I know I've shared some background on my two oldest children but I haven't really said much about the two youngest. See how lazy moms become with the younger kids? It's so true :)
I'll give them their own special blog another time, let me just give you a quick intro to child # 3, Tyler. He was born 3 weeks early and needed oxygen for 24 hours but seemed fine...at first. By the time he was 6 months old he was having respiratory problems and needed albuterol nebulizer treatments every 3 hours. This was all new to Dave and me but we learned and dealt with it.
When Tyler was 10 months old we were in for another surprise, I was pregnant again! Baby #4 was a girl, Amanda. Two months before she was born we moved from Oregon to Washington and I was promptly put on bed rest. Ugh, hard times! But she was born healthy and we were settling into our new normal...a six year old in first grade, a three year old, an almost two year old, and a newborn. Three kids in diapers, yay!
Now, on to the longest week of my life: My dad was flying from Ohio to WA to see the new place and the new baby. He arrived in the evening after the kids were in bed. I had already arranged with him that he would watch the two boys the next morning while I went to my 8 week postpartum doctor's appointment. Well, the day he was scheduled to come I became concerned about baby Amanda's breathing. She was beginning to sound a lot like her brother so I called the pediatrician and he agreed to see her first thing in the morning. That would be perfect, the pediatrician's office was just a few doors down from my obgyn and I would go there right after wards. Perfect!
The next morning Dave left about 6:00 am to drive down to Portland for work meetings, the kids woke up and got to see Grandpa (only Jennifer remembered him, the boys were too little, of course), Jennifer went off to school, and I left with the baby for the doctor appointments. I figured I'd be gone two-three hours at most. Sure, the boys didn't know their grandpa and he probably wasn't too comfortable taking care of two little guys but hey, he could turn on a movie and they'd be fine for that short of a time, right?
The pediatrician spent five minutes with Amanda and told me it was serious, he thought she had RSV (a respiratory virus) and that I needed to take her right over to the hospital. He'll call them and tell them to expect us. Uhhh, oh crap, what do I do now? Mind you, this is before either Dave or I had a cell phone! I told the doctor that Tyler was just as bad at home. He let me use his personal cell phone and man, did I put some minutes on that thing! I had to try and get in touch with someone from Dave's work. They said they would alert him to turn around and drive back home as soon as he made it to Portland (a three hour drive). I had to call my obgyn and let them know I wouldn't be making it. Then I had to call my dad and let him know I was going over to the hospital with Amanda.
My poor dad, this was not going to be the visit he was expecting! I had to give him a crash course in respiratory nursing over the phone because he would now have to take care of Tyler until Dave could get home and take over. And here's where you can find stuff for lunch, here's where diapers are, here's nap time, Jennifer's bus time, etc. Good luck and thanks! And then I was off.
Yuck, seeing your two month old baby hooked up and so tiny on that hospital bed was not easy!
I didn't want to leave her for a moment and I couldn't leave her for too long because I was nursing anyway. But what was I going to do about Tyler?
As soon as Dave got to Portland he got the message about a family emergency so he headed back home. He grabbed Tyler and I met the two of them back at the doctor's office. My pediatrician was wonderful. He told me later that normally he would have admitted Tyler, too, but he didn't in our case because 1. He didn't think I could handle it 2. He knew Dave could take time off work and we already had all the equipment at home and were comfortable/knowledgeable with how it worked and 3. Dave committed to bringing him back in daily to show he had improved. He was given steroid shots, all kinds of medicines to take at home, and we went our separate ways...Dave back home with sick Tyler and me back to the hospital with sick baby Amanda.
Needless to say, I didn't get much visiting done with my dad that week. He was able to use Dave's car and go to the school and have lunch with Jennifer one day, they both loved that! I guess he was able to get to know Alan better and help Dave with Tyler, I don't really know. I only went home once to shower during that whole time.
But wait, there's more! We had ordered a super deluxe tree house swing set with three slides, a rock wall, three swings, a hanging bar, etc, and it was supposed to be delivered that Friday. I wasn't about ready to pay an extra $200 to have them unload it so I told them we'd help unload it ourselves and they said fine. I figured my dad was there, no problem. They didn't give me a window of time when they'd be coming, they just said it'd be some time on Friday. OK.
Dave had missed work that entire week so he had to go back on Friday since I was now home. He had gotten a ride with a friend so my dad could take Jennifer out shopping for a baseball glove (she was going to start tee ball) and to take her to Dairy Queen for lunch (his traditional Grandpa visit.) My brother was flying in that evening from out of state to see the new house and baby and he, my dad, and Dave were going to put together the new swing set the next day. By this time I had no food in the house and I really needed to go grocery shopping. You know how difficult it is to bring little kids out shopping any time? Now imagine you have two sick little ones who need breathing treatments, you have to nurse one of them, you get all three of them changed and ready to go, it's raining (of course it's raining, we lived in Washington!), you drive the 20 minutes to the store, get your shopping done, get home, and by now it's time for lunch. I am starving, the kids are starving, and the two sick ones need breathing treatments again.
To my horror, the delivery truck is sitting in my driveway!!! Now! Of course they show up now...when I have a mini van full of groceries that need to be put in the fridge along with everything else going on! And you know my dad was still out with Jennifer! So what do I do? Start crying. Call every neighbor and finally find one at home and tell her I need help RIGHT NOW, can she please come over? She is making lunch for her son but says she'll be over in 5 minutes. I use that 5 minutes wisely...I leave the kids in the car and get the cold stuff in the fridge. :)
The neighbor comes running over minus her kid (she left him at home alone) and bless her heart, she feeds the two boys, tries to comfort the screaming baby, and even starts the breathing treatments while I help unload the stupid truck. Thankfully the rain hides the tears streaming down my face or else the delivery guy just ignores them but needless to say, I wasn't a whole lot of help unloading that heavy stuff. Oh well. We got everything off the truck and off he went.
As soon as I walked in the neighbor took off to get back to her son. My dad walked in with my daughter about half an hour later to see grocery bags all over the table and counters and me soaking wet sitting in the rocking chair nursing the baby with crumbs all over her from my hurriedly scarfed down peanut butter and jelly sandwich. You seriously don't want to mess with a hungry nursing mother! All three kids needed changed and all three of us needed naps.
My brother did arrive safely that evening. The swing set did get put together. And I even made a lasagna for dinner for us that Saturday night. I remember, I was so proud of myself for pulling that off, it seemed like such a momentous feat to be able to put all that together with everything else I had going on. An actual home cooked meal!
So yeah, what's a migraine in comparison? Not such a big deal compared to that! Reminiscing can be good, it reminds me that I've had it worse. And I'm so glad my kids grew out of that asthma and are healthy today! And weren't they just so dang cute and so tiny?!? Now they are all grown up. Sniff, sniff.
