home sweet home

Cary came home from the hospital yesterday. After tons of testing, they think he just had something like the flu. But, this trip to the hospital (and the trip in Oct. 2005) has bought him a ticket to surgery. We knew that one day he would need valve replacement surgery. I think we were both hoping it would happen in about 40 years. He has been going to the doctor every 6 months to check his heart for any change. The original plan was that when they found a change in his heart, they would start seeing Cary every 3 months and start about a 1 year prep for the surgery. Now, the plan is to have the surgery sooner then later - maybe this year. Cary goes back to his regular cardiologist in 3 weeks. They will talk about a definite time line for the surgery.

So, during the last 2 weeks of my maternity leave I got a cold, I passed my cold to Nolan and Grace, Cary turned 33, Nolan turned 2, Nolan had his 2-year-old check up and his second birthday party, Grace went to the ER, Cary spent a few days in the hospital, and I found out that my husband will be having open heart surgery soon. I'm so done with this maternity leave!




Back to Grace and the ER. A couple of weeks ago (or was it just last week?) I went to my sister's house to go through the 2T boy clothes. (I have 2 sisters and 1 brother. We all have kids. When our kids outgrow clothes, we load them up and take them to my sister's house. When the next person needs clothes, they go through those clothes. This way no one needs to buy any new clothes for their kids. After Grace and my new nephew finish the clothes, we'll consign the clothes.) Just before we started going through the clothes we started talking about how Grace needed her fingernails cut (I'm sure you know where the story is going...). My sister offered to cut Grace's nails, so I handed her the nail clippers. Then there was a scream. My sister cut the tip of Grace's finger. Not a big deal, people do it all the time. So, why did I take her to the ER? Over 30 minutes after the cut, her tiny finger was still bleeding. I called my dr. She asked if I was close to the drs office. I was an hour away. She told me to go to the ER so a dr could be sure the cut didn't hit any tissue. We went to the ER. Everyone owwed and awwed over Grace. The dr saw her finger and decided it was just a superficial cut. When we got back, my niece asked me what happened at the hospital. I told her they had to cut Grace's finger off. (yes, I am mean. but it was funny!) I just laughed about the whole thing - I have 2 kids, I was bound to go to the ER at some point. Grace is all healed now. (but don't tell my sister, I want her to stay on the guilt trip and keep buying us things.)





Nolan is now 29 lbs, and 34 inches tall.
He now says bubble, balloon, booger, car, triangle, circle, square, papa, GG (grace - no idea why he says GG), twinkle, here, there you go, what's this, and lots of other things. He can sign rainbow (thanks to moo for loaning us a couple Signing TIme videos).
He is now a big danger to the cats.

I found him playing with my cell phone the other day. I thought it was ok. He had the camera on. At least I knew he wasn't going to have a 3 hour call to Japan, so I let him play. A couple of days later, I found about 5 pictures on my cell phone that looked like this:





I just put Grace down on her stomach. I looked back and she was on her back.
She is in the middle of a growth spurt right now. I hope she becomes a chubby baby. I heart chubby babies.



Everyone's asleep. Time for me to sleep!




Thanks for all your prayers and concerns for Cary!! We have and best friends and family (that includes all of you out there in blogland that we have never actually met).

Cary didn't want me to go back to work today

Cary kept trying to talk me out of going back to work today. I kept telling him I need to go back to work - for my mental well being. I think most people with 2 or more kids will agree that work is great escape. Cary hadn't been feeling well all week. I told him I wasn't going to listen to him whining about not feeling well unless he called the dr. He called the dr Wednesday. The dr told him to go to the hospital. I didn't go back to work today.

It looks like Cary probably has another infection in his heart (endocarditis). He had the same type of infection 1 1/2 weeks after Caleb was born. That was fun. I was going from visiting Cary in the hospital to visiting Caleb in the hospital 30 minutes away every day - just 1 1/2 weeks after having a baby 13 weeks early. That was nice and stressful.

A little history for the newbies -
Cary was born with aortic stenosis. When he was 1 he had open heart surgery. The surgery was just a temporary fix. At the time, they predicted that Cary would need another surgery to replace the valve when he was around 25-30 years old. Well, he just turned 33 and hasn't needed the surgery yet. He goes to the heart dr every 6 months to check for any changes in his heart. When there is a change, it's time to start talking about surgery.

Back to now -
Endocarditis can cause damage to the heart valves. Since he's had it 2 times in just a few years, they are really checking him out. (endocarditis can also lead to death. I'm very glad the dr didn't tell us that until after Cary was feeling better last time. I'm not sure if I could handle knowing that Caleb and Cary could have died at the same time.) Cary checked into the hospital Wednesday afternoon and will be here at least one more day. So far they have taking tons of blood, they have done an EKG, TEE, echo, and a CT scan. (you can look those up on webmd - I don't know how to link this from this computer. "Why don't I just get my lazy butt up and walk across the room and switch computers?" you ask. Well, because I'm lazy.) A couple of heart dr have stopped by and a couple of heart surgeons have stopped by. The infectious disease dr (sounds all scary doesn't it?) will stop by later today.

Nolan and Grace spent some time at my parent's house last night and are with Cary's parents now. (Wonder if they will notice if I leave them there for a few days while I go home and sleep for more the 3 hours at a time.)

Any questions?

I know what 1/2 of you are going to say. We will call if we need help. (Rachel will be getting a call in a few minutes and if she can't help, Moo, you're next!)


Cary just got back from the CT scan.

I'll update on Nolan and Grace later. (I haven't forgotten that I need to tell you about Grace's trip to the ER) Wow! Too much hospital!!


Update!
Cary does not have endocarditis. He will probably be going home Friday.

Help, I have a 2-year-old!!

Today is Nolan's second birthday. The big 0-2.
He had magic toast (french toast) and a cookie for breakfast. And we took him to Monkey Joe's this afternoon. He had a great time!

Grace is now 9 lbs, 6 ozs.

I have lots of stuff to tell you (like about Grace's trip to the ER), but it's 9:45 pm and my day is finally done. I'm going to bed. I'll try to update soon.