Black Friday-N-Stuff

I'm bummed to say that we really didn't get any Thanksgiving pictures this year :( We spent Thanksgiving at my cousins house which isn't very "baby friendly" so most of our time was spent making sure Aidan didn't destroy her house or hurt himself. Pretty stressful! But we did have a pretty good time.
The collage of Maya is of pictures that I took yesterday. She gets cuter and cuter each day so I've been taking lots of pictures because I don't want to forget any of it. The good and the bad moments :)

We decided that we wanted to go shopping on Black Friday for the first time ever for either of us. It was lots of fun...for the first 2 hours, then it got kinda frustrating. We had a good time though and found some pretty good deals!

Aidan in Best Buy right before he pulled the valve off of his trach and threw it without me knowing. I noticed it was gone when we were going to check out. We had to retrace our tracks through the crowds to find it under some stuff in an aisle. Craziness!

HUGE line in front of BrandsMart. We didn't go in.Yesterday I had just set Maya down after feeding her and her bow fell out of her hair. Aidan rushed over and tried to put it back in her hair. It was so cute! He has become so observant. He has just recently learned that if he covers his trach with his chin he can make noise. He also tries to put on the passi muir valve and artificial noses. Such a funny kid. Gotta love 'em!

Fun In The Sun

Today we went to the park with some friends and had such a great time. Then we ran some errands and went home. Today is a little different than most days because Rich had to go to work. His shift starts at 9pm and should end around 2am but who knows. It's his 1st night so wish him luck! Hope everybody has an awesome Thanksgiving tomorrow.

Luckiest Girl In The World!

I had lots of laundry to do tonight so I had lots of time to think. I was thinking about Rich as I often do. I was thinking about what an amazing person he is and how lucky I am to have him as my best friend. Whoever said you can't have your cake and eat it too was lying. I thought everybody should know just how incredible Rich really is.

He is sooo much fun! He will always humor me when I want him to do silly things with me. Never to proud or macho. All of my friends out here were jealous because Rich read Twilight with me. One of them said she wanted to clone him. I love that he loves me enough to want to share my interests.

He is always willing to help anybody. He has such a good heart. I can't tell you how many movie nights we've stopped right in the middle of a movie so that he could help somebody in his family with a computer problem, research something or even just look something up. He helps people without asking or expecting anything in return. I love that about him.

For almost an entire year Rich would get home from work and make dinner while I took care of Aidan. He never once complained. He has always been great about lightening my load when I feel overwhelmed. A lot of the time he will clean the kitchen before he goes to bed so that I'm not stressed about messes in the morning. He still opens the car door for me. He calls me during his breaks at school just to see how I'm doing. He always tells me that he loves me and makes me feel beautiful. He still gets a thrill out of randomly surprising me. I love him. He's my best friend.

Happy 2 months Maya!

Maya is 2 months old today and just as adorable as ever! She is super smiley and almost always happy. She is such a good natured baby and we enjoy every single day with her.

Well here comes the ugly truth. Having 2 babies is hard! Especially when the oldest is 15 months old! I try not to complain too much because I truly am blessed with incredible kids but boy do they keep me running! Tonight I was running around like crazy trying to get the kids fed and ready for bed. In my haste I left the bag of cheese out on the table. Aidan loves cheese. So while I was getting Maya dressed he reached up on the table and grabbed the cheese. I saw him before he made too big of a mess but decided it was just too cute to interupt so I grabbed the camera instead :)

Just thought I'd throw this one in. G-tube is gone! Now he has 2 belly buttons!

What the big kids have been up to...

This week Rich has been working every night from 6:30pm-12:30am. That's right, working. We are super excited that Rich got a job working for Delta. This means that we get FREE FLIGHTS! This week was training so he had to go in every night but starting next week he will only have to work 5 hours a week on Tuesdays. I'm excited that I will be able to fly right into Springfield to go visit my family in Branson whenever I want. We are both REALLY excited to be able to travel the world for the next 4 years! Rich doesn't have school during the summer so we have already been talking about all of the places we want to visit. Florida has truly been a dream. Everything has worked out so perfectly for us in every way. It's one of the best decisions we've made. We love it out here.

And then there's TWILIGHT! We've both been reading it and loving it. We are looking forward to Aidan getting the trach out so that we can get a sitter and go on a date to watch the movie. Awesome book.

Maya's Paci

I'm convinced that I have the cutest kids in the world. Maya is such a happy baby and Aidan seems to love her more and more each day. I can't believe that even though he is so young he is very aware of her and wants to make her happy. Yesterday I was eating breakfast and looked over to find Aidan trying to give Maya her pacifier! Of course I had to get a picture and I am so glad I did. Then later that day he was putting his face right up to her face and laughing each time she would turn her head. He was playing with her! I just can't wait until she gets a little older and they can play together. I am so happy that they are so close in age. As you can see in the picture he has a suction catheter in his hand. He is obsessed with them and always seems to find them when I'm not looking. Anyway, a couple days ago I caught him holding the catheter up to Maya's chest. He was obviously trying to suction her. Made me smile at his innocence in thinking that everybody has a trach. Children are so special and I'm grateful for my two little angels.

G-tube Removal!

Yep, back in the hospital for another surgery. The doctors visits and surgeries seem never ending sometimes but this one we had been looking forward to for a very long time. On Monday the 17th we went in at 7:30am to prep Aidan for surgery at 9:00. Well, things were rough from the very beginning. Apparently there weren't enough recovery rooms so we had to wait until 10:30. You can imagine how hard it is to entertain a 1 year old for 3 hours in a hospital room.

Getting bored...

Good news is that we wore him out with all of our playing around that he fell asleep so I was able to carry him right into the operating room and lie him on the table and watch as the anesthesiologist put him into an even deeper sleep.
We took one final picture of the g-tube to remind us of the things we so often take for granted. Many tears were shed during the process of teaching Aidan to eat. I was so happy to see it go.
Aidan, once again, was furious when he came out of surgery. I couldn't blame him though. He had these casts on his arms to keep him from bending his elbows so that he wouldn't pull out the probe that they put in his nose, down his throat and into his stomach.

The pH probe was connected to this little monitor to check for reflux. Because of the chance that he might pull the probe out I had to spend the night at the hospital with both kids. What a nightmare that was! I only got 2 hours of sleep because I had to stay awake if Aidan was awake to make sure he didn't pull the probe out.

He did not sleep well in the hospital at all.

Maya, on the other hand, slept like an angel most of the night. It almost seem like she knows that she need to be low maintenance when we are at the hospital for Aidan because for the most part she sleeps through everything. She is so funny. Anytime she gets a little startled when she is sleeping, she tenses her arms and spreads out her fingers. She cracks us up.

So, we survived the night and were discharged the following morning. I was soooo ready to go home and soooo happy to be done with that...so I thought!! The next day we got horrible news. The monitor was defective! It didn't record ANYTHING!! Yes, this does mean that we have to do it again and yes I did cry.

Maya wasn't too happy about it either. The good news is that the g-tube is gone. Only one more surgery to go. The trach removal is scheduled for December 4th.

Update: 6-18-11 ~ I've noticed that several people have been led to this blog post by googling "g-tube removal". Since this post Aidan's trach was removed and I had another baby that also had a trach. If you have any questions or just need support, please leave a comment with your e-mail address. I would love to be a source of support and help in any way:)

Tomorrow!!!

I'm noticing that lately my post have had A LOT of exclamation marks. That's because life is so wonderful! So in my last post I started a count down for the day that Aidan is going to get the g-tube out and I obviously haven't done a very good count down but hey, what can I say. Life at our place has been crazy! Juggling surgeries, doctors appointments, Rich's new job with Delta, and tests just doesn't leave us time for much else and yet we are the happiest little family in the whole world. We have been so blessed. Tomorrow is the big day. Well it's not THE big day. Unfortunately the ENT wasn't able to squeeze Aidan into his schedule to take the trach out at the same time the g-tube comes out. We are going to have to schedule yet another surgery for that. But he will be going in for surgery at 9am tomorrow morning to say goodbye to the g-tube. It has been a very long, stressful and frustrating road. I never could have imagined that I was going to have to teach my baby to eat. Every week for a year we went to a speech therapist where we would try different techniques, textures and flavors of food and drinks to get him to drink and eat. It was a rough and bumpy road but we made it through it and we are now going to be closing that chapter in our lives for good...tomorrow!!

Aidan's surgery

This morning we got up at 4:30am to get ready to go to the hospital. I was so nervous I had a really hard time sleeping. The nerves started to fade as soon as we met with the anesthesiologists. They were both very nice and seemed very competent. We got to the hospital at 5:45am, checked in and then went to a waiting room where they gave Aidan some medicine that made him groggy. As soon as he was groggy enough not to put up a fight they took him away. This is a video of Aidan feelin' a little loopy.

Changing Aidan into his hospital gown.Rich and I were in the cafeteria grabbing a bite when they called us over the hospital intercom. We rushed to the recovery room where a lethargic little Aidan was drinking a bottle and watching Curious George I could tell that he wasn't completely aware of what was going on because when we called his name he just kept staring off into space.
He sure looked cute in his little hospital crib with his puppy.
Right when we walked in his nurse told us of the wrestling match she had with Aidan. She said he had her pinned. Apparently when Aidan came to and didn't know where he was or what was going on he threw a fit! She said he was kicking and screaming! She commented on what a fighter he is. They were finally able to calm him down with a bottle of juice. He was tired and hungry...I would probably do the same for food :) It wasn't long before he was up and playing. The drugs still hadn't worn off but he insisted on sitting up, after he realized he couldn't stand.
He was having a really hard time sitting up but he would get so mad when we would try to make him stay lying down.

Maya slept through the whole thing. What an angel.

Ok, so here is the lo down...Aidan is scheduled for surgery again on Monday to get the g-tube out. The ENT (trach doctor) said he wants to keep the trach in for the g-tube surgery and then as soon as that is over with he will take the trach out!!! I can't even believe this is all actually happening! So I'm starting another countdown. These are some of the most exciting days of my life. I am so grateful that I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I don't even know how to express what I'm feeling. JOY!! So much JOY!! One more countdown.

**4 MORE DAYS**

Pictures of Aidan's trachea:
This is what it's supposed to look like.

This is what it looked like. The doctor lased it to make it look like the above picture Great news. Both vocal cords are moving! The left one isn't paralyzed like he initially thought. These are his vocal cords.

Maya smiles :)

Yesterday, Maya suddenly seemed so grown up. Every single time I talked to her she would smile at me. It was so cute! My suspicions were confirmed. She has a dimple in her right cheek! What? Where did that come from? No idea, but it sure is cute.

2 more days...getting nervous

The closer we get to Aidan's surgery, the more nervous I get. All of these crazy, scary thoughts have been running through my mind. The excitement is turning into fear. Mostly of the unknown. Because of these thoughts and the fear, the past couple of days have been different. I feel so much gratitude. Even just writing about my thoughts and feelings is getting me all choked up. I don't have ANY regrets and that feels really good. I can honestly say that I have lived every moment with him to the fullest. I adore him and show him that every minute of every day. I know that everything is going to go fine. It's not even a major surgery, it's very minor but when it's your baby boy it feels like a huge deal. Hormones! It's my hormones that have me all out of whack! So here it is. My completely overreacting, emotional, hormonal post. Please keep Aidan in your prayers. And pray for me that I'll get off of this emotional roller coaster!

2 MORE DAYS!!!

3 MORE DAYS!!

We have been looking forward to the day when Aidan can sleep in his own room. I have to have him near by when we sleep so that I can hear him breathing. Sometimes in the middle of the night he needs to be suctioned and I've always had a fear of him needing me and not hearing him. I've developed quite a sharp ear, you can ask Rich. If his breathing gets labored or mucousy I can hear it in another room but I still have always had that fear. It's been a really long time since I've had a completely relaxing nights sleep. Nights have gotten even rougher since Maya joined us. They are both in our room and I'll tell you what, if it's not one it's the other. One will be asleep and the other will cry and wake them up. We are definitely looking forward to Aidan sleeping in his room.

3 MORE DAYS!!

4 MORE DAYS!!!

We are so excited to not have to suction him a million times a day! This is a big one for us because it just gets so old. He really hates it too. It doesn't hurt him at all but he hates being bothered with it all of the time.

We are also very excited to have one less bag to carry around. Not only do we have a diaper bag packed with stuff for 2 babies but we also have the 50 lb suction machine! Ok it's not really 50 lbs but it definitely isn't light. Not to mention the crazy loud noise it makes when you turn it on. I always felt so bad when I took him to the mothers lounge at church to suction him and the mothers were rocking their babies to sleep. This is about how every mothers lounge experience would go...

Me: "I'm really sorry but it's going to get really loud for a second."
Mother: "Oh no, don't worry about it."
***Really loud hum of the suction***
***Screaming babies in the mothers lounge***

Oh boy, are we ever excited to turn in that suction machine!

5 MORE DAYS!!!

Only 5 more days until Aidan's surgery. So Aidan also has a feeding tube that he no longer uses and will very soon be getting out as well. This is another thing I am very excited about. In the picture if you look closely you can see the button of the feeding tube that is in his stomach. Well, from the very beginning we had problems with it. The button would always pop open and thus he would lose his lunch. Everything in his stomach would pour out! This was such a frustration for me because the feeding process from beginning to end took about an hour and a half. To make a long story short, the doctor told us that this was a common problem and there was nothing they could do about it (grrr...I won't even go there). So for the past 15 months we have been taping it shut. I am soooo excited to not have to hold him down every day to change the tape on his button.

I was shocked when I was looking through my pictures and only found 1 picture of us feeding Aidan through his g-tube. You can see the milk in the bag going through tubing into a pump that pushed it into his tummy. Not fun. Don't miss it at all and can't wait to get the g-tube out! Just one more thing we are excited about!