My 'Stent' in the Hospital

For those of you who like a good story and for my own memories, here are the details of my past week:

On Sunday morning I woke up around 4am in pain. I realized that I had been waking up during the night thinking that I just needed to go to the bathroom and once I finally woke up realized that something was wrong. I went into the living so that I didn't bother Josh. Laying down wasn't much of an option. I started having flashbacks to when I was 14 weeks pregnant. My back was killing me! I tried to stay calm, drinking lots of water and walking around the living room, hoping that this was not what I thought it was. Occasionally I would lay down and rest, but couldn't stay down for long. Josh got up to check on me and I filled him in. At this point I wasn't quite sure that I wanted to admit it could be a kidney stone and I didn't want to bother the Midwife yet. I paced somemore and tried to relax as everyone in the house started getting up. Josh thought it would be a good idea to call the midwife at this point, so I did. Being a midwife she wanted me to try somemore natural, less harmful things before assuming I needed to be in the hospital. So I turned on the heating pad, Josh gracefully went to the store and got me some Tylenol PM and I tried my best to rest while he and the girls went to Bible class. That didn't help. Around 10am I called the midwife back and told her it wasn't working. She decided to call their referring physician at UNC to get her opinion. It seemed like hours waiting for her to call back! And of course, she said I needed to go to the hospital, my choice, Rex or UNC. Since Rex already had my health history and it was closer, at the time that seemed like the best choice. Josh was on his way home by this point so he stopped and got some essential last minute items for the girls to be dropped off at my moms for the day. A little after noon we reached the ER and passed the girls off. I went in and was prepared to wait. My last visit to the ER I had to wait 4 hours to get a bed. The midwive told us that since I was 30 weeks pregnant I would be taken to the OB triage, well, apparently Rex doesn't work that way. I saw the triage nurse, who was EXTREMELY compassionate and put in as much information to push me to the top of the list. She sent me to the waiting area to get a urine sample and wait. I was preparing for the long haul, but Praise The Lord! a wheelchair was waiting for me when I was finished in the bathroom. I was wheeled away to a bed immediately. Unfortunately, just because there was an empty bed did not mean that the nurse wasn't being over worked. I assumed my postion of comfort and rocked back and forth for 2 hours before the nurse was able to come in and start the process of the IV and finally the pain meds! Just like last time, the pain meds offered a nice little buzz, but didn't do much for the pain. I was wheeled away for an ultrasound, and just like last time they could tell there was some swelling, but couldn't see a stone. Also, they told me that this far along is was normal to have some swelling, especially on the right side. None of this was comforting. After a dose of more meds I though, hmmm.. I might could handle this at home. 30 minutes later when they were wearing off again, I knew I couldn't. Josh and I decided that with my nausea and lack of relief from perscription narcotics that going home wouldn't help much. So we were admitted.
I was taken to a room in the postpartum care and got some morphine, hopeing for relief. They started at 2mgs, that did nothing, so I got up to 4mgs. That night nurse just wasn't gonna budge! They weren't gonna give me fluids until I puked twice and they decided that I probably wouldn't be able to drink enough to pass the stone on my own. Wise choice :)
Monday morning the OB said that I could have 6mg of morphine. But that was tops....so, at my worst I was at a 5 on the pain scale, not enjoyable, but what can you do? The Phenergan helped me get the rest that I needed.
On Tuesday my girls were coming for a visit. I hadn't showered since Saturday and really wanted my hair washed. I guess not very many postpartum patients asked for that, but I had a wonderful nurse who said, if I wanted to get a hairwash she would figure out how to get it done. And she did! I was just finishing the process when my girls came, it was nice to visit with them feeling clean. The visit went well while I still had a good morphine kick, but once that started wearing off, any movements the girls made in the bed hurt, plus Sydney wanted to pull out the IV. The newness and coolness of the room was getting old for the girls, so even though it wasn't a long visit, it was nice to see them for a bit.
Things are a blur until Tuesday night around 5 when the Urologist came to visit since I wasn't passing the stone on my own. He gave me some meds to help the muscles relax around the stone to see if that would help over night. I was to get an x-ray in the morning, just one little one, to see if they could locate and determine the size of the stone. He promised it would not harm the baby. But who knows, I could pass it on my own during the night. Depending on the results of the x-ray, I may or may not have to have a stent put in. He left and I immediately started researching stents online and got very upset. This did not sound fun at all! I took my pheregan eagerly that night and kept it coming to get a good nights rest!
Wednesday morning they wheeled me down to get the x-ray nice and early since I wasn't able to eat or drink anything until it was over (not that I could eat, but I did get thirsty!) The RX technician made me feel so welcome once I got there questiong "Why was I doing this?" accusingly. Um, hello, I realize I'm pregnant, I'm doing what the Dr. told me to do! Thanks for making me cry lady! They inserted a dye into my IV and waited 10 minutes for it to get to the kidney. They took a quick x-ray and I lay there waiting..... The technician comes back and says that the Dr. looked at the x-ray and wants a retake in 45 minutes. Wait a minute?? Didn't you guys say just one? I was getting nervous. I laid there and waited , dreaming of the breakfast food I would order when they took me back to my room. They finally took the last x-ray. This baby is gonna have 4 eyes and green toes! They told me that it wouldn't take too long for the Dr. to give me to results. Once they wheeled me back to my room the nurse popped her head right in and said nothing to eat or drink. WHAT???? This really didn't sound good. I called Josh and asked him to come as soon as possible, that something wasn't right. My room phone rang while I was pouting/dozing, waiting for the Dr. to come and give me the results. I ignored it, figuring it was someone just calling to see how I was, I wasn't in the mood to talk. 15 minutes later it rang again. This person is persistant! I answered the phone. It was the Dr. He let me know that they there was a large obstruction, it wouldn't pass on it's own and they would be putting in a stent at 3pm. I stuttered a few questions through some tears. The nurse came in to the room as I was on the phone ready with the consent papers. It was all going too fast! Did the Dr. really just call me on the phone to give me that kind of a diagnosis? I felt like I had gotten dumped over the phone! I told the nurse I wanted to talk to my husband before I signed anything. She let me know that she had to start some meds before the procedure. What a pickle! I called Josh bawling! He got to the hospital ASAP, did I ever tell you know nice it is to have a nurse for a husband. Him and my nurse spoke a little nurse-ease and got the Dr. back on the phone. The Dr. explained everything to him and I got ready to sign the forms while getting the meds for the Stent placement. An anethesiologist came in and talked about what they would be giving me to put me to sleep during the procedure, making sure everything would be safe for the baby. Then the urologist came in, not the phone man, but the one who would be doing the procedure. The looked a little but like SuperMan. He was nice and explained things a little bit more for the non-medical people in the room :) Before long they were wheeling me away to the waiting area and then back to the surgery room. Everyone was very nice. They kept the mood light and kept me talking about silly things, probably just to get my mind off of what was going to happen. Apparently the anethesiologist changed his mind and decided it would be safest to give me Benadryl as a seditive instead of a twilight drug. Hmmm...Bendadyrl? I was really hoping for a good nap! Yeah, I forgot to ask about pain, because I thought I was going to be asleep..... I felt IT ALL!!! I won't lie, it HURT. No all of it, but when it did, WOW! The nice people did their best to comfort me. I couldn't even breathe! It was a quick prodedure and before I knew it they were done. I waited in recovery for what seemed like forever! Recover from Benadryl? I just wanted to see my husband! The nurse forgot to get Josh, but luckily we met in the hall on the way back to my room. I REALLY had to pee at this point, so I was in a rush to get back. I thought they were going to drain my bladder during the procedure! I will leave out gross details, but it was a little surprising going to the bathroom the first time. But, hey, my back pain was gone! I hadn't had any meds since noon and it was 5pm, an hour past when I would normally get them. I even ordered dinner and ate all of it! First time eating in four days, it felt good. I had some tylenol that night, but didn't get much sleep, Julianna kept me up and I didn't have my phenergan to knock me out. At least I had Josh to stay with me. I missed him. We snuggled, I cried about missing the girls, we watched tv and relaxed, what we won't do for a date night! My night nurse was very thorough as well. She was vigilant on getting vital signs and updates through the night. At least she was sweet.
Thursday I was READY to get home! I was experiencing some discomfort from the stent, but nothing a girl can't handle. Just feels like having a UTI all the time, for the next 10 weeks. The urologist finally came in to discuss the final game plan which includes repeating the wonderful stent process by replacing it in 6 weeks. They don't want to leave it in the full time to reduce the chance for infection. After the baby is born, about a week or two I will get a CT scan so they can determine the size and position of the stone so they can get it out!
Nothing like a little last trimester fun, huh? Luckily, the pregancy masks many of the symptoms of the stent, but I can definetely feel it in my back. I have back pain and pain around my bladder making it difficult to walk. I'm still working on getting my strength back. It's amazing how weak 4 straight days of laying in bed can make you. If I wasn't peeing constantly before, I am now, just with this nice burning, twinging pain as the stent drains from my kidney to my bladder. When things don't seem as pleasent I picture a newborn all swaddled up. I can do it for Julianna.

Makayla's 5th Birthday

Happy Birthday Makayla! I am the mother of a 5 year old! Time flies way too fast! When did my baby grow up?

Makayla a few days after her birth wearing the same dress that her mommy wore on the way home from the hosptial.

Makayla's First Birthday

Makayla's 2nd birthday

Makayla 3 yrs. old

Makayla 4 yrs. old

Makayla's 5th Birthday Party

Josh and I decided that 5 was a good age to start birthday parties. So this year was Makayla's first year to have some friends over for cake and ice cream. I actually had a lot more fun getting ready for the party than I thought I would. We had a good, simple time celebrating with just a few friends, but making some great memories.

Makayla got a big girl bike for her birthday, which we have yet to get pictures of her riding. She is enjoying the fact that she is such a big girl. She often points out what makes her so big, even making good choices in her words and actions. She's becoming a good little helper around the house (how many more years until she can mow the lawn and fold laundry?)

We started t-ball this year, this Saturday is her first game, I will be sure to get some pictures. She is getting some of the basics of the game such as catching and hitting, but running bases and fielding are a stretch.

Makayla is doing fabulous with her school work! She catches on very quickly and is eager to learn. She is often asking how to spell words and likes to make books and write things out.

Here are a few pictures of the party before it started:

We started off by decorating princess crowns.

With the help of a mentoring program for 8th grade girls at our church, I learned how to make this cute design for her cake!

I attempted some swirls on the side of the cake, it was harder than I thought!

The girls are waiting anxiously for guests to arrive.

Our pretty favor boxes, what a great find at the Dollar Tree!

Caroline's 4th Birthday

I can't believe my baby is 4! Caroline Hope, you are growing up way to fast! We had a fast and furious birthday celebration this year a day early since Josh was working on her actual birthday and we had church functions to work around the day we did celebrate. Caroline had promised me she would stop growing at 4, but I think that she's had a change of heart since she keeps asking me when she is going to turn 5.
4 is such a big age. Caroline just figured out how to buckle herself in the car by herself, which she is extremely proud of and mommy is extremely thankful for given that in a few months we will have 4 kids to buckle in! She loves to announce how big she is and tell others about her birthday. She is doing very well with her preschool work, I know she enjoys doing things just like her big sister. For some reason she has been going through a mommy clingy stage. Which is just fabulous because Sydney is doing the same thing. Oh it's great to be so loved......Maybe they can choose Josh next time ;)
Here are some pictures of our quick celebration:

yes, I made it myself! ;)

Rock Star Preschool

This week we have started a wonderful curriculum that I just happened to stumble upon while looking for some resources for teaching Bible class. We had been doing some simple theme units manipulatives that I was checking out for the Johnston County Partnership for Children (click to check out their stuff!) It's so nice to have a place to check out tons of things for the girls, even Sydney! This group has a membership fee which is pretty minimal. While we are still doing theme units we have added some simple, yet powerful, curriculum called Raising Rock Star Preschool. You must check out this site! She has so many tools not just for preschool, but for toddlers and early elementary. We have been having a BLAST this week and I, for once, feel like I can actually do this homeschool thing!

To start off we needed some Popsicle sticks for one of our activities. The girls were so glad to be able to assist me in my quest for Popsicle sticks. They humbly and happily ate some Popsicles for me :)

Here is Makayla working on some letter tracing for the letter Ll that we are learning about this week. I have our worksheets in page protectors so we waste less paper and I can use the same sheet for all 4 kiddos! We use dry erase markers and wipe when we're done. This is a technique that I picked up while tutoring at Huntington Learning Center.

Caroline is concentrating very hard at cutting out our Ll words for the week. I had to reprint this page since she is still working on her cutting technique :), but it was good practice! The website recommends putting the word cards in a baseball card pockets, which I happened to have from my couponing days. It makes it easy to save and flip through each letter!

Here is Caroline working on a puzzle during center time. Thanks to some generous folks that Josh works with for donating some homeschool supplies to us! I don't know what we would do without them!

Sydney is learning how to be a lady by balancing a cup on her head at dinner...ok, not really, but it was pretty funny so I had to snag a picture!

Posing pretty to show off our Calendar Time. Our friends from church gave us the magnetic calendar. Since my background is in teaching I have a fun little routine we do almost each day to work on months, days, seasons and such. I was blessed to have a great Kindergarten student teaching placement.

Each week there is a new sight word to learn. I was soooo impressed at how quickly the girls grasped the concept of a sight word! This week we learned the word "See." This picture shows Caroline reading our "I See" book.

Here is Makayla reading. Notice she's in Jammies! Isn't homeschool life great!

Each week there is a verse to memorize that starts with the letter of the week. This week it was, Let your light shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in Heaven. Matthew 5:16. It's nice to help me learn new scripture as well as placing those seeds in my girls hearts. This picture is the girls coloring their verse.

Our theme unit this week has been the Food Pyramid. I wish I had more pictures of the fun we have been having with that. The girls say we have a "fun house" with all the posters and toys we have for this unit. On this day we studied the fruit group so we made some fruit smoothies for lunch. I think they enjoyed them!

She might not look happy, but Sydney enjoyed hers too!

To practice our verse and cutting skills, the girls cut out our verse and taped it together and used the verse to measure things around this house. This week our verse was longer than Caroline!

Makayla really enjoyed the measuring and had fun going around the house measuring just about everything.

Some things that don't have pictures

Since there were so many resources available for this weeks theme unit, I was able to do centers with the girls after our lessons. We had sorting baskets of food by color, food hand puppets, a Food Pyramid chart where the girls got to put the right foods in the right part of the pyramid. We moved the toy kitchen out of their room and the girls could play with tons of food as we learned about each section of the pyramid. I also made some sorting activities in file folder games, not as popular, but still fun. We listened to some silly food music that came with our kits from the Partnership for Children while we played.

Another perk of the Partnership is once a month they do a story time and activity. It is sponsored by Target and they provided a copy of the book for each family. The girls had a great time meeting new friends, hearing the story and making a craft. Since the story was about a Hen, the farm and her chicks we decided we needed to go and visit the chicks for sale at the local hardware store. They loved it! Although, I was disappointed that they added a "No Touch" sign that was not there the time that I went to check things out. We also took some time to wander through the plants, as I am trying to teach them the names of different flowers.

Non-school Activities

"The Bean" aka Sydney has cut one of her top teeth. The second should be coming any time now. She has also been able to pull herself up at least two times that I have witnessed and crawled on her hands and knees across the room!

We also got the call that Makayla's T-ball season starts this Saturday, so we are gearing up for practice!

Phew...what a busy week!

The Day

We had a monumental day a couple of weeks ago. The magnitude of the day keeps showing itself, so I figured I should share with the world the positive side effects from "The Day." A couple of weeks ago we had finally set up a playdate with one of our new homeschool friends, well really, it would be the first time that the girls had really met these new friends. It had taken some effort to coordinate and I was a little nervous about having new people in to our home. So I went all out, as in, I cleaned my house! I offer that courtesy only to first time visitors. After that, you get to see how we really live. The girls room was a MESS!! You couldn't even walk through the floor. So I set them about the task to clean it. They actually volunteered to clean as soon as the finished breakfast; they were so excited to have a new friend come over to play. We had until 1:00pm, so we had PLENTY of time! The girls asked for my help so I helped them designate tasks and break chores into steps. It awful hard not to get sidetracked when you're putting away all those fun toys. Let's just say the girls focus was challenged. After an hour and a half of work, the room didn't look much better. They were starting to get tired and come up with all sorts of ailments that would prevent them from cleaning their room. Time was ticking! I let them know that if their room wasn't cleaned, they would not be able to have their new friend over. Humph, they didn't really like that! After one more hour their room still wasn't clean. It was now noon. I knew that with as long as it takes for them to eat lunch, there was no chance of the room getting cleaned before our company came over. I made a tough choice, but knew it was the right thing to do. I picked up the phone and called the mom. I let her know that my girls were not behaving today and that it would not be a good day for a playdate. She surprisingly understood and said her kids weren't in that good of a mood either. The girls were upset. I expected as much and honestly would have been disappointed if they weren't. But really, they made the choice, not me. So now it's nap time. I encourage them to rest because they are in a bad mood, informing them that it would help give them a more positive attitude. For some reason, they did not heed my advice. The played all during naptime, interrupting the nap that I should have gotten. Mommy was NOT a happy camper. Naptime generally ends around 4pm. Some might stop with punishment after the canceled playdate, but that wasn't the point was it? I told them to clean their room and they didn't. It was time to learn a lesson! I let them know that they were to finish cleaning their room before they could have any dinner. But surely I couldn't be serious? I wouldn't deprive them of dinner? Try me! We don't live in the third world, they aren't starving. They will survive! And, their room will be clean! They huffed and puffed testing the limits. I set about making dinner and playing with Sydney. By the time dinner was ready at 5:30, they were still not finished. Sydney and I had a lovely dinner together. It just so happened to be bath night as well, the girls favorite. I let them know that if they didn't clean their room in time, not only would they miss dinner, but also bathtime. Once they saw me eat dinner alone, I think they were starting to get the point that I was serious. Oh, but once I started the bath water for Sydney they really got the point! By 6:30pm they finally had a clean room! By this point they were VERY proud of their accomplishment. They realized that they really could clean their room all by themselves! Their food was waiting for them at the table. I didn't even hear them complain about what I made! I put Sydney to bed and then gave them their bath and got them ready for bed. Even if the story ended there, it would have been a good one! But no, it goes on! The next day was prayer group day, which means a few moms and their kids come over and the moms talk and pray while the kids play. The kids had a great time and when they left, the room was still clean! They had picked up after themselves, a first! Ever since that fateful day, the girls have been able to reasonably keep their room clean. They even voluntarily clean it up on their own. It makes a mom proud! That day was not a fun one. As a mom it can be hard to follow through with consequences. Now that my girls have such a since of accomplishment and responsibility, I'm glad I stuck to my guns.