10 Months!

My little love,



I cannot believe that we are only two months away from your first birthday!  You are growing so quickly, but you are turning into one of the most entertaining little boys ever.  You weigh 19.8 pounds and are in 9 and 12 month clothing. We are on our last set of size 2 diapers and you will be switching to size 3 as soon as those are finished up.  I can't believe how quickly you are growing.

We've been up to a lot during this month! You had your first official "illness."  It was extremely difficult to watch you feel so poorly and not be able to do much to help you get comfortable.  You are such a champ, and took your medicine without hardly any fight.

However, we need to discuss this situation with everything going into your mouth.  We've already had an incident with dog poop, and over the last month you have forced me to pull the car over quickly to fish something out of your mouth.  The first time I had to pull over I found a ball of string that came from who knows where, and the second time you ripped off your band-aid after an iron level test at the pediatrician. Watching you choke and gag on foreign object always scares me, but the car rides are definitely not the place to taste inedible objects.  It's got to stop.  Or you will be grounded.

We got to celebrate your first Easter this month! It's a tradition in our family that everyone gets a new pair of flip-flops for Easter, and you were certainly excited about yours.  In fact, it was the only thing in your basket you showed any interest in.

You looked so adorable in your seersucker suit for Easter.

As a really special treat, we gave you a Cheese Puff on Easter since you can't have candy yet.  You LOVED it, but you made quite a mess.

You somewhat enjoyed hunting for Easter eggs, but finding one was enough to satisfy your excitement.

                                          

Daddy took off a couple of days to spend with you this month too, and you LOVED spending some one on one time with him.  He took you to see Big Red at the mall, and you love him! We were so glad to see you weren't afraid of him.

You also discovered that you have one cabinet in the kitchen that Mommy will let you totally destroy.  The storage container cabinet will hold your interest for nearly half an hour some days.  You love pulling everything out, climbing inside and crawling around with your new finds.

We have been having some beautiful weather, and we spent one Sunday afternoon as a family outdoors.  You spent most of the afternoon on a blanket with me playing with some toys, but decided to venture away and help Daddy plant a few flowers.

       I'm not really sure why, but apparently you have already decided that you want to be a part of social crazes and start planking. 

                                                    

You are so animated, and I love that you have so many facial expressions.  One of your new favorites is the fish face.  You giggle and clap for yourself after you make it.

We have finally found a cup that you enjoy, and you've taken a new liking to using them on your own.  You look so big holding your own cup!

You LOVE books, love to be read to, love to look at the pictures, and love to turn the pages.  I love to watch your inquisitive mind start exploring through books.

You LOVE music.  It is so fun to watch you dance around.  We even caught you "conducting" once!

You are a clapping machine, and Daddy is already training you to be a sports fan.  You quickly picked up "Touchdown!!"


One of your FAVORITE playtime activities is total destruction, especially with blocks.  We build towers, and you have a blast leveling them.



Granny has been working on songs with you, and "If You're Happy and You Know It" is currently your favorite.


You are already realizing that physical fitness is important, and have started to workout.  Since you can't lift weights yet, your toy chest will have to do for now.



You have the sweetest laugh, and you immediately chime in with a giggle when everyone else laughs.  It's one of my favorite things you do.


You aren't standing independently yet, but you are definitely pulling up and using things to walk along with.  It's a good thing you have made such good friends with Fenway, because somehow he lets you use him as a push along toy.

You are so active and independent, but it is a rare moment that you will reject an opportunity to be loved on.  You still love to be held, you love to give hugs, and you love to lay your head on my shoulder.  You are such a snuggle buddy, and I love watching you love on your stuffed animals too.  I'm so glad to see that even though you are rough and tumble, you still have a soft heart.  You capture the hearts of total strangers with your sweet smile and friendly face.  I couldn't be more proud of you.

Love you always,

Mommy

An Update of Sorts

Hey all!  We've had such a crazy couple of weeks, I've had minimal time to update you all!

Ethan came down with an ear infection right around his 9 month birthday.  He was set for his well-baby appointment, so we addressed the issue when we went in.  I walked out with an antibiotic and ear-drops for pinkeye! I'm still not sold that he had pinkeye, because we were not cautious at all about making sure we didn't catch it, and no one else did.  It was a chaotic (and quite pitiful) few days while he felt so poorly.

No sooner had Ethan gotten over his ear infection did I come down with some type of major "yuck."  After multiple days and multiple protests, I finally headed to the doctor for an antibiotic.  I'm prone to strep throat and mono, so I routinely retreated to the lab for a strep test and blood work.

My strep test (shockingly) came back negative and I was diagnosed with a simple throat infection, given an antibiotic and sent on my way.  I was told that my blood results would take a day or so.

On my way to work the next morning, my doctor called me.  He quickly told me that my thyroid levels were extremely low, and I needed to have a scan done to solidify a diagnosis of hypothyroidism as soon as possible.  Um, excuse me?  I walk in with a cold, and I walk out with hypothyroidism?  Am I the only one confused here?

My sister has struggled with hypothyroidism for several years now, and has finally gotten her levels under control.  She experienced all the typical symptoms of sluggishness/fatigue, hair loss, dry skin, etc.  I have absolutely not a single symptom to indicate that hypothyroidism would be on the radar.  My lack of symptoms have left us dumbfounded, and thought the scan would surely show that the blood work was a fluke.

After a two day scan of the activity on my thyroid, my doctor confirmed that the function was extremely low, but that there was also an "irregular abnormality" showing up in the images that needed an ultrasound.  Again, I began to feel so incredibly confused because I've had ZERO symptoms of anything but a cold.  I begin toying with my love/hate relationship with Google and my search leads me to multiple sites of information on thyroid cancer.  Cue slight panic.  Cue countless rounds of post traumatic stress from my recent year of horror.  This seriously cannot be happening again.  Am I really going to be one of those people that "came in for a cold only to find out she had cancer?"

We did the ultrasound the same day that the results came back, and a nodule that is pressing right on my esophogus showed up on my left side.  Measurements were taken, showing it about 1.8 centimeters in size.  A biopsy is immediately the next words of recommendation from my primary care physician, but tells me that he wants me to see a specialist instead of himself.  So of course, my next step is to call my cardiologist.

I spoke with my nurse practitioner at Centennial Heart, who recommended, referred, and set an appointment with the best endocrinologist at Centennial Hospital for the following week (today).

She truly was as wonderful as we expected her to be.  She has discovered I have an autoimmune disease that is attacking my thyroid, which is making it have almost zero function. At this point, no known treatment for the autoimmune disease is available, so medicine to treat the thyroid function is our next step.  It is still a little baffling that I am experiencing zero symptoms, but I have also been told that I very well come out of a "fog" that I didn't even know I was in.  My doctor believes that I may not even be noticing that I feel poorly because I feel so much better than I did a year ago while I was experiencing so many issues with my heart.

We discussed the nodule, and she agreed that a biopsy was needed.  She feels extremely confident that the results will reveal a benign nodule due to the level of density inside the nodule and that there are no calcifications inside.  However, because it is so large and showing some blood flow through it, she felt it best to make sure there are no cancerous cells inside.  She did the biopsy herself right in the office in about 10 minutes.  Let me tell you, that was the strangest feeling ever.  The skin was numb, but the pressure of the large needle moving back and forth in my throat was enough to make me nauseous and lightheaded.  Thankfully she was quick to get her 4 samples and everything was complete.  We should have the official results in about two weeks, but we are all finally feeling a little positive about it.

Ethan turns 10 months old on Friday! I'll give you all a full update on his happenings then.