Gardening and mosquitos

It's been almost 3 weeks now since the surgery and I am feeling pretty much back to my normal self again which has been nice. The only restriction I have is that I cannot work out for 6 weeks (ugh!), so I have had to content myself with staying home and doing light work around the house. Since the weather has been pretty nice, this restriction hasn't been a particularly unwelcome one. I taken a lot of pleasure in plotting out my garden for the back of the house, plus maintaining the one in the front. My knock out roses really took off this year, I am going to have to trim them back soon!!

The one downside to working outside at this time of year has been the mosquitos. The exceptionally wet August and September months made for the perfect conditions for the mosquitos to breed and multiply so now there are just way too many.  Every time we go outside we get a couple bites from them as souvenirs. The little buggers got Kira pretty good under her eye a week ago, it was pretty swollen!

Like father like daughter?

Ok, so here is the back of the house. I prepped everything, edged and turned over the soil in preparation for the trip to the nursery last saturday. Mom graciously agreed to go with me to help me with decisions. It just so happened the particular nursery we went to had all the trees and shrubs on 50% off so that was a nice bonus!

Everything in the back will be flowering, on the left is japonica, then mountain laurel, then hydrangea

 Japonica and mountain laurel bushes do well in shade so these were a no brainer for the back since this part of the house doesn't get sun.

 Here's a better view of the hydrangea and on the corner I put winter berry-this has red berries during the winter months and red flowers in its blooming season.

And here it is all mulched and nice looking, love it! Can't wait to see them all blooming!!

 Oh, and around the winter berry, I planted Phlox-it is a perennial and does well in the sun so it should be nice and happy in this spot.

 Done! Now to make sure to keep them well watered into late November in order to make sure they get well established in their new home. I had no idea how much I loved digging in the dirt until I had my own place in which to do it!

 Some gratuitous shots of Kira, on this occasion, she decided she wanted me to cover her up with her blanket out in the kitchen

Surgery update

Surgery is officially in the past! So now that I am home and the pain is subsiding, I wanted to give you all a rundown of what happened yesterday...

Woke up at 5:30AM, before my alarm, feeling a little anxious. Prayed, then laid in bed until Kira got up. Wanted to make myself some coffee and fix breakfast but resisted as per doctors orders of not eating or drinking anything after 12 midnight the night before.

9AM Made a quick run to the the grocery store

11:00AM Tom called to inform me he was on his way home (earlier than I expected!).  My Mother-in law arrived shortly after at 11:30 to drive me over to the surgery center.

12 noon Arrived at surgery center, signed a bunch of papers and waited to be called back. At 12:30 I got called into the back and they took a urine sample (to make sure I wasn't pregnant), then took basic measurements. I got my blood pressure checked, pulse rate which was about 56 resting rate (I was surprised by this one!), then I had to change into the lovely hospital gown, socks with grips on the bottom and hairnet. Then the nurse let me know she would be putting in the IV. She had to hit my hand quite a few times to get the veins to pop up since I was so dehydrated. The next part was pretty painful b/c the one vein on my hand isn't perfectly straight, she had to push the needle in and then follow the vein. The had the blood pressure cuff on me and I could see my blood pressure shoot up to 148/? which is high for me. Once she taped it down though I could breathe easier.

1PM They were ready for me! My original surgery time was 2pm but they processed me quickly and everyone was there and ready so they took me earlier than I expected. I walked down the long hall, with one of the nurses holding my IV bag, then peed one last time so I could forgo having a catheter and  walked into the surgery room. I laid down on the table and one of the last thing I remember was someone grabbing my right arm to put the blood pressure cuff on, my left arm had the IV and my right and left legs were being strapped into stirrups. I felt scared but one of the first drugs I got when I laid on the table was a tranquilizer so I soon faded and didn't remember anything else.

4:20PM woke up groggy. I was under anesthesia for around about 2 1/2 hours, a long time but the Doctor working on me was supposedly very particular and careful. Knowing my history, He did not try to rush through the procedure but took his time. There was also a second doctor working with him who performed the laproscopy so I have two puncture wounds through my belly button and also on my bikini line. The laproscopy was an extra precaution on their part so as not to damage anything and it allowed another angle through which to see the operation. There was also a camera they fished inside the uterus. This camera allowed the Doctor to see the scars clearly and only cut them away while leaving the healthy tissue untouched. Once the doctor cut off the scar tissue covering the cervix, he carefully worked to rid my uterus of all the built up lining that hadn't been able to escape. While he was moving the camera around he saw a small spot of endometriosis in my uterus but he let Tom know that wouldn't affect my fertility since it wasn't covering my fallopian tubes. Finally they also performed another dye test to make sure my tubes and uterus were open as well as an ultrasound.

I got out of there and my MIL starting driving me home, I had about 3 sips of coffee and promptly threw up. But I felt so much better once I threw up so I was thankful for that actually.

As far as pain goes, I have none except for my belly which is sore and tender from the laproscopy since they punched through muscle and also filled it with gas to get a better view of the uterus. Another nice thing is the Doctor decided not to insert the pediatric catheter into my uterus because it wasn't sitting right. The catheter was supposed to be inserted to prevent the walls of my ueterus from scabbing and collapsing back onto each other but he decided ultimately not to do it b/c it wasn't sitting right. Hopefully it was the right decision, I wouldn't want to go through another surgery b/c it didn't heal right but he is the expert so I will trust him. I will be meeting with  him for a followup in two weeks. So I am just taking Estrogen to help the lining of the uterus build back up and an antibiotic to ward off infection.

Tom is home with me today, helping with Kira as I am supposed to take it easy for about 2 weeks. I can't pick Kira up for a little while and I can't workout for two weeks. Once I meet with the doctor I will hopefully get more details on how the surgery went. I will keep you posted! Thank you for your prayers and concern!

Frequency of Doctor visits

Due to the very personal nature of this subject I am about to share, I have been debating about the pros and cons of posting this on my blog for a while now. As you can see, I decided to dedicate a post to it, since this blog is shared with friends and family and serves as a journal of sorts. I also determined that maybe by my sharing this, it might help someone out there so I no longer see any reason to keep this a secret. I want to document it so I can look back later and remember what happened.

Many of you know of my horrific experience giving birth to Kira over two years ago now. To sum up, almost immediately after giving birth, I had a 4cm internal laceration, hemorrhaging of a loss of over 400cc of blood and a necessary D&E to clear out retained placenta. Unfortunately, the first D&E didn't get out all the placenta and at 6wks postpartum, I hemorrhaged again, this time loosing over 500cc and needing yet another D&E. This 2nd D&E seemed to take care the problem and I was finally able to heal properly. A year goes by and I finally start getting my periods again. Only they were abnormal. I wondered about it but let it go since we weren't really trying at that point. It wasn't until Kira was around 18 months old that I decided to start investigating.

I found a specialist in infertility in our area, told her my history and she immediately sent me for a battery of tests in the hopes that I could get some answers. I had blood work done first and that came back normal. Next was the ultrasound. That came back somewhat normal...they did find that the lining of my uterus was thicker than normal, so I was sent for a hysterosalpingogram, more commonly referred to as an HSG (google it!). What they found from that test was that my cervix was covered with scar tissue, therefore, the doctor could not complete the HSG and concluded I most likely needed a hysteroscopy to correct the problem. I was told at the time that the chances of getting pregnant with the scar tissue I have is quite small. I decided to get a second opinion. This meant yet another visit to the doctors office. I decided to see the doctor who performed my 2nd D&E and she recommended that instead of having a regular OBGYN doctor perform my hysteroscopy, I should have a Reproductive Endocrinologist perform it, since they see cases like mine all the time and are more familiar with surgery and treatment. I was happy to have that second opinion, because this doctor was the first one to put a name to my condition. It's called Ashermans syndrome. Here is a link if you're curious...http://www.ashermans.org/
Again, another visit to the doctors office, this time to see a Reproductive Endocrinologist (RE).

This RE was very nice and took time to listen to my concerns and very carefully go over my history. They conveniently had an ultrasound device in their offices so I had yet another ultrasound and he talked to me through the procedure and showed me the adhesions.  At the end of the appointment, he agreed that a hysteroscopy was my best option if I wanted to have another baby. I left the office with the promise that I would get a call within a week to schedule the procedure.

Well, at the time I this writing, I finally received a call from the RE office informing me that the doctors surgery appointments are booked through the rest of August. So my surgery date is set for September 21st. Now that I know what's going on I do feel at peace about the whole thing and comfortable waiting another month. I don't know what the future will hold, or what God has in store, but I do finally have a peace about the whole thing, knowing that it truly is in His hands and He is sovereign over the womb.

As a side note, I have to say a HUGE thank you to Mom for taking off work to babysit Kira for all the doctors visits I had to go to. Her support and encouragement meant so much to me in this uncertain time.

Kira's birthday and this old house!

As many of you know, I really have anxiety about hosting parties at my house. But Kira shouldn't be penalized for my inadequacies so I decided I needed to march forward and host a party for Kira's 2nd birthday. We invited local family and it really was packed in our small house, but it turned out to be better than I anticipated. I have noticed a pattern over the years, it seems a lot of the things I worry about never happen. :)

 I made chocolate chocolate chip cupcakes for Kira's birthday. I thought cupcakes would be a better idea for a 2 year old than cake. Kira almost never eats at parties anyway...she is usually too focused on people to be distracted with eating! What a social butterfly she is!

 Oh boy! Antshillvania II!!!

 This girl has WAY too many stuffed animals!

 Curious George! :)

She even got a Curious George Costume to wear for halloween this year, she liked wearing the hat most of all!

 Special Elmo chair!

she also got a little table and chairs to read her books, color and play with her puzzles.

 We continue to work away at the bottom floor of the house. Recently, with the help of dear-old-dad we replaced two of the 5 windows downstairs. Unfortunately, Tom will have to replace some of the drywall because there was termite activity (inactive now) that caused damage to the wood so they will have to be replaced with new ones when we get to this room.

 This is the window in my "coupon room." There are two rooms downstairs that we intend on finishing to be living space.

 This is a pic of what will stay the "unfinished" side of the basement. Tom ripped out the original beat up workbench and built this in it's place. I must say, he did a great job and I like that he is so particular when it comes to his projects on the house because it means that he will finish a job well!

 It finally warmed up enough for me to finish painting the final 1/3 of the floor. Definitely was worthwhile, since it cleaned it up in there and gives it a more uniform look.

This is the other side of the "unfinished" side. Tom ripped off the old pegboard, I scrubbed down the old mold on the 2x4 beams with bleach and then it was ready to have sheetrock put up. He finished spackling, then I painted it white. We also hung pegboard on the back wall. The pegboard will hold all our beach gear. We will be installing shelving on the newly sheet rocked wall to amplify our storage space.

It's been a great summer!

Well, even though I don't seem to be very good at this blogging thing, I am still going to update because there has been a lot going on and I don't want to forget it all! On top of that, Tom has been bugging me to post an update, so here goes! 

Kira continues to be a wonderful blessing and joy in our lives. One of my girlfriends asked me to watch her son on the day they moved into a new house and I was happy to oblige. As you can see, Kira loved giving Christian hugs! She is a very happy, outgoing bundle of energy and seems to make friends easily. She definitely got Tom's personality. She is talking a lot now and stringing words together so it has been neat for us to watch this new development. 

Just the other day, she was visiting at her one Grammy's house and looked at the huge clock on the wall and said very clearly, "that's a big clock!" Grammy got a kick out of that!

 We had the lovely opportunity to take a vacation at our favorite spot this summer...the beach! Kira loved going to the beach too and we got to do lots of fun things on our vacation this summer.

 Walked on the boardwalk quite a few times....

 We also brought our bikes down, took a bike ride with Kira almost every day, and one special morning, rode our bikes down to Browns for their special home-made doughnuts. Mmmmmm, yummy!

 We have lots of lovely prickers in our lawn, so Tom decided to buy a sprinkler in an effort to coax some green grass to grow. So far, all we have seen is an increase in our water bill...to be continued!

 Lounging in the pool! Here is the $8 Walmart special. Sure glad we didn't spend a lot of money on Kira's first pool because she doesn't want to swim in it! :/ She likes to throw her ball in the pool and the reach in a pick it out. Here's to hoping she will like it next year??

Of course, no post would be complete without pictures of Kira! :-)

 If it is a nice day, Kira and I will spend a couple hours at the park. Tom got a baby seat for me and attached it to the back of our bike so it is now very convenient to take her for a ride to the park.

 My little toddler!

 Almost every time we come to the park, Kira seems to find an older girl to make friends with and they end up playing together during the duration that we are there. She definitely got Tom's outgoing nature and has no problem meeting people and making friends.

 This was a visit to Chick fil a's play area with another girlfriend of mine. What a life this girl has huh? Play, play play!

 Since the performance for the musical I am directing is now about 2 weeks away, I am starting to need to be at the church more often to work on details. Kira kept herself busy this day when I was working on the set by running around the sanctuary and playing inside this school bus!

 Last night, we got the opportunity to go the The Tudor House in Bensalem. A nice perk of Tom's job is that we get to go to the school's formal events for free. It was a fun date night out! It was actually a murder mystery event...out of 290+ people there, only 5 people guessed who the murderer was!

 Tom writing down his guess!