I've been feeling the need to blog lately. But unfortunately that need hasn't ever been followed by the urge. I'm forcing myself to do it right now so we'll see how long I last :)
Update on the Pregnancy-- I have done 5 treatments now. The first three were horrific. Massive migraines and extreme discomfort for days following. After the 3rd time I knew something had to chance. I called my nurse and she is 100% behind me, which I love! She spent an entire day calling specialists, trying to figure out other options. The answer was really quite simple. Change Brands. So, we did. Each bag of IVIG (the fluid I get during treament each week) is comprised of IVIG, or immunoglobulines from a thousand (give or take) donors. It's expensive. The brand that they were giving me was the "cheapest" and what they always stock. But the suggestion by specialists was "change the brand". Each manufacturer makes processes the IVIG a little differently. I'm not sure whether it's temperature or the brand of saline, or what. But whatever the change, it worked! Well, that and I get a small dosage of a steroid beforehand also that is supposedly an anti-inflamatory that helps with migraines. Between those two things, I have felt like a new woman! I still get headaches on Friday and Saturday, but it isn't anything that one dosage of Tylenol won't fix. My favorite part about this new brand? It's only 600mls in stead of 1200! Which means that I'm only sitting in the chair for 3.5 hours each week instead of 6 or 7 hours. They start the drip out at like 30mls/hour, then every 15 minutes double the dosage. So it takes an hour and 15 minutes to get up to the 300mls/hour drip rate that I max out at. I've done a ton of research and have learned that most people can't tolerate the drip past 200mls/hour. So this next treatment I'm going to willingly stay a little longer at the lower drip rate and see if it helps the headaches even more. I am so very blessed and grateful that we found a solution to the migraines, and I'm even more grateful that it means that I only spend half of my Tuesdays in a chair instead of the entire thing. The side effects (because of the steroid) are increased blood sugar levels, which means increased chance of gestational diabetes (which I'll probably get once I start the prednisone at 24 weeks anyway). Honestly, I'll gladly take GD over weekly migraines and intense dosages of percocet. I'm kind of grateful for the treatment journey that I've had, because it will allow me to be grateful for the hardships that I have because nothing is as bad as those dang migraines!
And for my own records, I am still in all of my regular clothes. At this point in all previous pregnancies I'm pretty sure I was 100% in maternity clothes. I'm definitely not complaining. Treatment takes away my healthy appetite and I only crave (in a massively bad way) sugary sweets. Like skittles. And chocolate chip cookies. I've only gained 4 pounds, which I'm not sure at all how that's possible, considering what my last sentence said, but I'm grateful for it considering the massive weight gain that will accompany the prednisone. I don't feel uncomfortable pregnancy wise, I just feel really tired and weak and a little lot brain-dead.
I have my anatomy ultrasound on February 21st. We can't wait! The boys are praying for a girl, Sean and I are praying for a boy. Even though it would be cool to have a girl, I think having 4 boys would be so much fun. Don't get me wrong, I'd be thrilled with a girl. Ahh! I don't know. I'm just glad I don't have to decide :)
Update on Brayden-- Brayden is excelling in school. In January they did a half-way-through-the-year reading test and Brayden is reading at 55 words per minute (doing the first grade reading test). The end of year benchmark for 1st grade is 40 words per minute. He's rockin it! He love to read. The Boxcar Children series we got him for Christmas is still his absolute favorite and he makes sure we read some out of it every night. I don't remember if I mentioned this or not but we let him read the pages with pictures so they are usually half pages, and we read the full-text pages. It's so fun for all of us, and the whole family is entertained by the series. And, since it was written in the 70s or something, it's good clean reading, which I love the most!
Brayden has been talking about a friend at school named Devin. He said "Mom, I really want to play with Devin someday." So he got a post-it note and wrote "Janeway, Brayden" then my cell phone number, and handed it to Devin at school. I was only a little surprised yesterday when I received a phone call from Devin's Mom saying "Devin really wants Brayden to come over and play." So we arranged a play date for them to get together for an hour to play Wii Sports. It kind of hit home that Brayden is old enough to have friends outside the home, that I don't know their families and how they are being raised. I mean, I knew this, but it became very real yesterday. We dropped him off on our way to Costco and met Devin's parents. They seemed really nice, and it seemed like a clean home so I felt pretty good with dropping him off but still... it was a little nerve wracking! He came home beaming and on cloud 9. He had so much fun. I'm glad he had such a great experience!
Brayden is a huge helper around the house. He has figured out in the past couple weeks how to get Everett out of his crib. He jumps up to help if Everett drops his spoon off of the table while in his booster, he doesn't hesitate to grab me a diaper and wipes if I ask. I love that he is so willing to just hop up and do whatever it is that needs to be done, and he always does it with a smile on his face. I so appreciate it! But at the same time am trying not to take too much advantage of it. He is just a kid after all! I'd hate for him to just be running around doing stuff for me all the time.
Update on Asher-- Asher has such a tender heart. This was his prayer this morning over breakfast "Please bless that our hearts will know the right choices to make. Please bless Mom as she is growing this baby, that her body won't hurt the baby. Please bless that her blood will be healthy, and please bless that the baby will be safe and healthy and come out perfect..." I should have prefaced this with the fact that Asher's prayers usually are very quick with not very much thought put into them. But sometimes, he surprises me :) We have tried really hard to explain to the children why I have to go to treatments each week, and had them come visit me one week so they could see what it was like. We want them to know what's going on so that they understand when I'm laying on the couch with a migraine. So this prayer really warmed my heart, and made me realize that he really does care about this baby and he truly is excited for a new little sibling.
Last week I asked him if he wanted a girl or a boy sibling. Brayden jumped in and said "I want a girl! Girl! Girl!" and Asher stopped and thought for a little bit. He said, "Well, what do you want Mom?" I told him that I would take whatever I got and that I don't get to choose. God gets to choose. Then he said "Well, then I want whatever God wants, because He's pretty awesome, right Mom?" Yes son, God is pretty awesome :)
Update on Everett-- Everett is exploding with his language skills. We found out just before Christmas that the boys' cousin Jordan is most likely Deaf. Since learning that, we broke out the Signing Time DVDs and let the kids go to town. (They come in super handy during the days I'm on the couch!)Everett LOVES "Baby Time" and ever since watching them, his speech as well as his signs have exploded. He signs all.the.time and he says so many words. It is so fun to see how good he is at communicating. He calls Asher "A-tee" and Brayden "Bayden" and he loves getting their attention. And they love giving it to him! He knows that if he asks Asher for a cheese stick, he'll get it always, versus asking me when sometimes I'll say no. "A-tee, cheese peese" and Asher jumps up, grabs him one, and opens it for him. Ahh, I love my boys!
We got Everett some blocks for Christmas, and they are his absolute favorite toy. He loves building and it's amazing how adept he is at building towers, cars, walls, etc. I haven't broken out my camera in way too long, but I should do that soon. He's so cute and so content playing with them. It makes my heart happy!
His hair is getting more and more blonde. It makes me sad inside. It's still red, but not nearly as bright. He is still an incredible sleeper at night, he loves his brothers and loves being one of the "big boys". His brothers are pretty good at including him in everything that they do, which is so nice! He is warming up to Nursery. It took awhile, but he is to the point where he only cries while we drop him off, then he has fun until we pick him up, in which he remembers that we abandoned him and he cries again. It's sad. But adorable at the same time.
Update on Sean-- Sean is doing incredible with school. He got a 98% on his Cell Biology test last week. He has the top grade in his class, and he is loving learning. He loves to study, and it's exciting to see this light in his eyes. I'm only hoping that it lasts 6 years since that's how long we have til he's done with school :)
He got the flu last week. He was the only one in our whole family that didn't get the flu shot, and he is convinced that he'll be getting it next year. He was dead to the world for 5 or 6 days, and we are at the end of week 2 and he is still feeling week, and his stomach is still picky. He lost 15 pounds in the first week...so that's a sign of how awful it really was. I'm just so so grateful that the rest of us were immunized and that it was the right strain. That would have been AWFUL!
Alright, my brain is shutting down and I'm pretty sure I don't have anyone reading still :) Hopefully my next post will be filled with pictures!
