Something's Gotta' Give

(WARNING! This post not for the faint of heart.)

***Actually posted at 9:28am on January 18th. I'm not sure why the time stamp reads yesterday at 4:28pm. I was knee deep in diarrhea diapers and toddler vomit at that time. On with the post...***

If pediatricians offered frequent flier miles, my family would currently be on its way to Fiji, then to Europe, a quick stop in New York, and back home....FIRST CLASS! Yes, we've logged a lot of hours at the pediatrician lately, and something has GOT to give here.

It all started December 29th when Emma came down with a fever and bad cold which turned into an ear infection 7 days later. This occasion marked our first trip to the dr. from which we returned with a 10 day dose of Amoxicilin for otitis media (middle ear infection w/ fluid). Two days later, we were in the dr's office again with Nicky who was also given antibiotics for the same ear infection. Two days after this visit, and two somewhat sleepless nights on Nicky's (and my) part, we were BACK at the pediatrician only to find out that his ear infection was not responding to the antibiotic at all and that he would now require antibiotics by injection. Two pokes later and we were on our way home, only to return in two more days for the follow up shots. In the meantime, Emma was progressing nicely on her own course of antibiotics, her infection obviously responding to the therapy. Monday marked her last day of a 10 day dose. I administered her medicine and put her to bed at 7:30pm. At 12:45am, she awoke vomiting violently. This went on EVERY 20 minutes until 8:15am at which point it slowed to vomiting every 40 or 50 minutes. Finally, 7 loads of laundry and many unsuccessful attempts to hydrate later, she fell asleep at 9:45am dehydrated and exhausted. She awoke an hour and fifteen minutes later vomiting again. But at least at this point, the intervals between these episodes were getting longer, so I was becoming hopeful that we were out of the woods. I should've known better.

I feel compelled to mention here that while Emma is expelling every possible fluid from her body, Nicky is suffering from a mild but annoying case of diarrhea brought on by his antibiotics.

Anyway, at 2:15pm the day after the night-o'-exorcism-pea-soup-revisited we found ourselves at the pediatrican again. At this point, the nurses and receptionists know us and our children by first name, despite the fact that the practice services upwards of 500 patients or more. As predicted, Emma was diagnosed with moderate dehydration and acute gastroenteritis. Oh, and her ear hasn't completely cleared up yet. Nicky, who we brought in tow figuring, "What the hell, we're going anyway, we might as well bring him and get his ear checked and tell them about the diarrhea," was also diagnosed with acute gastroenteritis since his diarrhea had now worsened. Oh, and his ear is still infected too. Fabulous. The doctor, a very sweet woman with an incredibly warm and kind bedside manner, sent us on our way warning us that if Emma exhibited any more signs of dehydration or wasn't able to keep fluids down by 6pm, she would have to be admitted to the hospital for hydration therapy. Great.

So, home we went, praying for a wet diaper and her stomach to calm itself enough to keep down a couple of teaspoons of pedialyte. Over the next 3 hours, I fed her 1 teaspoon of fluids every 15 minutes by medicine dropper. She kept it all down until 6:15. But by then, she'd had one slightly wet diaper and had gone 3 straight hours without vomiting. So, according to the doctor's criteria, she wasn't hospital bound yet. Thank God.

In the meantime, Nicky managed to soil about 6 diapers and 3 pairs of pants in 3 hours. This, in and of itself, is of course no big deal. However, when coupled with a vomiting toddler who refuses to aim for the designated bowl for fear of having to see the contents of her stomach in front of her face, makes for a harrowing evening of figuring out who to attend to more immediately.

Anyway, the evening wore on, and we managed to get Nicky to sleep, and eventually Emma. Both slept through the night. Emma woke up looking less gray, and Nicky woke up looking more so. So, yesterday was Nicky's turn. Obviously, his diarrhea-due-to-antibiotic had turned into diarrhea-due-to-Emma. We were now changing diapers, 2 or 3 at a time, approximately 2 minutes after giving him a bottle. It went something like this: bottle, 2 minutes goes by, diaper change, followed by diaper change, followed by 2 or 3 more for the next 30 minutes. And throughout it all, he appeared listless, exhausted, and dehydrated. Great.

Meanwhile, Emma was slowly sipping away at her pedialyte cocktail on the sofa, watching television, and now I was SURE we were out of the woods with her. Shhaaa! Right! She went through the day, only vomiting twice, consuming a bit of banana, a half piece of toast, and about 20 oz. of fluids. Despite her limited intake, she looked 50% better. (see below)



I should also mention that Doug is working the 2nd shift at the moment which has him "on the job" from 5pm to 3am. The night that Emma got sick, he was up with me, doing laundry and helping all night. Neither of us slept. So, needless to say, the next day, he took the night off due to exhaustion. No one needs or wants a cop walking around with his loaded weapon, falling asleep while trying to keep peace. It was a safety call on his part, and a good one since both of us crashed after Emma fell asleep at 8pm. Anyway, the next night, when Emma appeared to be getting better, Doug decided he'd better go into work. So, he left the house at 4pm. That's when all hell broke loose yet again.

At 4:15 (as Murphy's law would have it), Nicky started having another bout of diarrhea. I managed to get some rice cereal in him which seemed to slow things down a bit, only to have them pick up again while he was IN THE BATHTUB! Yup. That was a lot fun. I'll spare you the fabulous details and just say that by 6:15 he was in bed with a little pedialyte in his belly, and on his way to sleep.

After scouring and bleaching the tub, Emma was then bathed and in her own bed at 7pm. Drained, I went into my room to fold one of the 15 loads of laundry I've done in the last 48 hours and settle into some bad reality tv. At 8:15, I was beckoned by the familiar coughing wretch that preceeds one of Emma's episodes. Here we go again. I walked into her room to find her projectile vomiting the day's fluids all over her newly changed bed. Being a pro at handling this now, I swooped her up, dropped her in the tub, stripped her down, washed her, tore off her sheets, remade her bed, and had her back in it smelling like a rose by 8:40pm. She calmed down, and appeared to go back to sleep. And I went to sanitize the tub yet again.

Ok. You know how the back of a shampoo bottle says, "Wash, rinse, repeat." Yeah. If Emma had instructions, they'd say, "Vomit, wash, repeat." At 9:15, I was in her room again, this time in time to catch the 8 or so oz. that came out of her. We vomited, washed, and repeated again at 10:15, 10:45 and 11:15pm until she finally fell asleep, stomach empty and exhausted.

This morning she awoke crying hysterically for water. Of course I gave it to her, but again, only one teaspoon at a time, every 15 minutes. And of course, she got more upset when I wouldn't let her guzzle the whole cup at once. Try explaining to your hysterical, dehydrated 2 year old that if she drinks a whole cup of liquid all at once after vomiting all night, that she will likely bring it all back up again moments later, making her dehydration even worse. So, this morning has been a lesson in moderation for both Emma and myself.

At the moment, she is sipping her cup and eating another half piece of bread. She begged me for both. And since she's kept her moderate fluids down since 6am, I figured what the hell. At this point, if she does vomit, at least the laundry is caught up, so I have something to clean it all up with.

Oh, and Nicky has only had one episode of diarrhea this morning. But if there's one thing I've learned in all of this it's not to even suggest that I might be out of the woods with either one of them. So, I'm just gonna' call it a fluke for now, and if it turns out that he's on the up and up, well, then, I got lucky.

One more thing. In the midst of all this, I started having diarrhea as well. At least I'm not vomiting...yet. Motherhood. No job like it on earth. And no "sick days" for mommy.

When I worked with animals at the zoo, people used to ask me all the time if I got pooped on and which animal produced the most foul substance. Let me tell you, NOTHING I cleaned or saw at the zoo even comes close to what I've dealt with in the last 72 hours. I'll take explosive monitor lizard poop over kid vomit or diarrhea any day.

Anyway, if you haven't heard from me in the last few days, or seen a post in the last 2 weeks, now you know why. I'll be back in communicado as soon as the viruses around here die off. Until then, buy stock in whatever companies make Purex laundry detergent, Pedialyte, and Huggies diapers. We've gone through enough of each in the last few days to single-handedly keep them in business.

Working World Nostalgia

So I used to have this AMAZING job! I got to spend my days teaching kids and adults all about the natural world using one of the greatest zoos in existence as my resource. I took them on tours through gorilla exhibits, simulated rainforests, snow leopard country, Siberian tiger habitat, etc.etc.etc. I got to go behind the scenes and see animals up close and personal, and was often treated to a viewing of feedings and enrichment sessions. And to top it all off, part of my job description was to be trained on the proper handling and use of a collection of exotic animals for education purposes. These ranged anywhere from birds of prey to snakes to alligators to kinkajous to porcupines, etc.etc.etc. Oh, and get this! They paid me to read books I would read anyway and surf the net doing research on topics I loved. It combined most of my passions: teaching, animals, ecology, psychology, and anthropology to name just a few. It didn't pay so well (teacher's salary), but it was a GREAT JOB! And when you're single with no kids, you find ways to live a little leaner for the sake of passion and happiness. Besides, when you feel like you're making such an enormous contribution to and impact on the world everyday like I did, money was just somethin' you needed to keep the heat on. Anyway, I find myself nostalgic for my old job these days, more than ever. I'm not really sure why. I stopped working 9 days before the birth of my daughter who is now 2years and 4 months old. So you'd think I'd have been hit with the nostalgia bug awhile ago. But I suppose the back to back pregnancies, sleep deprivation, MOUND of dirty diapers, endless breastfeeding and bottles, not to mention the move to another region of the country, has kept me a little distracted...until now.

Don't get me wrong, raising kids is rewarding in its own way, and quite a bit like my old job; dealing with animals, teaching, psychology, etc. But, it's just not the same. I'm starting to wonder if I'm one of those stay-at-home-mommies who's not really at stay-at-home-mommy. I might be more of a part-time-stay-with-the-kids-part-time-stay-at-the-office kind of person. Problem is, zoo jobs don't pay so well, and when there are kids involved, well....the stakes are a bit higher these days. Anyway, here's a glimpse at my former life. You'll actually see some "before" and "after" photos here of me skinny, then REALLY, REALLY pregnant. Check out the face! Sheesh!



That's me holding a juvenile American Alligator for the Girls for Planet Earth educational summit at the Bronx Zoo. (newly engaged and obviously not yet pregnant making this a "before" photo)



A mere year later and I am now holding an American kestrel (bird of prey) and am NOTICABLY pregnant (the "after" photo), 8.5 months to be exact. My supervisors were actually fearful that I'd go into labor right there. MAN...did you ever see anyone get so pregnant in the face!?!



Finally, another "before" photo. This is Jungle World at the Bronx Zoo, my favorite exhibit. It is an encolsed replica of an Asian rainforest and contains a variety of exotic and amazing animals. In this picture, I'm the one in the pink shirt way off to the left, looking noticably older than the teens that surround me, and we're looking up at fruit bats, a blood python, and white cheeked gibbons hanging in the trees above us. I'm telling you, it was an AWESOME job! How many people get paid to go hang out with gibbons and fruit bats? Then again, my current "job" sometimes feels that way. (wink)

The Eastern Infirmary

So far, both kids are on antibiotics for ear infections, I have been sick for almost 14 days secreting green mucus with ear and sinus pain (and should probably resign myself to seeing the doctor at this point), and Doug has been sick for 4.

Moral of the story: stay away from us for the time being.

Apparently there is some RIDICULOUSLY strong strain of cold virus ciruclating around the Eastern United States. I've spoken to friends from New York all the way down to Florida who describe the same exact symptoms as my kids and I have experienced. And the stupid virus just HANGS ON! As I said, both kids are now on antibiotics for secondary ear infections due to the volume of mucus that has decided to take up residence in their poor little eustacian tubes. And Doug and I are popping the cold medicine like it's going out of style. I also happen to know that my girlfriend Karen's daughter Marcie was sick with the same thing and suffered from a double ear infection herself. And of course she got it....when she came to North Carolina! So...stay away....stay away from the entire East coast if you can. Everyone I know is either suffering or on antibiotics. Blech.

Bonobos Among Other Things

This post is just for Jason.

The bonobo, or more commonly known as the pygmy chimpanzee, is one of the five great apes (gorillas, orangutans, chimpanzees, gibbons, and bonobos) that inhabit the natural world. Being apes, they differ from monkeys in two major ways. First, they lack an external tail. I specify, "external," because anyone that has broken their tailbone knows that at the end of our spine exists a vestigial bone piece known as the cocyx. This bone represents what is left of a tail after millions of years of evolution deemed that it was unnecessary for us as upright, bipedal animals. Apes also share this morphological characteristic. Monkeys, on the other hand, have an external and obvious tail, with the exception of a particular species of baboon. Second, apes, in general, are much larger than monkeys. Again, as with anything in science, there is one exception to this rule, and that is the gibbon. Gibbons tend to be on the smaller side, while their tail-bearing baboon relatives often outweigh them.

One could add a third distinction here, but truthfully, it is much more debatable than the others. This of course is intelligence. Having the largest brain to spine ratio, apes have developed complicated mental structures that allow them to perform such remarkable tasks as using tools and establishing rudimentary cultures. In particular, the bonobo and its larger relative the chimpanzee are well-known for their use of twigs to retrieve termites from the otherwise impenetrable mounds that they inhabit.

The most notable distinction about bonobos however is their DNA, particularly the amount of it that is found to be similar to our own. Recent studies suggest that the bonobo shares as much as 99.4% of the DNA that our own species does. This makes the bonobo more related to our species than to gorillas, orangutans, or gibbons.

There are a number of remarkable facts to be learned about this amazing animal, but I'll just leave you to google them if you'd like to learn more. I would like to leave you with this thought however. The bonobo, like a number of other species on this planet, lives in one particular location (in this case, the Congo rainforest). It's existence is currently classified as endangered, threatened by both habitat loss and the bushmeat trade (increasing lately due to the civil unrest and presence of heavily armed militia in the forests). Because it inhabits a specific habitat, once that habitat is gone, the bonobo (our closest living animal relative) will be lost forever as well. Just something to think about.

And Jas....tag, you're it. (wink)

Bearek the Apprentice

So I NEVER watch the Apprentice as I find Donald Trump generally revolting. And there really wasn't anything that could ever get me to watch his ridiculous tv show....until now. You see, one of my best friends from college is ON THE SHOW! Yep. Check him out. Derek Arteta.
GO DEREK! and GO BRUINS!

Sound of Silence

Imagine spending an entire day taking care of a 2 year old toddler, who's into everything, and a 10 month old bulldozer baby boy, both with colds which make them more irritable than usual, while you're sick yourself with the worst cold you've had in years. Then imagine doing it with NO voice. I mean NO VOICE WHATSOEVER. The coughing fits that kept me up several nights ago have also had an unforseen side effect. They have left my larynx so sore and swollen that yesterday I woke up and could speak no more audibly than a whisper. Today was a little better until about 5 pm when I lost it again. Nevertheless, try commanding the attention of your excitable and enthusiastically curious 2 year old, who is in the family room plotting to lock her 10 month old brother in the adjacent powder room, while you've been fixing breakfast for everyone in the kitchen. A little side note here, the door knob covers that we purchased to keep her diabolical hands from executing her devious plans to entrap her brother are about as effective as the "baby gate" that she figured out how to open and close in 2 days. But I digress. Needless to say, that particular episode elicited a lot of sharp clapping on my part to get her attention. She responded by exclaiming, "Yeah mommy! Clap, clap, clap!" while trotting around in triumph. That was effective.

Anyway, I have been literally speechless off and on for the past two days. And upon waking yesterday with nothing but a breathy whisper to my voice, I was terrified at the thought of having to face Emma for the day, sure that she would take advantage of the situation and run all over me and my imposed silence. But the kid NEVER ceases to surprise me. When she creeped into my room in the morning asking for her usual milk and vitamins, I pulled her into bed and whispered that mommy wasn't feeling well and that I couldn't talk today. I told her that I needed her to listen to mommy especially well today, and that she had to try and be patient with me (not that she has any idea what patience is, but one can hope). And you know, the kid LISTENED! She was basically a DREAM child for the rest of the day. She even sympathetically whispered with me at times (either that, or more likely, she just liked the game that it grew into). But my point here is that she surprised the hell out of me. This is a child that I regularly have to yell out her name in a loud voice to get her attention over whatever gibberish song or thought she's currently spouting at the top of her lungs. Yesterday and today...not so. I guess because she was listening extra attentively for the whispered call of mommy, she was on point all day. I swear, I could've whispered from 4 rooms away, and I think she would've gleefully come trotting in saying, "Yes mommy?" So, I have this new theory.

I yell to get her attention too much. I'm too loud with her and Nicky. And I don't mean that I yell at them for doing something that they shouldn't, although admittedly I do yell at them every so often despite my best efforts to control my temper (hey, I'm working on it - lately that's included self-imposed time-outs to prevent the yelling from happening at all). But rather, when we are happily going through our day, and the two of them are making a ruckous in the play room that resounds like a jack hammer in my head, I am prone to raising my voice when calling for their attention, in an attempt to be heard over the din of bongos, musical books, singing dump trucks, and talking Elmos. My experience with enforced silence however tells me otherwise. I don't need to raise my voice over their toys and toddler noises. They apparently are just as tuned into me as I to them. And sometimes the most commanding thing to be said need only be as loud as a whisper. So, I'm vowing to quiet down. Their world is already so full of noises and stimulation and action, etc. The last thing they need is more noise coming from someone with whom they should be able to find a quiet, comfortable, peaceful place to rest their weary heads.

Here are some photos of our days learning to appreciate the sound of silence....
Shhhh. and enjoy.


Emma "lounging" (if that's what you would call it) as she watches a few mintues of her favorite DVD, "Annie." (This is particularly unusual since she's usually in the middle of the family room singing along and dancing around for the duration of the movie.)


The kiddos dining together at their playroom table and chairs. This was Nicky's first time eating at the table without the assist of his usual strapped down booster seat.


We'll just caption this with, "Hey ma! I can yell and you can't! Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah!" Actually, Nicky is usually a pretty loud baby (much louder than Emma was). And I can't help but wonder if he's a product of his environment since my own volume has increased during the course of his 10 months in direct proportion to Emma's increasing age.


Finally, this is what I got after asking Emma to, "smile for the camera and say, 'Cheese.'"

New World for the New Year

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm not one to make New Year's resolutions. To be quite honest, I've always found them silly. Why does the turning of the New Year necessitate false promises (to be better people, or lose weight, or save money, etc., etc.)that most of us won't or can't keep anyway. I mean, why is improving oneself or one's relationships tied to the passage of time? Why wouldn't you try to be a better person in the middle of June, or September? And why not watch your weight earlier than Dec. 31st, BEFORE you've binged on egg nog, cookies and pumpkin pie? For that matter, why not resolve to save money BEFORE Christmas and perhaps it wouldn't be quite the commercialized circus that it's become. Call me cynical, or perhaps it's hopeful depending on how you look at it, but I don't see the point of waiting until the end of the year to reflect on your life and resolve to make it better. In my mind, that's something that should be done every day. Whether or not we live up to it is another thing.

Anyway, I bring up resolutions because I think I've stumbled on to one that I highly recommend to those of you searching for something noble to latch on to for the New Year. It's something I resolved to do years ago, and has been an ongoing ambition ever since; to reduce my ecological footprint. "What's an ecological footprint?" you ask. Well, check out Ecological Footprint and you'll see what it's all about. But for those of you that don't want to bother clicking, here's the skinny. According to the website, "This Ecological Footprint Quiz estimates how much productive land and water you need to support what you use and what you discard. After answering 15 easy questions you'll be able to compare your Ecological Footprint to what other people use and to what is available on this planet." Basically, your ecological footprint boils down to how much of the planet is required to support the natural resources you consume and discard, and then estimates the number of earths required to maintain your lifestyle if everyone on the planet lived as you do. The results can be quite surprising!

Ok, now I know some of you are thinking, "Enough with the tree-hugging, veggie-burger-eating, save-the-whales, Al-Gore-movie-toting hippy thoughts." I know the quiz and my resolution sound like yet another want-to-be environmentalist's promise to do their part, but trust me, it's more sincere than that. For the past several years, I have made a conscious effort to reduce my level of consumption in the interest of the planet's health. My family lives in a modest home, we only own one economy sized, gas efficient, low emissions car, we use public transportation (at least in NY - SC leaves something to be desired in that regard) or walk to reduce the use of said car, we limit our consumption of meat, specifically red meat (cows are raised in pastures that have been clear-cut in the heart of rainforests across the globe, not to mention the destruction of the American prairie habitat), we recycle, we reuse, and we try in every way to reduce our rubbish output (with the guilt-ridden exception of disposable diapers which rank highest in percentage of single items occupying American landfills). Granted, some of these choices are also financially motivated as we are a one income family. However, even when my husband and I had no children and were both working, we still maintained an ecologically conscientious lifestyle, and perhaps even more so than we are able to now that we do have children. Yet, even with all the small things we do that add up to a lot, we still had a much more significant "footprint" than I'd like. According to my results, if everyone on the planet lived as we do (1 car, energy efficient appliances, public transport/walking, limited meat consumption, recycling everything we can, reducing waste, reusing products as much as possible, modest home, etc.) we would still need just under 3!!! earths to support the world's population. That scares me.

It brings up a whole host of thoughts concerning the American lifestyle and our need to consume not just the world's natural resources, but everything else we can get our hands on as well. We're like junkies heading out in our over-sized, gas-guzzling SUV's to the Wal-Mart or Target (or as I like to call it, "the red dot boutique," or pronounced with a French accent "Tarjjay") to get our latest fix. It begs the question, "Do we really NEED all of this stuff?" And do we have to get it in the largest, most fuel inefficient vehicle we can find loaded with seat warmers and DVD's and a whole host of other stuff? Don't get me wrong. I think that stuff is cool too. I like the idea of going out to my car in the cold morning and getting a warm Starbuck's mocha to go with my equally warm tush. And indulging in some of life's eccentricities IN MODERATION is fine I'm sure. But I just can't help but wonder if the American interpretation of the word, "need," and how we act on it isn't just the least bit responsible for the current planetary condition.

As animal residents on this planet, and yes, we are ANIMALS by definition despite our arrogant suppostion to the contrary, we NEED only 4 things: food, water, shelter, and a little bit of space (enough to sustain our basic needs). The rest of the animal kingdom gets that (as did many indigenous people for that matter); living harmoniously with the world, taking only what is necessary to survive. Perhaps if we thought of ourselves more as guests of this planet rather than rulers hell-bent on controlling it, we'd treat the world and its natural inhabitants with a little more respect. Think about it, when you're a guest in someone's home, you don't go in and eat up all their food, throw your scraps all over the floor, fill the place up with noxious gas, and then leave. As guests of this planet, perhaps we should behave a little more graciously, wiping our feet at the door as we enter and leave, being sure to leave little to no "footprint" behind.