THOUSANDS OF FREE BLOGGER TEMPLATES »

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

To the pedi's

Today started way too early...like 5am too early. Jeff had to fly out to Cupertino, CA today for his Apple Executive briefing. He flew out of Lansing, which is an hour south of us. None of the THREE other guys who are going to this thing were on the same flight as him. Why? Because they didn't want to chance them all DYING if the plane crashed. Can we say paranoia? Anyways, his flight was "scheduled" to leave at 9am, we wanted to give him plenty of time to get checked in, so we shot to get him there at around 7:15, which puts us leaving our house at 6am. With 3 kids...one of which would need to be completely ready for school as I would be dropping her off on the way home. Oy. But, things went pretty smoothly, because, as Jeff pointed out, it was just HIM leaving, not us. It's easy to get him ready, I should know...I packed his bag. He doesn't need snot suckers, and 20 lbs of diapers/wipes, 4 changes of clothes for each day, and it doesn't take a giant backpack full of toys/paper/crayons/books/snacks/drinks/crap to keep him occupied on a plane.
But we dropped him in plenty of time...for his flight to be delayed by 90 minutes. Rofl. I had to laugh because if I didn't I would have fallen asleep at the wheel driving home. Emma got to school about 45 minutes late, and since Sarah had thrown up a bit this morning, I decided to not send her to school.
Speaking of Sarah, she's been pulling her hair out...again. She did this about two years ago. You can read a bit about it here. She's only been doing it for about 3 weeks, but I wanted to try & nip in the bud as soon as I could. She's been having not-so-nice diapers as of late & has thrown up twice since Sunday. Since it's been 2 years since her last episode, I'm not thinking she can trichotillamania, but at the same time, I do think it is something behavioral. Not sure what though. But, I was worried about her possibly having a hair-ball somewhere in her GI tract, and that could possibly kill her if it wasn't caught. So, it was off to the pedi's this afternoon.
First of all, let me say that I probably look like the world's worst parent. Here is my kid, who has a BLACK EYE from banging heads with her little sister, pulling her hair out & eating it, plus she has some weird spots on her trunk. Can we say "looks neglected"?? Ugh. The doc thinks the spots might be staph (double ugh) so he gave us some antibiotic ointment. At first he thought Sarah's BM issues might be some milk allergy. I reminded him that she's had a long history with that: breastfed, then put on whole milk, which she began having issues with, so we switched to soy, but after 18 months of that she was fine with regular milk again. So he decided to test her for celiac. Just the blood test for now. He also ordered an abdominal x-ray to make sure she didn't have a hair-ball in her GI tract somewhere. For my girl who is normally SO laid back when it comes to doctor stuff, the blood draw plus x-rays just put her over the edge. It took 2 people to hold her still enough to get 2 quasi-decent x-rays. And Katie decided she'd had enough before we even got there and was not a happy camper, and she didn't even have to get anything done!
Anyhow, I was hoping for some results of something before the end of the workday, but no such luck. What to even hope for? That she has celiac and that's the reason she's never had a normal BM? Because that would mean DRASTIC changes in the way this family consumes food. But if it's not that, what is it? Just her normal way of doing things? I don't think I'm ok with that. There has to be a better way. What about the hair thing? If there IS something in there that's causing her GI issues, that's probably going to require surgery. And even if there isn't, how do we get her to stop pulling out her hair and eating it?? Do we have to keep her hair short? I don't mind that, but I'd also like to find the root cause of the behavior, and not just the outlying problem. Ugh, just so many possibilities.
And to top off this most wonderful of days, I get a call from Jeff as I'm driving home this morning, to let me know that his flight is delayed. It left 90 minutes late, which made him miss his connection. So, I'm on the phone with United, trying to get him on another flight. But it doesn't leave until 3pm, CST, which is 5 hours after he finally got to Chicago. But, that plane has safely taken off, so he's on his way. He should be arriving in CA in about 3 hours.

3 comments:

Me said...

WOW...busy day for you! I feel your pain for sure. I hope you find out what is causing Sarah's blowouts. It's not nice having a reason, but it is nice to know SOMETHING so it can be helped. Kaia went through a phase like that too and it drove me nuts. She was tested for Celiac and it came back negative, although I'm not convinced that's the case. Her poops have normaled out though finally.

Amanda said...

That's what's so confusing, Sarah has NEVER been normal with her diaper issues. Like ever.
I told Jeff what was going on, and I said although her having Celiac would suck, at least it would be an answer. Thanks. :D

Shannon @ Gabi's World said...

Does your husband's company not allow carpooling then, too? Geez that is paranoia! Hoping the poopy issues find resolution and answers.