This poor blog has been greatly neglected these past few months. Not because I've had nothing to write about - indeed, life has been very full. Rather, it's due to poor time management skills. With so much going on, I kept meaning to write about it, but there was always something else that needed doing when I though of it, whether it be hungry and/or tired children needing food and/or soothing, to a beautiful day that just cried out for reading, to plain old down time for myself in those rare moments of quiet. Now that things are settling into a better rhythm, however, I want to make more of an effort to blog regularly. So this is the great catch up post.
The first big thing that distracted me from blogging was Edward's feeding habits. When I last blogged, he was still getting most of his calories from the NG tube, having started to fight the bottle again right after we got him home from the NICU. He refused to even consider nursing. Attempts to feed him didn't go well, because whenever I tried, his older brother was right there, trying to climb over him into my lap and demand his fair share of attention. I can hardly blame him, but trying to get Edward to eat at that point required all of my focus. After a few minutes of Edward and I getting more and more frustrated, and Vance getting more and more demanding, I would just give up and use the NG tube. Something had to give.
I am very, very blessed to have such a wonderful, supportive family. We were able to make arangments with my dear Mom and Dad-in law for Vance to stay with them for a few days so we could focus on Edward eating. It was slow going, with the first couple of days being extremely frustrating, but by the third day, he was starting to show a lot more interest in the process, and eagerly participating in his feedings again. By the fifth day, we were comfortable enough that Vance was able to come home, because Edward no longer required such intense concentration to feed. Around this time, Edward also started to breathe a bit more easily, and we were able to finally wean him all the way off of his oxygen. We went ahead and removed the NG tube, as Edward was able to get all of the calories he needed with his bottle.
It was rough at first, because feeding him still took most of the day. He was on a slow flow nipple to prevent aspiration, since he was still working so hard to breathe. Two weeks after we pulled the NG tube, we were able to get him in for a barium swallow test, where they found out that not only did he not aspirate with a regular flow nipple, but he could eat much more easily.
I no longer had to spend all of my time feeding him, but we were still exhausted. When Edward came home, being in a dark, quiet room combined with the magic of not-having-to-wake-up-to-eat-in-the-night-because-of-the-NG-tube and resulted in him sleeping through the night immediately. It was awesome. Sure, we'd gone through a lot of hard times with this kid, but at least he was sleeping through the night! Unfortunately, once he actually had to put a little effort into eating, he tarted acting like a typical baby and waking up all night. Ah well. He eventually learned to sleep well at night again.
The beginning of 2013 marked three years in the same apartment. It wasn't the greatest apartment. It was affordable. It was in a wonderful ward. It's immediate neighborhood was less than stellar, what with virtually everyone else in the building and surrounding homes being regular smokers. It was almost impossible to go outside without passing through a cloud of smoke. It was also old, falling apart, and infested with sugar ants who refused to die (at least, they never stayed dead for more than a day or two), despite trying every method we could find for getting rid of them. All of this had been hard enough with Vance. We had wanted to move much earlier, but were never able to find a better place to move into that still fit in our price range. Now that Edward was here, however, and having trouble breathing, it became more important than ever to get away from the smoke. In the winter, he almost never left the house. Once the weather warmed up, and the end of the school year approached, we took a leap of faith, turned in our 30 day notice, and began to look for a new place to live.
It was discouraging at first. Every time we found a place we thought would work, we'd find evidence that people who smoked lived right on top of it. And it didn't make any sense to move from one smoky situation to another. We had made arrangements to move in with my mom temporarily if we couldn't find a new home before we had to be out of our current one, but that would involve a long work commute for Wazi, not to mention the stress of having to move everything twice, so we hoped to avoid that if possible.
Finally we found what we were looking for. It was a bit more than we had hoped to pay, so money has been much tighter than we're used to, but we love our new home. It is open and bright. It has central air conditioning, which has been a true blessing this summer. It has a dishwasher, which I think is one of the best inventions of all time. It's in a whole neighborhood of similar apartments, with lots of grassy lawn, a playground, and other kids for Vance to play with. He has been in heaven since we moved here, running around with all of the "friends" outside. And while there are people who smoke, they are relatively few in number, and smoking is limited to specific areas. I can open my windows and let fresh air in, and it is wonderful.
Not much else to say. I spent most of July sick with the Virus That Would Not Go Away, but other than that, it has been a pleasant summer. We've been very blessed these past few months, and I can't wait to see what the next few have in store.
