3 Big Ones

So Rayne had quite the adventure this week. As toddlers we should all know toddlers mange to get bumped, bruised, and just into all sorts of things. Well our dear little Rayne had three 'incidents' this week.

1) 12 Fire Ant Bites

2) Dropped a 12oz soup can on her big tow

3) A face plant into the edge of the dishwasher

Now think about these three injuries. If you had to choose which do you think caused a larger reaction at the time of injury? Which would make you scream the loudest and longest?? Do you have your answers good. Because now I'm going to tell you how you Rayne reacted.

In last place, as in the least reaction is 12 Fire Ant Bites. No joke. I was out grilling Burgers for lunch. Fred and Rayne were just out walking around. Rayne stepped off our patio onto the grass and fell. I knew that there were some ants around there so I went and stood Rayne up and dusted her off. She went on her merry way. It wasn't until about an hour later after lunch we were inside and Rayne began to fuss a little. She was taking the bottom of her foot to scratch her leg. I looked at her leg and saw a bunch of bites. A quick bath and some anti-itch cream later and everything was fine. The next day Rayne's bites had turned into little pustules. I scoured the web and looked at where Rayne fell down and it was concluded that it was Fire Ant bites. Then on Friday Rayne had a Doctor's appointment and although they were already starting to heal the doctor could deal they were Fire Ant bites. What a though little girl we have.

Did you guess a face plant into the side of the dishwasher?? Well you would be wrong. Sunday night Fred and I were cleaning up and Rayne was playing. She was getting a little excited, lost her balance and WHAM. Face met dishwasher. I picked Rayne up gave her a cuddle then looked her over. There was blood in her mouth. She had split her lip. I told Fred, he took Rayne out of my arms and I grabbed a cold bottle for Rayne. She happily took it and then stopped crying. We gave her a frozen teething ring after that. The rest of the night went just fine. No more blood, no swollen lip, no bruise. You would never know.

Anyone guess the soup can?? Wouldn't have been my guess either. But after dropping that soup can on her foot Rayne cried for a whole two minutes. Of course it was right at the base of the nail on her big toe. Been there done that and it hurts. It even bled a little, it was her first bleeding wound. That took place Sunday morning. Her foot hurt for most of the morning but by afternoon she didn't seem to notice the injury.

So our daughter may be little but she can sure take a hit. And it's natural. It's not like she has had to build defense against siblings. I have a feeling she just might be a handful.... ohhhh payback

Cleaning House

Recently Fred and I have decided to get back to our scheduled chore routine. It's not that we don't keep the house clean. But this schedule helps us make sure things are with the frequency we want. Making it so that we only have to do a little cleaning each day so the big cleaning days don't take as long.

Today was the upstairs bathroom which is the one with our shower tub in it. And we decided to scrub it down hard to get all the gunk out of it and start with a clean slate. So I get in there with this awesome cleaner I found called Doktor Clean. I found it at Kroger and it is an awesome paste that takes a lot of muscle out of cleaning. Anyway I get in there and start cleaning our tub floor. Before we had scrubbed this with everything else we had and could only get off the basic layer of grime. So we threw a mat down and just didn't deal with it. Today I paint a very annoy discovery. Paint. That is right someone painted our tub floor. Well the whole tub but most of the rest of it had come off. And we aren't talking nice enamel paint to cover up the scratches, no we are talking about wall pant. The didn't even have the decency to use a satin, semi gloss or glossy finish. They used a FLAT finish!!! Oh I was fit to be tied. But there was nothing to do but scrub.

I got out a plastic spatula to help scrap up the paint. I was preparing to find a tub floor just covered in scratches that would make me want to put the right paint on it. Do you know what I found?? An almost perfect tub. Sure there were some scratches but nothing terrible, no need to paint at all. After getting up most of the stuff off the bottom I moved on to the walls. The soap scum came off pretty easy sadly it brought along more paint. Instead of re-caulking they painted. I this point I was just praying to slip in the water and crack my head open and bleed out right there. Thankfully that wasn't the case for all the caulking around the tiles but the wall joint and fixtures. They also painted the soap holder. Oh what sad sad people.

Lastly I found paint in the sink as I was cleaning up. What were the previous renters thinking?? I'm pretty sure it wasn't the complex because as nuts as they are to put flat paint up, in any wall in an apartment, they were smart enough to use a semi-gloss finish in the bathrooms and kitchen. So I wonder if the last renters felt they wouldn't get their deposit back or when they were painting (I know they had to because management had to paint over their work before we could move in) they thought it would be a good idea. Either way it stinks to be the one to clean it up!

A Sweet Thought

In my process of trying to figure out how to help Rayne I called my big brother Benjamin. Because of his work in statistics he can tell me whether my thought processes are absolutely nuts or not. In talking back and forth Benjamin said "I know you are just going to let this roll off but you don't deserve this. You have had enough trials in your life you don't need this." He was right I just laughed and let it roll off. We talked a little more but eventually it was time to put Rayne to sleep so I got off the phone.

As I was giving Rayne her treatment I really started to think about what Benjamin said. And although I still didn't care the I "didn't deserve it" I realized that there was a slightly deeper implied meaning. That Benjamin my big brother truly cared about what I was going through. Even though he had his own family and hundreds of miles between us I was still important to him. And he felt sorry for my plight. And oddly enough that made me feel better. Especially since Benjamin and I haven't always had the best of a relationship.

Overall things seem to be looking up but time will tell. But no matter what its nice to know my big brother, who at three years old was ready to take down a doctor because the doctor was going to give me a shot, is still out there looking out for me.

Information

First off let me start with a disclaimer. This post is to inform everyone with the many going on's in the Kaestner household. But during this process you may find that there is too much info for your liking on somethings and then on other topics there may not be enough information for you. If you are interested in more you'll have to contact me directly and even then I may not give it up. Also I'm going to vent a little of my frustrations and thoughts, non of this is to offend anyone just to vent. So if you think you may be offended then stop right here.

Okay now for the meat of it.

First off it can be a long drive to Birmingham. It's only about 2 hours away but that first trip down to see the pediatric Gastroenterologist (Gastro) it seemed like forever. I had no idea what he was going to say about Rayne and what his ideas were about her not growing. It didn't turn out too bad. The Gastro was a very nice guy even though his name was Stephen King (No Joke). He listened very nicely to all or our concerns and ordered just about every test in the book. The blood was drawn that day and an appointment was made for three weeks later to have an ultrasound and Barium Swallow X-Ray done. And off we went to grab some lunch and head home.

Three weeks flew by and testing day came. Short story IT WAS AWFUL!!! Rayne was hungry, tired, and did not like being held down for her x-rays. Thankfully I could go in so I could sing to her and she would know I was there. We got the results later that day at the Gastro. The x-ray confirmed Rayne's reflux problem and showed an abnormality with her ovaries. Which meant another specialist. Urggg. On our merry way we went. Only to go back the following month for a repeat ultrasound and a visit with the Endocrinologist.

Our lovely Endocrinologist had the test results before we got to the office. Which were normal this time. She said it was not uncommon for children Rayne's age to have temporary cysts on their ovaries. Slight crisis adverted. But this meant no true answers. She wasn't to worried about Rayne's lack of growth because... "Well she is still getting taller." Really? Okay she is taller but did you see how tall she was to start off with?? You talking about how the child needs to stay on a curve and my child is almost a flat line. Oh well moving on. More blood was drawn and a return visit set up for January. The blood work checked her Thyroid, and Electrolytes. Both were normal. That made me very happy because Thyroid problems run rampant in my family and normal Electrolytes means Rayne is getting the basic food she needs. Lack of growth isn't from lack of food. Now maybe they will believe me when I say that she does eat.

Shortly after this visit Rayne's already iffy sleeping habits take a serious turn for the worse. Back in January Rayne had settled into a pattern that left me tired but was extremely predictable. Length of time and time of day were consistent almost to the minute. Around May things slowly declined. We tried more food, cooling the house, more cuddle time during the day. Sleeping with her at night. We even invested in a new sleep chair. Some of these things helped but never for long. In June Rayne started waking up every 45-90 minutes. Sometimes she would go to sleep with just a bottle, or rocking. Other times she would be up for 2-3 hours. And nap time was almost non existent. I didn't know what to do.

Since the biggest culprit seemed to be her breathing we went to the Pulmonolgist. Oh did that visit suck for some many reasons. First he bashed our family doctor, Dr. Richards, who I love and has be wonderful for us. He was the one that pinned Rayne with her condition and got us into the Pulmonolgist in the first place. Oh and Dr. Richards diagnosed Rayne by what we told him and being in the same room for 5 minutes. Rayne was seeing someone else that day but Dr. Richards wanted to check on her. So her was my Pulmonolgist saying that I needed to change doctors because Residents are dumb and we should have more specialized care. And Dr. Richards shouldn't be stumped by Rayne not sleeping. HELLO!!! Rayne currently has 3 specialist stumped. Why can't the Family Doctor be stumped too?? Secondly the Pulmologist tried to scare me into giving Rayne shots. Telling me stories and saying that kids die if they don't get vaccinated. Okay I'm not an idiot and I'm not not doing shots because I think the medical world is wack or I believe it will give my child autism or that they are useless. We are WAITING to do shots because first off family history. Both sides have shown a wide variety of reactions to shots. I get site infections and end up on antibiotics, Fred will get sick for nearly two weeks. Nope don't feel like putting my child threw that. Secondly, I am a stay at home mom who gives breast milk to Rayne. And if there is an outbreak I'm completely fine with quarantining in my house. Lastly Rayne has gets poked and prodded enough for reasons she can't understand. I'm not going to add to it if I don't have too. Anyway--------So I left there with no answers and really angry. I still like our Pulmonogist but I hope I never have to do that again.

A couple weeks later we went back to the Gastro. He actually wanted to help Rayne sleep. His thought was maybe her reflux wasn't under control and waking her up. So we left with two more reflux meds to see if that would help. Well it wasn't the miracle we were hoping for but things have gotten better. Rayne no longer needs to sleep in a chair, we have moved her into the pack n play! The sleep isn't perfect but we are up to four hour blocks of sleep more often. WAHOOO!!! There are still a lot of nights we have to sleep with Rayne in arms but it's a little better.

This past week Rayne got some sort of bug but we are on the up swing of that. Yesterday she decided it would be fun to get her first bug bites. Fire Ant bites!! She didn't even cry, but gosh are they nasty looking. We have a follow up with the doctor about her flu-ish thing tomorrow and I'll get the bites looked at too.

In Fred News

We finally have his reflux under control. It took three different prescriptions to find the right one but we got there. He also had to have a scope and they found several abrasions on his esophagus. That was why the pain of is reflux was so severe and long lasting. So a couple weeks of an extra med to help heal the abrasions and life is looking good. He is still battling some insomnia, but he is holding up well.

Fred has been really great at helping me out. I have to tell him exactly what I need but after that he is right there. Fred is also a great Priesthood leader. He is a driving force behind family scriptures, prayer and Family Home Evening. Are we perfect HA!!!!! But the increased frequency has brought the spirit into our home and during this time where really no one is sleep we are still getting along and peace is pretty well maintained.

For me, well Rayne's life is kind of my life right now. But there are a few highlights

--There are three times a day my life really stinks. Its when I have to give Rayne her medicine. I hope no one I knows ever have to do what I do.

--I'm so very done with people telling me how little their kids where and how just one day their kids where caught up. I understand they are just trying to be kind but what makes you think I want to hear about your child's growth spurt at 9 months??? It is kind of funny to say that Rayne is almost a year and watch those people's faces drop.

--I do LOVE how people fawn over how cute and precious Rayne is. A lot of that has to do with how little she is and how bright those eyes are but Rayne loves it when people smile at her.

Overall I wouldn't change my life. I know I can complain and be a worry wart but honestly I love my life. My husband is AWESOME and my daughter is FANTASTIC!! So really my life is rather great :)