Tip-Toeing Through the Mine Fields

Here lately it's been...well...interesting. Life. It's hard to say what it will throw at you. This summer has been quite trying for me and sometimes I get a bit jittery to turn another corner. But just as easily as there could be something scary around that corner, there could be something equally wonderful and amazing. I'm waiting for the amazing things because I know they will come one day. But, this day was not yesterday.

It started with a fever around 2:00 in the afternoon. Alex was definitely a bit off and seeing as he'd been around a lot of kids this past weekend and out of his element, I wasn't surprised to see it. What I was surprised to see was Josh coming home, hunched over and in severe pain. At first, I assumed he'd hurt his back. Occupational hazards, you know? When he said he felt worse than he'd ever felt before in his life in a barely audible voice and I saw the pale skin beneath the dirt, I knew something wasn't right. He said his entire body was cramping up, he'd thrown up twice, and had to pull over due to his vision going out. All it took was one question: "Did you work in the heat all day?" When he said yes, I immediately thought it was heat related. Of course, he went downhill fast. He collapsed onto the floor in entire body cramps and then suddenly I heard him whisper, "I can't breathe!" Boom. That was it. Ambulance was in route. It was looking like he was having a heatstroke. He said he was sure he was having a heart attack. I kept my cool, but inside I was falling apart. Now before you get all freaked out, it wasn't a heart attack. His pumper's working fine. They took him away in the ambulance and suddenly I couldn't believe what was happening. I was in the car, dropped the kids off with my folks, and on the way to Josh. The hospital kept getting further away for some reason, but I got there eventually. I had called for prayer from Josh's brother and had him pass the word along. They didn't hesitate and were already in the car on their way...just as worried as I was. He didn't have a heatstroke, but it could have gone that far fast. He had what they called acute renal failure. His kidneys were all dried up and he his body began breaking down and eating his muscle to survive. Dehydration to the max. Four bags of fluid and a few tests later, he finally had to pee. The doc said that if you don't pee, you're not hydrated. First of all, the doctor said 'pee' and not urine. I loved that. It lightened my mood significantly. We all came up with a great t-shirt idea. "My kidneys are happy. I peed today." (Sorry. Had to joke a little. :-) All jokes aside though, it was scary and horrible to watch happen, but thank God he's okay. He's off work until Friday under doctor's orders. Actually the doc's orders were, "Get a red box DVD and relax for two days with lots of fluid." Done.

As for Alex, his fever is getting better, but he's got something else going on. His face is twitching. I took him in this morning and the doctor said she thinks he has tic disorder. Basically it's an involuntary tic that is caused by severe stress or illness. Well, I'd say we have that covered as he watched the five big guys hook daddy up to tubes and take him away to the hospital. Poor kiddos. I sent them to my room while it was happening but you can't hide everything. Let's just all pray that things get better quick for all the people in my house that I hold so dear to my heart.

So basically it's simple. There are no maps through the crazy thing that is life. You can tiptoe through the mine fields but eventually you're gonna hit the bumps you just didn't see were right in front of you.

Preparations

In three short weeks, I will have a preschooler. I must admit, I'm a bit nervous about the whole thing. Why am I nervous? Three things.

1. Life threatening milk allergy
2. Life threatening peanut allergy
3. Viral induced Asthma

Why do those three things scare me? Easy.

1. "Little Johnny's having a birthday today! Cupcake and Hershey bar time!"
2. "What's that on your hand little Billy? Peanut butter?"
3. Germs, sneeze, sneeze, sneeze, cough, cough, flu, germs, germs. *wheeeeze*

Did that make enough sense to you? Well the whole 'trust a total stranger with the protection of my child' thing isn't settling as nicely into the black pit of my stomach as I'd hoped it would. As they say, you can't protect them from everything forever. Anyhow, in light of the new school year, I am loaded down with things I need to do before it all begins. Not only do I need to buy the school supplies and get the medical records filled out, but I also get the joy of ordering a second medical alert bracelet *cha-ching!*, double inhalers*cha-ching!*, double Epipen Juniors*cha-ching!*, and stock up on frozen cupcakes for all the 'little Johnny birthdays'. That first day of dropping him off at school will either end with me in tears and sick with worry or with me sitting outside the school window behind a bush watching for the rogue attacking Reese's Peanut butter Cup...ready to pounce at any given moment. Do I chance being kicked out of the preschool because of my obsessive nature to nurture and protect? Probably not. I'm not that scary...yet.

In more preparations, Alex (and Abby as well) gets to visit the eye doctor next week. Family eye doctor trip. That should be a barrel of happiness. It's Abby's first time so we'll see how that goes. Next up is a trip the pediatrician for a shot appointment. Hep A never got done but it's got to be done before school according to what I've read. And naturally, the oral milk challenge was never done because of Alex's knowledge and understanding of his own allergic situation. I have had some problems convincing him to willingly drink cow milk at the doctor's office because he knows it's dangerous. How do you reason with him when he tells you, "I can't drink cow milk, I'm allergic and it will hurt me!" I've taught him this for his entire life so how can I tell him otherwise? So I think I may have convinced him, but it will cost me a blue Mighty Morphin Power Rangers costume. Which, by the way, doesn't come cheap as it is vintage and hard to come by. Sadly, I'm not sure I want to even do the challenge anymore. But I'll delve into that can of allergen-free gummy worms another day. For now I'll get started on all of the preparations. Excuse me. I'm going to go drain my checking account now.

One of those posts

You know...I'm such a dedicated blogger. It's like the best thing I do. I'm consistent. Consistently inconsistent. One of those little things that I should be doing is sharing photos with the dedicated family that check this blog in hopes of finding a shred of evidence that I do, in fact, own a camera and am capable of taking pictures with it. I do upload pictures from time to time but I do so tease those hoping to see pictures of my sweet little children. I'm sure they see a photo underneath the long written blog and think, "Oooh! Photo!" And then they see the actual picture and say, "Oh. Just a squirrel. Joy." And then I upload another photo and they think again, "Oooh! Photo!" And then again, "Oh. A spider. *sigh*" So, mostly for my mother-in-law who I know enjoys seeing all the photos of the kids, I now present you with...well...some photos.

First up, let's start with what we've spent the majority of our summer doing so far. Sitting outside and playing in the little kiddie pool. Note that it was actually well into the 100's as far as temperature goes and those two are, in fact, covered up with towels. But still cute.

I got the camera out and said, "Okay guys! I'll take your pictures but you have to run when I say 1,2,3...go!" They laughed hysterically as they were running.

Mmmm...red dye #40...nothing but the finest for my family. Note that the ramifications of giving children a concoction of high fructose corn syrup, sugar and red dye #40 (blue dye too) 2 hours before bed is not good. Not good at all. Though it sounded like hyped up elephants running amok through my house after this, it was actually two children with dilated eyes climbing my walls. Seriously.

Oh what to do, what to do with my boring evening. Oh! I have idea! Let's put dad's night pants on and see where that takes us! Yep. I'm just glad it wasn't my pants. Cuz that would make me feel just a tad fat. Kinda funny though.

And I had to throw this in here. Because it's just not natural. I'm proud to say that I finally got my corn harvest from the garden. And what a harvest it was! I think I might successfully have gotten enough to feed...oh, I don't know...let's say...a really hungry worm or a not-so-hungry squirrel. The 'normal corn', by the way, is not of my growing.

Isn't it beautiful? All that hard work and massive water bills really did pay off for me this year. I think I'd get more full eating the tube of chapstick...

And as an added super special treat...a video! Alex watched America's Got Talent one night with us and there was a magician on there making things disappear. So Alex, that little character he is, wanted to show us his skills as a magician. We were laughing so hard. He asked me show him how to make himself disappear so I did what I could and he tried his hardest to do the same. Funny stuff.

If I wrote a kid's book about the past two months...

...it would go something like this:

The Big Old Pile of Suck

By: Jessica Blogger

I woke up this morning and I asked life to send me a good day. I decided to get a puppy. I named him Titus. I loved that little puppy. But life sent everyone in my family a dog allergy. Everyone but me. I didn't like it, but I sent it back.

I woke up the next morning and I asked life to send me a good day. I sat down on the toilet and felt the floor move. Life rotted my bathroom floor and sent me loads of icky mold. I didn't like it. So I sent it back.


I woke up the next morning and asked life to please send me a good day. Life sent me a black widow infestation. I most assuredly didn't like it. So I sent it back.

I woke up the next morning and asked life to please, please send me a good day. Life ignored me and sent me shingles on my thigh. I definitely didn't like it. So I sent it back.

I woke up the next morning and asked life to pretty please with cherries on top send me a good day. Life continued to ignore me. It sent me a round of antibiotics. With that, life sent me a brand new shiny penicillin allergy. I liked this least of all. So I sent it back.

Now the next morning I woke up and begged life to find it in it's heart to send me just one good day. And it happened! Life sent me a beautiful new bathroom where you can sit on the toilet without falling to your doom. I loved it and thanked life for my good day.

So then the contractor sent me a bill for $2,900 for three hours of work.

I didn't like it.


So I sent it back.

(not really.)

The moral of the story? Nothing really. I just thought I'd share why I've avoided blogging...in children's book format. Cuz...ya know...I'm a writer. :-)

*Dedicated to Mandy. Because it was her idea. :-)*

Wanna know how hot it is?

It's so hot that our friendly neighborhood squirrels are using the bird bath as their own personal pool with a view.

Yep. It's that hot. And believe me when I say that this image can be seen five times a day when you look out the front door. It makes me laugh. Hope it made you smile too. Happy heat wave!

The Itsy Bitsy Infestation

My not so itsy bitsy spider encounter from the other night turned out to be a rather large problem. Mr. Bug Man came to my house right on time and took a look at my dead spiders. Yes. That is 'spiders' with an 's'. Just five minutes before Mr. Bug Man arrived, I went to turn on the water faucet again only to find another creepy looking spider (much smaller) climbing up the wall. Needless to say, without any hesitation, I whacked it with my shoe. After it twitched it's last twitch, I examined it only to find that bright red color staring back up at me. Mr. Bug Man informed me that they were both female black widows. He was so impressed with the size of the first one that he expressed severe disappointment in it's untimely death. He wished that I'd captured it alive. Alive!?! What?!? Is this guy insane!?! He wanted to send it to the extension office as a live example for display. So Mr. Bug Man then proceeded to take a look in our carport and immediately found another black widow nest. He looked at me, smiling, and said, "Yeah. I was going to use the low impact spray on the outside of the house. I'm gonna use the heavy duty stuff if you don't mind." I agreed. Half way around the house he came back to tell me that he'd already killed five more black widows. Three big mama's and two smaller ones. I thought he was joking, but no. Not a chance. He proceeded to tell me that we were dealing with a large infestation and that he hadn't seen one this bad in a while. So...I freaked out internally as I stared blankly at him. Inside my head I was screaming like a teenage girl who was grounded from a Justin Bieber Concert. Oustide my head, I smiled and thanked him for taking care of the situation so quickly. He advised me to let my neighbors know and to notify the poor souls that are going under my house in two weeks to redo my bathroom floor. (Our whole bathroom floor rotted out. It's a miracle we haven't yet fallen through the floor while sitting on the toilet.) Yep. Bathroom floor falling underground, air conditioner on the fritz, and now a black widow spider infestation. Anyone want to buy a house? I'll give you a great deal. As long as you don't mind your roommates being deadly, poisonous, creepy, eight-legged menaces that may or may not kill you when you're not looking then you'll love it here.

The Itsy Bitsy Spider...

...climbed up the water spout. Literally. It did. And it's been climbing up the same water spout for at least a month now. I have a water spout outside the carport that has had a nice thick web, perfect for keeping the ugly buggies away, under and around it for around a month or two. I'd never actually seen the spider that resides there but Didn't really give it too much thought. Last night Josh and I were outside trying to fix our AC. (I didn't help. I just turned the hose on for Josh to clean it out.) When I reached down to turn the faucet on, I saw a quarter-sized spider right by my hand. In the glow of the outdoor floodlight, I saw how incredibly pitch-black and down-right creepy this thing was. When the water turned on, the leaky drip caused the spider to turn tail and run back to the other side of it's web. As it turned upside down I caught a faint glimmer of something bright red. And as you should all know, bright red is not normally a good color in the animal kingdom. And in spider kingdom? Even worse. I jumped back and began an hour-long eebie-jeebie dance upon realization of what I had just found. The one...the only...the deadly Black Widow spider. At first I was hesitant to believe that I saw what I thought I saw. Trick of the mind perhaps? So I searched for it to no avail. The dripping water was keeping it at bay. We turned the light and water off and waited half an hour. I went back out there, flipped the light on and it was back. In all it's terrifying hideousness...there it was. No doubt about it. That red hour glass shape was staring right back at me and I commenced with my eebie-jeebie dance. It's web was so thick that I couldn't get my foot anywhere near it to smash it without alerting it. So I called my folks. Mom said she'd bring over a can of wasp/scorpion killer spray. Shoots twenty feet. My kind of weapon. My dad, hearing about this, was super giddy at the prospect of seeing a live black widow and came over too. That's my dad for ya though. It took three hits from the spray to kill that nasty thing. After the first two hits it slowly tried to climb back out. I did feel a tiny bit of guilt as I believe she was keeping my ant problem at bay. But I'd take ants over deadly black widows in a heart beat. Needless to say, I've called an exterminator and he'll be out to check and spray tomorrow afternoon. I took the lid off the butter container I'm keeping it in until he gets here so that I could take a picture to prove I'm not weaving a tall tale. I took the lid off, took the picture, put the lid back on and then did another eebie-jeebie dance. The Mid-west and black widows. huh. Who knew?