...why kids don't come potty trained?
...why children will decide to "help" one by pulling off their diaper full of poop and cleaning their own bums on your clean sheets while one is desperately trying to scramble off the toilet?
...why, when a kid is tired, they actually cry and scream that they couldn't be more awake and act like they've been shot up with a lethal methamphetamine/speed combo? Lethal for the parent, really.
...why the water is so hard here in North Pole that I could clean my clothes by beating them with a rusty bar and get the same smell effect and level of cleanliness?
...why I have to be convinced by various media outlets that I am the crappiest parent alive because I a) allow my child to own a few plastic toys, b) eat some non-organic produce when there's nothing else available or c) I either let my kid cry too much or not enough? Don't I already have enough angst without making me think I'm giving my kid a nasty case of autism by just being me?
...why, when a kid has a cold, is it his mother that gets tired and wants to lay down all day?
..why bitching is so easy to conceal as ironic musings??
Monday, March 31, 2008
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Ice fishing postponed
Well, we were going to take the little nipper out to Chena Lake this morning and try to get in a good ice fishing day before break up starts to happen...which is supposed to be sometime this month. The ice is pretty thick out there...four feet or so still...but the junior jet set decided to catch the cold train and is now coughing and snuffling. It's not really a surprise. Charlie came home this week with a vicious cold, bordering on bronchitis, and it looks Connor's caught it though thankfully not the same extent.
Still, he's waking up several times in the night and he's extruding various disgusting effluents out of his face so we thought it best not to take him out in freezing weather with a serious ice fog on, despite the heated huts. I don't want to tip a minor cold into a serious one just because I had a yen for fresh trout fried in cornmeal.
I managed to get myself into a nice little back spasm too, so I'm not altogether disappointed. This happens to me once or twice a year, at least once while pregnant, and used to happen with much more frequency when I was an exec. Stress plus heavy lifting (office supplies and filing cabinets and O-6 desks weigh a lot!) used to net me one of these every three months or so. The pregnancy ones always hit around the same time and is probably the result of relaxing ligaments and the weight of my belly starting to fall forward. I've tried every home remedy on the sun, even enlisting Charlie for some Swedish-style muscular torture, but it hasn't completely gone away. I've been snivelling for a couple days...I'm lucky Charlie puts up with me at all.
We got an email from the Freels...they're leaving South Padre Island to head up home to Indiana. They missed the worst of the winter craziness up there...for awhile I thought Angela was going to have to paddle her way up here for refuge from flood waters! As much fun as South Padre is, they're going to be glad to be home, I'm sure. I hope they'll come up soon! Mom and dad are already planning on coming up the week before Memorial Day...once we get settled in the new house we'll be so glad to see them and my prodigal kitties. We've already got some plans for what to do when they're here. Angela wants to come and go dog sledding and yet isn't up for Alaska winter weather, though those two things really rather go together. We'll see if we can't get her up here in the summer...I'm eagerly awaiting this much vaunted summer weather everyone keeps bragging about!
Red Flag Alaska kicks off for the first time next week, so we don't expect to see much of Charlie. He is running about putting out fires and trying to get a handle on his people...it's really tough because about half are deployed at any given time, and the other half are rather demoralized from only being here six months out of every year. Six months on, six months off deployments are terribly enervating for all concerned. Families are tired and stressed, the troops have a hard time feeling committed to either job because as soon as they get going they know they'll be gone again, and Charlie's the head cheerleader trying to rally the team. His pom poms are a bit tattered, because he knows none of this is easy on anyone. I'm not sure what the solution is, but I hope there's one soon to ease the burden on good guys like this.
I think we are going to venture out and pick up some fruit, yogurt and bread at the store. Connor has a yogurt and fruit smoothie every night and goes through the stuff at an exponential rate. He's still not reconciled to most veggies...green and orange things are right out...but I can always get him to eat his weight in watermelon, blueberries and apples so I'm hoping that compensates. He's chubbing out a little bit, probably preparatory to shooting way up in height again. We also need to look for new shoes for him because he's nearly outgrown the pair we got in January. I think he's only got one more toddler size until he's in grown up kid shoes. Sheesh, this kid is getting big!
Oh and on cool kid accomplishments...he added at least ten more words to his vocabulary this week: home, all right, car, watermelon, book, green, blue, yellow, purple, puzzle, boy, boat, square, star, circle, etc. Some of them probably wouldn't be very clear to someone who wasn't around him much, but he's trying so hard to really talk. And he adds the signs if he thinks you're unclear on his meaning anyway. He's known his signs for all his colors for six months or so, but it's fun to hear him say them and actively identify them. My favorite is please...it comes out "peez" and instead of circling a fist on his tummy, he does a funkified Queen of England wave above his head. If he's really desperate -- if, for example, cookies are at stake -- he'll yell "peez" in his most ingratiating Bambi voice and looks like he's trying to lasso something over his head. Yesterday was the first time that he tried to count independently without being prompted...he got a car as a reward for being a good boy during a haircut and was told he could pick one. He solemnly held up a finger and said, "one car?" I told him that was right, one car...so he grabbed a package of five cars that were all in one wrapper. I had him count and we agreed very seriously that there was more than one car, so that was not okay. You could see his little brain thinking I had somehow snookered him in semantics, but he gallantly accepted a little gray VW beetle as his reward for a job well done.
Wow, kids are cool.
Still, he's waking up several times in the night and he's extruding various disgusting effluents out of his face so we thought it best not to take him out in freezing weather with a serious ice fog on, despite the heated huts. I don't want to tip a minor cold into a serious one just because I had a yen for fresh trout fried in cornmeal.
I managed to get myself into a nice little back spasm too, so I'm not altogether disappointed. This happens to me once or twice a year, at least once while pregnant, and used to happen with much more frequency when I was an exec. Stress plus heavy lifting (office supplies and filing cabinets and O-6 desks weigh a lot!) used to net me one of these every three months or so. The pregnancy ones always hit around the same time and is probably the result of relaxing ligaments and the weight of my belly starting to fall forward. I've tried every home remedy on the sun, even enlisting Charlie for some Swedish-style muscular torture, but it hasn't completely gone away. I've been snivelling for a couple days...I'm lucky Charlie puts up with me at all.
We got an email from the Freels...they're leaving South Padre Island to head up home to Indiana. They missed the worst of the winter craziness up there...for awhile I thought Angela was going to have to paddle her way up here for refuge from flood waters! As much fun as South Padre is, they're going to be glad to be home, I'm sure. I hope they'll come up soon! Mom and dad are already planning on coming up the week before Memorial Day...once we get settled in the new house we'll be so glad to see them and my prodigal kitties. We've already got some plans for what to do when they're here. Angela wants to come and go dog sledding and yet isn't up for Alaska winter weather, though those two things really rather go together. We'll see if we can't get her up here in the summer...I'm eagerly awaiting this much vaunted summer weather everyone keeps bragging about!
Red Flag Alaska kicks off for the first time next week, so we don't expect to see much of Charlie. He is running about putting out fires and trying to get a handle on his people...it's really tough because about half are deployed at any given time, and the other half are rather demoralized from only being here six months out of every year. Six months on, six months off deployments are terribly enervating for all concerned. Families are tired and stressed, the troops have a hard time feeling committed to either job because as soon as they get going they know they'll be gone again, and Charlie's the head cheerleader trying to rally the team. His pom poms are a bit tattered, because he knows none of this is easy on anyone. I'm not sure what the solution is, but I hope there's one soon to ease the burden on good guys like this.
I think we are going to venture out and pick up some fruit, yogurt and bread at the store. Connor has a yogurt and fruit smoothie every night and goes through the stuff at an exponential rate. He's still not reconciled to most veggies...green and orange things are right out...but I can always get him to eat his weight in watermelon, blueberries and apples so I'm hoping that compensates. He's chubbing out a little bit, probably preparatory to shooting way up in height again. We also need to look for new shoes for him because he's nearly outgrown the pair we got in January. I think he's only got one more toddler size until he's in grown up kid shoes. Sheesh, this kid is getting big!
Oh and on cool kid accomplishments...he added at least ten more words to his vocabulary this week: home, all right, car, watermelon, book, green, blue, yellow, purple, puzzle, boy, boat, square, star, circle, etc. Some of them probably wouldn't be very clear to someone who wasn't around him much, but he's trying so hard to really talk. And he adds the signs if he thinks you're unclear on his meaning anyway. He's known his signs for all his colors for six months or so, but it's fun to hear him say them and actively identify them. My favorite is please...it comes out "peez" and instead of circling a fist on his tummy, he does a funkified Queen of England wave above his head. If he's really desperate -- if, for example, cookies are at stake -- he'll yell "peez" in his most ingratiating Bambi voice and looks like he's trying to lasso something over his head. Yesterday was the first time that he tried to count independently without being prompted...he got a car as a reward for being a good boy during a haircut and was told he could pick one. He solemnly held up a finger and said, "one car?" I told him that was right, one car...so he grabbed a package of five cars that were all in one wrapper. I had him count and we agreed very seriously that there was more than one car, so that was not okay. You could see his little brain thinking I had somehow snookered him in semantics, but he gallantly accepted a little gray VW beetle as his reward for a job well done.
Wow, kids are cool.
Friday, March 28, 2008
Spring will never come!
I have not even gone through a whole winter here, but it NEVER ENDS. It snowed yesterday. It's in the 20s now. So warmer, but come on now...it's almost April! Okay, complaints over.
The positive part is that daddy and Connor get to go ice fishing well into April. Connor went for the first time this past Saturday and had a great time. They caught about 25 little silver salmon...about 8-1
0 inches each...and divided the
m with the other kid and dad set that they went with. They have little heated wood huts they drag out on to Chena Lake and drill four holes through the ice. Luckily they cover the holes they aren't using, so no baby down a texas well incidents! Mommies still worry about little boys getting chilled, so I trussed him up like the kid in Christmas Story. He smelled like fish and had scales in his hair when he came home -- dirty, smelly and fish all in one day!? Kid bonanza! Of course he refused to do more than nibble the fish we cooked up last night but they're pretty tasty!
Then Easter came...and we needed to decorate eggs. If the pictures look blurry it's because Connor rarely slows down enough to take a still picture. Eggs are EXCITING! You can make a mess and throw around delicate objects all at the same time.
We were very excited about the Easter Bunny concept, especially since in a quest to get a forbidden movie down while mommy was in the shower, Connor used a chair and rolling pin to knock tons of items down from the closet shelf, including his Easter present stash. I let him keep the Thomas train, but the rest had to go back because the Easter Bunny hid them there to keep til Sunday morning. He talked the whole time about the puzzles he was getting when the Easter Bunny came back to give them to him. Sigh...maybe next year the Easter Bunny will get a titanium lock box for the present stash.
The positive part is that daddy and Connor get to go ice fishing well into April. Connor went for the first time this past Saturday and had a great time. They caught about 25 little silver salmon...about 8-1
0 inches each...and divided the
m with the other kid and dad set that they went with. They have little heated wood huts they drag out on to Chena Lake and drill four holes through the ice. Luckily they cover the holes they aren't using, so no baby down a texas well incidents! Mommies still worry about little boys getting chilled, so I trussed him up like the kid in Christmas Story. He smelled like fish and had scales in his hair when he came home -- dirty, smelly and fish all in one day!? Kid bonanza! Of course he refused to do more than nibble the fish we cooked up last night but they're pretty tasty!Then Easter came...and we needed to decorate eggs. If the pictures look blurry it's because Connor rarely slows down enough to take a still picture. Eggs are EXCITING! You can make a mess and throw around delicate objects all at the same time.
We were very excited about the Easter Bunny concept, especially since in a quest to get a forbidden movie down while mommy was in the shower, Connor used a chair and rolling pin to knock tons of items down from the closet shelf, including his Easter present stash. I let him keep the Thomas train, but the rest had to go back because the Easter Bunny hid them there to keep til Sunday morning. He talked the whole time about the puzzles he was getting when the Easter Bunny came back to give them to him. Sigh...maybe next year the Easter Bunny will get a titanium lock box for the present stash.
Friday, March 14, 2008
I haven't posted in forever...
Things were a mess for a couple weeks...between severe morning sickness on my part, Connor's mono, trying to fix this place up to something livable for the next two months, and house selling stuff, I just have not had time. I've been promising people some pics on Alaska stuff, and new Connor pictures, so this post is devoted entirely to that.
We got offered a house on base and we're able to move in on 25 April...yay! So it's six more weeks in the ghetto (do NOT expect to see a pic, we're ashamed!) but worth it for this big gorgeous base house with about 1.5 more room than we've ever had, with a custom basement playroom for Connor.
It's on the corner of Sundog Court, and backs up directly to Moose Lake, so we'll need to make doubly sure Connor can't get out there without help. There's two parks within walking distance, and two blocks away is the community center with a lovely indoor playground when it's crazy cold. The street is full of field gr
aders; both of us keep getting struck by the fact that we're the grown ups now. Eesh, scary thought. We have a nice big lot...of course Charlie immediately thought with a sigh of the extra mowing...but I remind him that's what teen boys are for. Now everyone send the people living there now strong "get out!" vibes!
Here's the view of the house from across Moose Lake. I think it's more pond than lake, but that's me I guess. Apparently people fish there, but I'm not sure I would eat what came out of there...Chena Lake fine, but Air Force minds in the 1960s and 1970s were not always as environmentally aware as they should have been, so I'm wary. It's very pretty though and will be even more so in the summer.
Here's a photo of where Charlie works. The wing headquarters building is just enormous and houses most of the admin and co
mmand functions of the base. Charlie also has people in Red Flag and the CTS, but the bulk of them are in the wing vault. Well, those that aren't deployed anyway! Eielson is a strange little base...tiny, they love to hide things (who would have guess the drycleaners was on the basement 2nd floor of the 2nd dorm across the street from the dining hall? Not me, as I spent 45 minutes trying to find it!), and yet has absurdly high-ranking people in charge of some things, and absurdly low ranking people in charge of other things. The place is also near about dead for several months in the winter. I wondered aloud one day about why the aircraft hardly ever flew...after all, most of them are technically all-weather and withstand very low temps at altitude. Was it a lift problem, I wondered? Charlie then enlightened me -- it was because downrange the weather was so bitterly cold (at least 20 to 30 below what it is here) that in certain temp ranges, that made the chances of recovering a guy alive who made it out of the jet in an accident virtually nil, no matter how fast they mobilized rescue. This is a very cool but rather dangerous place sometimes.
Anyway, I digress. One of the big tourist attractions in winter here is the Ice Art Festival. It's over behind Pioneer Park off Peger Rd, and it's pretty amazing. We did not r
ealize that the vast majority of the place was a kids' ice playground, but since Connor was NOT enthused about sliding down bitterly cold slides, that turned out okay. We should have had him in snow pants since he did want to play in the ice sleds, but it was so warm (45+) we didn't want to make him Randy from Christmas Story when we left the house. Ah well, lesson learned for next year! Next year, I think he'll probably be much more likely to want to play and actually wear the cold weather gear he needs to play safely. We eventually transitioned over to looking at the ice art competition sculptures, with some protestations from the junior jet set.
They were GORGEOUS! I can't believe what artists can do with something as simple as a block of ice. The unfortunate part was t
hat the weather 
was so dramatically warm for a week that many of the sculptures were cracked and damaged terribly. You could see how lovely they were though from display pictures. There were several different competitions -- single block, multi-block, amateur, and junior -- though a couple hadn't yet happened. The festival goes for a month, but the professionals do the contests in the first week so there is something pretty to look at for everyone coming. I snapped a few pics of my favorites. Connor wanted to pick up every pieces of broken ice he found, and tried to abscond with a small carved bunny. Luckily it proved to weigh much more than he could lift, but it was a close run thing!
So that's it for this entry...I'll try to get my act together and post more often from here on out!
We got offered a house on base and we're able to move in on 25 April...yay! So it's six more weeks in the ghetto (do NOT expect to see a pic, we're ashamed!) but worth it for this big gorgeous base house with about 1.5 more room than we've ever had, with a custom basement playroom for Connor.
It's on the corner of Sundog Court, and backs up directly to Moose Lake, so we'll need to make doubly sure Connor can't get out there without help. There's two parks within walking distance, and two blocks away is the community center with a lovely indoor playground when it's crazy cold. The street is full of field gr
aders; both of us keep getting struck by the fact that we're the grown ups now. Eesh, scary thought. We have a nice big lot...of course Charlie immediately thought with a sigh of the extra mowing...but I remind him that's what teen boys are for. Now everyone send the people living there now strong "get out!" vibes!Here's the view of the house from across Moose Lake. I think it's more pond than lake, but that's me I guess. Apparently people fish there, but I'm not sure I would eat what came out of there...Chena Lake fine, but Air Force minds in the 1960s and 1970s were not always as environmentally aware as they should have been, so I'm wary. It's very pretty though and will be even more so in the summer.
Here's a photo of where Charlie works. The wing headquarters building is just enormous and houses most of the admin and co
mmand functions of the base. Charlie also has people in Red Flag and the CTS, but the bulk of them are in the wing vault. Well, those that aren't deployed anyway! Eielson is a strange little base...tiny, they love to hide things (who would have guess the drycleaners was on the basement 2nd floor of the 2nd dorm across the street from the dining hall? Not me, as I spent 45 minutes trying to find it!), and yet has absurdly high-ranking people in charge of some things, and absurdly low ranking people in charge of other things. The place is also near about dead for several months in the winter. I wondered aloud one day about why the aircraft hardly ever flew...after all, most of them are technically all-weather and withstand very low temps at altitude. Was it a lift problem, I wondered? Charlie then enlightened me -- it was because downrange the weather was so bitterly cold (at least 20 to 30 below what it is here) that in certain temp ranges, that made the chances of recovering a guy alive who made it out of the jet in an accident virtually nil, no matter how fast they mobilized rescue. This is a very cool but rather dangerous place sometimes.Anyway, I digress. One of the big tourist attractions in winter here is the Ice Art Festival. It's over behind Pioneer Park off Peger Rd, and it's pretty amazing. We did not r
ealize that the vast majority of the place was a kids' ice playground, but since Connor was NOT enthused about sliding down bitterly cold slides, that turned out okay. We should have had him in snow pants since he did want to play in the ice sleds, but it was so warm (45+) we didn't want to make him Randy from Christmas Story when we left the house. Ah well, lesson learned for next year! Next year, I think he'll probably be much more likely to want to play and actually wear the cold weather gear he needs to play safely. We eventually transitioned over to looking at the ice art competition sculptures, with some protestations from the junior jet set.They were GORGEOUS! I can't believe what artists can do with something as simple as a block of ice. The unfortunate part was t
hat the weather 
was so dramatically warm for a week that many of the sculptures were cracked and damaged terribly. You could see how lovely they were though from display pictures. There were several different competitions -- single block, multi-block, amateur, and junior -- though a couple hadn't yet happened. The festival goes for a month, but the professionals do the contests in the first week so there is something pretty to look at for everyone coming. I snapped a few pics of my favorites. Connor wanted to pick up every pieces of broken ice he found, and tried to abscond with a small carved bunny. Luckily it proved to weigh much more than he could lift, but it was a close run thing!So that's it for this entry...I'll try to get my act together and post more often from here on out!
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Looks like our chinook weather is going...
...and I will bid it a fond and wistful farewell.
For the past week we've had record high temps here in the Interior...it actually hit 41 degrees on Wednesday. It's weird to see enormous piles of snow, rivers frozen solid and yet people are in shorts. Not me, mind you, because I retain so little heat that I might as well be reptilian, but some of those crazy Fairbanksians that think that 5 degrees is sweater weather. The Chena started melting in places, causing quite the flutter...that doesn't usually happen til April so February is a tad unusual to say the least. There's been a lot of muttering about global warming too, and the good old days of 60 below til March. Well, it takes all folks but I really don't mind a bit of unusual warmth. My toes are warm for the first time in a month.
This kind of weather is called "chinook" -- not sure why, but apparently it happens occasionally when really warm air from down south forces its way up here, rather than our forcing cold air down to freeze the good people of the northern United States. But today it's only supposed to be 10 degrees, and tomorrow it's supposed to snow in a goodly way and have a high of 4 degrees with a low of 11 below. Sigh.
We'll take some pics of the winter wonderland and post soon...it snowed last night and it's quite pretty. We couldn't take many pics in the really cold weather because the camera battery would freeze after a few seconds and no longer function properly. I REALLY want to get a pic of a moose for everyone...we had traffic stopped while Connor and I were leaving Fort Wainwright on Friday because a moose was munching their way through the trees at the gate. It was BIG...probably seven or eight feet tall and just massive. When something that big, ornery and near sighted comes tromping around, the gate guards scatter, in case they piss it off and become a tap mat for a moose stomping hoe down. A police car came and honked and flashed at it to make it move along -- I tried desperately to get Connor to check it out, but he liked the police car better. No accounting for taste eh?
Anyway, so it's getting cold again. Eeesh.
For the past week we've had record high temps here in the Interior...it actually hit 41 degrees on Wednesday. It's weird to see enormous piles of snow, rivers frozen solid and yet people are in shorts. Not me, mind you, because I retain so little heat that I might as well be reptilian, but some of those crazy Fairbanksians that think that 5 degrees is sweater weather. The Chena started melting in places, causing quite the flutter...that doesn't usually happen til April so February is a tad unusual to say the least. There's been a lot of muttering about global warming too, and the good old days of 60 below til March. Well, it takes all folks but I really don't mind a bit of unusual warmth. My toes are warm for the first time in a month.
This kind of weather is called "chinook" -- not sure why, but apparently it happens occasionally when really warm air from down south forces its way up here, rather than our forcing cold air down to freeze the good people of the northern United States. But today it's only supposed to be 10 degrees, and tomorrow it's supposed to snow in a goodly way and have a high of 4 degrees with a low of 11 below. Sigh.
We'll take some pics of the winter wonderland and post soon...it snowed last night and it's quite pretty. We couldn't take many pics in the really cold weather because the camera battery would freeze after a few seconds and no longer function properly. I REALLY want to get a pic of a moose for everyone...we had traffic stopped while Connor and I were leaving Fort Wainwright on Friday because a moose was munching their way through the trees at the gate. It was BIG...probably seven or eight feet tall and just massive. When something that big, ornery and near sighted comes tromping around, the gate guards scatter, in case they piss it off and become a tap mat for a moose stomping hoe down. A police car came and honked and flashed at it to make it move along -- I tried desperately to get Connor to check it out, but he liked the police car better. No accounting for taste eh?
Anyway, so it's getting cold again. Eeesh.
Friday, February 22, 2008
Sorry I've been MIA
Wednesday through Friday have literally been a blur for me. Tuesday night Connor was running around like wild man of Borneo, and fell and whacked his head. What's new, right? Heck, toddlers wear their bruises with pride...so we nursed and went to sleep and thought no more about it. Well, he woke up at 2 am burning up with fever. We gave him some medicine when the store opened at 7 am (no 24 hour quickie marts here!) but the fever never responded well. All day Wednesday it swung wildly between 101 and 104, and then at 4 pm, despite a good dose of Motrin, shot to 104.8. We called the doc and they advised us to hie ourselves to Ft Wainwright for emergency services, especially since he was getting very dehydrated and listless as well.
Just as a sidebar, I have never been taught by experience or word of mouth to respect Army medical care, but they rocked in a serious way. Blew Nellis out of the water by a mile. Anyway...
We had multiple tests for flu and RSV, and nada. He had a megadose of Tylenol and that took the edge off the fever. Finally we had a blood test. It's never good when the med tech pulls up the results and you hear her say, "Whhhhooooa." She ran off to the doc, and the doc came immediately to tell us what was going on.
Our son, the kid who has been sick maybe three times ever, managed to acquire such a wicked virus that it attacked his platelets. That suppressed his platelets to below half of what they should be, thereby compromising his ability to clot. The condition is called thrombocytopenia, and is more commonly seen in cancer patients than in healthy 2 year olds, hence the concern. We were given a follow up appointment for testing, and then warned to keep him quiet and still and watch him for any signs of bleeding. After some internet research, we half concluded that the test was faulty...people with this are usually VERY sick. There is an occurrence of false positives for this, usually in a dehydrated patient who clots too quickly and skews the test. We figured that had to be it, because, hey, he whacked himself good and hard Tuesday night and not even a welt.
We talked ourselves into thinking it was a mistake and today's testing would show this to be a great cosmic joke. Well, nothing doing...turns out the thrombocytopenia is indeed there and is indeed a concern. They did some more testing to try to isolate the virus they think is causing the issue -- apparently there's many including things that he patently doesn't have, like HIV. The doc doesn't think there's any reason to worry about cancers or anemia or autoimmune disease, but does feel it needs to be monitored closely. The good news is the platelets are not that low...not so low that he will start bleeding out of his eyes during a sneeze or anything. But they are low enough that we have to take great care in playing, not allow him to jump and fall more than a few inches, and any bleeding or bruising needs to be treated as an emergency. We have to check him over carefully every day to ensure there's no reason to think his platelets have dropped further.
This sort of thing resolves itself within a few weeks to six months, usually without treatment for the most part. If in a few weeks it doesn't improve or worsens, we'll have to do more extensive and invasive testing to eliminate anything more worrisome and might have to do a short course of steroid therapy. That is not expected to be needed, but eesh.
Connor hardly ever gets sick, but when he does, by God, he does it with a vengeance. It's really hard not to worry.
I wake up every few minutes to check him all night long...maybe someday I'll sleep again.
My poor baby.
ETA: Relief of all reliefs...turns out it's Epstein-Barr virus. That's right...my kid has mono. Can't wait for making out in high school I guess. Mono in kids this young acts nothing like mono apparently and the saliva test doesn't work in most cases to detect it. That explains all the sleeping he was doing before he got acutely sick, and why his appetite has been crap. Thankfully as a result the dr is going to wait another two weeks before testing his blood again, and it's all about watchful waiting. It IS possible for it to become chronic, but it likely won't...and as soon as the infection is inactive, his platelets will likely rebound. The thrombocytopenia is directly attributable to Epstein-Barr, which is quite a nasty little bugger. He had to have caught it 30-50 days ago, which was right in prime traveling mode -- we went to Indiana and back to Vegas, then Vegas to DC and back, then Vegas to Fairbanks. That's a lot to tax a sheltered kid's immune system with, especially with all the jet lag and confusion and stress of a major move. We were asking for this I guess, despite all my attempts to give him the best transition possible. The dr emphasized there's nothing we could have done to prevent this, but I fret anyway. Thank GOODNESS it's not cancer or anything horrid...mono I can deal with.
Just as a sidebar, I have never been taught by experience or word of mouth to respect Army medical care, but they rocked in a serious way. Blew Nellis out of the water by a mile. Anyway...
We had multiple tests for flu and RSV, and nada. He had a megadose of Tylenol and that took the edge off the fever. Finally we had a blood test. It's never good when the med tech pulls up the results and you hear her say, "Whhhhooooa." She ran off to the doc, and the doc came immediately to tell us what was going on.
Our son, the kid who has been sick maybe three times ever, managed to acquire such a wicked virus that it attacked his platelets. That suppressed his platelets to below half of what they should be, thereby compromising his ability to clot. The condition is called thrombocytopenia, and is more commonly seen in cancer patients than in healthy 2 year olds, hence the concern. We were given a follow up appointment for testing, and then warned to keep him quiet and still and watch him for any signs of bleeding. After some internet research, we half concluded that the test was faulty...people with this are usually VERY sick. There is an occurrence of false positives for this, usually in a dehydrated patient who clots too quickly and skews the test. We figured that had to be it, because, hey, he whacked himself good and hard Tuesday night and not even a welt.
We talked ourselves into thinking it was a mistake and today's testing would show this to be a great cosmic joke. Well, nothing doing...turns out the thrombocytopenia is indeed there and is indeed a concern. They did some more testing to try to isolate the virus they think is causing the issue -- apparently there's many including things that he patently doesn't have, like HIV. The doc doesn't think there's any reason to worry about cancers or anemia or autoimmune disease, but does feel it needs to be monitored closely. The good news is the platelets are not that low...not so low that he will start bleeding out of his eyes during a sneeze or anything. But they are low enough that we have to take great care in playing, not allow him to jump and fall more than a few inches, and any bleeding or bruising needs to be treated as an emergency. We have to check him over carefully every day to ensure there's no reason to think his platelets have dropped further.
This sort of thing resolves itself within a few weeks to six months, usually without treatment for the most part. If in a few weeks it doesn't improve or worsens, we'll have to do more extensive and invasive testing to eliminate anything more worrisome and might have to do a short course of steroid therapy. That is not expected to be needed, but eesh.
Connor hardly ever gets sick, but when he does, by God, he does it with a vengeance. It's really hard not to worry.
I wake up every few minutes to check him all night long...maybe someday I'll sleep again.
My poor baby.
ETA: Relief of all reliefs...turns out it's Epstein-Barr virus. That's right...my kid has mono. Can't wait for making out in high school I guess. Mono in kids this young acts nothing like mono apparently and the saliva test doesn't work in most cases to detect it. That explains all the sleeping he was doing before he got acutely sick, and why his appetite has been crap. Thankfully as a result the dr is going to wait another two weeks before testing his blood again, and it's all about watchful waiting. It IS possible for it to become chronic, but it likely won't...and as soon as the infection is inactive, his platelets will likely rebound. The thrombocytopenia is directly attributable to Epstein-Barr, which is quite a nasty little bugger. He had to have caught it 30-50 days ago, which was right in prime traveling mode -- we went to Indiana and back to Vegas, then Vegas to DC and back, then Vegas to Fairbanks. That's a lot to tax a sheltered kid's immune system with, especially with all the jet lag and confusion and stress of a major move. We were asking for this I guess, despite all my attempts to give him the best transition possible. The dr emphasized there's nothing we could have done to prevent this, but I fret anyway. Thank GOODNESS it's not cancer or anything horrid...mono I can deal with.
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Exploding moose
yes, you read that right. I saw a moose explode yesterday. I went commissary shopping on base and was driving back on Richardson Highway to North Pole when a guy in a rattle trap old minivan blew by me. The roads were pretty clear, but the guy was foolhardy in the extreme to be traveling at 75 mph plus on that road. Near the Chena flood channel, a yearling moose stepped out onto the road from the median and just stood there. It was like a horrible game of chicken -- the car never flinched, wavered, slowed, anything -- and that moose absolutely imploded from the impact.
Quite honestly the guy was lucky to be alive -- check out these pictures of what usually happens during a moose vs car situation. The moose blew apart into two separate pieces and was a small one, which is probably why this guy will live to tell the tale. Unbelievably when I stopped to help, he got out and looked at the damage, and managed to drive away -- engine rattling and clanking ominously the whole way. I stood there absolutely stunned, next to this steaming moose carcass and the absolutely gianormous blood smear on the road. As I turned to get back in my car and go home (with a leery eye out for a pissed mama moose) a guy in a red pickup pulled up to ask me what happened. I told him, he eyed me for a second and asked if I minded. Minded what, I wondered. He walked over and grapped the back half of the moose, dragged it heavily to his truck and heaved it in. He then did the same with the front half. Again, stunned bunny expression from Erin. He drove off, I drove off and wondered if I had just Twilight Zoned it.
Charlie explained that this sort of thing is common practice -- it's very common for people to keep animals killed in this manner, and some police departments even keep lists of people to call when they are called to an animal-car collision so they can come get the freshly killed carcass. That gives me a major hooz, but hey, whatever floats your boat. I asked Charlie why the guy asked me if I minded, and he said as first arrival, I had dibs. Oh boy. Guess if I had acted with more celerity I could now have three hundred pounds of moose meat getting rendered for me. But I hate getting blood stains out of the minivan so there you go. BLEAH.
Yup, things are different up here.
Quite honestly the guy was lucky to be alive -- check out these pictures of what usually happens during a moose vs car situation. The moose blew apart into two separate pieces and was a small one, which is probably why this guy will live to tell the tale. Unbelievably when I stopped to help, he got out and looked at the damage, and managed to drive away -- engine rattling and clanking ominously the whole way. I stood there absolutely stunned, next to this steaming moose carcass and the absolutely gianormous blood smear on the road. As I turned to get back in my car and go home (with a leery eye out for a pissed mama moose) a guy in a red pickup pulled up to ask me what happened. I told him, he eyed me for a second and asked if I minded. Minded what, I wondered. He walked over and grapped the back half of the moose, dragged it heavily to his truck and heaved it in. He then did the same with the front half. Again, stunned bunny expression from Erin. He drove off, I drove off and wondered if I had just Twilight Zoned it.
Charlie explained that this sort of thing is common practice -- it's very common for people to keep animals killed in this manner, and some police departments even keep lists of people to call when they are called to an animal-car collision so they can come get the freshly killed carcass. That gives me a major hooz, but hey, whatever floats your boat. I asked Charlie why the guy asked me if I minded, and he said as first arrival, I had dibs. Oh boy. Guess if I had acted with more celerity I could now have three hundred pounds of moose meat getting rendered for me. But I hate getting blood stains out of the minivan so there you go. BLEAH.
Yup, things are different up here.
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