The Problem With My Sons Toys

I'm getting new storage shelving in the kids' bedroom.  Faye's toys are mostly in our bedroom and Maddox's toys are in their bedroom.  I've got bins for his toys and am separating them and getting them organized. 

The problem is there is a lot of separating and very little organizing.  He has a bin of monster trucks, a bin of cars, racecars, some airplanes and motorcycles.  Mostly they are all Hot Wheels, Matchbox, and "Cars" brand die cast vehicles and belong together.  Then there is a bin of transformers and I have another bin that I made the "space" bin.  It has an astronaut kit, star wars items, and other space related stuff.  Everything else are just a bunch of random junk that does not belong together.  He has a handful or less of a lot of different stuff and its frustrating trying to organize it and make it easy to find, easy to get to, easy to put away, and look nice all at the same time!

Grr!

Mama has Strep Throat

I woke on Sunday with a sore throat.  It wasn't too terrible, but I decided I didn't want to go to church because I am still not better from the original junk plus I was tired, had the sore throat, and a headache.

I woke up on Monday and felt miserable.  I knew I had to have something.  I get sore throats all the time, but nothing quite like this and my right gland under my chin was the size of a meatballs and sore!  By Monday night, I had decided I wanted to go in to the doctor the next day.  Tuesday morning I woke up and wanted to beg Clayton into bringing me in right away in the morning.  I tried to be hinty about it, but he didn't want to go before work and I felt guilty begging.

I went into the minute clinic with swollen glands all over the place, white spots on my fire red throat, the right side of the back wall of my throat puffy and lopsided.  The doctor did a rapid strep test, but that came back negative.  She still gave me antibiotics because between all of that stuff, a fever, headache, the sinus infection that I had the week before and the fact that our original colds were more than likely Influenza, I wasn't getting better and something was obviously going on.

It took me by complete surprise that the strep test came back negative.  If this wasn't strep, I would never, ever, ever want to get strep!  The antibiotics started working over night and Ibuprofen is extremely helpful too.  Between the two, my biggest issue is that I cannot have Caribou because anything chocolate hurts REALLY bad!

A doctor at the minute clinic called a short while ago to let me know that I do have strep.  The lab test came back positive.  Fortunately, the lovely doctor that I saw on Tuesday night already started me on antibiotics, so I'm good to go!

While I was at the minute clinic, I talked to the doctor about Faye's ear.  Her drainage used to be a drippy, clear, dark yellow color and it had switched to a sticky, pale green another like discharge that was pooling in her ear instead of coming out.  The doc said it would be best to bring her in, but this morning she had almost no discharge and her ear drops went in without very much stimulation (wiggling and pushing) on the outside of her ear, so I think she's good.  We'll definitely bring her in if the lack of drainage seems to be a fluke.

Antibiotics for Ear Infections

The "new" recommendation for ear infections is the "watch and see" method.  We are not to rush our children into the doctors office for treatment.  Ear infections can and often do (I have read...) go away on their own.

Well I watched and I saw my daughters eardrum rupture.  Also something that seems to be recommended by some sites as no big deal.  I read MayoClinic, WebMD, Medline Plus, and AskDrSears.  No conclusive information on this topic.  Some suggest to wait to bring your child in until s/he has severe pain (Faye seemed to have that instantaneous), some said if you see blood coming from the ear after rupture, some said if your eardrum ruptures there will be clear fluid, blood, and even pus, but with no other recommendations.

I've got to tell you though... I've decided this "watch and see" bit is not for me.  At least not for Faye.  She had an infection in the opposite ear in Feb.  We brought her in right away in the morning because she was down right miserable all night.  We got her on Amoxicillin and her pain was gone by that night.  I accidentally didn't give her the full 7 days of it (eek), but it went away very quickly and didn't return.

Thus time she was in miserable pain for a day and a half until her eardrum ruptured.  She got relief from that and was able to sleep (a lot!) during the day, but then she was in pain again.  The next day most of her pain went away and her fever had been down to normal temp for almost two days, she was dripping everywhere though.  About 36-48 hours after her eardrum ruptured, we brought her in to get checked out.  We ended up with $50 ear drops!  Four drops, two times a day, seven days.  Yikes!

Next time we'll go back for the Amoxicillin.  Torturing her isn't worth it.  She goes from zero to 50 in 60 seconds and if she hadn't taken the antibiotics for the first infections, they eardrum would have burst too.

Ear Infection & Sickness

Faye was up all night.  Second night in a row.  She started complaining Tuesday evening and putting my hand over her ear, then she passed out in my lap. 

She was so heartbreaking the first night.  She kept crying for "more medicine, mommy" and then she started out crying to me "take care of me, mommy!  Just take care of me!"  That was heart wrenching.  I had been giving her Ibuprofen, Acetaminophen, and a benzocaine ear drops.  There was nothing else I could give her at the time.

The second night she was more mad about stuff.  She was kicking me about stuff, mad because she wanted to read books, and mad about lord only knows.  She refused Acetaminophen all night.  She told daddy "I don't want to feel better, I want to feel bad."  She then cried because she was scared.  Scared of me (lol) and scared of the dark.  Lots of times she claims to be scared of Maddox.  Then she wanted to go sleep with daddy.  He was on the couch.  I think half because I was sleeping on his pillow and maybe a little bit because he knew Faye was going to be crying all night again.  That sounds bad (lol) but she will never let him do anything for her, so he might as well get his sleep.  He didn't LEAVE bed!  I let Faye go lay with him two separate times.  Once early in the night and then again early in the morning, maybe 5-7 ish?  In-between she cried and cried to sleep with him.  Finally, sometime this morning she said to me "I want to feel better!"

We went upstairs to get Ibuprofen.  She didn't want to drink it, she just wanted "eye drops" haha!  I told her she couldn't have any ear drops until after she drank the medicine.  She drank it down in a second!  Of course when I got her laid down for the drops, her ear is all crusty and I think her ear drum burst.  Fortunately, she passed out before she could cry anymore about wanting ear drops.

Yesterday, she slept on and off all day.  She has been falling asleep very easily.  Unfortunately, she wakes up very easily too.  She did sleep a decent nap before lunch time and again after school.  She's sleeping now too, has been for almost an hour.

All of us have been sick the past week and a half.  I got sick on Sunday afternoon (6th?).  I had to have our neighbor bring Maddox to his bus stop on Monday.  Tuesday I had Clayton stay home from work.  I had a 105 degree temperature.  I felt the most miserable I ever have and could barely move.  I got my appetite back this Monday (14th), but my throat has still been too sore to eat much.  I lost my last week too and still cannot talk much.  The coughing has settled down a bit, if it weren't for Faye, I'd be able to sleep at night!

Faye woke up around 1-2am on Tuesday the 8th, puking.  She was up all night.  I ended up having to leave the bed and let Clayton deal with her.  I needed sleep so bad and, of course, when I woke up Tuesday morning, the was the worst day of my sickness.  Faye only puked that morning and she was fine, in that aspect, for the rest of the day.  She has had a 102-103 temp since that day.  Lately, she's been around 101-102 even though she was feeling perfectly fine otherwise... now she has the ear infection.

Clayton went to work Wednesday and had a sore throat.  He was really feeling like crap on Thursday and by the time he got home from work that day, he had a 104 temp.  He is coughing (and so is Faye) but not as bad as Maddox or myself.  He's getting his appetite back.

Maddox woke up on Wednesday the 9th with a terrible belly ache.  He threw up a few times.  He cried his little heart out too.  He had a bad headache with ear pain.  I wanted to cry with him.  During my entire first several days of having this, I had a massive headache with really bad ear pressure.  It is what made me non-functional a lot of the days.  I thought it was the high fever (I was 104+ for over 12 hours and then on and off as the medicine wore off), but I realized it was from the cold that we had.  I gave Maddox some medicine and felt better.  He only threw up the couple times and was actually feeling much better before dad even left for work.  He stayed home from school Wednesday and had Thursday & Friday off.  I sent him to school on Monday because he had been feeling better for a couple days, but he was still in the 99's.

Hopefully Faye will be feeling better soon.  Spring is around the corner and hopefully we can kick all this sickness.

I Need to Get Up.

In her half delusional feverish sleep, Faye says:

"I'm sorry Mom, I have to get up.  I'm starting to pee in my underwear and on your bed so I have to get up and sit on the potty."

Fortunately, she did not pee a wink in her undies or on my bed.  She is the funniest kid ever!

And nothing seems to slow Maddox down...

102.3 has always been Faye's breaking point. She's generally happy and perky until she hits that temp.

A Conversation between Faye and Myself

Me: Are you going to take a nap or are you going to sit on my lap and play Starfall ABC's?
Faye: Sit on your lap and play starfall ABC's.
Me: Are you going to pee on my lap?
Faye: Noooooo, I'm going to pee in the potty! You pee in the potty.
Me: Yes, I do.
Faye: PokeBall's do not have butts.... So they don't pee in the potty.

I KNOW that she is "Normal".

With children, "Normal" has a million variations.  I know that my daughter, Faye is normal, but I ask myself a lot, "what on earth is wrong with this child?"  I love her dearly and would never change a single thing about her, but I'd pay you a hefty million to know what goes through this kids mind on a day-to-day basis.

We've been working on potty training since Wed, February 23rd.  It was not planned, Faye has been having rash issues because she refuses to let me change her diapers.  Wednesday evening, Faye came into the kitchen on her tiptoes, in a squatting walk, like she'd been riding horse all day and begged me to change her.  I put her in underwear for the evening, changed her bed linens to waterproof and she's been in undies ever since. 

We started out with your basic potty training stuff, about 2 accidents a day.  She stayed dry every single night.  She pooped in her undies once, she went in her little potty once without any guidance, she pooped in the big potty once with my encouragement. 

Then we started going down hill.  We've had 3 other poop accidents.  This is frustrating because she KNOWS when she has to go.  We've had a lot of resistance with sitting on any potty.  Fits and tantrums, begging to wear a diaper.  We have two options.  The first, she continues with potty training and successfully learns and practices this ability.  The second being she cries and begs for a diaper for days in a row and we decide to try again at another time.  If she isn't constantly throwing tantrums for a diaper, we stick with #1.

Things started to look up the other day, Monday, when her butt did not leave the potty.  She just sat there for half a day, peeing in her potty.  Then came Tuesday.  Accidents and resistance and she pee'd on me and told me that she wanted to do it again.  She also woke up at midnight with wet PJs.  The first time she had wet her bed with 6 previous nights being dry.  Wednesday was another light.  She was wearing clothes, pulling her pants down, peeing, pulling back up, etc.  She didn't wipe, but I was letting that go!  As long as she was taking care of everything else, I was ok with not wiping, for now.  She did really well all day.  Just one accident; she sat down to go potty but forgot to pull down her underwear.

Now there's today...  She wet the bed last night around 10-11pm, then I woke to a wet bed this morning.  She wet the bed twice in one night.  Her second night in a row.  The next time she had to go, she sat on her potty and proclaimed, with arms crossed across her chest "I'm going to pee in my pajamas!"  I told her that if she pee'd in her clothes that she would not be getting any princess fruit snacks or any other treats.  She said fine and pulled her pants down to go.  She did pee in her potty a couple times, but she threatened to pee ON hr brother and then later this afternoon, she, again, sat on her potty with arms crossed and said she was going to pee in her pajamas.  When I went to tell her that was not OK, she announced "I'm not listening to you!" and proceeded to pee in her clothing.  I sent her in the bathroom to take her clothes off, she went in but didn't take them off.  She told me she couldn't.  I asked her if she pooped in her underwear (it smelled like it) and she got angry with me and told me she did not.  Of course, she DID poop in there...

Now that she is all cleaned up and she is not getting any treats for the day, she claims she is going to go in her potty and NOT in her clothing.

I need to come up with a different incentive program for her.  A calendar progress report?  An accumulative treat jar?  I don't know.  She's perfectly capable of going in the potty and going without being told to or asked, however she is randomly resistant with ALL techniques.