Mommin' It Up!

May 30, 2014

Rough Week

Forgive me if this is not all that coherent – I am not operating on all cylinders at the moment. But here’s the story…

In January 2012 I wrote a post about how Kate had been randomly vomiting since the December before. Months of tests and MRIs and all kinds of stuff led us to find out that she had Rotovirus, and it was taking her system a long time to rid itself of the bug. But, it was a diagnosis, and we thought we would eventually see the end of it.

Two years later, we haven’t really seen the end.

It’s weird. It doesn’t happen with any regularity, but I’d estimate that about once every 4-6 weeks Kate has a bout of vomiting and/or other digestive issues. Typically, she’s sick once and then fine (which makes me REALLY PLEASED to have to take a day off work). A few weeks ago, though, she had an episode that lasted about four days, and we found ourselves back in the GI department at Cincinnati Children’s.

Initial blood and, um, other tests showed that something was off. She has inflammation of some sort in her intestines, but those tests weren’t enough for a diagnosis, so Wednesday (my 35th birthday, coincidentally) we headed back to Children’s for an upper and lower endoscopy.

I’m not sure which was more fun – Wednesday, the day of the actual procedure, or Tuesday, the day of preparation for the procedure.

Those of you who have been through such things know what I’m talking about.

It was really not fun for any of us, but overall Kate was a champ. She handled 36 hours of a liquid diet much better than I had anticipated. (I agreed to do it with her in solidarity, but you’d better believe I hit the vending machine for some M&Ms as soon as we got into the waiting room.)

The worst part – for Andy and me anyway – was watching her be sedated. I had a long list of things to worry about going into that day, and the moment of sedation wasn’t one of them. I was caught off guard by how disturbing that sight was.

Fortunately, everything they were able to see through the scope looked good. They didn’t see evidence of Crohn’s or ulcerative colitis or any of the other chronic conditions her blood tests indicated were possibilities – huge relief. But, we don’t know what it is yet. They took some samples to biopsy, and they’re running another test for a bacterial infection; hopefully one of those things will turn into a diagnosis of some sort so we can figure out what the heck this is and get it fixed.

I know this is a minor issue in the grand scheme of things, but I still hate to see my baby sick.

May 28, 2014

Dealing with Carsickness

This post is sponsored by CVS ExtraCare. All opinions are my own, as is my big love for CVS.
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Over spring break, we took a short trip to Nashville. Everything was going along swimmingly, until the wee hours of the morning on the day we were to leave to go home.

I awoke to the sound no parent wants to hear (but we are all far too familiar with) – vomiting.

It was Kate, and I thought we were totally in for it. We had a five hour drive in front of us… and, if there’s anything worse than puke, it’s puke in a car. I wanted to avoid that situation if at all possible, or – at the very least – be prepared when it did happen.

So I spend the last few hours of our trip on The Google, searching for cures for carsickness.

To spare you the pain of searching for them yourselves, I thought I’d conglomerate them all here.

Thank God we were in a civilized area with a few CVS stores nearby – not only is CVS my go-to place for what we need in every day life and our family’s medications – it’s also a great place to get everything you need when you have an unexpected detour on your spring break trip! Happily I was able to get all the things that Dr. Google told me I needed for Kate at a nearby CVS.

First up – Children’s Emetrol. Children’s Emetrol–the first anti-nausea medication formulated for children ages 2 to 12–relieves childrens’ nausea by calming the stomach, not coating. This is what’s known as cola syrup – it’s basically coke without the fizz. Remember when your grandma used to tell you to drink flat coke when you were sick? Yeah, same deal. It’s made with cane sugar, and it doesn’t have any crazy ingredients. It just calms the stomach.

Next – Nauzene. NAUZENE features a specially buffered formula that helps calm and control upset stomach discomfort, including discomfort from overindulgence in food and drink. Because I wasn’t taking any chances, I got another anti-nausea medicine. Nauzene is chewable, and Kate didn’t give me any trouble when I asked her to take it. And, evidently it’s also a hangover cure. {filing that one away…}

Finally, Sea Bands. Sea-Band is a knitted elasticated wrist band, which operates by applying pressure on the Nei Kuan acupressure point on each wrist by means of a plastic stud. I had always heard of these, but had never tried them – but they sounded worth a shot.

So, as a farewell to Nashville, I hit up CVS and dropped $50 on those three concoctions (as well as paper towels, plastic trash bags, and baby wipes). While it wasn’t an expense I was planning for, I took solace in the fact that I got 2 percent back in ExtraBucks Rewards! (Do you know that’s what they’re REALLY called? NOT ECBs like Jenny likes to call them – they are called ExtraBucks Rewards. It gives me great pleasure to know that I know something about CVS that Jenny apparently does NOT.) I’m sure Jenny could have whipped up some coupons in addition, but I was pretty desperate. No time to hit the hotel business center and install the coupon printers on their computers before we left town. But anyway, the expense wasn’t really a huge concern, because not having vomit in my car? PRICELESS.

We made it back to Ohio without incident, amazingly. I’m not sure if these things did the trick or if we just got lucky, but whatever it was, I’ll take it. And the next time, I will know exactly what to grab at CVS for such an occasion!

Have you ever had a kid get sick on a family vacation or in the car? How did you deal with it?

May 20, 2014May 19, 2014

Two weeks in.

So. Today marks two weeks since I’ve been wearing this monstrosity.

And I’ve got to say – it’s worse than I thought.

Aunt Diane, you’ve seen me in person – it’s worse than you thought, too. Am I right?

It hurt like crazy for the first week. I had sores all over my gums, my tongue was cut to pieces, it was just awful. It has gotten better pain-wise. Quite a bit, in fact. But I’ve still gotten up in the middle of the night the last two nights to take it out.

The worst thing, though, is that I can’t talk. Again, that’s gotten better, but I still talk like I’ve got a giant wad of plastic and metal in my mouth. Because I DO. It’s pretty embarrassing.

And speaking of embarrassing, there’s also the way it looks. Which is awful. It looks like I’ve got a giant wad of plastic and metal in my mouth. Oh wait.

In the grand scheme of things, this is not a big deal. It’s a short-term problem, and theoretically it’ll be better in the long run.

And, for what it’s worth, I went to the gym on Friday and I actually think this ridiculous thing helped me breathe better. Who knows. I may become a runner yet.

But I doubt it.