"The O Usually Stays with the B"

I had to have an X-ray done today for the one-year follow up to my kidney stone from last year. I have an appointment in a couple of weeks to make sure a new one hasn't grown in the past year, but I needed to have the X-ray before our radiology co-pay through our health insurance increases tomorrow (from $25 to $50). (I'm trying to be frugal now that we're paying daycare for two.)

Anyway, at the imaging center, you go from the regular waiting room to the "gowned waiting room," where, you guessed it, you change into a gown and wait your turn. To change, you use a small three or four foot square dressing room. There are three lockers, so I assume up to three people can use the same room within a certain time span. I changed, waited less than five minutes for my name to be called and then had my X-ray, which also took maybe five minutes. When I returned to the dressing room to change, it reeked of B.O. I'm talking "rampant, mutant B.O." I can't believe someone could have such bad B.O. that their body stinks enough to skunk up a room in less than ten minutes. How could you not realize that? (I cannot imagine having to be an X-ray technician or anyone else in the medical field who has to deal with smelly people. That's why I work at a desk by myself.) I changed as fast as I possibly could, but I was still afraid the smell was going to follow me around all day.

Four-Month Check-Up

Hannah had her four-month check-up today. She weighs 17 lbs., 8 oz. (!) and is 24 1/2 inches long. Her weight is beyond the 100th percentile, but her length and head circumference are right on target. We can start introducing cereal anytime now. We've tried it a couple of times, but she never seemed very interested, but maybe we'll try again this weekend. All of her other skills were on target as well - grasping, laughing, cooing, etc. We're working on sitting up and she's trying really hard to roll over. She can also scoot backwards when she has something to push her feet against.

Let's Start at the Very Beginning

It’s a very good place to start. When we last left our plucky heroine, she had just given birth to Little H and almost had to spend Christmas in the hospital.

To summarize my 13 weeks of maternity leave – Christmas, bottles, diapers, waking up at 1am and 3am, New Year’s, bottles, diapers, waking up at 3am, turned 35, bottles, diapers, waking up at 5am, etc. I think you get the picture. Actually, I can’t complain much at all. Little H has been an excellent baby. She’s a good eater and a good sleeper – she’s been sleeping through the night since she was about 7 weeks old. Now, she’s 4 months old and working on sitting up and trying to roll over already. She’ll have her four-month check-up tomorrow – and I’ll already have something new to post about!

So, I went back to work on March 26th and everything since then has fallen under the category of “nothing is ever easy.” I woke up on the 25th with a fever, congestion, sore throat - the works. My fever broke later that day but I absolutely, positively had to go to work the next day. Luckily, my officemate and my boss were both out the whole week I returned, so I kind of took it easy, trying to get my feet wet again, but honestly, the whole first week is kind of a blur.

After I recuperated over the weekend, Big H got sick. She had just finished a bout of strep throat the week before and it sounded like it was back. So Monday morning, we dropped Little H off at the sitter’s and then I took Big H into work with me so I could bring home some work to do and explain everything to my boss. How mortifying! Big H went to the doctor and then to the back-up babysitter on that Tuesday, since she couldn’t return to preschool until we had the results of her strep test. Her strep hadn’t returned; it was just a regular sore throat and she went back to school on Wednesday and I managed to work the rest of the week (three days) without missing a day (which was a short week with the Good Friday holiday).

Week 3 was even shorter. I worked Monday and then went into the hospital on Tuesday for gall bladder surgery. This should probably be a separate post, but I’ll try to be succinct. On President’s Day, I went to the emergency room because I thought I was having a heart attack. (Good thing I wasn’t since I would have died in the waiting room, but that really is another story.) I ended up going to see my doctor the next day and she diagnosed it as a gall bladder attack (I had had a similar, but shorter and not as painful attack the previous Thursday). An ultrasound confirmed “multiple stones” and even though I pleaded my case with the surgeon at my consultation (I’ve already been off work for three months, I can’t be out again for a week; I have a small infant at home who needs to be cared for; I’ve used up all my medical leave for the year), he didn’t want to hear it and scheduled the surgery for April 10th. So I was off from work from April 10th through April 13th. After staying with us for two weeks after Little H was born, my mom returned again to take care of Little H again.

I returned to work (again) on April 16th and that week was uneventful. I worked a full five-day work week. And now I’m two days into what is technically week 5 of being back at work and decided to start blogging again. So I’ll make the usual promise to start updating again.

PS - Wow, I should have switched over to the new Blogger sooner and maybe I would have updated more. It’s so much faster and I love adding tags to things (it’s just like making lists).