Soapbox

Generally, I like to keep my blog a happy place, free from inflammatory opinions, political commentary and other stuff that people might find offensive. But sometimes I come across something that I feel so strongly about that I have to get up on my soapbox and preach.

A week or so ago I heard about an outbreak of pertussis (whooping cough) in California. Pertussis is a bacterial disease that is characterized by violent coughing spells where the sick person makes a "whooping" sound as they struggle to breathe in during the coughing fit. The last numbers I saw were somewhere in the neighborhood of 900 known cases and 4 or 5 deaths of infants in CA. This is amazingly sad, especially since pertussis is a completely preventable disease. All you have to do is get your children vaccinated. That's all!

It's beyond me that some parents don't vaccinate their kids. I know there are celebrities that swear on their Botox that vaccinations cause Autism, but there is absolutely no basis in fact. Granted, there was ONE study done that found a correlation between the MMR vaccine and Autism, but that study was later discredited when the guy who published the study was found to have acted unethically while conducting the study. (see http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/02/02/lancet.retraction.autism/index.html) I have to say that if you are raising your kids based on what some former Playboy model says (she's NOT a doctor, people! She has NO clue what she's talking about!), then you should have your head examined. If you're going to risk the lives of your children, please do your own research.

Then there are the parents who worry about Guillain-Barre syndrome. This is an adverse reaction to flu vaccines where the person receiving the vaccine experiences paralysis, starting at the feet and working its way up the body over the course of a few hours to a few days. In the most severe cases (about 30% of the time), the person may stop breathing, and require a ventilator until the reaction subsides and they can breathe on their own again. Eighty percent of people with Guillain-Barre recover completely. Now, Guillain-Barre is an actual thing that can happen if you get a flu vaccine, but it only happens to one person in a million. To give you an idea of how this works out in real life, there are about 8 million people living in New York City, the largest city in the US. If every single person got his/her flu shot, that would mean 8 people would suffer some degree of Guillain-Barre syndrome and 3 of those would need a ventilator.

I know there is also a movement in the US toward organic, green, more natural living, reducing your carbon footprint and all those other buzzwords. I'm totally fine with free-range eggs and conflict-free diamonds, and whole-wheat socks. I would love to be able to afford food with a philosophy! But please don't take it so far that you become afraid or morally opposed to all modern science. I understand and respect the choices of people who are into herbal supplements. I know there are things that modern medicine misses and some prescription drugs can be more brutal on your system than natural alternatives, but vaccinations work and they save lives! Just because our ancestors died from whooping cough doesn't mean we have to!

To me, the choice seems clear. Yes, there are some weird, rare side effects and yes, we don't actually know what causes Autism (maybe it really is the MMR shot, who knows?), and yes, we can do a lot for our health by eating good food and getting plenty of sunshine. But from the information I have, the risks are minimal compared to the benefit of knowing that my kids won't be one of those 900 in California who got whooping cough. They also won't get polio or diphtheria or Hepatitis B.

I love my children so I choose to vaccinate them.

Just Because I Think It's Funny When My Kids Cry....

doesn't mean I'm an abusive parent, does it?

I love the funny noises he makes when he's attacking his pacifier.

Logan's First Smile

A couple of weeks ago, Logan smiled for the first time while he was conscious. He'd been doing the sleep-smiling thing almost since birth, but his first official on-purpose smile was two weeks ago, give or take. This is the story of that momentous smile.

I had been feeding Logan and was doing my best to coax a burp out of him. Somewhere during the middle of having his back slapped, Logan shifted positions so his face was not on the burp cloth slung over my shoulder. In fact, if he had been anyone else, Casey would have been very unhappy about where he was looking and would have broken his legs (Logan was looking right down my shirt). At that particular moment he released a juicy burp laced with about 2 tablespoons of spit-up. All the lovely nutrative spit-up went right down my shirt and soaked all the underwear and skin in there. The actual shirt remained dry. I yelled at the shock of having my unmentionables puked on and Casey came to relieve me of Logan while I went to change.

While I was in the bedroom, Casey told me that Logan was smiling. And it was a dazzling smile that would have blinded anyone who gazed upon him except he didn't have any teeth yet to dazzle and blind them with. But it proves that Logan has inherited his father's vicious sense of humor and that he enjoys a good practical joke at his mother's expense. Little stinker.....

I don't have a picture of Logan smiling his first smile because I was mopping throw-up off my bra, but here's a photo of him which is equally cute.

This kid is gonna have to beat the girls off with a stick, seriously!

You might be the mom of a newborn if....

1.) You can now sleep through a nuclear war in your bedroom, but if the baby so much as sniffles, you are out of bed and over to that bassinet before you're fully conscious.

2.) You find yourself rocking back and forth, even if you're not holding your baby.

3.) It is a GOOD day if you get a shower.

4.) It is a BETTER day if you shower and blow dry your hair.

5.) You find yourself alternately busier than you have ever been and bored out of your skull.

6.) Instead of being drudgery, trips to Wal-Mart or the grocery store now become exciting excursions. ANYTHING to get me out of this house!

7.) You spend half your life looking for that blasted pacifier.

8.) Have stopped showering alone. You KNOW that as soon as you turn on that water, baby is going to start screaming, so it's better if he screams where you can reach him and plug that pacifier back in. Wait, where is that blasted pacifier?!?

9.) The news-worthy events you post on facebook include how many hours of sleep you got the night before and how many poo-poos you've changed. 5 and 8, how 'bout you?

10.) You begin to realize all the sacrifices your own mother made to raise you.

The Perils of Having a Son

That's right folks, I have officially joined the Tinkle Club, an exclusive group of parents who have been peed on by their son during a diaper change. It took me three and a half weeks, but finally I have succeeded in having my pants soaked by baby urine. That's not to say that Logan hasn't "leaked" during diaper changes until now. That is definitely not the case. In fact, the day we got Logan home from the hospital, he soiled 6 outfits in a 24 hour period. Some of these got wet from him doing his business and missing the diaper completely, but some of them were from the diaper changes where we weren't fast enough. Luckily, each time his aim was off, saving me or Casey from having to change our clothes.

I actually thought I might be spared from joining the Tinkle Club, since I have been getting pretty good at changing diapers at lightning speed and have also discovered the usefulness of wipes as a shield. But I guess it was inevitable that I experience this particular joy of motherhood.

When Casey and I announced the impending birth of our son, we got several comments to the effect of, "Boys are different from girls, so be prepared." Be prepared for what exactly? Now I know. It's the golden arch* I have to be prepared for.



*For those who haven't read it in a while, this is a reference to To Kill A Mockingbird. So, I'm not being graphic, I'm just showing you how well-read I am :)

It All Started Two Weeks Ago.....

So I have had a pretty eventful two weeks. It all started last last last Friday when we welcomed Logan into our family a month earlier than we expected. I went in for a routine exam where my doctor decided that Logan wasn't doing a good enough job growing inside me, so he sent me downstairs to Labor and Delivery to wait around for 5 hours before he went in and got him. It makes no sense to me but apparently babies who are lazy bums about growing inside mom tend to be less lazy about it if they have to fend for themselves (sink or swim, kid. Time to cut the cord, I guess :) ). Anyway, one c-section later, I doubled the number of children I have and reduced my gross hours of nightly sleep by 75%.

Logan joined the family on April 23 at 5:21 pm local time clocking in at a whopping 4 lb 11 oz and 18 inches. He is giving Katherine a run for her money by threatening to overtake her as the cutest child on the planet. Once he fills out a bit and starts looking less like an undercooked roast, we'll see if Katherine retains her title as "Fairest in the Land." But for an undercooked roast, Logan is pretty stinkin' cute!

See!!

Katherine likes him pretty well too

But this is not all. Two weeks after Logan made his debut, Casey graduated from college for what I sincerely hope is the final time. He walked across the stage and received his diploma cover and hood for a PhD in Math (I know, what a smarty, huh?) that he will actually complete in a few months. Casey was a good sport and walked for me. If it had been up to him, Casey would have spent last Friday holed up in his office thinking mathy thoughts and completely ignoring the fact that the building next door was filled with his colleagues wearing funny hats and dresses and marching around to "Pomp and Circumstance" while their adoring families looked on. But luckily my husband thinks I'm cute and can't resist my eyelash-batting, so I got to be one of those adoring family members. Proof of the power of eyelash-batting can be found below:

This is Casey being hooded by a professor who is on his defense committee

A little explanation of this picture is required. Again, it's all about the eyelash-batting. I wanted a photo of Casey showing off his hood a la blushing bride showing off her train and he obliged, quite convincingly too. You can't even tell that there was much eye rolling mere nanoseconds before the shutter snapped. Seriously, if you are a wife and you want your husband to do something, just bat your eyes and smile. Works every time!

But this is still not all. Seriously, more momentous stuff happened to me in the last two weeks, but I will only add one more thing because this entry is already WAaaaayy too long. A couple of nights ago, I suffered my second stab wound by a steak knife. Oddly enough my sister was indirectly involved in both stabbings. The first time, I was eight and I got stabbed in the leg which required 50-ish stitches, but I won't bore you with the details. The second time was on Saturday.

I was minding my own business in the kitchen and grating cheese to put on top of a cassarole, when my sister walked by and accidentally (at least that's what she says....) knocked a steak knife off the counter. This knife landed on/in my foot causing severe lascerations requiring a trip to the couch and a couple of those dot bandaids and a kiss from Katherine. Fortunately there are no photos of my injuries. My foot is so mangled, it would make you sick, or more likely you wouldn't be able to find the scratches since they're pretty much healed. Still, I have to wonder about that sister of mine.....

Wonders of the Internet

185 people who have never met forming a virtual choir and sounding pretty good!