Thyme moves on . . .

photo.jpg

2010-04-02T17:20:00.001-07:00

photo.jpg
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Early morning

2009-08-23T04:07:00.000-07:00

Sticky eyelids peel apart, left side only, searching for the bright spot in the room. I'm not yet used to where we keep the alarm clock. 3:18 a.m. The bedroom door is gently creaking closed.

Al's home early I think as I drift back to dreaming.

A quick Spider monkey crawl across the bed and she finds a spot fitting herself to me like the missing piece of a puzzle. I snuggle an arm around Brenna and kiss her hair still drifting toward dreamland. I breathe in.

Ketones?? wide awake I sniff her hair again. Smells like cake from Therin's birthday party to me. Why did I even think ketones . . . I can't smell ketones.

A big sigh and a quick hug then off to her room to find the meter.

What could have woken her? Is she high? Did I not give her a big enough bolus? Is she low? Did I miss judge and give her too much insulin because she played so hard with the other kids today?

Zip open the bag. Snap open the lid. Push the strip into the meter. Search for my iPod. Now I need its light. Tuck it under my chin and pop the lancet draws blood, the lancet draws blood but not quite enough. I squeeze, just a little, and there is enough. The test strip soaks it up. 5 . . . 4 . . . 3. . . .2 . . . .1. . . .

132

Yaay! A beautiful number. I'm happy on the inside. There are no "good or bad" numbers but it is so nice not to have to correct anything. Brenna starts to snore. Now I should relax into sleep.

Hmmmmm. It's not happening.

Slipping out of bed I sneak downstairs to the computer. Put it "on paper" or on blogger and maybe I can go back to sleep. Tap tapping the keys I pause. Did I hear something?

Pit, pat, pit, pat, pit, pat. Little face half lit by the laptop's glow, hands on hips she leans forward, "Mommy, don't you know I'm scared to be alone today!"

"Oh, sorry," I answer lamely. I guess I know what woke her now.

2009-08-16T21:03:00.001-07:00

Roasting marshmallows has become a weekly ritual at my Mom & Dad's. I love watching the kids interact with them and each other in such a fun and relaxed atmosphere. Tonight we're celebrating (Belatedly) my Dad's birthday. The kids were stargazing. We're still packing and moving stuff from the old house into the new one so it's back to work soon!

Keys!

2009-08-13T13:54:00.001-07:00

It's Ours! We hit every red light in the 1/2 mile stretch of road between Prudential and our new home but we made it.

Mmmmmmmm

2009-08-09T19:35:00.001-07:00

Getting ready to roast marshmallows again.

Almost home

2009-08-08T00:02:00.000-07:00

Dining & livingroom will get a new coat of non-red paint next week! We are going to have a painting pizza party once the house closes (or opens up when we've got the keys). Thursday is supposed to be that day.

Still waiting . . .

2009-08-02T11:08:00.001-07:00

Still waiting . . .
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Well, apparently I misunderstood many things about Friday. One of them being the amount of money we needed to have in the bank at closing. The other one is that Friday was just a "lets double check and see if we've got everything in order" date not the closing date. Escrow is still set for Aug 21st but we could close as soon as next Friday. It's more likely that we'll close on the 12th. So . . . we've got lots more time to pack!

Packing packing packing

2009-07-30T21:11:00.000-07:00

We're packing up our house. No matter how many boxes we fill there always seems to be more. I think our stuff has rabbit genes or something. Hopefully tomorrow we'll sign papers & get the keys to our first house.

Autopia

2009-05-14T20:48:00.000-07:00

Grandpa & Buttercup driving.

After time out

2009-05-14T10:55:00.001-07:00

Boo is feeling much better especially after a little breakfast.

I'm about to go on this!

2009-05-13T16:38:00.001-07:00

Bug whisperer

2009-05-13T09:32:00.000-07:00

Boo gets nose to nose with the first bug of the day.

Almost awake

2009-05-13T00:18:00.001-07:00

While we were uploading pics Boogirl woke up. She fell asleep before I clicked this pic.

Waiting for the princess

2009-05-12T23:28:00.001-07:00

Attitude was greatly improved after the princess donned her stately attire.

2009-05-11T17:57:00.001-07:00

Earth Hour

2009-03-28T21:18:00.001-07:00

The kids took a bath by candlelight during earth hour. I guess it means that I don't see the dirt ring until morning. We only have candles, cell phone, and laptop's glow to light our way.

Sweet Kids

2008-12-30T13:11:00.000-08:00

My sweet kids went with Grammy to the JellyBelly factory.

Questions?

2008-12-21T09:58:00.001-08:00

Questions?
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Like how did a giant tree get into your library? Take a look at the Stanislaus County Library "Dominion" blog to see the three minute video.

The tree is really cool! It totally changes the feeling of the room and to quote many patrons "it's magical".

After Brenna's recital we stopped by in our fancy clothes to take some pictures under the tree. And around the tree and just the tree. . . Um, can you tell I like the tree? I had StoryTime earlier that week and I performed all tree stories. It was sooooooooo fun!

2008-11-30T20:41:00.001-08:00

Untangeling the lights!

A Hermione Moment

2008-09-19T23:06:00.000-07:00

The kids have been enjoying trickster stories lately. Rowan's teacher read a different version of Brer Rabbit & the tar baby. He called it Fox, Rabbit, and the Gummy man. He had a blast acting it out at dinner time. I've been bringing home stories about the spider trickster, Anansi, from the library. Therin was reading Anansi and the Moss Covered Rock this morning in the van on the way to school. Midway through the story Brenna stopped him and said, "Therin you need to say Uh-nahn-SEE not uh-NANCY, Uh-naaahhhnnn-SEEEE."

Watch out!

2008-09-19T23:03:00.000-07:00

For the Rowan shuffle . . .

OK so just keep your eyes peeled. I'm going to have to either blog from my phone or flickr. Trust me, Rowan is too cute to miss!

Future tatoo artist

2008-07-29T21:27:00.000-07:00

Red sharpie on Brenna. At least it's only on her today. I'm going to give Purell a try for removing her tats.

Vacation

2008-06-28T23:20:00.000-07:00

Ah, summertime.

Sitting on the front porch with good company watching the girls run around like crazy while slurping on a Sam Adams and shootin' the breeze.

Languishing while waiting for Rock Band to load, "crap! who hit that button? we have to start over again!" Fingers flying (ok on Medium) through Dani California, Creep, and Detroit Rock City songs blurring together beautifully. Except when I warble Margaritiaville then hand the mic back to our lovely singer.

Lovely piano tunes dulcetly drifting by.

Counting the fireflies that my littlest "bug whisperer" scoops up effortlessly.

"What's that on my nose?"- "A Kiss!!"

Finding out that I'm fond of fondue.

Margaritas.

Lounging with my Mom.

Watching my baby brother do his daddy duties: tickle babies, mix formula, apply sunscreen, wipe booties, and make it look easy.

Digging minnow traps by the river's edge.

Teaching my boys how to play UNO.

Sweet singing to BabyMax making me cry. Hey, you were crying too!

Frogs and fun at Nanny & Papa's, "girls! stop picking those flowers!"

Nineteen finger-pokes in one day to keep numbers marching a straight line in the logbook. Now if only I could get paid to be an artificial external pancreas.

Naptime! "I can hear every word you say. . . snore."

Three thunderstorms tamping the heat of the day into the earth.

A fourth storm following us to California to strike just minutes after my father-in-law says "we don't have weather like that around here. ever."

Splashing at the pool.

Twenty minute call to Animas when the pump screen goes blank. Dry everything off and have it work again - whew.

Swinging at the park.

Uncle Dan or Junglegym?

1 a.m. with the girls "just say sorry, hug, and go to sleep. please."

Hanging in the kitchen, shouldn't I be helping more? Oh, look at that drawing! Thanks for the Spongebob Trev.

Fun with Penguins. More fun with Tongo.

Watching YouTube over Trevor's shoulder.

Jake stopping in with the ladies.

Tessalita, Brennaboo, Ro, and Ther all crammed in the sandbox.

Mom's day out without the kids! Target, icecream, and an outdoor biker bar. Ahhh.

Getting to hang out with my Virginia family. . .

Priceless.

MAX_8629
Originally uploaded by Xenophod.

and higher still

2008-06-28T23:08:00.001-07:00

and higher still
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

The kids had a blast at the company picnic. There was food and candy all over the place. With that great rock wall, a bouncy house, and so many things to do Brenna's numbers didn't bounce too high.

Therin and Rowan had a great time running around. Therin climbed the rock wall 7 times! Wow!

Where have all the pokers gone!?!?

2008-05-24T15:18:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago we lost every lancing device in the house. As you can see that is quite a feat to accomplish. I'm not too worried about misplacing any of them because we have backup meters & pokers at each major location that Brenna spends time visiting: Grammy & Graumpa's, preschool, & the Grandparents' VerHulst. I'll add notes to the flickr version of this picture later but you should know that the white BD poker is Brenna's favorite.

The newest "poker" in this batch is the Walgreens generic lancing device. It is difficult to put together and take apart to change out the lancette but I got it because it was the only thing available. Walgreens doesn't carry any other lancing devices anymore. The helpful advice I got from the folks in the pharmacy when I asked if there were any others available, "Call the number on the back of your meter. If they want you to test they'll send you a new one." I don't believe I will be shopping at Walgreens again. The Kaiser pharmacy doesn't have them on hand to purchase so I took a look at Rite Aid, Longs Drugs, and CVS. All of them carry the same crappy poker that Walgreens has only with their own logo and a couple of the locations also carry the $30 MultiClix. I don't want to shell out 30 bucks everytime a poker gets lost and I certainly don't want to spend that much for a backup at each location. Since it is a backup to our many other backups , hopefully, we won't have to use the Walgreens device very often. So what has happened to all of the rest of the lancing devices that used to line the pharmacy shelves? I find it very, very strange that there are only these two lancing devices in retail stores.

I would love, love, love to get the Pelikan Sun digital lancing device but right now I can't justify a $200 poker that isn't covered by insurance. Especially when we keep losing the pokers. Amy over at Diabetes Mine has a couple of good articles that she has written that make me want to justify that purchase. Until then, we'll have to keep an eye on the ones we've got.

Not Meter Blood

2008-05-18T08:11:00.001-07:00

Not Meter Blood
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

We have this wonderful volcanic rock in front of our house that the kids just love to climb and play on. While climbing down Brenna started to wail piteously. Camera around my neck kicking back on the front porch (a fine view of less than 5 feet away) I didn't see her do anything that would make her cry so i tucked her meter under my arm, scooped her up, and whisked her away to the bathroom.

When she calmed down enough to show me her owie. I whipped out her meter and popped in a strip.
"Look Brenna, free blood! We don't have to poke."
She sniffled some more and took back her hand.
"No mommy, this is NOT meter blood".

Ah, well. I tried. After we cleaned up her hand we had to check her BG anyway.

Proof is in the pudding

2008-05-18T07:55:00.001-07:00

Cake
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Or in the cake.

Cake

2008-05-11T01:20:00.000-07:00

As I stood in my kitchen at midnight licking blue icing from my fingertips I looked down at my most recent creation and thought,

"I should have had somebody else do this. Why am I decorating a cake the night before Mother's Day?"

My mind raced through the litany of my faults:
Bad at organizing
Didn't plan ahead
Should have done this last weekend when I had more time & was off
Need more patience
Should have done this Wednesday after work
Suck at parties
Lousy at housework

Over and over and over and over. Same stuff different words. I know negative thoughts breed faster than rabbits and are harder to get rid of so I try to inject a few "positives" into the cycle:
Everything will be OK
Calm down
Relax
AaaaaK!

See, I did think ahead in March and started to try and plan for Rowan's birthday but I kept figuring that this week is too busy so I'll do something about it next week. Rowan's birthday was on May 7th, Wednesday. I made him his favorite breakfast, Daddy & Brenna brought cupcakes to his class, and Grammy and Grandpa had a cake and a great spaghetti dinner that night. Rowan wanted to invite his classmates but you can't just invite a few in Kindergarten and I can't afford to take 25 kids to Funworks and I don't think that I am patient (or insane) enough to keep track of all of them in our pool. I explained that cupcakes at school was for his school friends and the party on Sunday was for family. So anyhow if I had just sat down to plan this earlier I wouldn't be planning a birthday party at 2:00 on Mother's Day. I feel like I'm treading water in everyday life so add a special occasion or holiday that I have to plan for and I sink to the bottom until the event is over and done. Maybe someday I'll get better at this. Maybe I won't. I try and keep positive.

But what about that cake? Why not just buy one decorated or ask my Mom to make one?

Because it's my oasis.

When I'm decorating the cake I am in the moment.
It's like a meditation.
Squeeze, lift, move, squeeze, lift, move
I have to stop cleaning the house for a little while and futzing about with stuff I should be doing more often
Mix, scoop, squeeze

Short and simple, I like to do it and it calms me.
I think of my own birthday cakes and how happy I was to see
A Cinderella pumpkin cake with little mice
Garfield
Barbie in a cake dress
Looking at my birthday cakes made for me by my Mommy I felt special.
They were just perfect and the parties were always fun.

I want to make Rowan feel special.
He always looks at me and tells me I'm beautiful, no matter how rumpled I am.
He always tells me I smell like a rose, even if I've been gardening and smell more like dirt & sweat.
Everyday he tells me he loves me.
In the moment of decorating his cake I think of how much I love him and how special he is.

After.
As I look down with blue tipped fingers at the cake I feel stupid for trying.
If I were more organized, more patient I'd have done this last weekend with all of his classmates and those little gift baggies. Instead I'm hoping that it's good enough.
Hoping that I'm good enough for such a sweet, kind, little boy.

Hanging out

2008-04-10T23:15:00.001-07:00

Hanging out
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

We have this cool lava rock in our front yard and every once in a while the kids just climb up, sit down, and hang out.

2008-04-08T08:28:00.000-07:00

My flower

Random thought . . .

2008-03-17T20:48:00.000-07:00

I think that My Little Ponies have contributed to the popularity and frequency of little tattoos. Playing with those tiny tattooed ponies planted the subliminal suggestion that body art is good. And fun!

Before MLP tats on guys were a rebel thing and biker chicks got them all over.
After MLP I see cute tats all the time.

Before MLP tats were naked ladies on the forearms of sailors.
After MLP little heart, flowers, moons, stars, are found on ladies but only if you see them naked.

I would write more but my future tattoo artist is drawing on herself again.

New Chair

2008-01-11T21:17:00.000-08:00

How do you like Bren
s new chair? Always warm, cozy extremely portable and available in a variety of colors the Grandpa can be found anywhere grandkids congregate! Order yours today.

These Shoes

2008-01-09T13:29:00.000-08:00

I normally wear flatter-than-pancake shoes. Today, I helped MC with StoryTime and didn,t fall over - even during
Jumping & Counting by Jim Gill!

Ninja Dan

2008-01-07T06:16:00.001-08:00

masked attacker
Originally uploaded by treeee.

Tree took some amazing photos of my bigger baby brother and his family when baby Max was being born. This one cracks me up.

Abscess

2008-01-07T06:11:00.000-08:00

This is something they didn't warn me about. My darling daughter will be forever more prone to developing abscesses. Back in October she got one on the back of her leg. It was just a small pimple looking thing in the morning which she scratched and by afternoon it was an angry red and about the size of a quarter. We thought it was a bug bite. We went to emergency with all the coughing, puking people. They lanced it & sent us home to go take antibiotics. She is normally my best medicine taker -- she refused. I used every trick -from memory, books, and google to try and get it in her. I thought I was successful but the abscess got worse. To make a long story short she had to be admitted to the hospital with IV drugs PLUS the original antibiotic that I couldn't get into her. Each nurse added something new to my bag of tricks but it would only last for a short time before we had to try something else. It was a staph infection but the average run of the mill sort not the killer scary one that hit the news at about the same time. Trust your local librarian. I went to work morning after she was discharded from the hospital and was griping about it to my coworkers (librarians all) and I discovered (rediscovered?) Bribery! So we got a sticker chart and after all her medicine was taken for the day she got a pony. My Little Pony that is. She kept seeing them on the TV at the hospital and she likes to play with the herd that lives at preschool so I was set. It worked!

Yesterday, we noticed another one on her bottom. It's small and, so far, she hasn't complained about any pain but she was limping like Quasimodo and saying "I'm O.K., Mommy, I'm O.K." with the last one so I can't be sure. When she sits still for 2 minutes (eating, playing with forementioned bribe, etc.) I slip a warm compress under her. Nice warm baths. Neosporin. God, I hope this works. I don't want to do this again.

Welcome to the World

2007-12-10T22:18:00.001-08:00

bebe max
Originally uploaded by xenophod. Here's Max, king of all Wild Things.

A Meme! A Meme!

2007-11-27T19:14:00.001-08:00

I've been tagged! Woo hoo!
Margaret tagged me because "Amberthyme cause she always has something good up her sleeve". Um, I'm sleeveless today but maybe I can connect the dots on my arms and come up with something!

A Game Of Tag

Here's how you play:

Once you have been tagged, you have to write a blog w/ 10 weird, random things, facts, habits or goals about yourself. At the end choose 10 people to be tagged, listing their names and why you chose them. Don't forget to leave them a comment ("You're It") and to read your blog. You can't tag the person who tagged you. Since you can't tag me back, let me know when you've posted your blog so I can see your answers!

1. I cry over just about any touching moment. I even got mentioned on the front page of the local newspaper for crying. Sigh.

2. I hate hypodermic needles with a passion. Actually blood draws creep me out more than shots. I will not watch when they draw my blood. I force myself to watch when they draw my daughter's blood & insert IV's to make sure everything is O.K. not that I can do anything about it if they mess up, but if she has to have the poke the least I can do is watch.

3. I am math impared. A math teacher of mine once told me that I should buy a calculator that could do fractions for me because I wasn't going to get it on my own. Same teacher told me that it was better to be the top of a lower level class than the bottom of a more advanced class.

4. Girlz nite out ROCKS!

5. I am a close and personal friend of Weird Al Yankovic. Along with everybody else who belongs to his fan club. I saw him at RenFaire one year though. No lie!

6. I get paralyzed by indecision at times.

7. I pick at my eyelashes.

8. I belong to the cult of Apple Products. I was indoctrinated in the 2nd grade when I was in a "special" math class that used Macintosh computers and math games to try and improve my math skills and give me warm fuzzy feelings about math. I now have warm and fuzzy feelings about my computer. As for math. . . see #3.

9. I disolve into laughter at the most unusual things. Most recently when I found out that Paul Simon was inspired to write Mother and Child Reunion by a Chinese chicken and egg dish. Most frequently whenever I botched the "this is my brother larry and this is my other brother larry" joke when attempting to introduce my brother and his best friend. You had to be there.

10. I am a Major Geek. I took the Geek Test online and I scored over a 50%. And I'm weird. But you figured that out by now.

I'm tagging -

Xenophod, Krystal, Berzerker Librarian, Anne-Marie T., Anne-Marie M., and anyone else who would like to do this.

Paranoia, sort of.

2007-11-24T01:13:00.000-08:00

O.K. So a few months ago my husband wakes me from a dead sleep to tell me that I need to change some stuff on my blog because murderous psychos could find us and steal our kids. I'm sure I got a very long explanation at the time but as I was very tired (and it was 2 a.m.) I fell back asleep, "honey are you listening to me" he says. "Um. Ya. Tell me again in the morning," I say. But he didn't. It was all very surreal. So I asked my berzerk friend if he had, indeed, scared my husband with tales of doom and destruction. "Yes. Here's how a psycho could steal your kids . . . " There is no way I'm divulging that info on the web. My berzerk buddy may have a psychotic mind but at least he's on my side. Now how to fix it is to change the names of the innocent so that nobody knows who they are again. Especially since I keep getting mentioned in our local newspaper and anyone can google me and find out more. Grrrr. Eventually this ploy will succeede -- cashed pages eventually die, don't they? And Bob, Snicklfritz, and Gertrude will once again be anonymous.

The moral of this story: O.K. psychos I've got my eye on you - just don't look at my Flickr. Or my seestor-in-law's site. I'd like to meet all of my nieces and nephews some day. And just don't blog for a few months and all the psychos will go away (um, that one has a flaw - all the not psychos go away too. I've missed you all.)

Lot's to say, but not today . . .

2007-10-17T23:50:00.000-07:00

I have so much to write about but since I'm already a sleep deprived wreck I'll do it another time.
Things I want to post about (teaser for you, reminder for me so I don't get brain drain by the time I log in with a great idea)

- Brenna & Preschool (yep, she started!)
- Rowan & Kinder
- Therin in 3rd (and the 1st IEP of the year)
- Staph infection
- Oh, Dad, what was that cute thing that Brenna said that we were supposed to write down but didn't
- My Dad & stories (board books for babys & the banilla pony)
- Work (but I probably won't say all of what I want)
- Responsibilities
- Vampires
- Renfaire!!

100th Post!

2007-09-17T22:51:00.000-07:00

Don't know what to say about my 100th post other than WOOT!

Better late than never

2007-09-11T19:47:00.000-07:00

Well, it's been since mid April since we last saw the Endocrinologist & the D-Team. I started making phone calls in late July. I left a couple of messages but didn't pursue aggressively. Just a polite "um, excuse me, don't we need to make an appointment to see the endo soon? It's been 3 months." I had to go down to the Hospital Under Construction in August to pick up a prescription from that pharmacy instead of the one right across from my work so I stopped by the office to make the appointment. Long story short, last Monday was the endo appointment.

The lowdown. . .
A1c 7.5 Woo hoo!
We changed some pump settings.
Signed off on the preschool plan.
There was something else cool about that visit
but I lost my train of thought.
I guess it's OK to lose a train, especially if it's a Thomas train covered in lead paint.

Not so good news. Someone forgot to order the other blood tests . . . so we have to go back to see the vampires again.
Sigh. Poor baby.

Chicken?

2007-09-09T08:21:00.000-07:00

So the burning question generated by the last post is how is Brenna doing in preschool? Well, she's not going yet. I felt good about training but there were some things I wanted to talk to her Endocrinologist about and Al lost his job. So the combination of those two things helped make my decision to keep her home for just a little bit longer.

And I really AM chicken. I just couldn't part with all three children on the first day of school.

D-Teacher is In

2007-08-22T20:44:00.000-07:00

Aaak! Tomorrow is D-day I get to teach Brenna's preschool about d-care. I have too much information at my fingertips. I hope I don't scare them away. I got some great advice from parents on my CWD email that I subscribe to so I'm going to use it. I'm going to keep it mellow tomorrow and get Brenna's routine set up and let her play with the kids while I talk to some of the teachers. I want to stress that we do not expect perfect numbers and that it is difficult some days to see really good numbers in a 3 year old. The very very basic stuff is if she's low - feed her, if she's high -- give her insulin and/or have her run around. If she's acting wierd -- poke her finger and treat her. If for some reason you can't poke her pretend it's a low and if it's not we can fix it later. Wow. So much for my 12 page instruction booklet. I just hope I can figure out how much to reduce her basal rate for play time while I'm with her there so we all don't have to worry so much about scary lows while they learn the basics. Wish me luck. I'm going to need it.

Diagnosis

2007-08-18T22:27:00.000-07:00

Brenna's Story:

Toward the end of July last year we had a heat wave. Brenna had just turned 2 the month before. The weather was over 105 degrees for a full week. The kids and I were all hanging out at the refridgerator waiting to take our turns filling up with water. The temperatures dropped to a somewhat more normal summer temp. 90 - 100 degrees. I noticed that I was changing a lot of wet diapers so started to try and potty train her. She had just gotten tall enough to reach the water dispenser in the fridge all by her self. Usually she would fill a cup, dump it on the floor and play in it. I heard her filling up her cup and ran in the other room -- she was just drinking. Whew. Then I watched her fill up the empty cup to the rim and drink it all gone, not a drop spilled. That day I counted 12 diaper changes - as many as she had as an infant. The next day I had to work so my Mom was watching the kids. She said that it was strange how much she was peeing and suggested I look up stuff about diabetes. I looked on the internet and the only symptoms she seemed to have were the drinking and peeing. This was a Friday and my dad called me that night to tell me that mom was worried and that I should take her in to the doctor's office and get her checked out. That evening between 5 p.m. and 6 a.m. I changed a bunch of really full diapers. At 2 a.m. the diaper exploded. Not literally but it was so full it was like we had soaked it in the pool for twenty minutes and her bed was sopping wet underneath her.

Early the next morning I called the advice nurse and she got Brenna an appointment. I blogged a little bit about this last year here. The doctor we had the appointment with is Kaiser's Diabetes Peditritian in our area. I hadn't met him before and I felt like I got the brush off when I mentioned that I looked up the symptoms on the internet and that when it pointed to diabetes I brought her in. She was quiet and very "good" the whole time -- and wouldn't drink water while we were at the office. It took a while to get a urine sample and once we had it they did two tests: glucose & ketone. She had Moderate Ketones and no glucose in her urine. He told us she was dehydrated but didn't have diabetes, just give her more water. MORE WATER! Other than the doctors office she was drinking constantly. I told him that and asked him why she was dehydrated when she was drinking so much? He didn't have an answer but I was relieved when he said no diabetes I counted my blessings and took my daughter home. That night we went camping and ate a ton of marshmellows. She was having so much fun that day and Sunday that she didn't drink as much and I thought we were out of the woods (figuratively & literally).

Monday and Tuesday were heavy water drinking days and on Wednesday a friend suggested I weigh her diapers and keep track of the amount of water she's drinking and take her back to the doctor soon because there might be something else wrong. I called that afternoon to see if I could get an appointment with her regular pediatritian. Thursday at 3 p.m. Thursday while I was at work my Mom called me. Brenna was lethargic. Mom was having a hard time keeping her awake. She woke at 7 a.m. and went to sleep at 9 a.m. slept until noon and wouldn't really eat more than a few bites. She said that she thought Brenna could wait until the Dr. appointment. Mom dropped the boys off with one of my best friends and met me at the Doctor's office. We saw Brenna's regular Pediatritian. She took one look at Brenna, asked what was going on, and sent in a lab tech. The guy pricked her heel and put this little white strip up to it flipped it over and it was dark black. He kept flipping the strip over and practically ran out of the room. Dr.E came back in and helped us gather up our stuff and took us to a back room with hospital beds and had Brenna hooked up to an I.V. At that point she gave me a hug and told me how sorry she was that my daughter had diabetes. She said that there wasn't much that she could do at this point so she would be going to a Kaiser hospital in Sacramento - they had a bed but they needed a doctor that would take her. Then, we waited a while longer. They found a doctor but didn't have a bed. I didn't understand but held my daughter. Mom took off to go get stuff packed for me. I called my husband at work to tell him the news and he came as soon as he could get away. For an hour I held my sleepy girl in my arms and cried quietly and listened to the Nurse call Sacramento. I called my work and told them I was going to be out for a few days and I wasn't sure when I'd be back in. Al came in and sat with us. By now it was after 5 p.m.

At around 6 p.m. Dr. E came in and told us that Brenna needed to be in a hospital and that Sac was taking too long. She called an ambulance and they would be taking her to Memorial - across the street from my house. She was strapped into her carseat, her carseat strapped onto a gurney and I wasn't allowed to ride in the ambulance. We arrived at Memorial about 20 minutes after she did and I sat with her in the emergency room in a daze. Mom got to emergency around 9 ish? I don't remember much. We sat together and the doctors didn't do much other than bring her some diet 7 up. They did take x- rays and I think they gave her some insulin. At one point Brenna was acting like she was drunk. It was hard to tell, she was really happy, animated, giggled a lot, but when she started to slur her words. (Two year old words are hard enough to understand when they aren't slurred) Nurses and doctors at Memorial couldn't tell us about what hospital she was going to or what else was going on. Finally around 11 p.m. I get a call from my Dad telling me that she would be going to Santa Clara. The ER staff couldn't verify that (Kaiser & Sutter don't get along) but at Midnight we were sent by helicopter (after a few scary minutes I was allowed to fly) to Santa Clara Kaiser Hospital. It was the most amazing flight over the valley, over the mountians, to San Jose airport. It took maybe 25 minutes. I found out from the Helicopter nurse that Brenna's number was over 400 and that her number at 12:15 a.m. was 80. I thought that was good at the time. He explained that they'd prefer her BG to drop slowly so that she doesn't have a reaction. I have never (and will never) have such a short trip to San Jose ever again (I hope). Usually traffic is so bad that it takes 2 or more hours to get there from here. A short ambulance trip and we were in Santa Clara.

They immediately hooked Brenna up to 2 more IV's and put some other "stickers" on her chest and stomach. They took out the old I.V. and ripped off the tape. (It took us 6 months to get her to be O.K. with "stickers" again). I stroked her feet while these people decended on my baby like a pack of vultures. Later, they become friends, but at that point they were just taking care of business. I told her it would be O.K. everything would be just fine while she screamed. I don't remember what all was going on but it was over and she was asleep. At 3 a.m. I started on some paperwork and the night nurse told me some stuff. I told him I hadn't eaten since breakfast - I had no cash only my atm. I wandered around the hospital until I found the atm got to the snack area - no change machine. Back up to Brenna's floor and a kind nurse finds change for me. I go all the way back to the basement to the snack machines get a sandwich and eat only half. By 4 a.m. I curled up on a matress near Brenna and fell asleep. 7 a.m. they are poking and prodding my baby and I wake up to her cries. That first day was a blur. Little food and little sleep. There were a ton of people coming in and out of her room telling me everything would be OK and she'd be on a pump in no time (I had NO visual picture - the only pump I knew about was my BreastPump which I needed about that time- Brenna was still nursing occasionally). I watched videos and took notes and the day nurse must have thought I was going to be noncompliant because I refused to take her number. I don't think that I even left the room to go to the bathroom all day. Mom finally got to the hospital late in the day. I had just been talking to some lady, an administrator I think, who was telling me her husband's D-story. She was the only person who asked me how I was feeling. I told her the whole story (I'm sure it wasn't very coherent at that point) and she took my Mom aside and told her to get me out of the hospital and let me sleep. Mom took me to a hotel and went back to the hospital to stay with Brenna while I slept. I called Al & spoke to him for a bit and then crashed into sleep from about 5 - 8 pm. I called Mom to come and get me and I spent more time with Brenna. She was watching the Wiggles on her TV. She fell asleep and I went to sleep at midnight. I woke to somebody poking Brenna again. I was amazed that she didn't wake when they took her number. I asked the nurses to wake me before they do something to her so that I knew what was going on.

Over the next 3 days in the Pediatric ICU I learned a lot about diabetes and how to care for Brenna. I wanted Al to come and visit and learn but I knew he wasn't in a state to drive and it would be unfair to have him drive the boys here for and back (4 hours round trip) for a short visit so I called him to give him updates. DKA was scary but now past and they needed the room for somebody else so we were moved to a pediatric room that we shared with 2 other children and their parents. One of them left before the end of the day but overnight we shared the room. That first day in the Pediatrics wing I barely saw a nurse and I took care of her diabetes the whole day, carb counting, mixing NPH & Novolog, Lantus in the morning, everything. The nurse was trying to get us discharged that day but the doctor suggested one more night, just to be sure. I had to prove I knew what I was doing to two more nurses, on seperate occasions the next day and, finally at 2 on Tuesday, Brenna was discharged and Mom drove us home.

We've come a long way. One year and one day later.

Here's where it used to be!

2007-08-12T20:40:00.001-07:00

Here's where it used to be!
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Rowan lost a tooth. It seemed like it was a very short time between loose tooth and an empty space..
He's growing up so fast! He's such a sweetie. At work we do our monthly "Books and Brags" meeting where all of the noteworthy comments (good or bad) are read aloud for the whole department to hear. During July's Books and Brags meeting there was a comment for me. Someone had written down "This treasure chest is as beautiful as my Mommy!" Rowan age 5. I'll have to add a picture of the treasure chest later. Such a love bug.

They're listening

2007-08-02T22:35:00.000-07:00

You know kids are listening to every word you say. Usually this discovery is made in the grocery store line at top volume. A small sweet “Shit” rings clearly through the store as you look around and all other parents are giving you the stinky eye. Or a child takes the Lord’s name in vain with a loud “God damn!” in front of the most religious person you know. But in those quiet moments just before sleep or when you’re trying to bring comfort to a child in pain you question that knowledge. Is he listening? Can she hear me?

For each and every blood draw, IV, or vaccination I hold my children tight so they can’t move. When I was 4, I got a shot in the leg and was told if I moved during this vaccination the needle would break off in my leg and they would need pliers to pull it out. This is my fallable 4 year old memory talking here but it has been a key memory that contributed to my needle phobia. I don’t know if I hold them too tight but I know my kids can’t move. I try and distract them or give some small comfort by kissing their hair an saying “I love you sweetie, everything will be alright. Mommy’s here.” Like they could forget that Mommy was squishing the movement out of them while someone else slides steel into delicate parts of their flesh.

Brenna, obviously, has been the recipient of this loving torture quite a lot in the last 9 months. I never knew whether she could hear me over her screams and I figured I was the only one gaining some small shred of comfort from my words.

One Sunday afternoon Brenna started a game. She would poke my arm with her finger and tell me to cry. I humored her. “Waah, waah.” We played this game a couple of times. I was only half paying attention when I realized that she was whispering something into my armpit while I was hamming up the cries. I bent down and put my ear next to her lips. She patted my arms and hair and whispered. “It’s O.K. my baby, Mommy’s here. Mommy’s here. It’s going to be O.K.” When she realized I was listening she patted my arm.“Here’s your sticker,” pat on my chest, “here’s your band-aid,” pat on my arm. “Good girl, my baby!” She patted my hand then went to find another game to play.

Guest Blogging

2007-08-01T01:05:00.000-07:00

One of the wackiest people I know has gone on vacation and left me the password to her blog. Well, me and three other people. If you're curious. Take a look at Drunk Drama Queen to see what we're doing while she's away.

On the Horns of a Dilema

2007-07-20T09:39:00.001-07:00

101_4538
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

I recently contacted Stanford University to become a participant in the TrialNet Natural History Study. In this study, if you have a family member with type 1 diabetes they draw some blood and test to see if you have any markers that indicate that you might develop type 1 diabetes. This study is open to parents, siblings, cousins, and more. If you're interested just follow the link.

This study to me is a no-brainer. Give some blood. Give more blood if markers are found. Hey if Brenna can get poked EVERY DAY I can do it when needed to allow scientists to learn more about diabetes.
So where does the dilema come in? If I want to have Therin participate he has to sign an assent form. He is 7 years old and must legally agree to a blood draw and even if he signs the paper he can back out at any time. I can't force his participation in a blood draw when it is medically necessary. If by some bizarre chance he developed diabetes I'd have to hold him down for his A1c anyway (they still do blood draws rather than finger pokes at my daughter's doctor office). But even THAT isn't what's bugging me. Therin gets to choose whether he helps but if I were to enroll Rowan, because he's 5, all I have to do is sign the consent form and force him to do it. How fair is that? Not at all. I think he's more likely to follow through than Therin but should I ask it of him? Should I demand it of both?

But, that is only the first horn. The second horn is should I enroll Brenna. She fits the criteria to join some studies regarding the testing of CGMS (continuous glucose monitoring system). One of the studies seems fairly non-invasive. Keep the CGMS device attached and download her pump information, CGMS information, and send in her daily food log (that is something we've been doing already). But to join this study she'd either have to have a CGMS device already OR I could enroll her in a study that would give her one as part of that study. The other study basically would hook her up to an IV and induce hypoglycemia. It is in rigidly controlled circumstances and once she got to 60 they would give her a glucose tab or hummingbird juice in her IV (my wording not theirs). She'd end up having to go do this twice, maybe more, if I'm reading this right. Now, Brenna doesn't always present with "symptoms" when she is going low. Sometimes she's really cranky. Sometimes she asks for peanutbutter or a glucose tab. She really likes glucose tabs and will ask for them at any given time. I'd say that she's low about half the time she asks though. Do I just miss the signs when I'm busy? I think it would be facinating to find out what is going on and see what happens in a controlled enviornment. But . . .experimenting on my baby girl seems so callous. Putting her through that kind of stress on purpose seems mean. But. . . if I can get more information in a controlled enviornment then I will be better able to help her if a severe hypo develops. Maybe? I don't really know about that one. When in a stressful scary situation sometimes information flies right out of the brain. Chances are that she'll have icky stressful diabetes related situations at some point in her life and will have to deal with them. But . . .if we could be a part of the solution . . . part of the group that says that CGMS is not only helpful but a necessity for people with diabetes of all ages especially the youngest when their numbers are all over the place and you can take one look and know if she's going up or coming down. To have access to that device for just a few weeks to keep an eye on trends and figure out what's going on with some of her weird spikes.

So, my plan of action. Have Al read through the Research Consent Form and get his opinion. If he doesn't think it would be torture for Brenna then we inform her Endo & diabetes nurse of our plans and see what they say. Then, if all is well, contact Stanford and see if the studies are still happening and go from there. As for the boys? I thought I'd tell them that my husband and I will participate but we're not sure about our two sons..

I Love My Job!!!

2007-07-19T00:01:00.001-07:00

Rita Skeeter, Professor Snape, and Professor Lilly (he wasn't in the books)
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Hogwarts @ the library has been so much fun. It is a LOT of hard work. I'm not the brains or the brawn behind this series of programs but I'm tring to give as much help to the ladies that are making this all possible. It's sooooooo cool, you know, in that geeky I'm going to dress up and be a character from my favorite book kinda way. I'm an unpublished Slytherin at the moment. I'll post a picture when I've got one available but I'm looking forward to transforming into Prof. Sprout. Too bad she's not Slytherin too. I've become rather fond of being the cheerful, yet ambitious, one in our house. Hey, like I tell the students being a Slytherin doesn't make you evil, it's how you use your skills that sets you apart. After all you couldn't become President of the United States without being ambitious. O.K. not the best analogy because I'm sure somebody is bound to list off their favorite "evil president" story. Anyway, Slytherin contains one of my favorite names in the universe Sly -Therin. Which was totally unintentional and a connection I didn't make until I looked up the proper spelling of that word about 10 seconds ago.

1 More Children's Dept. Event to go. Friday at 9 p.m. will conclude our festivities. There are a few of us that are going to stay dressed up and hit a nearby bookstore to pick up a brand new copy of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows"

Then "Rita" and I will freak out about the Teen Harry Potter Event coming up on Monday.

Transitions

2007-07-18T23:03:00.000-07:00

Nope, not the snazzy lenses you see on T.V. that darken in the sunlight. I'm talking about the messy phases of life that everybody experiences.

School starts August 27. Already I have pulled out Therin's yearbook and pointed out his new teacher. My Mom has been awesome getting him to read out loud to her during the day and doing math from last years workbook. I'll need to start tighening up the bedtime and morning routines . . . after all the Harry Potter Events at the library are over. Next week. I hate that I have to be strict year-round about "no T.V. before breakfast". It would be nice to sleep in and let Therin watch Saturday Morning cartoons and get him to come to breakfast without a fuss (o.k. meltdown). That morning transition would be impossible without that rule. The thing bugging me is that I completely forgot about Therin's social story. There was supposed to be a transitional social story that they were supposed to be using at school and then it was supposed to come home with Therin after school was out. Things were so crazy the last week of school that I completely forgot about it. Arrgh. It bugs when I do that. I should have asked for a copy at the last IEP but I didn't. I have been doing some research and I think I have found a wonderful person who will help be an advocate when the school year starts. That is a relief but I do need to talk to her more first. Therin has a hard time with all transitions - positive ones as well as the negative and neutral. Inside to outside activities especially frustrate him. Every day brings a new challenge and this new school year so much more will be expected of him. I hope I can help prepare him enough for the coming months.

Certified or certifiable?

2007-07-16T01:24:00.001-07:00

card 1
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

I was cleaning out one of my catch-all bowls on my dresser and look what I found! If you haven't read the story already check out my version or Anne's version It .

Flirt

2007-07-10T19:23:00.001-07:00

This walrus followed Brenna and clapped his flippers.

2007-07-10T19:14:00.001-07:00

Butterfly

2007-07-10T19:12:00.000-07:00

Casa de Mariposa

MacBox Pro

2007-07-08T12:32:00.001-07:00

MacBox Pro
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

This is the closest I'm getting to my computer until sometime late next week.

Brenna inserted a tomato into the disk drive. Don't worry, it's not a real tomato just a plastic one. Hopefully, it hasn't done any damage to the drive.

Blogging on Al's PC just isn't the same.

Where your friends are

2007-06-29T20:43:00.001-07:00

I knew they were around here somewhere. I'm starting to talk to friends again. It's very nice. I love going to Starbucks in the Market and seeing Sam. I need to go and visit her when we're both not working. Friday night I got driven home by Zaid. I went to Chilli's with the girls. Shannen, Donna, Melissa, and I hung out, caught up, and had fun. Zaid took Al back to Chili's (there's one out by the mall sorta where the movie theater where we saw the 15th anniversary edition of Rocky Horror used to be). They'll be picking up the car that I couldn't drive home - 2 margaritas and I was not fit to drive. Very nice end to a barfy day (no, literally, Rowan was barfing Thursday night and a little on Friday too. Therin took a nap so I figure he's fighting off this bug too.)

Al & I were supposed to go our and celebrate our anniversary Friday night but with Rowan sick I didn't want to take the kids over to my Mom & Dad's house. Mom agreed. I called and talked to Jenny on the phone tonight. Gary writes my MySpace (I never look at my myspace) and opened up a can of worms that got buried months ago. Whatever, at least he's writing. I went out to Chevy's with Jim just after my birthday for the first time in ages. This month I've made a big effort to reach out to my friends. It has been very hard. Diabetes is routine, I don't have to think about it a whole lot, just do it, unless Brenna's numbers are all wonky and I have to back up and figure it out all over again.

It's hard to do. Reach out. I don't know why. While I'm feeling better I'm snatching the opportunity before it slips away again. It's a lot easier to lurk, read posts, and when I feel up to it after I've thought about it and come up with something to say then type it than deal with ambiguous conversations that could go anywhere, I guess. Kinda makes me feel a little cowerdly.

After I knew my blog was being read, it became harder to post. I started it for me as a place to vent -- and then I had readers. I thought I had to come up with something more interesting than my whining. I have a lot of draft posts that have never made it live because I felt they were too whiny or weird to post. I love getting comments. It is so much fun to have a dialogue with other people who are reading about me and my family because they care.
I try and strike a balance with positive and negative. I still lurk a lot. Thanks for letting me lurk. Without my online friends I don't know if i would have gotten to this point again.

So, I want to thank my friends. My "here and now" friends for being patient with my absence and allowing me to pick up where I left off. My "virtual" friends for letting me lurk and gain my confidence back. Mom, my friend who listens to me no matter what.

And Al, my partner, my best friend, my husband. The man who loves me inspite of all my insanities. He thinks I'm perfect even when I know damn well I am far from it. He takes my shit and doesn't stoop to throwing it back at me -- even when I deserve it. He kicks me out of the house when I won't take a break on my own and makes sure friends are there with me. And he makes it possible, on a day like today, for me to blog.

Thank you, everybody.

New Post?

2007-06-29T20:39:00.000-07:00

I had all these cool ideas for new posts. I sat down at the computer, like, 2 seconds later just to put the ideas down in an "idea" post and just save it to drafts. Now, of course, they're all gone. Where's the rum? I know I didn't get any.

Sigh.

3

2007-06-23T23:26:00.001-07:00

3
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Every day you get bigger. You already have strong opinions of your own. Smiles like sunshine make my day bright. I love how you love snails and pounce on your brothers (even if I have to hold back my snickers & give you a time out). Gotta, go, go, go you are always on the move -- you'd rather be outside than sitting and watching T.V. You are a beautiful little girl and I look forward to watching you grow into the wonderful young woman you'll become.
I love you Buttercup.
Happy birthday.

Adventures in Potty Training

2007-06-21T21:26:00.000-07:00

****WARNING*****
Too much information - unless you've been privy to the prossess of potty "training" -- or maybe even if you have.
I'm just writing this for posterity. And so I can google this when she's 16.

Nakie girl comes tearing into the living room.

"Mommy, mommy! I pooped in the potty! Come see."

She grabs my hand and we both run down the hall to the bathroom.
Sometimes poop means pee - but there it was just like she said.

"Mommy, one is floating one is sinking."

"Wow! That's amazing"

We stand there admiring her work of art and I notice that the view is unobstructed.

"Hey, I have a great idea! Lets get you some toilet paper"

The previous roll had gone swimming during the last potty break.

When I had finished wiping her bottom and tossed the paper in I inadvertantly reached out to complete the next step.

***flush****

"Mommy, I'm so mad at you!"

She stomps out hands on hips.

Ah, I'm so used to walking into bathrooms and having to flush all manner of things (both here and at work) I do it automatically. That she might want to admire it a little longer and flush it herself didn't even cross my mind. I've been through this twice you'd think I'd remember that one.

Those were the good old days . . .

2007-06-18T22:26:00.000-07:00

I've been reading DDQ & QoD's posts and reminising. DDQ and I go waaaaaaaayyyyyyyy back. I love all of her stories especially of her bizarre relatives. I want to put one of our stories out on the web but I can't figure out which one to write about. This isn't as well written as QoD or as funny as DDQ but here goes. . .

I'd love to write about our time in Drama Class down at the JC especially because the title of this post would fit perfectly-- I freaked out our teacher by crossdressing and singing "Wierd Al" Yankovich songs (not during the same performance though). Fun as that was I'll take you on a little ride on back to the 1999 County Fair.

This took place in a little town that's home to Earthworm Jim (no, really the cartoon character hails from this place). Turkey Tech isn't too far away and we'd been on an adventure to secure us some Hewie Lewis and the News tickets. It's the armpit of the Central Valley of California during the hottest part of the summer. August. I am a cool 112 degrees because I'm a week away from having my first born. Anne & I got to the fair a little early so that we could get some good seats -- even though we bought tickets it's an elbow your way to the best seat kind of venue. Well, when we got there the monster trucks weren't done kicking up the dirt in the arena area so we thought we'd take a walk around the fair. Anne was afraid I'd go into labor at any minute (frankly I was a little nervous too - at that point in my life all I'd had to compare labor to was cramps and those puppies always sneak up on me).

After a while we saw a vision of air conditioned lovelieness and wrote our names down on the ledger.

It was . . .

Budwiser Brewmaster Bus

Ahhhhh, heaven! Slightly padded foldie chairs and a 10 degree difference from the external temperature. Woo hoo! Now was only 102 degrees!

We sat down and Anne made herself comfortable while I did my best to NOT do my impression of a beached whale. People filed in around us and kept turning to stare. I really was HUGE. Fortunately it was before the digital age of cameras. Anne, darlin', you're going to have to write your version of this story 'cause my memory is a little fuzzy. Did you actually say "What! Haven't you ever seen a pregnant woman drink a beer?" I know we kept laughing and making jokes just to watch these people try and put their eyes back in their head.

O.K. you know when you "taste test" something they usually only give you such a tiny amount that you really do need to go back when that Costco lady isn't looking to grab 3 more just so you know what it really tastes like? That's what I figured was going to happen in the Beer Bus. They brought us samples of 3 beers in dixie cups smaller than the kind I had to pee in every week. I'm sure everyone was thinking pints when they signed up but what they got were thimbles.

The Budwiser Guy did a lot of talking about how the beer was brewed and how it was sacreligious to keep your beer in the garage, unless you have a fridge in there, of course. High temperatures kill the taste, you know. We got 3 more teensie Tinkerbell draughts sipped them and listened to more talking. Not even enough alcohol in all six cups combined to kill a braincell. After 30 or 45 minutes we each got a little card proclaiming us Brewmasters. So now I can say "I was a pregnant Brewmaster." The only thing left to do was see the guy who made it "Hip to Be Square". I'm such a rebel.

Skoolz Out!

2007-06-08T13:31:00.000-07:00

Well, mostly anyway. Therin's last day of school was yesterday and Rowan's last day is the 18th (officially). Rowan graduates preschool on June 11th in the evening. They have little cap & gown outfits for the kids. I think he'll have a good time "walking the stage". They're getting so big so fast! Can you believe it?

An ear infection

2007-06-02T21:11:00.000-07:00

Barely. She didn't throw ketones with the last ear infection. Why now? Anyhow, back to the beginning of the story. I got home from work and Mom told us that Brenna felt hot during her nap. Her underarm temperature was 102 farenheit. So, she gave Bren some Tylenol. I took her numbers;

BG 296 Blood Ketones 1.4

O.K. so ketones show up faster in the blood than urine and nobody knew what to do with blood ketone info last time.
"Brenna, lets go sit on the potty" woo hoo! she actually peed on the stick!
Within seconds it turns a dark burgandy. Large ketones, second darkest color on the bottle. But her bg number isn't too terribly bad (for her) and the blood ketone number is actually lower than the urine ketones suggest but Al is nervous. So while I wrangle the girl back into her clothes. . .

Al called nurse J and described what was going on. She told us that we should take her to urgent care because her fever had been going on for 3 days. She said that even though she was acting just fine that we should take her to urgent care because things can turn scary quickly for little ones. So I called the appointment line to tell them that we were going to urgent care. They told us to wait by the phone and they'd call us back. Brenna & I headed out with a cell phone and Al waited at home for the call. We were close to the Urgent Care center when he called to say that we needed to head to Emanual Medical Center emergency or north to Manteca's emergency room (side note: I live less than 2 minutes WALKING distance from a hospital but Kaiser doesn't deal with either of the hospitals that are in my town -- grr). We get to the emergency room and I get her checked in then she's the next one called. A nurse takes her vitals, weight, height, listens to her heart, etc. hands us a paper bag with a pee cup inside. We head to the potty to get a sample. She does it again! It is soo rare for this girl to pee on command. We took it back to the nurse and waited. And waited. And waited. I took her numbers again.

BG 186, Blood ketones 0.1

Brenna slides out of my lap and is dancing around and playing hopscotch across the tiles while other folks are waiting to be seen. Can't we go home now? Her numbers are good. As long as we're here we might as well find out about her mystery fever.

A vampire (professional blood taker, I can't spell phle. . . and I don't want to look it up on google -- I get sidetracked) comes out. I can tell he's a vampire not because of his pasty white complexion and cape but because he carries a tackle box full of tubes and sharp pointy things in sterile plastic packages. He calls about 5 names and as we file in we're set up in beds with curtains mere feet apart. Brenna is in the bed closest to the door. Lucky her, first blood. There isn't anothe nurse available to help hold Brenna's arm so the blood tech directs me to lay on the bed with her and wrap my legs around hers. I will need to hold her arm still while this is done. So I wrap my self around her as tightly - yet gently- as I possibly can. I tuck her head under my chin, her 'free' arm under my body and grab hold of her hand and arm. I'm told to keep her arm from twisting. She's very good at twisting. I worry somewhere in the back of my mind about bruises and file it away for later. I ask about a butterfly needle and he says that he's using a pediatric needle but it's going to take a while. I watch as he inserts the needle into her arm and tighten my grip as she begins to thrash and scream. It feels like child abuse. I blink slowly twice to give myself a break from watching the needle then go back to my vigil. If she can feel it -- I can watch it. Have I told you how much watching fake needles on TV make me want to puke? I don't watch my own arm get poked. After a long moment the vials are filled and before I know it he has tape on her arm. I hate tape. They don't use that stretchy stuff that doesn't stick to your skin anymore because it has latex in it. That sucks. The tape is like supergluing a cottonball to her arm. And we're walking to the waiting room again as I contemplate tomorrow when I try and remove that thing. I know what the blood and urine is going to show them. I just took it myself without pinning her to a table. I just hope it shows what's been cranking her fever up.

I watch my beautiful, happy girl dance some more. I count while she hops. We sing songs and I teach her the "I'm a little teapot" song again. Then I show her how to be a sugarbowl. If I were being politically correct I should have told her we were Splenda bowls - but I'm not.

A few more hours pass and a group of us are called into the same bed area as before only Brenna gets the one furthest from the door. First one seen by the doctor, lucky us. A very tired very patient (a doctor that was trying with all his might not to be irritated) gives me the lowdown. No ketones, 186 (I guess her meter is working well), temp is normal (If I could read minds I bet he was thinking "so why the hell are you here!!!!")
"Do you know what this means"
"Yes, everything is good. We get to go home. But what's been causing her fever."
"Her temp is normal"
"That's because I gave her Tylenol"
"Her temp is normal, 97.9"
"But she had a 102 fever underarm temp and we gave her Tylenol. She's had a fever for 3 days."
"A fever is the body's natural defense against infection"
"So it's an infection? What kind? What did her blood show?"
"It's not bacterial, it must be viral."
"Her blood showed nothing?"
"Well, let me check her ears."
Brenna screams . . .he's 2 feet away.
"Oh, she has an ear infection."
He checks the other side "this one's not as bad as the other. Does she respond well to amoxicillin?"
"We aggressively treated the last one so I guess she does well enough"
"O.K. I'll write you a prescription and fill out your discharge papers."

Brenna was in her own bed by 1:30 a.m. I was asleep by 1:31 a.m. if not sooner.

Mystery fever solved. . . or was it?
Stay tuned for the next Adventure of Captain Ketone and the Mystery Fever part 3.

Guess where we are. . .

2007-05-29T22:44:00.001-07:00

Hospital waiting room

Pacific Ocean

2007-05-27T15:22:00.001-07:00

The Adventures of Captain Ketone IV

2007-05-25T00:55:00.000-07:00

It was just before dawn on Tuesday morning. Brenna started fussing in her room and then climbed into bed with me. As we cuddled up I felt her little body was on fire.

I held her long enough for her to go back to sleep so I could sneak out of bed to hunt down the thermometer. I couldn't find the ear beeper thermometer so I put the digital one under her arm and waited for the beep.

101.5

She felt hotter than that to me and I remember that under the arm isn't the best or most accurate spot but I wasn't about to lube it up and give her a rude awakening. Next stop, blood glucose test.

1-2-3 poke. 256.

Not bad, really. The range her Endo suggests is between 100 - 250. I like to see her in the 100's (who doesn't like to see their numbers in the 100's) and I've set her target in her pump at 165 so it's not really that far out of her range.

Drip, drip.

I was getting blood all over. So I figure as long as her finger is still bleeding I might as well put it to good use. Go go gadget - ketone meter! Pop in a purple strip and hoover up all that blood and

::beep:: 1.7

What the ?!?

I shuffle through the stack of info I brought home last month from the CWD confrence and find the colorful bookmark that explains the numbers. Until that morning, the reading on the PrecisionXtra has been 0.3.

Red. If your blood ketones are 1.6 or above get immediate medical care. Yikes! Deep breath. Another one. Dial Nurse J. Get an answering machine and leave a message (neglecting in my state of almost panic to leave my phone number). Sift through the cabinet for Tylenol - nada. Call Nurse J's office & leave a more detailed message. Hang up. Call the appointment call center and make a 9:30 a.m. appointment. Run to grocery store for Tylenol. Send Therin off to school with Al. Call work & leave message.

Test again. Blood Glucose: 190. Blood Ketones; 2.1.

Load Brenna, barely awake now, and everything we might need into the van and start driving. Use handsfree Uhura earpiece to call everybody again (why did I forget to call the Endo's pager?) Arrive at the clinic early. Thank goodness we're seeing her Pediatritian. Dr. E. gives her the once over, no ear infection, throat's fine, fever's down by now, she's just got kid crud. Some virus that her body is fighting off nothing particular. Clear fluids & fever reducer and rest. But, diabetes changes everything. Those ketones are worrysome. She's probably a little dehydrated from the fever. But to be safe . . . Dr. E suggests doing some blood work to make sure everything is O.K. Since the lab work is going to take a couple of hours it'll be better to start her on an IV now than find out 2 hours from now we should have started her on it right away. Nice that they were able to draw blood using the IV thingie.

Nobody has any experience with blood ketones so we try and get her to pee. No luck. We snuggled up toghether and watched Land Before Time on the tiny hospital bed-- the same one where we waited anxiously for news of a hospital bed when she was diagnosed. I convienently made my official "I won't be in today" call to work when Little Foot's mommy dies so I don't have to watch it. Call the babysitter, call Al, put the phone away. I want to call my Mommy but she's having fun with Rowan so I hug my girl close and wait. I do BG testing about every hour and watch the normal pattern. 100's, bolus, bagle, 301, bolus, 100's - still working on that postprandial spike.

The IV stand thing begins to beep and the nurse unhooks the tube from the IV but she leaves in the IV . . . just in case. I take Brenna to the potty again and she has a meltdown. Poor baby. I can't really blame her.

Before we can go home we need a urine sample.

Two more tantrum trips and I try a different tack. Finally, we have a cup full. When we get back the nurse tells Brenna that she did such a good job! Woo hoo! High five. Then she leaves to do the urine ketone test. After she leaves, Brenna turns to me and says, "Mommy, she was so excited."

"Yep, baby, you did such a good job! Can I have your finger?"

The blood results are back and things look good. Her bicarbonate level is 22. She was a little dehydrated so keep pushing clear, non-sugary fluids as long as she's eating solids. If no solids give her drinks with carbs -- water them down if you can. And the Endo says start her on the 6 day plan. Huh? What's that? Test her every two hours for the next 6 days. Sigh. Might as well start now.

Poke - 84

Well, it is almost lunchtime.

So here I am. I'm taking the first shift and Al's taking the second. The last two nights I was so tired I was afraid I'd fall asleep so I did housework. Not that it looks like I've done anything. . .

Tonight though, I finished my audiobook while holding my sleeping beauty. When she was safely tucked away in bed I caught up on all the blogs I've been composing in my head for the last couple of weeks.

Time to go wake up Al.

San Diego, revisited

2007-05-25T00:19:00.000-07:00

My cute backpack turned 5! We had his birthday party at FunWorks the day before Mother's Day. We played and pizza with just a few of his friends. FunWorks is loud and crazy, but we picked a good time, 10 a.m., so there wasn't a huge crowd. The cousins weren't able to join us but Rowan's best friend from preschool was able to come . . . her birthday party was at the Bowling alley down the street at 1 p.m. so it worked out to be a party kind of day for the birthday boy. Rowan had a blast!

My parents took a trip with Therin to Disneyland during the summer before he started Kindergarten and they took a trip with Rowan earlier this week. They left early Sunday morning, just the three of them and arrived in Legoland at 1:15 ish. So after their 7 hour car trip they played there for about 4 hours and went to their hotel to crash. They went to Legoland again on Monday, SanDiego Wild Animal Park on Tuesday, and SeaWorld on Wednesday. They got back into town about noon today. I missed Rowan but I'm so glad that my Mom & Dad got to spend time with him. I'm glad that Rowan got to talk without having to compete with his siblings for attention. As soon as I get pictures, I'm posting them! He was so excited and he called us every night. They're making a scrapbook of their adventure.

I sent Rowan with his birthday money. I was talking with my Mom on the phone and he walked up to her and handed her his money. "I'm buying the phone so I can talk to my Mommy." I laughed so hard. He bought me zebra socks and he tried so hard to keep it a secret. He told me on the phone each time we spoke that he had a "secret that he wasn't going to tell me about the zebra socks." He whispered to me often and sent me lots of phone kisses. What I noticed most over the phone was how very little he sounds. I know that sounds wierd but he's growing up so fast and I ask him to take responsibility for so many things and expect so much that I forget that he's still just a very little boy. Still my baby. I'm not saying that I want him to grow up fast, but if I don't encourage him to try to do things that might be difficult for him then he won't know a sense of accomplishment. I forced him to try and buckle his own seatbelt for months before he could actually do it. "You try once and then I'll help." Twice, three times, five times, then one day; "Mommy, I did it! I buckled myself!" Somedays he still has a hard time buckling but if he tries first I help him. But that little voice on the phone made me want to just scoop him up and take care of him but I've got to let him go be his own little person. He had a great time doing it this week too! Ah, growing pains. Does that mean I'm growing up a little too?

Sweet Victory!

2007-05-24T23:26:00.000-07:00

On May 16th, I stayed home sick. On the 17th at 8 a.m. I had an IEP to go to that I was positive would be no way to reschedule should I need to cancel. Luckily, I was able to drag myself to the meeting - I felt LOTS better than the day before but had no energy for anything.
The Autism specialists from the County have been working with Therin to put in place a self-monitoring system to take the burden off of the teacher and give him the tools to keep himself on task. They reported that while Therin is a very smart boy and could be doing the school work he is unable to self monitor with the amount of time they are allowed to spend with him per week to teach him the system. Since they've seen him 3 or more days a week for a couple of hours each time during many times of the day (recess, math, reading, direct instruction, morning, afternoon, etc.) They collected A LOT of data. Therin is very smart but he doesn't do his work in the large classroom setting unless he is being prompted. The teacher is doing her absolute best to promt him and be able to teach the rest of her class. And their conclusion is that to properly teach Therin the self monitoring concepts and keep him on task for classroom learning -- he needs an aide. Then she point blank asked the District Guy "Who are you going to get to do this? This is beyond the scope of the services we provide. We will be unable to come out and be there as often as Therin needs to learn the system." In a way, it was probably good that I was sick so that I didn't stand up an whoop! The tension was so thick you could scoop it with a spork. The District Guy grudgingly agreed to an aide for Therin at 3 hours a day for a 6 week trial period. Then he signed the IEP looked at me, and tersley told me that he felt that he felt that all of the FAPE protocols had been met . . blah, blah. . . basically it seemed like a sour grapes kind of thing or a CYA kind of statement. Gee, the Autism Specialist collected data to back up what I had been saying about my son since Kindergarten! I wasn't surprised - it just ticks me off that it took so much red tape to get what my son needs. But we got it!

But it makes me wonder. . . did I get it because of all the hard work from the team of wonderful people that I'm working with? Or did it happen because Therin's teacher let slip (on purpose with my blessing) that I was looking into getting an advocate?
So when I sip from the victory cup -- there is a bit of an aftertaste -- but not enough to stop enjoying the taste.

Life as We Knew It

2007-05-24T23:01:00.000-07:00

I've been listening to audiobooks. My most recent book is called Life as We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer. Follow the link for the publishers info page, I think it has just enough information there were some good reviews but they gave away too much plot. It's a very interesting book. I'd put it in the Apocalyptic science fiction genre. We have it in the Children's Department but it woud take a VERY mature 6/7/8th grader to handle this book. I could have eaten this book up after reading Watership Down in the 6th grade if it were around. It might even appeal to the Lurliene McDaniels fans - a little bit anyway. It's a "what if" book. What if the moon was hit by a huge asteriod and knocked it closer to the Earth. It starts in mid May and I don't think it'll give anything away that California gets dunked by Tsunami's (LA always ends up "falling into the Pacific" in some way or other). What's wierd is that I started listening to the story about the same date that the moon is knocked out of orbit in the book and they mentioned SanDiego being hit - Rowan was in SanDiego at the time so I felt a momentary panic thinking about him. Then I walked into Walgreens to pick up some diabetes suppilies and had to stand in line right in front of a tabloid that was talking about a little girl that had been kidnapped right out of her parents hotel room while they were on vacation. Rowan was on vacation with my parents. They just got back today. It makes me feel so much better to have him home safe and sound. I love Sci-fi and I've been fiddling around with a plague story since 1996. As much as I like the story (Ms. Pfeffer's, I don't have a completed draft of mine) -- don't read it while you're depressed (although if you did have a draft of mine it would still be good advice). Oh, "Catherine, Called Birdie" fans might enjoy this book as well. It's similar in that it's written as diary entries. Something else reminds me of Catherine too but I just can't put my finger on it. Two plucky young ladies handling circumstances beyond their control the best they know how? Perhaps. If you happen to read it let me know what you think. Oh, if you read the autism fiction books tell me what you though as well.

My Backpack

2007-05-04T21:13:00.000-07:00

Mornings are always hurried trying to get everyone ready and out the door but since Therin has been keeping track of the days he tells me "today is Friday, no school tomorrow" and all the little things his siblings do just don't seem to bother him. Brenna is alway a big helper especially after Therin puts out our bowls or plates on the table - she loves to rearrange them. Sometimes I think she does it just to bug him. But my favorite morning thing to do is put on my backpack. O.K. so this backpack is a little heavier than other backbacks but he's just so cute! I love that I work right across from Rowan's Preschool. I can park at work and walk across the street with him. Since I usually give him a piggyback ride somebody from my work notices and comments on my "new backpack" and Rowan always giggles and says, "It's just me, Rowan".

It's been really cold at work recently even though outside the temperature is nice. Last Friday, I was sitting outside eating & reading when my Mom drove by me and waved. Must be time to pick up Rowan from preschool. I took longer to find my stopping point than I thought because Mom was already outside with Rowan & Brenna getting them into the van as I wobbled over on pins-and-neeedle feet.
"Are you coming with us?" asked Rowan
"I had lunch early today. I came outside to read so I can warm my bones. Library is so cold."
"Can I go to your work? I need to cool my bones, it was hot in my preschool," replied Rowan.
That would have been fun if he could come inside for a bit but there was stuff to do. So I had them drive me around the block and drop me off.

Bernard's Blog: Decoding the Dexcom data format. An update

2007-05-04T07:00:00.000-07:00

Bernard's Blog: Decoding the Dexcom data format. An update

Dexcom Challenge

2007-05-04T06:58:00.000-07:00

Don't you hate it when technology doesn't work right? Me too. Bernard's trying to get Dexcom to help him get to his data. What is a Dexcom? It's a continuous glucose monitoring system. It's great to have that data but if you can't get to it to analyze it and figure out what you can do to fix things it really doesn't help much. If enough people link to Bernard and he becomes number one on the list if you google Dexcom, maybe the company will pay attention to his requests for assistance.
Good Luck Bernard!

TGIF

2007-05-04T06:39:00.000-07:00

Friday's are great! Hardly anybody at work so fewer distractions and sidetracks. Mornings are slightly less crazy with the kids. And sometimes I get to go home just a little bit early. I had a teen poetry thing last Saturday so I got to have longer lunches this week and I get to leave at 3. Yaay!

Overwhelmed

2007-05-01T01:00:00.000-07:00

I don't know why I do this to myself. I let things back up and get out of control and then I scramble to "fix" them. I'd feel so much better if I could just keep on top of things. I start to work on something and then get sidetracked. I wish I were more organized. It's frustrating to watch people who can look at something and just organize it. Too much stuff. Rowan's 5th birthday is in 7 days and I still don't know what to do. What's so hard about writing up a few invitations and deciding on a place and time? Beats the hell out of me I don't know why I'm so bloody incompetent. It'll all turn out fine in the end but a semi-clone would be mighty handy. Or Martha Stewart. Or just her brain. Any brain? If you've got a spare let me know. This is the "easy" thing to organize there are a zillion other things clamoring for my attention and here I sit at 1:00 a.m. blogging instead of doing any of them or sleeping. Sleep would be nice. I fell asleep on the couch and Al sent me to bed and I woke right up. I don't feel like I deserve to do anything fun until my "must do" list is taken care of.

CWD Pumping Confrence

2007-04-20T20:46:00.000-07:00

The confrence in SanDiego was great!
On the drive south, we stopped at a "travel mall" with a bunch of gas stations and a bunch of convienence marts next to them all by the same company. Inside of the mart were these toy dogs. Life-like sleeping puppies that breathe. We saw them in the gift store near the hospital lab last time Brenna had her blood drawn. I got two, one for her and one for Rowan. They were her constant companions the WHOLE trip. She wanted them to be with us everywhere.

We got there on Thursday evening and ate a a little Japanese restaraunt that was across the street from the Marriot Hotel. We spent all day Friday at Sea World. We petted Budwiser horses, sea stars, and almost a dolphin. Raw stinky fish were flung to sea lions. We imagined ourselves in the pool with the beluga whales like the freezing family that was out there. Shopped at every gift shop. Walked through a tunnel as sharks swam above. We got back to the hotel room around 6:30p.m. cleaned up and left to go sign in for the confrence.

We met so many people there! It was so cool. Brenna made lots of friends; child, adult, with diabetes, without diabetes. Mom & I got to go to a lot of the breakout sessions. I enjoyed and got a lot of information from every session I went to. Some were more helpful and more applicable to Brenna than others. I really enjoyed learning about the unteatherd regimen and it didn't really apply to Brenna but it could be extremely useful for teens and I will definately pass the info on to Brenna's diabetes educator. I wish I had chosen to go to the how to choose the right infusion set even though I currently like the ones we get.
Brenna was with the daycare ladies. It was so wierd to leave her with no meter and no instructions. They had a meter handy and stuff to treat lows and were all diabetes educators. Everytime I came to get Brenna, she was getting messy, I know she had so much fun I hope the ladies had as much fun as she did. She made some friends her own age as well. It was so cool. Every vendor waved hi and many knew her by name. She talked to everybody! We wore our conference shirts and name badges the whole time and she'd introduce herself by holding up her badge and saying "I'm Brenna, what's your name?" when they'd answer she'd say "that's a great name!". I love her to pieces!!

So much info in so little time! The food was great but it was hard to remember the carbs from the cards beside the food when you're dodging people and tables all the way back to where we were sitting.
Brenna picked a new pink medicalert bracelet, and a new pink pump pouch. I picked a purple pouch with a clear "window" in the front to make nighttime boluses easier to do - no removing & replacing the pump. We got those from Angel Bear Pump Stuff New books came home with us too! I was hoping Diabetes Mall would have merchandise with them - no shipping and you can actually see what's in the book before you buy! So cool!

The things I remember:
*Make sure Brenna's pump settings are correct
*Don't set a bg "range" to shoot for in her pump pick one number to aim for-- if you were shooting an arrow at a target you'd aim for the center dot not the whole target
*Dry breakfast cereal is the fastest carb in the west (or east, for that matter)
*CGMS are the best thing since sliced bread (or carb counting, or the insulin pump, but you get my point --every speaker mentioned it at some point -- some for a good portion of their program)
*Bolus Bren before breakfast or other meals (at least 15 minutes) to "Strike the Spike"
*Choose your words wisely; don't "test" 10 times a day "check" 10 times a day - testing has a pass/fail connotation - checking is more neutral
*Watch your body language too. If the number is high or low, don't freak or give negative body language just use the data to correct and get back on an even keel.
*Free stuff is fun!
*High & low bg's can affect performance & personality dramatically. Don't pay attention to the words coming out of your child's mouth during a low -- treat the low and ignore the mouth. A few of the T1 grownups gave their kids permission to ask them to test their blood at any time to be sure if they have a grouchy parent or one that needs glucose. Kinda cool actually.

On the way home we stopped at Legoland. I thought we'd be there a couple of hours - we were there until a little after 5 p.m. and then had an 8 hour trip to look forward to. I drove through L.A. (the infamous Los Angeles traffic wasn't backed up too much we traveled at 20 m.p.h. Much better than a dead stop.) Mom and I swapped out a couple of times because we were both tired. I think I may have lost my phone at the Iron Skillet restaraunt where we stopped for dinner after we got over the grapevine. It was also in the same "travel mall" area where we found the puppies earlier in the week. Grrr. All my numbers programmed into it and all the pictures in it of my kids lost. And I just figured out how to send the camera pics to flickr. Oh well. We got home at about 1:30 a.m. Brenna was asleep and I joined her shortly afterward. I think I just recovered from last weekend today. I would have liked to have the boys with us but it was really nice to be able to talk to my mom and just hang out just us girls.

Confrence!

2007-04-14T07:55:00.001-07:00

Sleepy girl! My camera phone was taking backward pictures for some reason.

Puppies!

2007-04-12T20:38:00.000-07:00

Sleepy breathing puppies. Best friends! Brenna loved to show them off to everybody.

Ol'Blue Eyes

2007-04-12T19:10:00.001-07:00

An older picture of Rowan that was in my camera phone.

Therin's Award

2007-04-12T14:18:00.000-07:00

You can't really see Mrs. L & Therin just after he got his award for compassion.

Snails Galore

2007-04-12T13:46:00.001-07:00

Brenna's newest favorite pastime, loving snails all to piceces. Literally. It's yucky to watch and I try to take them away from her. She peels the shell off and holds them and touches them and squishes them and finds them after I hide them for the twelveth time (darn those Easter Egg Hunts!! Actually, I think she may have found more snails than eggs on Easter . . . If they were Pokemon she'd have caught them all)

The IEP of Dr. Visits

2007-04-11T00:21:00.003-07:00

Monday, was Brenna's third Endocrinologist visit. I left work shortly after 2 p.m. and met my Mom at the doctor's office. Brenna was asleep so I put her into a pink umbrella stroller slung her diaperbag over my shoulder and headed toward the building. I saw a BlueBelly lizard streak across the parking lot close by and pause for a few moments on the warm sidewalk before dodging into the bushes. Nobody was in line at the check-in desk. I told the lady behind the desk that we were here for her endocrinology appointment. When I got a blank look I clairfed by saying we have a diabetes appointment. While she was punching in Brenna's Kaiser number she started to tell me that the Chronic Diseases Department moved to the new hospital building and that we'd have to go over there. I explained that we come to this building for this kind of visit when Dr. G comes to town. She was surprised that I was right and sent me over to the waiting area. We weren't there for very long when the nurse called us in. It was a little bit before 3 p.m. and Brenna was still asleep. I had to wake her up to weigh and measure her. I was hoping that I'd be able to leave her to her nap for a good portion of the visit. The nurse insisted that they had to do it now. Bren cried briefly and then was her normal happy self.

Brenna colored in her coloring book and I drew pictures and shapes on the paper covering on the examination table (I wonder what the nurses think about our doodles). The knock on the door came after a bit and in came CNE J, Dr.G and Dr. Misdiagnosis. Grrr. Why is he here again? Oh well, I addressed most of my questions & answers to the ladies anyway. We changed her Basal rate. I hope it will bring down all those 300's she's had lately but I was warned that she'll go through a lot more lows. Yikes. I don't look forward to that. I came in armed with a ton of information. I filled out all the forms that they asked me to, made photocopies of her logbook and printed a bunch of reports from the Animas Pump program. We now have a new PC in the house (I'm a diehard Apple fan and taxes went to Al's new computer, yay Al!) so I can actually download the pump information and print all kinds of cool graphs. On particularly active days I need to remember to decrease the basal rate from Midnight to 7 a.m. I could also decrease the insulin ration by 10% for meal boluses. Brenna started talking about going home midway through this long meeting. It'll be even better when we get her a meter cord!

Next, I spoke to the Dietitian who was impressed with the food choices - hey I just put it on the plate she eats what she eats. Her favorite foods - chicken, turkey, string cheese, brocolli, corn, grapes, watermelon, milk, water. I'm enjoying this while it lasts. I know the picky phase is around the corner. The dietitian suggested more protein at breakfast to keep the mid-morning spike at bay. Although really there wasn't a discernable pattern to Brenna's blood glucose readings in her log book which is a halmark of toddler-hood. I asked for suggetions for traveling to SanDiego for the conference (woo hoo! this Thursday!) Always have food & water available, make frequent pit stops, let her run around, and watch out for high readings. Brenna was really ready to go during this talk. She kept sitting in my lap putting her hands on my cheeks and looking in my eyes to tell me stuff. "Mommy, need to hold a puppy. Mommy, time to go home. Mommy, the square is red." and other important things.

Finally, we spoke to the Psychologist. She asked about the pinching issues from the last time we spoke. She is doing much better, Rowan isn't a pincushion any more. I think Brenna is adjusting well and is very happy at the moment. She was very responsive to all the other medical personell during the visit. She was running around in circles, not answering questions, and attempting to escape every two minutes.

The stats:
A1C 8.2 - I was really hoping it'd be better than that but the frequent 300's started a week or so before her visit.
Weight is 90th & height on 50th percentile - Wierd, she doesn't look it to me. She's only gained about 4 lbs since last November and has grown about an inch in the last month.
Thyroid is good.

We were out of there at about 4:15 p.m., got a number, had a snack, and went to go get Therin & Rowan. By the time we got to where we were going it was just about 5 p.m.

Autism Fiction

2007-04-01T15:02:00.000-07:00

I was looking up the subject heading Autism - fiction at work the other day. I was very surprised that there were so many titles! Here are the books that I have read from that list:

The Boy Who Ate the Stars
by Kochka
An outgoing young girl, Lucy, moves to a new apartment and decides to meet every person who lives in the building. When she meets Matthew, a fascinating four year old with autism, all of her plans are turned upsidedown. She works hard at undertanding what autism is and what it is like to be autistic. It's a quick and lyrical read an gives a refreshing perspective on autism.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time
by Haddon, Mark
Currently a very popular book. I enjoyed it. It's written from the perspective of a boy with Aspergers. A friend of mine wrote a paper about it for a young adult literature class she's taking and felt that the author's voice intruded too much. I can see her point of view but I think that your average person who hasn't encontered or interacted with an autistic perston in a meaningful way wouldn't be able to translate the behaviors and since it's in first person rather than third or omnicient there really is nobody else to explain what is going on inside his head. Ah, if only we could get a peek into the brains of all our kids!

The Art of Keeping Cool
by Janet Taylor Lisle
How I discovered this book:
I went out on maternity leave with Brenna in the beginning of June 2002. It was that same week that a volunteer at Therin's preschool suggested that he had a PDD. I had no Idea what that was so I followed directions and immediately called the school district to get an evaluation and was given a brush off. It took me a week to get somebody somewhere to get an appointment for an evaluation. I did no research during that time because I wanted to wait for a professional opinion before I dove headfirst into the information and possibly misdiagnose my child. I know myself well, but I didn't know how long it would take to get professional opinions. Frustrated with the attempt to get Therin evaluated, I googled PDD and found out about Autism and Aspergers. I figured Aspergers was the way to go so I requested the maximum number of books from the library and when the first 2 showed up in my email I went to get them. While I was in, I stopped by to say hi to my colleagues and SC was on the desk. I told her about the PDD/Autism research and asked for a recommendation. "Something good, but out of my normal reading zone," which is usually Sci-fi/Fantasy. She suggested the Art of Keeping Cool. As I read it I expected to "get away" from my research, but I found myself diagnosing one of the children in the book. It is not linked, catalogued, or reviewed anywhere as having to do with autism, however, I figured that one of the characters acted the way he did because he's on the spectrum, so that's why I include this book in this list.
Summary:
During WWII Robert and his Mom move in with his grandparents when his father is deployed. He and his cousin Elliot befriend a German artist that lives outside of town even though he is reputed to be a spy. Lots of internal family drama make all relationships difficult in this coming of age story.

A Wizard Alone
by Diane Duane
You'll have to take a look at the plot elsewhere. I know I read this book. I just can't remember anything about it. Bizarre. I don't remember Kit & Nita interacting with an 11 year old boy who has autism. I'll have to read it again. If you're waiting impatiently for the next Harry Potter read books 1-5 first, then read this one.

Rules
by Cynthia Lord
Catherine is simultaneously bothered by other peoples reactions to her brother David's behavior and yet she is often embarassed by how he acts in public and in other homes. She doesn't think her parents are preparing him for the real world as she sees it so she is creating a list of rules to help David fit in better. Her emotions become even more complicated when she befriends Jason. He uses a wheel chair to get around and a picture board to communicate and helps Catherine realize that her rules are holding her back.

Andy and his Yellow Frisbee
by Mary Thompson
At recess Andy always spins his yellow frisbee. The new girl in school watches and tries to make a connection to Andy and his older sister.

Test Strips

2007-03-23T19:26:00.001-07:00

Toes
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

I think we used 400 test strips in one month.
It took 3 test strips to get her number in this particular instance.
I'm not sure how that happened. I keep checking the cabinets thinking, "Maybe I missed a spot." I haven't. I know she's had a lot of lows lately and we test a lot when that happens. We've also experienced some meter errors but I 'm not sure that that would be enough to suck up 400 test strips. I just hope we didn't throw a box (or two) away by accident.

O.K. math is not my best subject so I broke out the calculator. It's been exactly 46 days and 400 divided by 46 = 8.69.... I looked back through her logbook and we've been testing Brenna between 6 and 12 times a day. I guess we did use that many strips. Considering that it's about $1 per strip I am VERY thankful for insurance. Brenna's diabetes educator is wonderful. She said that she'd order a batch of 600 for her. That ought to throw the pharmacy for a loop! I just went to link to that story and it wasn't there! I guess I'll have to write it again.

Last time I went to pick up her test strips from the pharmacy they gave me one box of 100. It wasn't my usual pharmacy guy who knows Brenna and has seen me about monthly since last August - he'd know better. This pharmacy is almost directly across the street from the Library where I work & I can usually pop across the street during my 15 minute break to pick up prescriptions. Here's the conversation (at least how I remember it):

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Me: "Excuse me, can you tell me why there is only one box?"

Lady:"Looks like the tag says 100 test strips and that's how many are in the box. It must be how many your doctor ordered for you."

Me:"Humm, that's funny. This is a reorder. I used the lable on the box when I placed the order online and there were 4 boxes in the last prescription."

Lady:"That does sound strange. Let me check with the Pharmacist."

Me: "Thanks"

Lady: "She wants to know if you really need that many test strips."

Me: "Wow, really? Well, my 2 year old daughter has type 1 diabetes and we test her at least 6 to 8 times a day --even more if she has a hypoglycemic episode. If she goes low we test her every 15 minutes until her numbers are back to normal. I'll take the 100 strips but it won't last very long. I've got to get back to work soon, I'm only on a break."

Lady:"Thanks If you can wait a few more minutes we'll have those other boxes ready for you."

Me: "Thank you for your help, but my break is over. I'll be back during my lunch time."

So now the Pharmacist is second guessing the doctor? Or did she just think I was lying? The clerk seemed very friendly but I thought it was bizarre that the pharmacist didn't even come out to speak to me personally. Wierd. It was a very nice day for walking and I actually had an hour lunch that day. They had all 400 strips ready and waiting when I got there. I was glad that I didn't get ticked off especially since it wasn't the clerks fault. Boy, won't they be surprised when they get an order for 600! He he he! If they question me I'll have them call Brenna's diabetes educator.

Computer Problems

2007-03-11T21:21:00.000-07:00

Or, more accurately internet conection problems. I called my brother and I didn't even get to try what he suggested and my internet works again! Yay! Lets just hope it keeps going. If not . . . pull out my bag of tricks.

In Grampa's Pond

2007-03-09T16:48:00.000-08:00

What you can't see is a little bitty whirlpool in the pond.

Something that's been bugging me

2007-02-27T20:56:00.000-08:00

I work at a library. No matter where you work it can be very stressful. It's budget time again and everyone that has to put together a budget (or two, or three) is a little cranky. Actually, yesterday should end that in some circles since it was the day to turn them in to Management. Even though there is stress and crankiness everyone is usually kind in other ways. Everyday someone not the same person everyday but someone will ask how Brenna is doing or how all the kids are doing. Depending on how I feel they may accidentally get too much information about the latest illness going around the house and what it is doing to Brenna's numbers or how crusty Rowan's nose is . . . well, you see what I mean. All of you get that info and more but if you didn't want to know you wouldn't be here right?

Last week Brenna was sick. When I'm worried that it might be something serious I usually clam up and don't talk to anyone at work about it until I know I won't be crying all over the place. Anyhow, I don't remember if I volunteered the information because I got a doctor's appointment for Brenna or whether she actually asked how the kids were doing or because I needed to let her know I'd be leaving early that day to get her to the appointment on time but I told this person that Brenna was up all night coughing. I didn't go into detail telling her how the cough sounded slimy and wet not croupy or dry and that she was coughing so hard that her face would turn red and and she'd inhale like she had been holding her breath for two minutes after her coughing fit was over. I just said "Brenna's sick, she was coughing all night, and I have to leave at 2 to get pick her up in time so I don't disrupt the kids afternoon routine". I don't know if I did anything to provoke this or not but this person responded, "Well, life is hard." with a get used to it kind of tone. Well, no shit. My response to that was "Too bad Brenna has to learn about it so soon". Most of the time I hold it together really well inspite of sleep deprivation and all the other stuff that happens. This episode didn't bother me until later, I was more worried about Brenna than my co-worker's attitude. Now, I can't seem to let it go. So here I am blogging about it. Sometimes I DO give to much info but I usually catch myself before I go to far. Or so I thought. Maybe I've been complaining a lot lately. I know I've been rather gloomy. I even went to a happiness workshop in an effort to feel better. What I didn't tell her is that I have heard of a lot of kids in this area getting pnumonia and I know that our area has a higher number of pnumonia related deaths compared to other places. There was even an article in our local paper today. I was scared she might be really sick, her numbers were in the 400's that day and the 300's the day before. I really try hard to just keep things brief. If you work with me and are lurking I'd appreciate feedback to see if I'm actually talking more about my woes than I think I am. I don't believe I deserved that kind of brush off attitude. If she didn't care she could have just said, "O.K. see you later." I deliberately kept the info to a minimum and still got a negative attitude. Grrr.

It's been a long time

2007-02-27T20:17:00.000-08:00

I haven't posted much lately. I haven't really felt like I had anything interesting to say. It's not that there hasn't been anything worth ranting about (cancelled IEP, fluctuating numbers, heavy antibiotics, pinkeye, budget time at work, etc.) I just don't feel like I have anything interesting to say. I feel kind of blah. I have several posts that I've started and saved to drafts -- maybe I'll finish them someday.

I did it!

2007-02-14T19:29:00.000-08:00

Brenna put this shirt on all by herself!

And now for something completely different. . .

2007-02-11T12:40:00.000-08:00

When I was little I lived in San Diego. I remember that we had passes to the Wild Animal Park and Sea World because we went all the time but I can't remember if we had annual passes to the San Diego Zoo. It was so much fun. Mom, Brenna, and I will be going to the CWD Pumping Confrence in San Diego in April so I decided to take an peek at some of my favorite places online.
One of the cool things I discovered while poking around was the Shamu Cam I am actually watching two killer whales swimming around right now. It is so cool. Mind you, I watched a lot of empty tank time too today before I figured that I could shrink my widows enough to display the Shamu Cam. If you follow the link it takes you to a cool animation that looks very real but to get the Shamu Cam you'll have to follow their link at the bottom of the page. Apparantly San Diego has a lot of streaming video cams all over. It is way cool but seems to be rather big brotherish. There are a couple of Zoo cams so if you like Pandas, Apes, Elephants, or Polar Bears take a look.

Forwarned is not always Forarmed

2007-01-29T07:15:00.000-08:00

Dr. M. did the I.Q. test and initial assessment of Therin to see if he would qualify for VMRC to do an official PhD Psychiatrist assessment/diagnosis when he was in Kindergarten. He spent about 1.5 hours with Therin and when he was done Dr. M told me that if the Psychiatrist saw Therin on a good day his autism might go undiagnosed. So 4 months later durning the 2 hour drive to San Jose for the appointment to get an official diagnosis I was trying to analyze all of the triggers that Therin might encounter. We did what we would normally do for any drive with Therin. We made him comfortable, brought toys, games, snacks, and music to keep him occupied. He had both parents on the trip so that if Therin needed a break and we had to take a walk one of us could be talking to Dr. J. We didn't do anything to "aggrivate" or push his buttons so that his autism would be obvious. I wanted a diagnosis but what I wanted more than anything was somebody else to see what I saw. I wanted Dr. M to be wrong. I figured that Therin would get a diagnosis of PDD-NOS or Aspergers and then he'd get help at school. Yet, when we got there Therin was in his element. Three adults paying attention to him. He was extremely compliant and time constraints didn't bug him at all. Therin was on his best behavior and I hadn't seen him act so well, ever! I figured we were going home without a diagnosis and I'd have to find a way to pay for a second opinion. To my surprise Dr. J gave him the diagnosis "High Functioning Autism" He meets 10 of the 12 criteria for an autism diagnosis. Many of the difficulties on the list are very mild. A few are moderate and 1 or 2 cause him great difficulty. Most times he does well handling his minor sensory issues but if it's a bad day you can tell because noise or shoe problems will be triggers for tantrums.

I was warned at the beginning by Dr. M that an Autism Specialist may miss Therin's autism diffuclties why is does it continue to surprise me EVERY IEP that the people observing Therin miss his problems when they don't have a background in autism. The school psycholigist likes to point out to me "that we ALL observed him and we ALL came to the same conclusion. How could ALL of us be wrong." "If he's on task 85% of the time what do you really thing an aide would do to help him?" He's "on task" for the 1/2 hour that they are observing him and when they leave he melts down or becomes defiant. Doesn't that say something? They probably think that Mrs. L is lying. Who knows. Just because his difficulties aren't always apparant doesn't mean that they are addressing the issues he needs help with. Just because (compared to other children on the autism spectrum) his issues are less intense doesn't mean his teacher doesn't need an extra person to help her when his issues do become more intense. There are 2 other children on the autism spectrum in Therin's class. I would be happy with a whole class aide but there isn't a classification in our school district for this kind of thing.

If you haven't figured it out already this IEP was pretty much just to tell me that Therin isn't severe enough to qualify for an individual aide. It only took 2 weeks of observation for them to come to this conclusion. Whatever. I told them what I thought and I wrote on the IEP that I still feel strongly that Therin needs an aide. There is someone who will spend more time in the classroom with him to help get his behavior plan together. We will see how this works. I'm tired. I don't want to fight them anymore. So for right now I'll wait and see and save my energy for future fights.

IEP Today

2007-01-29T05:47:00.000-08:00

I caught some kind of icky cold that's been going around and have been out of it since last Monday. Monday and Tuesday I took some sick time and slept but I still felt awful when I went back on Wednesday. I used up most of my sick time when Brenna was diagnosed so I didn't have the hours and I had to get the preparations finished for two work thingies that were going on Saturday. I carried Clorox wipes with me everywhere and wiped down phones, knobs, and computer keyboards after touching them.

I was so stressed out about work last week and so fuzzy that I forgot to go over the IEP stuff. I keep a red (Therin's favorite color) binder with everything related to IEP from the first note I got from the Preschool to pamphlets and articles on autism. I can't even remember why we're having an IEP. Therin's teacher called on Thursday evening but by the time I got home I figured it was too late to call her -- and now I'm remember it's 5 a.m. of IEP day and waaaay to early to call. Oh well, I have time to stop & chat with her when I drop Therin off.

Wish me luck! I'll be perusing the red binder until it's time to wake up the kids . . .

Doing the Shuffle. . .

2007-01-22T12:32:00.001-08:00

Nearest Distant Shore posted this meme & I thought it would be fun to participate.
It was a lot of fun. I discovered songs I didn't know I had. I've made a playlist with all of these songs so that I can listen to them & make comments about the songs I haven't commented on.

The Rules:

Put your music player on shuffle.
Press forward for each question.
Use the song title as the answer to the question.

Here are the questions & my songs. . .

What does next year have in store for me?
Cheese - Group X (huh? Have to listen to this -- taken on face value I hope this year has a lot of laughs & cheezy grins?)

What's my love life like?
I'm A Loser Baby so Why Don't You Kill Me - Weezer

What do I say when life gets hard?
If Had a Million Dollars - Barenaked Ladies

What do I think of on waking up?
All the Waiting - Frou Frou

What song will I dance to at my wedding?
Old Apartment - Barenaked ladies (Kinda close Old Time Rock and Roll was one song and we did the Time Warp with our friends)

What do I want as a career?
What do you do with a B.A. in English - Avenue Q (This was PERFECT!!!!! When I was close to getting my BA in English I asked this question many times. The answer: Work at the Library!)

Favorite saying?
Aikendrum - Raffi (Not my favorite Raffi song but it is silly and fun)

Favorite place?
Marijuana in your brain - System of a Down (huh?)

What do I think of my parents?
Mother Earth - Without Temptation (obviously mom so I'll do two here)
Drive My Car - Laurie Berkner (Another Children's Music Artist. A sailing song would be better here but . . . not too bad for random)

What's my pornstar name?
When You're Magic - Anne Hill (Not sure how to translate this one. . . since it's from a children's album)

Where would I go on a first date?
Buddy Holly - Weezer

Drug of choice?
Our World - Maire Brennan (hey this should be swapped with that Marijuana one)

Describe myself
Botony Bay - Denis Gibbons (traditional Austrailian folk tune - it's about getting shipped off to Aussieland as a prisoner. Guess I'm feeling a little trapped right now.)

What is the thing I like doing most?
It's Tricky - Run DMC and the Beasty Boys (?okeydokey. . .)

What is my state of mind like at the moment?
How do you do - Shakira

How will I die?
Feel It Again - Honeymoon Suite

Rowan

2007-01-20T22:13:00.001-08:00

Rowan
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Here's Rowan. He has fun at preschool. My sweet boy. I love to watch him play with his friends. I am so lucky that his preschool is across the street. Miss S., his preschool's director, told me how well he is doing (even though he got into trouble that day). She told me that when we're ready that Brenna will be welcomed. This blog is about Rowan so we'll talk about Brenna & preschool another day.

He's at home playing a video game with Therin. I made him pause the game so that I could get this picture. He is such a snuggle bunny. This is a nice smile -- he usually hams it up for the camera. His favorite color is blue (most of the time). He loves his brother so much that he tackles him. Often. Hard. Yet, he gets so irritated when Brenna does the same to him. That makes me laugh. Hey buddy, you're teaching Brenna how to do this. He is the spittin' image of my baby brother. Put a picture of Rowan next to a 4 year old Dan and my kids can't pick who is who (not even Rowan). Now Dan can lie and say that the picture of him sitting nakey, backwards, on the potty is really Rowan! He he he. Rowan will believe it.

Rock on!

2007-01-19T09:39:00.001-08:00

Everyone should be a Rock Star! At least for 5 minutes.

O.K. so this picture doesn't much look like I'm rockin' out but 10 minutes later I sure felt like a rock star!

SC was my partner in crime for this school visit to JM Elementary. SC is a Librarian and I'm a library assistant at our local Public Library. We were admiring our lovely set up for the 1-3 grade assembly (that's when SC took the pic of me hamming for the cameraphone) when the classes started to arrive. We took a look at eachother and we commented that they looked a little big for 3rd graders. SC went to the teacher and asked what grade they were -- oops we had the 5th graders first so we scrambled to change our set up for the 4-6 grade group. The teachers did a fantastic job squeezing in 80+ kids into the tiny cafeteria but then had a difficult time getting them to settle down. You couldn't hear the teachers and even SC couldn't be heard using the mic and their PA system. I had an idea and I wasn't sure if it would work since they are all WAYYYY to young to know this song but. . .

STOMP STOMP CLAP - STOMP STOMP CLAP- STOMP STOMP CLAP -
it didn't take long for the whole group to get get the rhythm.
STOMP STOMP CLAP - STOMP STOMP CLAP- WE WILL, WE WILL ROCK YOU! the chant started with some boys in the back, I joined in & so did many others
WE WILL, WE WILL, ROCK YOU! STOMP STOMP CLAP - I put my fist in the air and yelled HELLO JM SCHOOL!

That was sooooo amazing to be there!

The rest of the assembly was, in my opinion, way cool. Hopefully the students felt the same way.

The Tangled Web

2007-01-17T18:21:00.000-08:00

"Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies" -Fleetwood Mac

Therin asked me the other day if I have ever lied to him. I defined lying and explained about little white lies and how sometimes when someone asks you "does this makes me look fat" they really don't want you to tell them that they are fat they just want a to know if they look good (I also told him the answer is always "You look beautiful") We then got side tracked when he listed 3 or 4 cartoons that had a character who asked that loaded question to other characters and how the other characters in the stories reacted. Then we talked about what would have been a better reaction and then we were at the store and I never really answered his question.

So, have I lied to him?

Yes.

But I can't really give him the answer that question. Not yet. But I will. I'm bogging about it first so I can get my answer straight in my head. It's always worked better if I write things down before opening my mouth. I rarely get a chance to do it and since I've been let of the hook temporarily I'd better take the opportunity. Is this a form of lying? Probably.

"Shoe box, shoe box of lies...from my first little fib when I still wore a bib to my latest attempt at pretending I'm someone..." -Barenaked Ladies

I can't remember all of the things I've "lied" about to him. Not that I lie all the time but that what he perceives and what I perceive as a lie may be two different things. Have you seen Galaxy Quest? It’s a spoof of Star Trek with Tim Allen playing the Captain Kirk character. At one point the alien species they are trying to save finds out that the Commander and his crew are really actors. In the alien society no one lies. Ever. Nobody pretends, does make-believe, or uses their imagination to tell stories. The only being that they have encountered that has lied to them has also destroyed their home planet and all but a handful of their people are left. When the evil alien forces the actors to reveal the truth, the good aliens are crushed. More than just disappointment that their heroes are not who they thought they were their world was destroyed because they believed in something that wasn't real. . . a lie. All that is left of their home is a spaceship the good aliens created aIl because of the TV show that they mistakenly think is real. It is a tragic moment in a funny movie. Right now in Therin's world nobody important to him lies I am afraid of crushing him. I know that all children go through this at some point in time. In Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie it's those first little disappointments that pave the path to adulthood. What keeps Peter young forever is that he forgets the disappointments. I am a storyteller. It is part of my profession and I love to do it. What magic can be found in a story and the truth can be found in fiction is what draws me to books and storytelling. And, yet, technically stories, make-believe, can be perceived as a lie.

What about Santa? What about the Tooth Fairy? What happens to them? If I tell Therin now he'll ruin those fun fictitious fantasies for Rowan & Brenna. I'm probably going to have to try and break it to him gently before he hears about it from kids at school. That will be awhile considering that he spends recess & lunch by himself (hopefully that will be addressed in the IEP on 1/29).

I always get caught in a lie.

I have a hard time lying. That is: telling straight out non-truths to your face. My friends & family know immediately when I am lying. (Go ahead, this is the time to post those embarrassing stories in the comments field guys). My friends DJ & D used to live in the house that my family is currently living in. Therin & their son went to the same school and we didn't change their address when they moved out and we moved in so that he could continue going to school. DJ knew this lie by omission was eating me up and so she took pity on me and gave the school their new address. They had to change school districts. Sigh.

This next story isn't me - but it could have been. A person I know was doing a good deed for her daughter. Cable was acting funny and since her daughter was at work she called the cable company and pretending to be her daughter so it could be fixed before she got home from work. The cable company told her it was because the bill was late and the cable had been turned off until it was paid. She said that she'd pay it. Then they asked her for her Social Security Number. Well, she didn't remember her daughter's number so she said that she didn't have it handy. Well, she had to do a lot of swift thinking to explain why the name on the card she was paying with wasn't hers (see, definitely not me - I'd get flustered or caught here) finally after much story bending was able to do a good deed for her daughter.

"No I would not sleep in this bed of lies" - Matchbox Twenty

I've been working on this blog for a few days now and I still haven't fessed up to Therin about lies and lying. I am afraid that this will be the only experience that he will generalize. My fear is if I say, "Yes, I have lied to you" he will automatically assume that everything I have EVER said is a lie. Mommy = Liar One moment will negate all of the "I love you's" ever spoken. Most people will assume that that I am overreacting but they probably don't know Therin or haven't worked with autistic children. When I read "The Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime" by Mark Haddon (without spoiling the plot for those of you who haven't read it yet) Christopher, a 15 year old boy with autism, discovers a couple of rather large lies that his father tells and has such an extreme reaction that he pushes himself out of his comfort zone to seek a person in another town and try and find them alone overcoming sensory integration problems, sights, sounds, touch, smells that are all overwhelming to him because the person who loves him the most, his father, lied to protect him from emotional harm. I think this will make a good read-aloud for my kids someday.

Teach Your Children
by Crosby Stills Nash & Young

You who are on the road
Must have a code that you can live by
And so become yourself
Because the past is just a good bye.

Teach your children well,
Their father's hell did slowly go by,
And feed them on your dreams
The one they picked, the one you'll know by.

Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you would cry,
So just look at them and sigh and know they love you.

And you, of tender years,
Can't know the fears that your elders grew by,
And so please help them with your youth,
They seek the truth before they can die.

Teach your parents well,
Their children's hell will slowly go by,
And feed them on your dreams
The one they picked, the one you'll know by.

Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you would cry,
So just look at them and sigh and know they love you.

I think I'll let him bring up the subject. If he does I'll ask him why he wants to know and either speak directly to his query or explain very plainly first that if someone has lied that doesn't make everything that they have said a lie.

A few of my favorite things. . .

2007-01-15T11:32:00.001-08:00

Group Hug
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Watching my kids give eachother a group hug.
Pancake breakfasts.
Breakfast in bed!
Supervising playstructure building
Peanutbutter kisses.
Rainbows, in the sky or crystal sprays. Rainshines.
Watching fish swim.
Tide pools
Afternoon updates
Rowan's songs, "To the moon!"
Brenna's "best friends"
Therin's "well actually, Mom, did you know that . . ."
Al's jokes.
Yoga.
Shakin' my sillies out with 100 kids!
Ladybugs.
Tiaras (my princess & queen!)
Pedicures and someone to share them with (hi Mom)
Warm winter scarves.
Mittens.
Purple violets, pink roses, white mini daisies.
Chocolate.
Hugs.
Iced Chai Latte
Camping with my family.
Slugs
Lasagna
Long showers
Shamrocks
Forest green
heck, forests!
emerald
pearl
Ocean sunsets
waves crashing
floating
Sandcastles
acorns
superhero capes
bubble baths
bubbles!

Pancake Highs & Night time Lows

2007-01-06T11:01:00.000-08:00

We had a few very nice weeks with good numbers. I don't like to talk about good numbers while they are happening because I'm afraid I'll jinx it. Superstitious? Yup! Brenna's numbers were still good but on the high end of her spectrum on Thursday when we did her site change. She was a little higher than normal two hours after her site change but it is not unusual for her to go a tad high. Still higher than I like at 3 a.m. 277. The next morning she woke up at 205. I checked her blood ketones - nada.

Then we had pancakes.

Why did I make pancakes when Brenna had been a little higher than normal? Because I was home and could actually spend the time making pancakes. I usually make a huge batch and freeze the leftovers for instant snacks later in the week. Cheaper than Eggo! If I have wheat flour it's usually healthier too. But, no matter what we do she goes really high with pancakes. 414. Made REALLY sure she had no sugar free syrup on her fingers and tested her again. 380. Not a single number under 200 all day long so I kept an eye on her and checked her site but it looked good. After dinner I noticed that special "insulin" smell when I was blowing raspberries on her tummy so we did another site change -- she was really mad about that. Brenna fought harder than she's fought in awhile. I try to keep diabetes routines low key: I give her a hug, comment about her behavior, ("Wow, you sat so still. Thank you!" or "You must be frustrated with getting poked today, you wiggled a lot.") and move on to the next thing (play dough, coloring, dress-up, playing, lunch, whatever). After dinner is our nighttime routine and thus not something very exciting to her so I popped in a Greg & Steve CD and we all danced for about half an hour.

Recap: the day was highish, way high, nearly high, insulin smell, site change, dancing, bed.

What's this a recipe for? You guessed it! That night time low. Al even gave her ice cream for snack that night. She went to sleep so easily. Al and I hung out watching the TV. I started nodding off and on my way to bed asked him to test Brenna before he headed that way. I was out when my head hit the pillow. All of a sudden, Al's shaking my shoulder saying "wake up, I need your help she's 89, she's 89." I grab a tube of frosting and Al gets some milk. We meet back at Brenda’s bed and start squeezing the tube into her mouth. I realize at this point that it's red frosting and somewhere my mind pops up with "I hope this doesn't get all over the sheets" and "awwww, I should take a picture. With the red all over her mouth she makes a very sweet vampire". Don't ask me where it comes from. She's shaking her head trying to get me to stop and yet she's still asleep. We dribble some milk into her mouth, wait 15 minutes, and she's 88. Lovely. At least she's not dropping too fast. We succeed in waking her enough to finish half of her milk and squirt some more frosting into her mouth against her wishes. (Isn't that bizarre? I have to force my frosting girl to eat frosting). Finally another 20 minutes pass and she's at 111. I tuck her in and flop back into bed. In the morning 213. Sigh. A new day to attempt to get that number below 200 and keep it there.

*****

I still haven't gotten the hang of balancing exercise and insulin and food. Some days she runs like crazy all day long and it doesn't seem to affect her numbers. Some days she goes low. I can't recall a time when she has gone high after exercise. But. . . hours or days later exercise is supposed to affect her BG readings. I don't know how to calculate for that. I suck at math on regular days. Well, not suck really, but I work really hard and take a long time to get to the right answers. If somebody told me that my child would be diagnosed with a disease that required me to be able to perform daily math calculations and administer shots I would have told them that they were being incredibly cruel to even suggest such a combo considering my aversion to mathematics and my needle phobia. I did have a teacher tell me I was going to get diabetes and that I'd have to get over my fear of needles. I think her daughter had diabetes and she was ticked that I had the luxury to have such a phobia. I WISH I had gotten diabetes instead of Brenna! If I could go back in time my 12-year-old self would never understand that kind of wish and she'd be hurt that I can sympathize with that teacher. Strange what curveballs life throws at us isn't it?

Brave?

2007-01-05T03:11:00.000-08:00

There is a very lively discussion happening over at Diabetes Mine. It's in the comments section of the post What Makes You Think I'm Brave? It got me thinking. I say it to Brenna all the time. "You're so brave!" Maybe she'll become sick of hearing me say it and tell me to stop some day. Maybe, just maybe, I can rub together two brain cells and find something more, something different to say to describe my outsider's view of her experience. I watch her, knowing she doesn't understand, and it seems to me like bravery. Maybe I should define bravery.

Bravery, to me, is choosing to get the job done or to do what is right even though you are afraid. Amy at Diabetes Mine describes herself as "Chicken-shit" but she does what must be done. Is it really that far off? I might have a tiny inkling of how she feels. I do what needs to be done for Brenna and I don't feel brave -- I feel numb or angry or scared but I do it anyway. I give my sweet girl the opportunity to poke my finger (and flinch when she does it). I wish I could be the kind of brave that puts on armor, jumps on a horse, and whacks to pieces the evil D-beast for my daughter and knows that at the end of the day everything will be fine. It WILL be fine! I work at making it fine and at the end of the day I'm still afraid it won't be. Afraid of complications. Afraid I'll sleep through the alarm again and she'll go too low in the middle of the night. Does all this make me brave? Yes. Do I have to like it? NO!

This is why I'm up so late reading so many d-blogs and drinking in the experiences of those who have dealt with this far longer than I. Parents whose heartache I share and PWD's who are living through what Brenna is experiencing give me a perspective far broader than daily life in my own little world.

Oh, all of that, and it's time test Brenna again.

I guess it's time to be brave.

Pincushion & a little Ramble

2007-01-05T01:40:00.001-08:00

Arrrgh!
Originally uploaded by amberthyme.

Not enough blood. I hate having to poke Brenna when she's asleep but when I have to poke her a second time it really frustrates me. Some days she bleeds like crazy and other days I end up poking her 2 or 3 times before I get any blood. I don't want to dial the lance up too high. This was taken last week when I was home at naptime.

My poor baby is a pincushion. Tonight I had my husband set up the site change stuff while I was giving Brenna a bath. My goal is to have everything ready, give her a brief choice about where the site will be, (if she doesn't choose I pick for her) and to make it as fast and painless as possible. Since I can't seem to get close to painless I aim for swift so we can minimize trauma and get on with the hugs, kisses, and something fun. Al forgot to take the sticker off of the back of the site. This is the second time he's done it! I know he feels bad but I had a very hard time being sympathetic to him as I was trying to calm her down then hold her down for a second site change. Nobody, child or adult should have to be a pincushion for the rest of their lives.

That is the main reason that I post her pictures on Diabetes Made Visible -- people need to see the faces and the lives of the people who have diabetes. If you haven't taken a peek follow the link or click on the button over in the sidebar.

There are some funny pics and some wonderful art photos (I never knew I could find a row of insulin bottles beautiful) and the everyday pics of test strips, testing, blood drops on fingers. There is one of Gracie crying with a blood smear on her finger -- I want to give her and her mommy Sarah a hug and make them both feel better every time I look at the picture. How can people in power NOT want to do anything when you see and read how all of these wonderful people are living daily with this disease.

2007-01-04T19:37:00.000-08:00

Postcard from School

2007-01-04T19:00:00.000-08:00

Mrs. L sent Therin a postcard with a special message just for him. I just love his teacher! I have been reminding him that school will start again soon and trying (with various amounts of success) to give him homework during the break so that his routine is continued, at least a little bit. I think that this postcard is a gentle, yet fun, way to remind him about school. Mind you, I'm sure she does this for every student but it is especially helpful for Therin.

Routine is so important for him. Even breaking routine for something fun can disrupt his equallibrium. Today, my friend Sam, took Therin & her nephew to the movie "Happy Feet". She came and picked him up and they had a great time. During dinner he started throwing mini tantrums. Brenna plays with a dinosaur on her dinner plate mushing pasta sauce all over it and herself. He screams, "NO TOYS AT THE DINNER TABLE! I WISH SHE WOULD NOT PLAY WITH THAT RIGHT NOW! MAKE HER PUT IT DOWN!" Rowan starts to tell a story and he starts screaming "That's not REAL! Stop TALKING!" I am almost positive it's because of the excitement today at the movies and the eminent arrival of the start of school. I wish that enjoyable things wouldn't disturb him so much.

Break routine to do something fun? Or will you just end up tearing your hair out and scrambling to find fun things to do with cranky kids? MileMasterSarah asked the same questions a couple of days ago. She was thinking about New Year's Eve . All of these routine problems connect back to generalization (which MileMasterSarah also wrote about -- thanks for jumstarting my brain Sarah).

People with autism have a difficult time taking knowledge and applying it in new situations. Each year is a brand new school year. Therin doesn't apply last years knowledge of classroom routines to the new class. To him it's a different room, a different desk, a different teacher, he doesn't immediately see the pattern Bell, Desk, Recess, Desk, Lunch, Desk, Recess, Desk, Home - he focuses on all the little differences in the middle. But it's more than just focusing on the little things. Generalization takes a certain mindset. Most of us take for granted that when you know how to swim that you will be able to swim in the ocean, lake, and reservoir as well as a pool. But if you are autistic you may need to have it explained to you that it is O.K. to swim in an inside pool, an outdoor pool, the lake, the ocean, ect. Around here there is a big water safety program geared toward keeping kids out of canals. We live in an agricultural area so there are many canals criss-crossing the Central Valley going right through towns (looking so inviting durin 104 degree weather). Splasher the Frog comes out to the schools and along with a helper teaches kids about not swimming in canals and other water safety tips. I have to tell Therin that the water safety tips apply to all bodies of water. I don't have to worry about him then concluding that if you can never swim in a canal you can never swim in a pool. When we have talks like these I try and think out loud and model generalizing verbally. Is it working? Who knows. Only time will tell. Do these examples make sense? I'll let you be the judge of that.

******************

Bath & site change time. I know it's kinda late for a site change but . . . the sooner we start the sooner it's done.