started to get the first feelings of an upper tooth towards the end of November (still is not through yet)
• at the beginning of December he was up on all four rocking back and forth not really sure what to do or where to go from there so back to army crawling
• he now pulls up on everything he can get ahold of, started that about the middle of December, what is scary is that he thinks he is so cool standing up but he doesn't realize that he has to keep holding on....so mommy is right there just to make sure there are no major incidents!
• he has now decided that sleeping through the night is really not his thing, he likes to get up at different times and you can't sooth him with his paci or anything, its best just to let him cry it out (which usually doesn't last long, if it does I know he is hungry so he gets a bottle, he has been going through a growth spurt this last week and a half so he is getting oatmeal before bed to see if that helps...only time will tell!)
• he has also decided that when he wakes up in the middle of the night that he is not going to lay back down for us, nope he is going it sit up and cry or pull himself up and stand and cry, its the funniest/cutest thing to see - not that he is crying but that he is sitting up and standing up in his crib now - he is getting to be such a big boy!
• as of about a week ago is almost fully crawling now unless he wants something immediately or trying to get away from us then he will army crawl because he is still faster at this - its so funny and he just laughs when he is trying to get away from us!
• he LOVES to try and get to the dog, there is a gate between the livingroom and kitchen and he pulls himself up so he can stand up, everything is about standing up these days and reach through and try and grab her, she just jumps back so he can't reach her, she wants nothing to do with that!

He has changed so much over the last 2 months its crazy, where has my baby boy gone!!! I love seeing all the new things he is learning but I also miss that ity bity baby too! I am now making all of his vegetables that he eats, they are so easy to make. He still doesn't do well keeping the orange veggies or fruits down so I try to limit those or mix them with something else. He loves to eat everything you put in front of him, no problems there, its just that there must be something in the orange foods that just don't agree with his tummy yet. He is also now eating puffs and he LOVES them and he drinks from a sippy cup, which is fun to watch him learn that too!

Christmas was awesome! He was only interested in helping try and open about the first 3 presents after that he just wanted to play with whatever was in front of him or see what his 3 cousins were up to. But the best part of it was just having him there with all of our family, I have dreamed of that day for so many years. It was also so fun to see my nieces help him with all his presents, they are all so good with him. New Years Eve was alot of fun too. We always go to my brothers. I tried to get him to take a nap early in the evening, well it was a short nap so I figured there was no way he would last very long into the night.....boy was I wrong! Baby boy rang in the new year with us...he was attempted to go to sleep around 10 pm but not 5 minutes after I left the room he was wide awake and never went back to sleep after that! He was having so much fun playing with his cousins and he loved all the noise makers and he finally crashed at 12:30 - he didn't want to miss anything!

I am excited to see what this month brings with baby boy. He is trying to say a few things, every once in awhile he will say bye-bye and hi, but nothing concrete so far, I am still working on mama but no luck yet!!! I just signed us up for swimming lessons that start the end of this month so I am looking forward to that should be fun since he loves bathtime!

Well I am exhausted since last night was the first night we have slept through the night in a week and a half...hoping for another good night tonight! I am off to relax on the couch, hoping something good is on tv!

Blessings to everyone!

Update Coming and some changes...

Well once again life has taken over and I have lots to update, but for once I am glad I am late on updating. I have alot weighing on my mind due to the recent negativing many have been receiving on their blogs in reference to anti-adoption and those people leaving very nasty comments. I have never searched out any of these blogs and I don't intend to start now.

What I need to worry about is my family and what I feel comfortable posting now that I know there are others out there violating mine and others rights to post our feelings, journeys and experinces, just as they are and not feel attacked or violated in any manner. As you can see I have deleted all pictures of baby boy and will not post any from here on out. I also don't feel comfortable going private as I know of one person whose private blog has been attacked, so as much as I want you to see him grow and learn new things it will have to be express solely through writing.

I have thought about switching to wordpress...anyone have any experience with it and if so can you give me some feedback on it?

Okay Baby boy's 7th and 8th month updates will be coming soon along with Christmas...I am so behind, but he is keeping me very busy these days!