Monday, July 27, 2009

Another great weekend...

What a great weekend! Actually, it was a great long weekend. I left work about and hour early on Thursday to start my weekend. Thursday night Husband and I went to the Cheap Trick/Poison/Def Leppard concert…it was a pretty good concert. Never in my wildest teenage dreams did I ever think I’d go to a concert and see Every Rose Has It’s Thorn (Poison) and Pour Some Sugar on Me (Def Leppard) performed live. I was in 1980’s Rock and Roll heaven!
The kids and I spent time at the pool (one of our favorite activities) then spent the evening grilling out with friends. Saturday was pretty much spent inside because of gloomy weather, but it cleared up in time for another cook out. Unfortunately, Sunday was spent mostly in bed fending off a killer migraine.
The weekend was just about perfect. And I’ll admit, with the cooler than normal July, I’m really in the mood to go to the apple orchard…mmm…apple pie…apple butter…

A bloggy gift...

My first blog award presented to me by my best friend (which is a gross understatement of our friendship)...We've been together through thick and thin...

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Visit to the Doctor

I forgot to post this last week, so here it is…

I’m not sure if I posted anything about Bear’s last appointment at the Children’s hospital or not…the appointment was back in April. At the time, the doctor felt that he could safely reduce the level of maintenance medications that my son takes on a daily basis without serious risk to his health. So that’s what we did. Roughly six weeks later, Bear began coughing. Nothing serious…just ‘clearing his throat’ is what he would say. As the weeks passed I noticed that he was doing it more and more. I considered calling the doctor but since we had an appointment coming up I decided to wait it out.

Normally my concern is that he hasn’t put on any weight or hasn’t grown any. Every time we would go to the doctor he would only have put on a few ounces. It is nerve-wracking because he’s so skinny…anyway, I never considered that lowering his medication would have a two fold affect. Just the other day it was time to go back to the Children’s hospital for a check up. In the three months Bear was on the lower level of maintenance he grew 3 inches and put on 4 pounds. YES! Finally! Significant growth! WooHoo! This is going to be a great visit!! When the doctor came in to examine Deacon he asked if I had any concerns. I told him that I was a little concerned about the coughing as it seemed to be getting worse over the past two months. The doctor gave him a once over and sent Bear for a lung function test (which we do every time we’re there). Here’s a quick background on lung function…people who have Bear’s level of asthma have a ‘normal’ lung function of 80% or better (meaning that their lungs do not function at 100%), when we first started seeing this doctor, Bear’s lung function was 48%. Bear’s lung function topped out at 76%, not even in the ‘normal’ range. Okay, back to normal programming. I really hadn’t thought that the lower level of meds would have such an affect on Bear…his lung function tanked 13% (which is why he was coughing so much) in three months, which, of course, is unacceptable. I was wholly disappointed. I wanted so much for him to be able to stay on the lower level of meds…but with this result it just isn’t possible. So, he is now on the higher level of maintenance medications again. Which makes me sad. It’s not an additional pill, or inhaler…just higher dosages of the meds he’s already taking. I know, at least he’s going to be able to breathe…I get that, but this has been such a battle for so many years, I thought that we were finally getting close to the light at the end of the tunnel…

Thursday, July 16, 2009

I'm 36!

My 36th birthday was this past weekend…and I’m glad to say it was definitely a good weekend. On Friday the 10th my sister-in-law and I went to see Paramore and No Doubt at the Verizon Wireless Center. It was a great concert and we had an absolute blast. On Saturday the neighbors and I cooked (to celebrate a friend’s birthday) out after the rain stopped, it was fun but there were lots of bugs out and I was still tired from the night before so I turned in a little earlier than usual. Sunday (my birthday) Husband made me breakfast in bed, French toast, bacon and coffee (courtesy of Bear, he makes the BEST coffee!!). Husband bought me some awesome jewelry that I had been eying for quite some time. Later that night we loaded into the car and went to Olive Garden for dinner. It was so nice to hang out with my family (yeah, they were on their best behavior)…it turned out to be a great weekend.