Monday, November 18, 2013

Everyone has rough times.

Let me preface this post by saying, I am overly sensitive and take things very personally. Even if it wasn't directed towards me, I feel like I need to say something.

I have had a rough week. Is it the worst week any person has ever had? No. 

My children were having a rough week and misbehaving and it was overwhelming, does it mean that I don't love them to death? No.

I lost my wallet and have had to start from scratch getting things back in order, is it the worst thing that has ever happened to me? No. 

Just because I have had a rough week and have vented about it, doesn't mean I don't appreciate what I have. Everyone has tough times, some have tougher times than others, but to judge or compare and say they don't know what tough is, is in my opinion BS. I have been through so much with Addi's health, sat by her bedside in the NICU not knowing if she was going to survive the night, I know what tough is and believe me that still isn't close to what others have gone through, there is always something tougher. I am not usually one to "complain", I have an awesome family and amazing friends and I feel I am so lucky and I thank God every day for that. So don't think for one second because I am venting about a rough week that I don't know that. I really wish that people would stop judging others and just be understanding that while it may not be the worse thing you personally have gone through and it seems trivial to you, people are allowed to talk about it. It's completely fake to go on and on about how perfect your life is, it's just not reality. So get off your high horse and have a little compassion as other would for you if you were having a rough time, and know that just because someone is having a rough go of things and expresses that, it doesn't mean they appreciate things any less than you do.

This day and age I feel like you can't say much without someone picking it apart. You know when someone asks you while you are pregnant what you are hoping for, and everyone gives the beauty queen answer, "I'm just hoping for a healthy baby", (umm is that not a given?) because we are so afraid of being judged if we have a preference, afraid of looking selfish (hello, do you not know how many women out there would kill to have a baby, any baby and you are sitting here hoping for a certain sex?) We can't even honestly answer because of something, somewhere that someone (whom we don't even know) might be going through. I say this being a person that struggled with fertility for a long time. I was so happy to be pregnant but I still had hopes of what the sex might be, it's only natural. I was talking to my friend on the phone today and she was talking about how hard this stage with her kids has been, and she said "I love them but..." It's like we have to say a positive thing before we can vent so that we won't be judged for feeling the way we do. What happened to Mama's supporting each other. We are all trying our best. and you know what? Sometimes it's not all rainbows and butterfly's, sometimes its really hard. I guess we should just keep that inside though, so that no one will think we don't appreciate life or what we have. It's just craziness if you ask me. If a friend were to call you to vent about their lives, would you tell them that their petty problems aren't important and to call you back once they have more valid complaints, I surely hope not. You definitely wouldn't be a friend worth having if that were the case.

My point is, that just because you are going through a tough time and you feel it is tougher than what someone else is going through it doesn't make their problems any less valid. 

Alright, I am done. I usually just leave things alone and am not very feisty but I just can't put up with anymore crap right now. 

Thursday, November 14, 2013

Have you ever? (warning venting post)

Have you ever had one of those days where everything that could go wrong, does? Well that has been my WHOLE week thus far. I am running low on patience, energy, brain power, on pretty much everything. It got so bad today when I realized we were going to miss karate, which I had very much been looking forward to seeing Aubrey do (she was beyond excited about it). I called Greg crying about how I just can't do it anymore. I feel like I am trying so hard and nothing is going right.

I have been trying to get to the grocery store for FOUR days. How is it possible that I have not been able to make it? We have NO food at home right now, its ridiculous. The only thing we have any of is milk, I kid you not. We are busy but really are we THAT busy? We finally made it to Target today just to pick up stuff to make a quick dinner tonight and to get dresses for the girls, for family pictures this weekend. I already knew exactly which ones. I was just running in because we had to be at karate. Lets just say I didn't have a single happy camper while we were there. Then I get to check out and the dresses that were on sale, did NOT ring up on sale. So I told the cashier nicely and she got so rude and told me I was wrong. I stood my ground (of course with my kids crying, fighting, and screaming the. entire. time.), and it cost me 20 minutes. 20 minutes I did not have. I got my $14 dollars though, so wooptie-doo.

Just a few other fun things that have happened just today alone (the rest of the week was just as bad but like I said I am running low on brain power), broke my favorite large hurricane candle holder into a million pieces, spilled rice all over my floor (not sure if you have ever tried sweeping up a bunch of sticky rice, not fun.), lost Addi's shoe while leaving target, she was flailing around while I was holding her hand refusing to put her feet on the ground (I of course realized it after I got two of the kids in their car seats), went to the garage to unsuccessfully hunt down my extra hair straightener for this weekends pics (left mine in Melbourne) and when I came back my couch was COVERED in blue crayon which made me almost late picking up Aubrey from school (and I like to be early), hit Aubrey's head on the car door while she was trying to get in the car (accidentally, of course) a meltdown ensued, Aubrey kept saying "Oh my GOD" over and over again (which she knows upsets me) and I asked her repeatedly not to say, and she just gave me attitude and told me she can say what she wants to say and I needed to just leave her alone (oh and her newest thing is telling me "that's not fair at all" and that "I don't know nuffin" if I try to ask her questions, both with full on attitude. She said she learned it from a friend from school, fun stuff.). I guess the hardest thing about this week is on top of my two oldest not behaving Greyson has been a grump, and is throwing major tantrums. I can deal with one or two kids misbehaving or being cranky but to have all three at the same time, its just TOO much. I love my kids more than anything but sometime it's really overwhelming.

I need a break.

Monday, November 11, 2013

Speech Going Down Down Down Downnnnn...

So you know how I posted about Addi's speech taking off. Well it really did, the first two days after surgery she was talking great. Then on Saturday she was acting off all day and not talking much or clearly. I was just so confused. I kept calling her Zombi Addi. She was just out of it. I took her temp that night, she hadn't felt warm to me all day, but I just couldn't figure out what was going on. She ended up having a high temp, so we called the doctor and they said to watch it. The next day her temp was not as high, but still not normal and she is sooooo mucusy. It sounds like it is all in her throat and she seems to be having a tough time sleeping because of it. Today she hasn't been any better, her words that before surgery were fairly clear are barley coming out. She isn't herself at all. Its so weird because you would of thought the hard days would of been right after surgery, but nope. They said she'd get stuffy and have mucus but I didn't know it'd be this bad.

Friday, November 8, 2013

Speech Taking Off!

We have a house full of chatterboxes now. Addi is going crazy with talking. The songs she used to sing that were just the tune but mostly garbled together words, are now actual words... and she knows them all! We ran into her speech therapist today at Target, and she was blown away with the clarity of her talking! It has only been two and a half days since surgery and there is already huge improvement. I'm so excited and I just can't hide it! Yes I am singing and doing a little happy dance!

Mr. Gman he has been working on his ABC's, and can get up to F. Not super clearly but he is working on it NON-STOP! He has also been saying Chugga (for choo-choo soul, all my kids are obsessed), and night-night (he actually asked to go night-night, pointed me to his bedroom and then to his crib, and within minutes was fast asleep), He says yeah and is very clear about what he wants and doesn't want. I'm not going to have a little baby for much longer. Kind of sad, but really loving him communicating so well!

So to top it off we have Aubrey, the original chatterbox! Man that girl loves to talk and sing! I love every second of it, even when she has "questions?" to try to prolong bedtime.

So yep, things are looking up in the Moore household, lots of communication going on!

Thursday, November 7, 2013

Our Amazing Fighter.

This surgery was not by any means the scariest surgery Addi has every had, actually no where close. That of course didn't keep me from stressing about it constantly and losing sleep over it. The scarier part of this surgery was what the Doctor might find when he got in there. If you have read my other posts then you know that there was talk of reconstruction and further surgeries. Going in, I was under the impression that those future surgeries would be happening immediately, if not immediately then fairly soon. So I was much more scared of finding out what the results of this surgery were, more than even the surgery itself. Although any surgery is scary in my opinion.

We found out beforehand that Addi's doctor had taken into account how taking the adenoids out would affect her speech. He decided to only take the top half out and leave the bottom. So now we don't have to worry about her speech becoming worse, but still have hope of it improving. Great news, right?!

When the doctor came out after the surgery, he started showing us pictures of inside her throat and drawing pictures to help us understand. Her airway is narrowing in spots, one spot in particular is really narrow. It looks like because of everything that is happening in her nasal area it is affecting everything below. It has caused her airway to be weak which is allowing it to be pushed in by outside factors (not really sure if its muscle or bone or what is pushing in on it, I was a little overwhelmed at the time that I don't think I could of even formed the question to ask what was possibly pushing in on it). I was sitting there silently freaking out. I swore the doctor was going to tell me that he was going to have to cut open her throat and fix this. I stayed as calm as I could on the outside, and kept listening. He was going on and on about it, and finally after what seemed like an hour, he said that he wasn't going to do anything about surgical about it yet. He instead wants to focus on getting her breathing through her nose, which this surgery should help and also they have some other "tricks up their sleeves" to help her along. He feels that once she gets breathing better her airway will strengthen and hopefully fix itself. She will need more surgery in the future, but not in the near future. Which was SO relieving to hear. He went on to say that she is so young and he feels she has already been through enough and doesn't want to do anything else surgical until it is absolutely necessary, and after she grows more we can see what just might happen to be something she grows into/out of. So for now they are keeping a close eye on her breathing, to make sure the narrowing doesn't get worse and to try to improve her nasal breathing.

I know this probably doesn't sound like fantastic news, but to me it was better than I had ever hoped for. My baby can focus on being a baby and not have to go through more surgerys for a while. To me, that is a win! I am just hoping and praying she grows out of all of this and that all this worrying was for nothing.

So besides all that, the surgery itself went well. Addi was in a good bit of pain afterwards, which was so hard to watch. She kept saying "I sooo sad", and asking "what you doing?" and fighting every nurse that tried to touch her. She ripped her IV out, so we really had to force drinking on her more than we would like to. It breaks my heart to see her like that especially since she is normally so spunky and crazy. Sad Addi is so much worse than Angry Addi, which might I say it pretty bad. Addi does everything 100%. So when she is happy, she is super happy. When she is angry, she is extremely angry. When she is sad, she is intensely sad, she is pretty much the saddest child you will ever see.

On the way to the hospital:


Before Surgery:
 After surgery:


She is such a fighter, it is amazing how resilient she is. She seriously is always amazing me.

These past few days have been hard, but we are lucky that we had so much support while going through this all. I can't even begin to thank everyone for their support. We are truly blessed to have such awesome family and friends in our lives. I really don't know how I would of gotten though all Addi's surgeries without everyone. Without, my parents dropping everything to help us out every. single. time. (I can't even begin to tell you how amazing they are.) Without Greg's Mom getting her whole church to pray for Addi each time, and coming up to be with us during her heart surgery. Without family and friends making meals, thinking and praying for Addi, checking in on us, and just lending an ear for us/me to vent to. JUST AMAZING! Every little bit of support means the world to us. Thank you ALL from the bottom of our hearts.

Monday, November 4, 2013

Never-ending.

Today was a tough day. We met with Addi's pediatrician and went over everything with him. Asked him all the questions I have been compiling in my mind for the past few weeks after finding out suddenly that Addi had so many more problems than we had thought. I was so overwhelmed the day we got the news that I didn't even get to wrap my head around it enough to ask any real questions. So finally getting to ask them was nice, but after getting the answers I am pretty sure I really didn't want to know the answers.

It seems like this is going to be a long process, and that it may entail reconstructive surgery in her future and we found out that taking out her adenoids might not help with her speech, it might actually make it worse. It will help with her breathing though. Which I am thankful for but I am just really sad to know that her speech could get worse. We have been working so hard on her speech, and come so far that being able to understand her less than we already do is going to be hard to swallow. Over the past few weeks (since they took the earwax out allowing her to hear out of her good ear) her speech has taken off like crazy! It is still very nasally but we can actually understand a lot more of what she is saying, and she is saying a TON of sentences! I am now worried we are going to be taking a huge step back.

I told my doctor it seems like this will be never-ending and he told me it pretty much would be (in nicer terms of course). It seems like she might always have speech problems. I am not sure if he is trying to make sure I am not getting my hopes up to high, or just being realistic. I do get overly hopeful about things, and by now I think he knows that. Thank goodness for him though, he is always so honest with us and straightforward and he has such a soft spot for Addi. He loves her spunk and how resilient she is. She always shocks all the doctors with her fight and how quickly she bounces back from things. I just pray that as she gets older that it stays that way. I really hope she doesn't remember any of this because I know that watching my baby moaning in pain after her last surgery was so traumatic for me that I can't even imagine how traumatic this all is for her or will be for her in the future. I asked the doctor for reassurance that this recovery wouldn't be as bad as her cleft surgery, and he told me that the cleft surgery is one of the most painful surgeries there is, that it is even much more painful then childbirth. Can you even imagine? Thank goodness we are past that surgery already, and I just hope to God that when they do the bronchoscopy and laryngoscopy that they don't find any more issues with her cleft.

I know this is a totally uninteresting post, this post is mostly just to get my thoughts out because I am going insane thinking and worrying about everything. Please if you are still reading this, just keep my baby girl in your thoughts and prayers. I am dreading these next few days and I know they are going to be way worse for her, especially since she doesn't even see it coming. It just breaks my heart.


Friday, November 1, 2013

Halloween!

Halloween isn't one of my favorite holidays. As a person that stresses easily, figuring out costumes, getting kids ready, and having enough candy for trick-or-treaters isn't on the top of my fun list. Once I am out watching the kids have a blast I feel it is totally worth it but leading up to that I kind of dread it all.

I love seeing all the homemade costumes, people come up with the cutest ideas. I wonder if I will ever be one of those people who make a costume. Growing up we made EVERY single costume. We were never allowed to just go pick out a store bought costume and on top of that my Mom couldn't sew. So we were a very crafty family and we had a blast figuring out costumes, but I couldn't help but yearn for a store bought costume. It's sad because I can sew, and I am crafty. Maybe once I am not so tired from chasing three little ones around... 

So here they are my cuties in their store bought costumes...

 They make anything look good! :)

Glad that's over, now we can focus on my favorite holiday... Thanksgiving!!! (You had to know that was my favorite... a whole holiday centered around food, family, and being thankful. Can't get much better than that!!)