ten fevers in eight months

It is the bane of our existence. It rears its ugly head and refuses to back down for three days - always. It sent us to the doctor asking for answers and leaving with blood tests that come back clear. It makes the doctor shrug and agree that, "it is strange' but not strange enough.

Owen is my 4.5 year old fever magnet. A virus brushes against him in the store? Owen invites it home. These stray viruses he collects like snow globes. He doesn't like being sick, except for the extra screen time, but he continually and perpetually brings them home. And truth be told, I will take every virus happily if it truly is him MO and just "strange."

It costs us in time, daycare, work, commitments, but these are merely inconveniences on the grand scale of life. My friends assure me that he will be healthier because of this, and I hope so and know so as I think about Drew and his school record.

But when I am in the month of April and have taken five half days and one full day, It is hard to keep in all in the balances, and I continue to wish summer here soon.

Where do you like it?

Are you in the know? I'm guessing since most parents of little'uns and school-age kids are Gen X-ers that many readers of the blog are on facebook. Which means that you're privy to the latest trends in savvy cyber-movements. Like how last year during breast cancer awareness month (October), we gals all told the world what color the bra was that we were wearing. It was clever, with each woman just putting a single word on her facebook status, like "black" or "pink," and then not letting out the secret of what it was. After a few days, everyone (including the men) picked up on it and the initiative got enough attention to merit national reporting. If you haven't noticed it yet, this year we're telling everyone where we like to put our purse by using a sentence in the form of "I like it [locative prepositional phrase]," for instance, "I like it on the staircase," or "I like it on the floor, in the cushy carpeting in front of my fireplace." Provocative, no? All this titillating cleverness used in order to bring awareness to breast cancer.

I didn't participate in the "color of your bra" campaign and I won't post anything like "I like it somewhere" this month. I'm not willing to risk my image in that way. And I'm not sure it does any good.

There's something about the whole thing that I can't put my finger on...

Last week my oldest daughter's best friend asked via her facebook status "what's with all these 'I like it in the...' statuses?" Two comments later she got her answer, to which she replied, "I'm already informed enough about breast cancer." BINGO. That's what gets to me about the whole thing. I feel like I've been flooded with good feelings and smiles about being "aware" of breast cancer. Yet I do nothing to help find a cure. I do nothing to make a difference at all.

My ex-husband's mother had breast cancer 20 years ago. She survived. Now she's got stage 4 lung cancer. It's not so tragic for me at this point in my life, but it's the way I first became "aware" of breast cancer. She's my oldest daughter's grandmother, so it still indirectly affects me long after my divorce from her son.

One of my sisters-in-law just got a mammogram with a suspicious lump. She's 44. She's going to have a piece of it biopsied shortly. Now I'm even more aware.

On the general cancer front, a friend just got news last week that her husband's colon cancer has metastasized and now it's in his lung. More surgery, more chemo, more heartache. He's 40. And last Thursday night, a cousin who I've known my whole life lost his battle with cancer. He was 70. A co-worker's partner has had most of his right calf removed and he's still not out of the woods.

If you're like me, none of this is so remarkable. Cancer is everywhere around us. Some people win the battle, some people don't. Still, it keeps coming and we still don't have a great way of fighting it. The treatment is still, kill a lot of cells and hopefully the cancerous ones won't survive. And hopefully no new ones will learn how to grow, go forth and multiply.

I think I've become apathetic towards cancer "awareness." The pink ribbons make me feel good and cozy, even though I'm not doing anything. I don't even know who Susan "race for the cure" what's-her-face is. Since no one REALLY close to me has suffered from cancer yet, I carry around a sense of naive immunity, like it will never affect me directly since it hasn't yet. It's a rather irrational line of thinking, yet it keeps me from having to face an ugly truth: Cancer is with us and the situation is bad.

So this October, I'm trying to find something out about the whole cause, the campaign to raise money to find a cure for breast cancer. Feeling good inside when I see pink spatulas on sale at Meijer is not going to cut it, I don't think. For any readers out there who are passionate about this thing, please give me more info, something I can sink my teeth into. Because really, I fear I'm am the middle-aged version of my daughter's best friend: trying to smile and get past the month without facing the ugly truth, trying to convince people that "I'm already informed enough about breast cancer."

The Peace of Nature

Even before I had kids, I loved to visit botanical gardens.  There's something about the flowers and trees and pure feeling of nature that puts me at ease.  Although my kids love to visit them now, too, sometimes I still go alone, on days that I need the peace sitting among the palms and blossoms brings me.

photo credit:  mbaylor

When I was pregnant with my first son, my husband surprised me with a trip to the Mitchell Park Conservatory in Milwaukee.  As a recent transplant to the bitter cold of Green Bay, WI, a visit to the domes took me worlds away and help ease the "I'm pregnant and living in an icebox" feeling that consumed me.

After we moved, we continued to visit Botanical gardens in different places.  Some, naturally, are spectacular and others are smaller and more, ummm, cozy.  But even the little guys exude the peace of nature; I think all of us can use that from time to time, don't you?

Here's a link  (and another) to some gardens in the Midwest.  I've found that many have reciprocal privileges for members--either allowing free entrance or a discount at their location, which makes membership really worth the price.

Do you have a favorite that we could visit when we're passing through?

My Coaching Surprise

When I first started playing basketball, I was in about the 4^th or 5^th grade and I wasn’t very good.  The teams were co-ed, then, and I spent more time thinking about my freckled, red-headed teammate Mike Fayard than listening to what the coach had to say.  It was, as my father has often said, more of a social event for me.

Several years passed before I showed much promise.  I think I was quick and fairly athletic, so they kept me around.  Eventually things began to sink in.

I’d forgotten this.  I’d forgotten how hard it was to learn this game.  I’ve played for so many years now that these concepts seem obvious.  Cut to the basket.  Come to the ball.  Pick and roll.  ROLL, people, ROLL.

I know, those words don’t mean anything to most of you but trust me, they’re fundamental parts of the game.  If your child ends up on a basketball team, these are things she or he will learn.

In all these years, I have played and practiced and cheered but I haven’t coached until now.  And, man, it is so much harder than I expected.  It’s so hard to teach the kids this basic stuff, this stuff they must learn if they’re going to continue to play the game: to take the baseline, square up to the hoop, keep the ball alive. 

And I love it.  I love almost everything about it.  I love helping them understand, I love watching them hustle, I love watching them watch themselves become players.

I still don’t like losing, but I’ll take a loss with good fundamentals as a positive step forward.  I don’t like that everyone can’t play all of the time.  That’s hard for me.  I’ve been a player and I know how it feels.  I don’t like watching kids get down on themselves when they still have so much time to learn and grow and perfect their skills.

But watching the camaraderie that develops between the boys is something I could do day after day.  Working, working, working with them to teach these concepts—I only wish I had more hours to give them.  Some of these boys may go on to be real ball players and others will likely move on to different interests.  But right now, for this season, I’m giving them everything I have.  And do you know what’s been my biggest surprise?  They’re giving me even more in return.

It's the most horrible time of the year

Am I the only one who finds the first week back after New Year's the bleakest of them all? The festivities are over, we're all trudging back to the normal routine, the winter weather is suddenly no longer charming, and we're all realizing that the egg nog and candies have indeed had their effect on our waistlines. Right now my den has become "De-Holiday-ication Central," complete with a 7" desiccated Douglas Fir and more bags of discounted holiday paraphernalia than I care to admit to. And through it all, I just keep nibbling on the leftover gingerbread men and red, green and silver chocolate kisses.

The day before we left for Christmas weekend, December 23rd, I had my prescription for migraine medicine filled at our local pharmacy. I just picked it up yesterday. They had messed it up, billing it incorrectly and giving the incorrect amount of pills. It took 2 hours this morning to sort it out.

The weather outside is frightful, no? We don't even have it that bad compared to the rest of the region; we're in the 20s with flurries. My recollection is that this same time last year we were having days in which the temperature stayed sub-zero around the clock. Still, the clouds won't break and it's making things a bit dreary.

Just yesterday, my oldest daughter, a high school sophomore, brought me a note from her orchestra conductor. The note came home two weeks ago, of course, but I was just getting it on January 3rd. The message? She needs to perform her solo piece with accompaniment at a school recital in a week. There are two catches: she's not ready to perform it...and I'm her accompanist. I hadn't even looked at the music until I saw the note. Eep.

The laundry is piled up in the basement, the kitchen is a mess, the baby is turning 5 months old this week and I STILL have not sent out birth announcements. I've been trying to hang window treatments in the den and in the nursery for months to no avail and we're still trying to solve the problem of sweating windows throughout the house (maybe it's an unknown setting on the humidifier we had installed in March?).

My birthday is coming up in 3 weeks and I'm feeling old. And fat. And tired.

And yet...

In each of these annoyances, isn't there a blessing?

I have a home, one I have wanted for years. The first home my husband and I have ever shared, even though we were married for three years before having one home we called "ours." More than that, it is more than I could have ever dreamed I would have. Plenty of space, lots of comfy corners, and beautiful wildlife that visit every day.

We have a driveway that needs to be cleared if we want to drive out of the house. But we have a car and a driveway and places to go in the car.

We have clothing to put on our backs to keep us warm. More than we need, in fact. We should donate some of our less-used coats and sweaters to a charity. Especially at this cold time of year.

I have health insurance with prescription coverage. And I can afford the co-pay. Yes, I could bitch all day about how broken the system is when it takes so long to get the medicine I need. But five years ago, I was suffering without the medicine, dealing with migraine pain with overdoses of OTC pain medicines because I didn't have sufficient insurance coverage. I'm definitely better off than I was five years ago.

About a year ago, I got a piano for free through our community's freecycle. Because of this, I have been able to enjoy making music in my more dismal moments. Sure, I've got to practice my head off in order to perform with my daughter in a week, but it's a simple pleasure that doesn't present itself often. It's a pleasure I wouldn't have at all if someone else hadn't given their piano to me.

We had a wonderful gift-giving season, full of family time and plentiful provisions. Food was flowing, and the smiles were all around. The gifts were spot-on and I went out today donning all new clothing. Clothing that fit around my broad belly. My broad belly that really isn't that broad, but I'd like to believe that I should have my 25-year-old body back despite my lack of discipline.

There, now. I think I've gotten my head screwed back on straight-like. A new year full of blessings.

Wordless Wednesday: Avoid the flu of the pigs

Avoiding the piggie flu

It was a problem that didn't have a perfect solution. And the information needed to make a decision regarding the solution was ever-changing. Enter stage right: swine flu.

See, I'm already messing up. It's politically incorrect to call the virus "swine flu." Poor pigs. Ok, then. H1N1. It doesn't really matter, though, right? The new, more technical name still causes panic in people.

The problem was how to keep everyone safe and healthy, especially those most at risk in our household, my 3-month-old baby and me.

Our household, minus our youngest member, we all got the H1N1 vaccine last Thursday. The critical at-risk population that qualified us all to get it was that the wee 3-month-old in our household was at risk and not able to receive the vaccination. Since the only way to prevent her from getting the virus was for her never to encounter it, everyone in the household could to be vaccinated.

I've had my reservations about this whole thing. It's a brand new vaccine. What if something went wrong? What if I got the vaccine and I got sick or debilitated and couldn't take care of the baby? What about my older daughter? I don't want her to have some strange reaction to a vaccine. How would I feel then? Still, there were no reports of people suffering from the vaccine...and there WERE reports of babies getting the piggie flu and being dead 24 hours after diagnosis. One of those babies was in my state of Michigan. I couldn't get it out of my head: what if MY baby got the flu accidentally and died? How stupid and foolish would I feel for not going ahead and having everyone in our household protected against the virus?

Normally I'm not a person who is an alarmist. I take the wide angle lens to examine the world and try not to jump to hasty decisions. When swine flu hit the US last spring, back when I was just a pregnant woman with asthma, I didn't worry too much. Sure, all flu strains result in death for a few, but I always sought medical attention when needed. Surely if I caught the bug, me and my growing baby in utero would eventually be fine.

The effects of the pandemic abated in the US over the summer. That was when the news hit about pregnant women being particularly susceptible to the fatal effects of this flu. The way I heard the guarded warnings in the news was like this: You shouldn't worry unless you are pregnant (I was) or if you are asthmatic (I am). Even if you are in one of those groups, don't worry too much because it's summer. Where the swine flu is really spreading right now is in the southern hemisphere, where it is the dead of winter. So really you're not at risk unless you travel to South America, like Brazil, or if you live with someone who recently has. Oops. My husband was in Brazil at the time. But we beat the odds and I didn't encounter anyone who seemed symptomatic. Groovy. The baby was born without so much as a hint of a flu-like symptoms on my part.

Then, just about the same time I was breathing a sigh of relief for no longer being pregnant and potentially being exposed to the virus every week due to my many medical appointments, the flu season reared its ugly head here in the northern part of the northern hemisphere. The promised vaccine was slow in coming. When I called the pediatrician's office, I heard a pre-recorded message before I could reach a live person: "If this a life-threatening emergency, hang up and dial 911. If you are calling to inquire about vaccination against the flu for your child, we are not scheduling appointment since our supply has not yet arrived..." ...and the recorded voice trailed off into a slew of conditionals and apologetics. I started getting a little more nervous. Maybe this thing WAS something I should worry about. The most likely groups to catch the flu? Teenagers and those on colleges campuses (that covers my older daughter and my husband). Those most at risk? Those whose respiratory systems aren't strong, like very young infants and asthmatics (that covers my baby daughter and me). I thought, we're screwed. My immunologist's office didn't have the vaccine at all and had no idea when it was coming. The county announced a free vaccination clinic; all the doses available were accounted for in the first hour when those who had already been waiting for 4-5 hours were assigned numbers. As a result, the county canceled the three remaining clinics scheduled in order to avoid similar panic-driven chaos.

Finally, the county announced a county-wide mass vaccination clinic held at one of the local university's large arenas. 4000 doses of the vaccine available. 10a-7p, one day only. I showed up at 9a with the baby, aiming to get wristbands (required to enter the building and to receive a vaccine) for me, my husband, and my older daughter. I was successful...and spent the next four hours in line. With the baby. Surrounded by hundreds of other people in a confined space. My husband ended up having to cancel his classes for the day in order to get his shot. I took my older daughter in the evening after the school day was over and she had completed swim practice. The whole time I was there with her, she kept saying, "this is JUST like I Am Legend. Maybe we'll all turn into ZOMBIES!" I told her to keep it down and not to incite panic. By the time we got home, it was far past dinner time. We raced through reheated leftovers and finally finished at about 9:30p.

But. The point is. We got our swine flu vaccines.

Wasn't the whole point of vaccinating against this virus so that the normal flow of activity in the country wouldn't be disrupted? I feel like there's some irony in here somewhere.

A Great One

There were people lining both sides of the walkway, just standing, immersed in their own conversations. It was a maze to snake through, with only space enough for on average-sized person to fit through although she’d need to turn sideways and shuffle every few feet.

“Excuse us,” my voice wasn’t nearly as commanding as it needed to be, and my words, even to myself, sounded like a suggestion.

“Excuse us,” I tried again with more volume and authority.

The blockade remained strong.

“Aw just run ‘em over Heather!” Brian would exclaim, smiling mischievously all the while.

So, with Brian’s blessing to use him as a battering ram, we’d begin to forge our way through, clipping heels and the occasional buttock, leaving startled spectators in our wake.

It was always Brian and I who led the way. Brian because he was the more outspoken between his sister and he. In a way, the pairings were reversed from what they should have been.

My friend Amy was much more willing to bellow at people to move it than I, and Jessica, her partner, was more soft-spoken.

But for reasons I don’t recall, or maybe they were never expressed, it was always Brian and Heather, followed by Jessica and Amy.

Most often our outings included a hockey game where we’d try to navigate the people, oblivious to their insensitivity, blocking the aisles until only one smallish person could slide through the space.

Neither Brian nor Jessica was a large teen. At nearly 17, Jessica’s ankles were, at best, the size of my wrists. Brian, the younger sibling of the pair, seemed to me much younger than the 4 years that separated us.

Both Brian and Jessica loved a good hockey game despite the difficulty the venue presented for two young adults pushing two teens confined to wheel chairs. Brian and Jessica both had ataxia telangiectasia, a degenerative disease that mimics several other diseases all rolled into one. It is a disease that robbed the two of muscle tone and mobility rather than intelligence and spirit.

My friend Amy was a home-health aide at the time that we went on these excursions with Brian and Jessica. They were two of her clients, but also friends. She was not on the clock on these outings (and neither was I).
Amy and I attended the first fund-raiser for ataxia in Rochester that Brian and Jessica’s family organized. That first year it was simply a golf-tournament followed by a banquet. Over the years it has evolved into a celebrity-attended annual silent auction and golf tournament, headed by NHL player Shjon Podein’s charity Team 25, which Podein started along with his wife after meeting Brian and Jessica Christensen.

The life expectancy of children with ataxia is not high (most do not reach their 20s), and sadly, Jessica lost her battle at 18.

Brian grew to be a man who brought his sunny smile and spirit to many. He grew awareness of his disease and through his efforts met celebrities who continue to raise funds for research because they were so struck by Brian’s dynamic personality.

Brian beat the odds and lived to be 30 years old. He died May 22, 2008, the same day that my youngest child was born.

Heart Lessons

I had my annual physical a couple of weeks ago with my new doctor. So far, I'd only seen her in the context of my son's well-child checkups, but I really liked her. Her office typically does blood work with cholesterol & diabetes screenings at annual appointments, and in addition to that I requested a thyroid panel as well. A few days ago, I got the results of the blood work back, and it appears I have a cholesterol problem.

On one hand, I'm shocked - I eat pretty healthily (healthfully?) and I think I'm reasonably active -- as most moms of two year olds are, can I get an amen? On the other hand, though, I'm not that suprised. I have a really strong family history of heart problems. My mom's cholesterol has been horribly high since she was in her early 30's (and I'm getting close to that at 27) and she's been on medication to keep her levels lower for years now.

Over the last ten or twelve years - basically, ever since I left my parents' house to go to college - my mom has been on a big health kick. In addition to her cholesterol medication, she's started walking five miles every day. She eats three or four servings of fruits and veggies with every meal! She stopped drinking coffee and sodas, and sticks to water and juices now. I'm really proud of her, and I think it's great that she's taking better care of herself. But I wonder: what would have happened if she'd made those changes sooner?

While I was at home, I saw a mom who could put away a half-gallon container of ice cream all by herself every two days. I saw a mom who frequently bought a bag of candy, chips, or other snack food on her way out of the grocery store, and ate most of it (she usually shared a little with us kids!) by the time our car was back in our driveway. I saw a mom who didn't exercise - even walks around the block - and who really didn't ever have time by herself away from our family.

I think I internalized a lot of those lessons - even though I doubt she planned to "teach" me those things. Now, I have never had quite the sweet tooth that she has; and my metabolism and body shape are very different from hers, so if I ate that much ice cream I'd be 100 pounds overweight instead of my current 10! But still: I saw her "treat" herself for a long, hard day... with food. And I saw her put her kids and family first, all the time, even if it meant she didn't get to do basic things to take care of herself.

I'm younger than she was when she first was diagnosed with high cholesterol. I want to make some healthy choices and changes that not only put me in better shape and better heart health -- but also show my son, and any future kids who come along, that taking care of yourself is a valid choice. An important choice. That our bodies are only as strong as we allow them to be, and that we need to invest in our own futures by making our bodies as strong as they can possibly be.