Pulled ALL of my hair out

Guess this is what happends when you are soooo stressed out.

The 28th came and went

The 28th finally came. We went to see the neurosurgeon and now it is gone. We now wait for our next date to come - May 8th. Not much new was told to us today. They did confirm that surgery will be needed for both kids and that by surprise, Cooper's is actually worse than Carson. Cooper's brain is actually starting to get a bit squeezed and so there is fluid in places there shouldn't be and not enough in places there should be. Both kids will be having MRI's on May 8th because of that. Then, on May 18th we will be visiting with Dr. Jensen, the other half of the surgical team - Craniofacial (plastic surgery). So, no surgery date is set yet, it will depend on what the MRI's show.
Until next time.....

56 hours and counting

Until the much anticipated trip to Milwaukee to see the neurosurgeon. It seems like it has been months since we made this appointment! I can't even begin to tell you how anxious I am. I have been so stress out about the whole ordeal that I have blow my diet totally out of the water - gaining 6 of the 15 lbs back. It is true.....I am an emotional eatter. But, who can blame me. (For you that don't blame the stress....keep your comments to yourself.) If anyone is truely interested in our situation, I invite you to cruz' through this message board - cappkids.org - It stands for Craniosynostosis And Positional Plagiocephaly Support. I have learned a lot from this message board. There seems to be a few people from our area who are going through the same thing and are seeing the same doctors. I know not everyones situations are the same but it's nice to aleast have some sort of a clue.
I am attaching 2 pics I just took of Cooper and Carson's heads. They both have partial sagittal fusions going on, but 2 totally different shapes.

Carson's is "bossing" in the back and starting to "boss" in the front. Her soft spot is also starting to get pushed up. Looks like a lump on the top of her head. Coopers is long and narrow in the back and wide at the front. No "bossing" going on. Go figure. Like I said before.....Friday can't
here soon enough. I need to know what's truely gone on.

Until Friday......have a great Wed and Thursday!

Oh Crap, I've been tagged.

Thanks Molly for tagging me! Not much I can do about it now, so if I must.......

5 things that are strange about me. HUM....

1. I had a blue little baby blanket that had the satin edging on it and I just finally gave it up and gave it to Keegan when he was born! Matt was very glad to see it go!

2. I love blankets with the satin eadging on it. When I am using it, I have to have a corner and I stick 1 finger inside of it. Weird? I know.

3. I can't stand it when kids bite on their towels.......it makes my skin crawl!

4. I can't stand zipping up zippers. The vibration it makes drives me crazy!!!

and finally.....
5. I can not stand to sleep with socks on!


Ok Becky....I am tagging you. Let's hear all about it!

Say Cheese!

Hope everyone had a great Easter! We had a great, but long and semi stressful Easter weekend. Saturday, we had a great family outing at our local class A minor leage baseball team. The Wisconsin Timber Rattlers are the farm team for the Seattle Mariners. The games are a lot of fun and very family oriented. Last year Matt had won a suite that we could use for the 2006 season and we had decided to use it. The kids love it. We even got a photo opportunity with "Fang". Carson was also very intregued.
Then, after the "base game", as Riley and Keegan call it, we had a pizza party back at our house. Our friends from Indiana were there and Matt's family from Chicago were also there. It was nice catching up with everyone.
Sunday morning, Carson and Cooper were baptised at Easter mass. Let me tell you, we had a ton of people. Cooper had his God parents, Kerri Olsen and Tom Robinson, Carson had her God Parents - Kevin and Molly Ray, plus Erin and Brian Benes were honorary for both kids. Plus our family and close friends and everybodys kids. We had a crew!
After mass we all come back to our house for a Easter / baptism feast. Let me tell you, there was no point counting that weekend.
It was wild, and fun! We had a great time.
Now it's back to reality. There is laundry to be done, a house to be cleaned and lets not forget the stress and anticipation that is brewing around here awiting the kids NS appointment on the 28th.
I need to be bluntly honest with you. It is all starting to take it's toll on me. I have been having weird vision issues, headaches, and pain in the base of my head/neck area. I am trying so hard not to let it get to me or bug me but how is that possible? I am streched to the max. Maybe now that the baptism is done, I won't have to worry about so much at once. Hopefully I will be able to find time to myself and relax! Yah Right, maybe in my next life.

Tish....This is the purse Linda sent me. Isn't it great?

Until next time America.

Are you STILL there God?!?!?

...Ok, I have had about enough of all of this CRAP that you are putting us through! I know it is Easter and it's a big day for you, but geez louis....Give US a break man! All I can do is sit and wonder if I caused this all be having them early?!?!?! I can't imagine what else it would be.
Do I not go to church enough? Is it because I yell at my kids on the days I have totally lost it?
What???? What did I do to deserve all of this? Please tell me!!!!

Now we sit and think....if they need to have surgery, do we do them together? One at a time? Hire a nanny? Is it covered by our insurance????? Move to Milwaukee???

Please answer me!!!!!!!!!!

Are you there God....

..no, it's not Margaret, it's Cindy. Listen up pal, we need to chat, not about my period, about Cooper, but not until tomorrow though. I need to see what you are going to do for Cooper first. He has his CT scan tomorrow morning at 7:15 am....you better be there! And, if you give this family one more thing to stress over, I'm going to $#%^*$%^&$*%#$, OK? Do not tell us that Cooper's head is also starting to fuse.
This chat is to be continued.........

Consumed by desire

This.Is.My.Life. - In a nutshell. Oldest to youngest. I know I ALWAYS write about these 4 little people, but This.Is.My.Life.
What did I do? Who was I? Before these 4 little people came about?
I could write about the cat that Matt and I used to have . Parker. He was an orange and white tabby. Fat Cat. If he was hungry and you didn't feed him exactly when he wanted to eat, he would play dare devil kitty and chew through our electrical cords. So my options were: feed the damn cat, or lose all our expensive electronics and have a fried kitty. Bless his little heart....He is now looking down upon us from up above.

I could write about the dog we used to have. Silly me. NEVER get a lab puppy when your twins are only 10 months old. What in the hell was I thinking. Anyways..... Bentley. Our attention seeking puppy. Everyone commented on how calm this dog was for being a puppy. Which, he was. Until you placed him in a crate. Not a good thing usless you want your house full of dog spit....from barking so much! He ate our couch, our phone, the kids toys.......you name it he did it. Until one day, Bentley went on a permanent vacation....as my kids know it. He found a nice couple who were not able to have children of their own and were looking for a "baby". They made a great 3 -some. I hear he is doing well and loves his new home.

So, that brings me right back to the 4 little people in the picture above. I would much rather write about them then anything else. If you get sick of hearing about them then tough because
This. Is. My. Life.

~ It's a small world ~

Ok, first..I have been asked to to blog again. If I was smart.....I wouldn't have place this picture of Cooper's hernia in the begining of the blog. Now everytime someone checks to see if I have blogged, you see Cooper's "inside's". Sorry about that. :)
Ok, on to business.
About 3 yrs ago I was reconnect with my childhood friend Becky. She grew up across the street from us. My family moved off of Ridge lane when I was in 8th grade and we sort of lost touch . We saw each other in high school, but didn't converse much. She was a year old than me and we hung out with different people. Once we were both out of school, my mom or I would occasionally run into her mom and we would learn bits and pieces of what she was up too. About 3 yrs ago, I had ran into her mom at Kohl's department store. I had just given birth to Riley and Keegan. Her mom had told me that she was pregnant with her first and was living in Conn. and that she was married and had 2 step children. It was wonderful to hear that she was doing well. About a month or so after seeing her mom, I got an email from Becky and she had found me on classmates.com. It was so good to hear from her. Some time later, after a few emails, I had let her know that the kids and I were going ot be out in New Jersey at my grandmother's and that if it would work, it would be great to get together. So, while we were in Jersey, she and her 2 step children and her new little boy Josh came to visit. It was great. We had a good time catching up. It's funny how time flies by and so much happends.....when you look back from when we were in grade school. It makes me smile. We had such a good time growing up together. I remember when we used to dance in our family room to Michael Jackson's "beat it" and we used to make up our own dances.....laughing. Oh how much fun we had.
She comes home ever so often and we met up. I just found out last time she was here that I live almost directly across the street from her cousin, who we also hung out with during Jr high.
It truely is a small world. Becky is looking into starting her own blog as she also now has a toddler and a baby. Can't wait to read Becky!!! Good Luck! Thanks for tracking me down on Classmates..it's be great catching up!

One down, two to go.

Well, It has been an eventful week here at our house. Cooper had his hernia surgery a week early. It was supposed to be done on the 7th, but the the doctor called and asked if we wouldn't mind having it a week early. So, finally, it's over. Cooper was a champ. He did terrific. The surgery lasted about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Not bad. They made an incesion under his belly button and scoped both his left and right groin areas. They only found the hernia on the left. They then made about an 1 1/2 incesion and repaired the left side. (the picture isn't the great but if you look up at the right corner of the picture you can see a line that goes down about 1/2 inch...that's the hernia that needed to be sewn shut.)Get this, they gave him an epidural. I thought that was pretty funny. I thought they were only used on pregnant women. Who knew?
Anyways....I wish I had a camera when he can rolling out of the recovery room. He was laughing and flirting with the nurses...... It was cute. I am sure he was feeling pretty good at that point.
Except.....that all changed a few hours later. His pain meds must have worn off because he was a hurting little boy. With being so small they could only give him tylenol. I felt so bad for him. Needless to say, neither of us got much sleep that night. He was examined the next morning and we were free to go home.

Today, Carson had her head messured again. Let me back up a second. Not sure If I have blogged about this, but Carson has been dealing with some "head size" issues for a couple of weeks. Her head has actually been growing to fast and in a "toaster" shape. So, our doctor has been watching her closely. Carson had a CT scan while she was in the NICU to make sure things were growing well and that the bones hadn't prematurely started to fuse. Everything looked great at that point. Except...her head has continued to grow funny and fast. She had a second CT scan about 2 weeks ago and they found that there was a small area behind her soft spot that has started to fuse together...which if it countinues to fuse it could start squeezing her little brain...NOT GOOD.
So, today....Carson had a 3rd measurement done and a 3rd CT scan. At 4.5 months old her head size is off the growth chart, which makes us a little nervous. In 2 weeks her head grew 1 1/2 cm.
So, she has an appointment with the neurosurgeon at Children's in Milwaukee on the 28th. She now needs to have x-rays done so they can see how bad the fusing is. They call this head growth / fusing thing "Craniosynostosis". WARNING....if you are like me and want to look this up...I must warn you that some of the pictures you may come across are very graphic. Just to warn you. I was no way ready for what I saw. Expecially the after surgery ones. She has also been having some issues with her left eye wondering. They said if she wasn't a preemie there would be nothing to worry about but since she was she needs to see the ped ophthalmologist.

So, it's our next hurdle that God has given us. Hopefully we will be strong enough for this.

Riley also has an appointment with the neurologist on the 24 th and then the neurosurgeon that same day with Carson for her A. Chiari Malformation. I'm sure it was be just a joyous day!
Oh yah....It was also weigh in day. I must be honest with you. This week was TERRIBLE! With the stress of Cooper's surgery and not being able to work out all week because the school was out for spring break....I crashed and burned big time. But, there must have been someone watching from above because when I stepped on the scale this morning it said I had lost 1 pound! I could not believe my eyes. So, I am now down 12 lbs!! Hopefully this week will be much better!