Archive for the ‘Mothering’ Category

tinea versicolor, be gone!

Friday, July 29th, 2011

I am so overwhelmed. Drew’s rash isn’t better even though we’re using ketoconazole shampoo all over his body every day AND he’s taken oral medication for three days.

The rash is on his face, arms, and the trunk of his body. The patches of skin that are irritated are really dry and flaky. I’ve tried putting lotion on him and I’ve tried NOT putting lotion on to see which is better and I really can’t tell. So I’m continuing to use lotion for now.

We’ve been staying out of the heat – only going for small walks in the morning and he’s getting at least two baths a day. During one of the baths we use the ketoconazole and the other bath is just plain lukewarm water. And every other day I’m using his regular shampoo and bar soap (that has a bit of lotion in it).

I feel helpless with all of this and very, very frustrated. I called his pediatrician yesterday and they said to stop the oral medicine and keep trying the shampoo. If I haven’t seen an improvement by Monday morning, I’m taking him back to the doctor.

:(

four year old checkup highlights.

Wednesday, July 20th, 2011

– The pediatrician and nurse both said it was very rare to see a four year old who has excellent hearing, vision, vocabulary, doesn’t wet the bed at night, is in the 75% percentile as far as height and weight, looks as if he won’t need braces (how do they even KNOW that?!), and then the doctor proceeded to say (I kid you not!) “you should have more kids if they are going to be like this.” :O I didn’t know whether to be proud, embarrassed, or offended.

– He aced the 54 questions about gross motor skills, verb tenses, relationships with others, and even drew awesome pictures wherein they were impressed that he drew arms, legs, and fingers on a stick-figure Mommy.

– Apparently he should know how to unbutton his own pants now, brush his teeth by himself, and be serving himself at the table. Yeah, right. HAVE YOU SEEN MY CHILD? He would have his toothbrush in his pants and be throwing peas at everyone if I let him have that much control. Wait, do I sound like a control freak?

– When the doctor asked him why his hands were so warm, Drew said, “my hands are warm because they were in the sun. And the sun is a BRIGHT STAR THAT IS VERY HOT. That is why my hands are warm. Your hands are cold.”

– He got caught up on some immunizations that I’ve been lazy about (boo me!) and although we spent several days before talking about shots and why it was important to get them, he was certainly shrieking by the FOURTH shot. But he was very brave and even told me later that he would tell his friends to be brave too if they needed shots.

– So, it wasn’t eczema that he’s been suffering with for four weeks. No wonder the cortisone wasn’t helping. He has Tinea versicolor. For about fifteen minutes, I don’t think I blinked as I couldn’t get past Tinea versicolor means “multicolored ringworm.”

MY KID HAS RAINBOW COLORED WORMS INSIDE HIS BODY?

Yes, for a very small second, I wanted to see the worms.

But then I was back to freaking out.

I was relieved to discover that he doesn’t actually have worms. He has a fungal infection of the skin (cue gagging) that is caused by a type of yeast that is normally found on human skin. It only causes problems if a.) ones body is susceptible to the fungus and b.) if you live in a hot climate.

Apparently Drew is rather susceptible and the recent hot weather caused a flareup. Unfortunately, once you have it, you can deal with it on and off for years. šŸ™ But it is easily treatable. I just gave him a bath with medicinal shampoo and after three or so days of that, we should see his rashes clearing up completely. And then that means we have to avoid excessive heat and sweating all summer.

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. We’re visiting South Carolina in a few weeks. Why, I’m sure we won’t deal with excessive heat or sweating there. šŸ˜‰

So, with nerdy parents who prefer to be indoors anyway, I imagine Drew will find out about nature and outside things from the Internet.

OR ELSE THE RAINBOW COLORED WORMS WILL COME BACK.

P.S. He is not contagious.

P.S.S. My kid keeps abusing me.

sickly drew, decking halls, and team coco.

Tuesday, November 9th, 2010

Around 4am, I heard a whimpering from Drewā€™s room and my feet hit the floor. I knew that sound. By the time I knelt by his pillow, he was crying softly and holding his hands up in the air.

ā€œItā€™s so sticky. I got sick.ā€

That began a day of Overwhelmed Horribleness that I havenā€™t experienced in awhile. Now that I think about it, today was probably the first time Iā€™ve seen Drew this sick. Heā€™s had a pretty healthy childhood and the crippling feeling of helplessness was new to me. My adrenalin kicked in at 4:01am and Iā€™ve been running high all day but throughout it all, Iā€™ve been battling fears left and right.

He got sick pretty much every single hour throughout the day and he did not subscribe to the notion that when one is dealing with such an event, one should hover near a bathroom or bucket. Instead, he would start making a shrieking noise and then run frantic through the apartment like he was chasing an invisible ferret. Heā€™d hop off the couch and the noise would start and Iā€™d grab The Sick Bowl and encourage him that I was going to take care of him and everything was going to be okay. But no, he would dart into the kitchen and then whirl around and crawl quickly through the dining room only to dash high speed through the living room and then wobble down the hall and then swoooosh into his room and under the bed. All the while, ā€œAAAAIIIIIIIEEEEEE.ā€ I finally convinced him later in the day that my way was much better but in the early morning hours, I cleaned a lot of carpet and did a lot of laundry. Iā€™m sure his fears were just simply that he didnā€™t remember what getting sick felt like and it was freaking him out.

After four baths, lots of tv-watching, and reading Snow a billion times, He carefully slid out of the recliner and said, ā€œcan I have the snow-globe please?ā€

I was shocked because he hadnā€™t played AT ALL today. I was shocked and immediately wiggly because I knew he was feeling better.

So I marched over to the christmas tree and pulled the snow-globe ornament off and gave it to him. And he pranced away and then delved into cars and spinning and before I knew it, he was back to normal.

Yes. I said christmas tree.

I know itā€™s only November 9.

We went shopping a few days ago and Drew fell in love with all the christmas trees. After we got home that afternoon, he began asking WHERE IS OUR TREE and PLEASE GET IT OUT and Daniel and I just grinned and looked at each other.

And we put the christmas tree up!

Judge away! ^_^

So my little boy is sleeping, the tree is sparkling, and weā€™re cozy in the living room. Waiting for Conan.

P.S. Have you seen his new ad for American Express?

parenting in the present, with joy.

Tuesday, July 13th, 2010

One of my online friends, Annie, recently linked to an article on Facebook that discusses joyless parenting. After clicking on the link about a week ago, I read the first two paragraphs and then had to add it to my Read Later file because I already had tears in my eyes and my stomach ached.

It ached because Iā€™ve said ā€œI love Drew but I hate my lifeā€ so many times that it breaks my heart. Each time those words slip out of my mouth I spend the next five minutes desperately clammering to Daniel I HOPE YOU KNOW I LOVE DREW and DO YOU THINK Iā€™M A BAD PERSON? He always smiles so sweetly to me and calms me with things like yes, youā€™re a good mother and a good person. Youā€™ve just been through a lot. Youā€™ll adjust.

Thatā€™s all well and good but after I finally got the courage to read the entire article, I knew that I couldnā€™t just wait for Someday When Iā€™d Adjust. Iā€™m not suffering with crippling depression anymore and mothering for me isnā€™t so much about resentment (as it was during the most horrid days of depression) anymore as it is about joyless repetition. I know thatā€™s horrible. šŸ™ It hurts to type that.

It isnā€™t through any fault of Drewā€™s though! Heā€™s the most genuine, loving, happy little boy and even if he WAS a fussy kid, it still wouldnā€™t be his fault that I have succumbed to the lie that modern parenting is drudgery. I havenā€™t thought it was all drudgery though ā€“ we have had these AMAZING moments lately, when the stars are aligned, in which weā€™re all three HAPPY and SWOONY and I suddenly think, wow, parenting is fun! But itā€™s as though my brain has categorized mothering as something I have to live through and that itā€™s mostly difficult, fussy, and I may have one or two days a month that are wiggly.

But that is not what I want at all. I want my relationship with Drew, for as long as we each have breath (and my hope is that weā€™ll be able to giggle together until weā€™re both old and wrinkly, wondering where time has gone), to be wonderful, delightful, fun, and dreamy. I want to walk with him, while being emotionally and physically present, as he learns about the world.

Realizing all of this has made me face the reality that Iā€™ve been holding Drew back quite a bit. He turned three in April and for the past six months, heā€™s been mentally and emotionally moving ahead and yet Iā€™m still treating him like heā€™s younger. Our list of Things To Work On includes teaching him better table manners, play dates with other kids, getting completely rid of the high chair and sippy cup (he uses a booster seat at the dining room table and a regular cup at the table but the high chair is used a lot for pizza night, movie night, or when Iā€™m just lazy ā€“ and he uses the sippy cup at night-time and for most of play-time and Iā€™d rather just get him a water bottle to carry), lots more structure in his day-to-day, and POTTY TRAINING.

Iā€™m always pretty aware of parenting fads, and when Elimination Communication became the Thing To Do (Drew was less than a year old), I bought the book + a baby potty chair. And the potty chair sat in the corner, with dust, because the reality was that I was fighting depression and there was no way I could deal with potty training an infant.

Around two, we bought a real potty chair and pull-ups and had a few conversations with Drew (and attempts) about what should happen and he was pretty upset about it to the point that I decided to wait a month or so. Even though my Granny was calling and writing letters to me about how I should have him potty trained YESTERDAY, I knew that he wasnā€™t ready.

And then, at some point, we crossed into the reality of Drew being completely ready and his mother ignoring the issue. Iā€™m not sure where that line is and when we crossed it, but weā€™re totally there. He wakes up with dry diapers each morning, I absolutely know when heā€™s going to poop or pee and he talks about it all matter-of-factly. But I havenā€™t been ready. At all.

And when I started pondering the reality of my joyless parenting, I realized that this is a huge opportunity to place myself back in the present of walking with Drew as he encounters these big, new changes. We brought him into the world over three years ago and were SO happy and thankful to have him here. Iā€™m not going to hate myself for going through thick depression and severely struggling with the balance of parenting, but now that those dark clouds have lifted, Iā€™m having to kick myself pretty hard to get back into active mothering and being prepared for constant change.

So, my current plan, if all goes well, is to make this weekend the weekend of Change. Weā€™re spending the next few days talking about it all, re-doing his bedroom and closet, buying pull-ups, big boy underwear, his own soap, and wipes for the bathroom. And then making cookies together as the reward for having met his goals!

But, Iā€™m smiling while doing it. šŸ™‚ Iā€™m really eager for this. Iā€™m aching for it, to be honest. I love Drew so much and I feel like heā€™s really lost out on wonderful parts of life in the past year or so (just as I have) and I want to make it up to him by showing him that part of growing up is learning all these new wonderful things and that even if it feels overwhelming at times, that Iā€™m going to be there with him, every step of the way.

After breakfast this morning, we sat on the couch and talked about potty-training for a few minutes and I explained that we were going to be talking about it a lot over the next few days and I asked him if he was excited about learning to go in the potty all the time and he said, ā€œno thank you.ā€

So, if he ends up peeing and pooping all over the carpet, Iā€™m just going to eat all the cookies, have a good cry, and keep trying.

mom sense.

Saturday, February 28th, 2009

Have you seen this Mom Sense video? I think it’s hysterical and this particular video has the lyrics of the song as well.