November 29, 2011.

Check out the new blog header. Eli is laughing himself silly because Andy is chasing him.

Picture taken July 22 by Catharine Bliss

November 28, 2011.

November 29th

At our household, we’re big fans of Sesame Street, and their online content is one of the best parts of the Internet. Eli loves watching his Super Grover. Here he is learning to make the sound of the letter “F”, and then laughing at Grover’s attempts to fly.

This was taken a few weeks ago.

This is what I think is running though Eli’s head: “Just sitting here reading my book. Oh shoot! Daddy caught me being all grown up! Must act like a baby! Throw the book! Grab the feet! Do the baby sign for milk!”

August 14th

August 11th: Eli fell asleep during our bike ride.

August 12th: Cleaning the house.

We’re doing better over here! I’ve stopped losing weight and we’re all eating real food and sleeping normal hours again.

Eli would like you all to know that he loves his Mama even when she doesn’t shower for three days.

We are all still alive, but just barely.  It’s been a rough 2.5 days.

Last week, as I mentioned here in the blog, we were all feeling pretty icky.  But we got so much better as the week progressed!  We had a great Thanksgiving at my parent’s house.  My sister made a “non-traditional” feast of tacos and all the fixings.  I had very little nausea (it didn’t stop me from eating) and Andy’s allergies were the best they’ve been at my parent’s house for as long as we can recall.  Eli was a little grumpy, but didn’t seem sick. It was a really fantastic day.

Then we left for home. We had just gotten on the freeway when Eli threw up all over himself and his carseat. I stopped at the next gas station and Andy and I both started to clean him up. I was handling the smell ok, but one sight of my child covered in curdled milk and I nearly threw up. I ended up standing a few feet away from the car while Andy did all the clean up. Then I watched Eli while Andy took care of the car seat. We made it home, but my nausea was back in full force. Andy put Eli to sleep while I threw up. I spent the rest of the night waking up about every 3 hours with vomiting and diarrhea.  The diarrhea had stopped by morning but the vomiting hadn’t.  Andy was starting to feel nauseous, too.

I called the OB nurse and we determined that this wasn’t pregnancy related vomiting, but that I (and Andy and Eli) probably had the Norovirus and I was reacting worse to it because of the pregnancy. We discussed my level of dehydration and she recommend that we get some Pedialyte and if I couldn’t drink 2 oz in 2 hours without throwing up, that I should come into OB triage to get an IV of fluids.  With the very real possibility of a hospital visit on the table, Andy called his mom to come over and help us.

Andy went and got some Pedialyte for me (and Gatorade for him) and filled a prescription the nurse wrote for Zofran (an anti-nausea medication). My Mother in law arrived and took over care of Eli. I took a Zofran, poured 2 oz of Pedialyte and set the timer on my phone for 10 minutes. Every 10 minutes I took a sip. I sat on the couch and didn’t move.  There were many MANY times (just about after every single sip) I thought I wasn’t going to make it, but I did manage to finish all 2 oz in 2 hours (I was pretty motivated to avoid a trip to the hospital).

At that point I poured myself some more Pedialyte, and Andy and I left Eli in the capable hands of my mother in law while the two of us took a nap. Andy was supposed to sleep in that morning because he was working on overnight shift that night. I set my timer for an hour, and every hour I took a sip of the drink. In hindsight, I think I was suppose to drink 2 oz EVERY 2 hours to stay out of the hospital, but that didn’t occur to me at the time.

While Andy and I slept, my mother in law watched Eli AND cleaned my kitchen (including inside the microwave!). This is so awesome I don’t have words for it.

Around 5pm I had to get out of bed, I was achy from laying down all day. Andy got up to get ready for work. My mother in law helped me feed Eli dinner, then she had to go home.  Andy made sure Eli and I had everything we might need, and he left for work.

The two of us had about an hour alone before bedtime, and we managed (with the help of an episode of Sesame Street). Once Eli was asleep I called my Dad to put him “on call” for tomorrow. My dad was terribly sick with a head cold all last week, but when he heard that we were having a rough week he called a few days ago and told me that if I needed him, he would ALWAYS find a way to come over and help me. He said this through a stuffy nose sounding like he was about to die, but I knew it was an honest offer.  This made me feel so loved and cherished.  So I called him, told him what was going on and that we didn’t know what tomorrow would look like.  He told me to call him when I needed him, that he’d be ready to go.

I made it through the night better than I thought I would. Eli woke up twice, but both times he only needed me to find his pacifier and pat him on the back to go back to sleep.  I threw up once, early on. And I woke up every couple hours, just uncomfortable. Every time I woke up I drank some Pedialyte and as the night wore on I was taking more real swallows rather than just sips.

Come Saturday morning I felt much better!  Still not “well”, but way better. And most importantly, I felt able to care for my child.  Eli and I had about two hours before Andy would come home, and I noticed we were out of hand soap and toilet paper, both pretty important things in a sick household.  So Eli and I headed to Target and did some shopping.  The shopping cart has never felt so heavy and hard to push, but we made it.  I also realized his carseat needed more cleaning.

Andy got home, he had a pretty good night, too.  I texted my Dad that we probably wouldn’t need him, but to remain “on call”.  Andy watched Eli while I did chores. It’s no surprise that we had A TON of laundry built up from the last week.  I took Eli’s carseat out, totally disassembled it to remove the cover and washed it. I was moving much slower than I usually do, but it was felt good to be doing something.

Around 3pm I felt hungry! This was great! I hadn’t eaten anything in 46 hours and it was about time that I felt hungry.  I had buttered rice with peanuts and it tasted awesome, I was so happy to be eating! About 10 minutes later I realized that was a mistake, and I spent the rest of the night sitting on the couch trying not to throw up.  Andy cared for Eli the rest of the evening. I put Eli to bed, and Andy and I were both asleep by 8pm.

Right now it’s 8:30am Sunday morning and they are BOTH still asleep  I think my boys are sicker than we realized.  I’m feeling pretty good.  I’m taking Zofran every six hours, I think that’s helping. Still a little queasy, and I have no interest in eating anything, but I’m drinking really well.  So long as I can stay hydrated, I can stay out of the hospital.

Since I’m pregnant, I weigh myself every week and Friday is my weigh-in day. In between all the vomiting I remembered to do it this Friday, and was down 1.6 lbs from last Friday.  I weighed myself Saturday morning, too, because I was curious. I lost 3.4 lbs in one day. I weighed myself this morning (Sunday) and was only down 0.4lbs from the previous day.  5.4lbs in a little over a week is pretty bad, but it’s all water, I’m confident I’ll get it back as soon as I start feeling better.

It’s 9am now and both the boys are up.  Eli is grumpier than I’ve seen him in a while, I hope he gets better soon

Eli is very cuddly when he’s sick:

August 10th