Endocrine Follow Up

Talked with the endocrinologist last week and he said that all my levels are within normal range and that one of the images from St Joes that I had done a year ago showed my adrenal glands and they looked fine as well.  So he did not want to order an MRI of my brain.  He said there was probably subtle damage of the pituitary gland, but since the tests are normal, that shows it is still functioning so I just need to continue my current dose of Levothroid and my levels should stay stable.

So why won't this fat go away?  I oscillate between being disgusted with myself and thinking that it's ok to just be ok with the way I look and go on living.  Sometimes I see my reflection and think, 'I don't look that bad.'  and other times I'll see a picture of myself and think, 'holy cow, who is that huge fatty?!' 

I started taking Cymbalta to help with anxiety and joint pain, but it also has the side effect of weight loss due to lack of appetite.  However, I've been on it a week and still not losing any appetite.  Especially when I work out, I get sooo hungry!  You know that feeling you get in the back of your throat when you're just starving...that's what happens when I work out.  It's hard to push that feeling out of your mind, let me tell ya!  I know what it feels like to have no appetite because that's exactly what happened after I came off the feeding tube and people kept pushing me and pushing me to eat more even though that's the last thing I wanted to do.  I think that might be where this all started because eating more combined with my thyroid going whacky would send my body into a metabolic tailspin right into fat-land. 

Moving on...Nola is saying words in context now.  Like she knows what some things are without even seeing them and she can name them.  Like, she knows her milk is in the fridge and she'll say 'thank you' without being prompted.  She's growing up, but she's still my little tiny baby girl.  I had a HORRIBLE experience with her the other day when they had free kids meals at Chilis.  I took both the girls out to lunch by myself and we sat down and Nola just flipped out.  Like serious screaming, kicking, throwing herself on the floor meltdown.  I tried everything: snacks, milk, crayons, toys, blanket...she just kept screaming.  So I told Embry to not move and I rushed Nola into the bathroom where she continued the tantrum for a good 5 minutes before I whisked her and Embry out of the restaurant.  The waitress took pity on me and didn't charge me for our food since we had only gotten our drinks so far.  Once we got to the car, she was absolutely fine...I however was crying from exhaustion and embarrassment.  Ugh! 

 Embry spent 3 hours a day for 5 days at church for a 'Sky' themed vacation bible school a week ago.  She LOVED it!  Each age level learned 2 songs from a children's cd and performed in on stage that Friday night.  She's had me play those 2 songs over and over and over again every time we're in the car since then.  It's a little repetitive, but still cute to hear her little voice singing along with big hand motions and everything.

She insisted she wear all her headbands to VBS one day

At the Friday night program

Nola really enjoyed the umbrella

The performance, Embry is the second from the right

Nola going to see Pancake Pig.

Embry in the obstacle course at VBS

Embry and her friend Ava in the train.

My section of the mom to mom sale

most of the mom to mom room

We finally completed our lastfundraising effort of the summer for MOPS...The Community Fair!  It was a huge success, much more than we had anticipated and we had about 1500 people come through.  We ended up with over 100 vendors which spilled into our outdoor space and about 20 sellers for the mom to mom portion (which is what I was in charge of).  It was a LOT of work and now we have to write out a bunch of thank you notes for all of the donations we received and sponsors and vendors.  I talked to the woman who headed it up this morning and she said she already had vendors and patrons contact her about when next year's fair is going to be because they want to make sure to be included.  I'd say that's a good sign for future success.  :)

Independence Day

 Nola loved to play in the big mud puddles!

We went to a bbq at a park with some of our friends from Young Marrieds.  It was a lot of fun even though the weather turned into the rainiest day we've had all year!  Although this also meant it wasn't sweltering hot, so all in all, it turned out great!  The girls had so much fun splashing around and playing on the playgrounds with their friends.

 The sun came out for a little while.

 We had lots of fun in the splash pad!

 Embry loved the splash pad, we haven't been there since last year when Nola was just a baby.  Nola was very apprehensive and hardly got wet, but that was to be expected, she hates getting splashed.

 Nola kept her food in her mouth the entire time.  She's crazy.

 

Sisters!

Then we went to the University of Arizona parking garage to watch the fireworks on A Mountain.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The fireworks show started at 9:15 and then after about 1 minute it stopped for about 20 minutes.  Apparently one of the pyrotechnic guys had a medical emergency and had to be taken to the hospital in an ambulance.  Then the fireworks started again.  Embry seemed to like them a lot and kept saying 'wow!' and 'that was a big one!' and Nola just repeated me saying 'ooooh' and 'aaaah'.  We started towards home around 10:30 and both kids slept on the car ride home. 

Endocrinologist

 As you may notice, finally changed my blog title.  Here is the inspiration...
Proof of Your Love
I love this song.  It embodies all that it should be to be a Christian.  Only love remains in the end and all that I do with my life and every word I speak, I want it to show Jesus's love to others.  It's the least I can do in return for all He's done for me.

This morning, one of the zumba instructors at the Y said that her husband was on life support in ICU because his liver and kidneys were failing.  She said she just had to get out of there so she came to zumba.  She was so strong the whole time, then afterwards a bunch of us went up to hug her and she just broke down crying, oh my heart just breaks for her, so please pray for her and her husband.  I really pray that they can feel God's love through all of this.  Life is so fragile and fleeting. 

I had the appt with the endocrinologist yesterday and I'd say it went pretty well.  He didn't seem like an idiot, so I'm calling it a win!  He was very nice and seemed knowledgeable. The end result was that he thinks my pituitary gland may be damaged either from all the blood clots (hmm I remember asking my PCP about that) or from hemorrhaging after I had Nola.  I guess since your blood volume doubles during pregnancy, your pituitary glad enlarges during pregnancy so if you have a sudden drop in blood pressure (like when you hemorrhage) it can damage the gland.  So he took 6 vials of blood to run a ton of tests.  He also said, 'I'll definitely make sure to check your growth hormone' which is another thing I asked my PCP about and she told me that in all her years practicing medicine she's only had one person on growth hormone supplements and she didn't see the point of even checking it on me.  Take that PCP! Anyhow, he also said depending on what the blood tests show which we should get by the end of the week, he would like to order an MRI.  I'm supposed to go to St. Joe's and release all of the imaging I had done there to him so he can look it over.

The plumbers started tearing our house apart yesterday as well.  There are about 30 big spots of drywall missing all over.  Kitchen ceiling, dining room ceiling, bathroom downstairs, garage, laundry room, office, master bedroom, and both upstairs bathrooms. They have off tomorrow so they'll start back up on Thurs.  They started placing the new pipe downstairs this afternoon, but it should take about 7 days total.  Then we get to paint all the drywall patches.  Joy.  ;)  I brought the girls home for lunch today after doing zumba and a swimming playdate and the entire dining room/kitchen/living area was covered in plastic tarps...so it's a good thing I had picked up something to eat on the way home otherwise we would have had to wait quite a while for me to get into the kitchen.

Our good friend from young marrieds, Scott, came home from his year long tour in South Korea with the air force this afternoon.  A bunch of us went to the airport to meet him.  It made me so happy and I'm just a friend, I can't imagine how his wife (Janell) felt, but this picture captures her excitement of seeing him:

 and of course pics of the girls showing their American Pride!

Ah, I love our country and I love being FREE!  Wooo!

What We've Been Up To:

• Health:  thyroid med got upped again.  Going to endocrinologist on July 2, way across town.  INR has been in range for a while, so woohoo!  Thinking about switching from Fluoxetine to Cymbalta for anxiety b/c Cymbalta is also prescribed for fibromyalgia and decreases appetite...might as well see if it makes any difference.  Although it increases sweating and since gaining this weight I already feel like a big fat sweat monster.  Oh well. 
• Embry:  Sassy as ever, but can also be oh so sweet.  I am leaning away from homeschooling cuz that kid can drive me up a wall when she wants to.  I've learned to pick my battles with her because fighting with her all day long is just not something I want to do.  She has her second summer camp day at church on Tuesday, it's a water day.  Hopefully she'll have fun, I'm sure she will.  She's a social butterfly after all. She got a rash a few weeks ago which turned out to be really dry skin and it's been better since we've been moisturizing it extra.  She also got hives about a week before that and we think it might have been from honeydew melon, but we're still not sure.  She had one piece yesterday and no hives, so who knows what they were from.  
• Nola:  This kid a roller coaster of emotions and such a drama queen.  She can be laughing one minute and crying the next for what would appear to be no reason at all.  It will be so nice once she can actually tell me what is wrong instead me just trying to guess what she wants (or doesn't) until finally something makes her happy...or I just give up and walk away.  For the most part she's over her whole 'I hate the pool' thing.  Although last week she threw a huge fit in there when I hosted a playdate for MOPS and didn't stop screaming until I put her outside the fence on a towel with a popsicle, then she was happy as a clam.  Like I said, it'll be a lot easier when she can express her emotions with words!  
• House:  Oy!  Here's the whole long saga...our homeowners insurance cancelled us because we had 2 claims since we bought the house in 2008 (one when the hot water heater broke and one when the air conditioner broke).  The agent said it was no big deal because they could get a bunch of other insurance companies to underwrite our policy.  Well, then I talked to the other agency they sent me to and the agent there said that no insurance companies are allowed to insure a home for water damage if it has polybutelene pipes, which ours does.  So we could either pay 3x as much and get an insurance policy that does not cover against water damage or we could redo all our plumbing and switch it to aquapex pipes.  I asked around (since almost all the homes in Rita Ranch have/had polybutelene pipes) to see what companies other people have used/liked and I got a quote from the most recommended one...$7k.  I'm going to call another company that claims they can do it cheaper with a similar warranty tomorrow and see what they say.  Obviously, we don't just have 7k lying around so this means that we'll have to put it on credit and hopefully not have to pay any interest for 15 months so we can either pay it all off or a big chunk of it before the 15 months is up.  Problem is, whatever we do we need to do before July 14 because that is the date our mortgage company gave us until to get new homeowners insurance coverage or they will assign us some expensive/not good coverage.  

I'll leave you with some pictures of our fun summer activities instead of a long rant about the house!

Furthermore

To continue the rant on my dr, I gave her a jury duty medical excuse form and I get it back 2 days later to find that not only has she not written down any of my med probs but instead she wrote down issues that I don't even have! She put down that I can't be a juror because I have 'severe depression' (really, interesting that I was unaware I am depressed) and I am 'unable to focus reliably'. How interesting! I'm learning all sorts of new things about myself!

My dr is a Quack

So still haven't lost weight after working out for roughly 4 days a week at the gym for 6 weeks. Plus my hips started to hurt again and my period went funky, so of course I make a dr appt and go my own online research (I mean who wouldn't after the dr of death experience?!). So I go in armed with all my info and she's soooo slow...which could be a good sign, but then when after a half hour of me mostly waiting for her to type up stuff in her laptop I say, 'you ready for the next issue?'. And she says, 'you're killing me, fine, but I only have time for one more.'. I felt like telling her that she was the one that wasted all my time and maybe since she's so slow, next time I'll make 2 back to back appts do we can actually cover everything. I refrained.

Basically I tell her that I'm not losing weight and I think my thyroid might be messed up again. Then I lead into, do you think my pituitary gland could have been damaged when I had all the blood clots from lack of blood flow and it sent my hormones out of whack? She goes, 'well I don't really see the connection, blah blah blah, but I guess maybe I could try to send you to an endocrine dr....pause...thinking thinking...yeh I guess we could try that.'. Then I go, 'GREAT! Let's do that! Fantastic!'.

By this time I'm ready to scream or cry, I can't decide which, so we move onto the she doesn't have time for me thing and I tell her that between my spine and right shoulder blade has been tingling a LOT. She checks my range of motion and says, 'looks good, I guess I'd just monitor that, let me know if it keeps up.'. Then tells me to let it swing loose ever once in a while stretch out the tendon. Thanks doc, you're a real help.

Beautiful day

It's times like this, when I feel the closest to God...

Sitting outside, listening to the breeze rustle through the trees and my girls laugh and sing together in the sandbox (I'm just ignoring the occasional yell or threat from embry when Nola steps in her wet sand).

I'm amazed at how God can create all of this miraculous beauty and still have room to love me so fully.

Not that life is all roses and lollipops, but these moments remind me that through all of the struggles of this world, God is still so good!

I am SO not ok with this!

So what the heck?  Still working out and not only have I not lost weight, but get this, I went up 2 sizes all because of my big old fat belly!  I just went to Target to get some more fat clothes for summer and I am just disgusted.  I initially brought in size 12 and size 14 shorts/skirts.  The 12's were a joke, and the 14's were even funnier because they were also nowhere near buttoning.  Oh but everything except the waist was WAY too big.  Begrudgingly moved on to size 16...could button if I tried really hard and then had a muffin top AND bottom...bulge above the waistband and below the waistband.  Then, as I tried to hide the size label in case I see anyone I know (it was the Target post-church crowd after all), I put on the size 18 (mind you the biggest size before going into the 'plus' section).  Fits around the waist and looks ridiculously large everywhere else.  This bites.

Trips

Nola's still sick, but I took her to the dr on Friday and she doesn't have an ear infection, it's just a yucky cold. So today while the kids are home with tony I'll be going to the Y to do Zumba. They don't offer childcare on Sunday anyhow, and I really needed to get out of the house. Plus I think exercise will help my mood, I've been in kind of a funk lately.

I'm trying to do fundraising for the mops convention. Normally I say I HATE fundraising, but this is not the traditional 'here, buy something from me' approach which generally comes down to begging and hurt feelings. I am organizing 2 bunco game nights this summer. Getting people to pay $10 to come eat and play bunco is super easy since its so fun! The other part of it is trying to get businesses to donate gist cards or gift baskets to use as prizes. I was initially pretty worried about this, but it turns out it's going better than I thought. I'm getting a lot of help from other women who are going to convention too and my efforts have proved to be quite fruitful this far. I'm now just doing follow up calls to businesses where I've already dropped off donation letters. The convention is in Dallas on Aug 9-12 and it looks like there are a lot of great sessions going on. I've been wanting to make more of a difference in mops and I really think this will help me to do that.

Aldo, I booked our tix to wi for my 10 year reunion! We'll be gone July 27-Aug 6. That means I'll only be home for 2 days before heading to Dallas for convention.

How is this possible?!

I joined the Y about 2 weeks ago. I've been bustin my butt working out since then and according to the scale at my drs office I've actually GAINED weight! How encouraging is that?! Although, I must say, I LOVE working out in a class! I think this may have solved my problem of hating to work out that ive had in the past. Plus I feel so much better when I'm done (and let's face it, I like taking a shower without my kids needing me). Now the issue is that Nola got the cold that embry had (which led to embry's current ear infection) and she's snotting all over and coughing up a storm, so obviously I can't leave her in childcare. End rant!

LA Fitness

I went on a tour of LA Fitness yesterday. They're building one on Golf Links and Harrison, which is closer to my house, set to open in April. It was nice, but the child care was really not something I liked. It's a nice set up, but there were 2 workers for like 15 kids, they don't change diapers, they don't give sippy cups, and when I picked up the kids Embry was whining. So come to find out some boy in there head-butted her and knocked her over (she has a bruise on her forehead now) and they didn't even reprimand him. I mean you can't exactly trust everything a 3 year old says, but either way, I didn't want to take them back there. Next up is the YMCA. Only issues I have there is that the pool is outside (although it is heated all winter), and there is no spinning or cycling class. I have heard that the childcare does fill up sometimes so you'd either have to wait for 2 spots to open or just forgo your workout if you can't wait. That would really tick me off. I know a lot of mom's that go there, which is good and bad. Good that I might have some added accountability, but bad that I look like a red-faced freak when I work out and would be trying to hide behind every pillar and weight machine possible. ;)

Fat

I started this post about 2 weeks ago and added a bunch of pictures etc, but then the autosave didn't work, so it got erased...argh.

My thyroid level was normal with the med adjustment and my cortisol level was also normal, so now it's time to get on the workout bandwagon. Especially since my 10 year high school reunion is on July 29!!!!! I can't possibly go back there looking like this. Once I start to think I don't look so bad, I see a picture of myself and am totally taken by surprise and how incredibly horrible I actually look. I mean, it's gross. I almost feel like taking 'before' pictures of myself in a bikini or something as motivation to not give up on working out, but I might actually break down if I have tangible evidence of what this looks like without clothes on. Oh and get this, gained another 5 lbs. That puts me at 180lbs. 15 lbs heavier than I've ever been. Something must be done.

Health Update

Kids are great!

My leg ultrasound came back fine, so no clots, woohoo!

My back xray was also good, the fractures are there, but have hardened nicely so that means less pain, but never no pain. I'm ok with that.

I went to the ear/nose/throat dr on Monday who said that the perforation in the ear drum has healed, but there is a lot of fluid and pressure in the middle ear which is causing the ear drum to be sucked in making it concave and unable to vibrate, hence the lack of hearing out of that ear. He prescribed a taper of prednisone starting at 40mg which I took the first dose of yesterday. I'm really hoping this does not add to my already troublesome weight problem, but I doubt it will since it's only for 2 weeks.

My pcp rechecked my thyroid and also checked my cortisole levels (per my request) and I'm hoping to get those results back tomorrow.

We got some sickies over here!

The kids are sick. Bleh.

Geez, I started this post about 2 weeks ago and all I got down was one line. Now, the kids are all better and I'm the only one that's still sick. Nola had a bad ear infection and a fungal diaper rash and Embry had a double ear infection, they took some antibiotics and were all better. Tony got a cold type thing (which is very weird for him) and he's feeling normal again. I got a double ear infection with a ruptured right ear drum. They're both still draining, but the left is much better and the right one I still can't hear out of. My PCP is sending me to an ear, nose, throat specialist because I guess sometimes they actually do patch up the eardrum, but it seems that most of the time they just let it heal on its own...which it should. In the meantime I just keep saying, 'What?!' a lot because I can't hear people! This can actually come in handy sometimes though, like today we went to a movie and the gentleman behind us was making some weird snoring sound when he breathed (but he wasn't asleep) and I couldn't hear it until Tony had me specifically listen for it. Then it was annoying. I've also left my blinker on quite a bit because I can't hear the little ticking that goes along with it. So now I'm almost done with my second round of antibiotics and it seems to slowly be getting better (ie, less drainage).

In other news, I'm having nightmares about being really fat. I think this was brought on by looking through some pictures from after I had Embry when I was a good weight and feeling so incredibly disgusted by how I look now. It's really unfair that I did NOTHING to put on this weight and yet I am the one who will have to work really hard and kill myself to lose it. I stopped having soda in the house and have I lost any weight, nope, in fact, I think I've gained some. That's really motivating.