Today's Joys

Kyle loves to feed Elias his bottle. I forgot to mention in my last post that with medicine I'm on I can't breastfeed. But that just means Ben can help out and take one of the night feedings for me.

I also was able to get into the Endocrinologist yesterday and I'm going to have the radioactive iodine uptake and scan May 9th to determine if my nodules or my thyroid itself is overactive. Then I can start taking the anti-thyroid medication at that point. I asked about ablation of my thyroid to just kill it but she wants my levels to come down first before that because I am having so many bad symptoms. So it will probably be a month before I'm noticing any significant improvements.

God did bless me with a 2hr nap today though! Praising Him!

Where my life is at right now

So things have been crazy in my life for the past few weeks. I feel I'm at a place where I want to write out everything that's been going on.
I know my last post was about how overwhelmed I was. Over the past few weeks I'd been getting increasingly anxious and that turned into depression. I just thought I had PPD so I finally called my OB and asked for anti-depressants and started seeing a therapist. Well things got worse from there...alot worse. Last Sunday I woke up feeling horrible. I felt like my skin was crawling and I was hot but didn't have a fever, and had no appetite, and was nauseous, but the worst part was I was so jittery. I felt like I was on speed (though I've never done drugs). It was awful. I thought maybe I had a bad reaction to the anti-depressant so I stopped that. And thus started my week from hell. I felt like I was going insane.

By Tuesday I asked Ben to take me to the ER because I hadn't slept in 2 days because I would wake drenched in sweat and was lucky to get 2 hrs of sleep a night. I felt like I didn't want to live anymore. They gave me ambien to help me sleep which helped me get to sleep but if I woke up I couldn't go back to sleep and I started really stressing about not sleeping and trying to take care of Elias and feed him at night which made me sleep even less.
It got to the point I couldn't even take care of the kids during the day so my parents took them for the week.
Wednesday I called my Endocrinologist about what was going on and they had me get my bloodwork checked which came back Thursday that I have Hyperthyroidism. I have had nodules on my thyroid for years and last summer I woke up one morning with a golfball sized one but my bloodwork was always normal. Without getting too medical on you my TSH was been consistantly going down throughout my pregnancy but my T3 and T4 levels (the actual thyroid hormones) were always normal. So that was the answer to why I felt so horrible.

My Dr. gave me a Beta-blocker to treat some of the symptoms and I go back this week to figure out what they do now. Dealing with this disease is going to be a long, hard road.

I'm home now with my kids, though I don't feel much better and I'm still not sleeping much I'm relying on God to sustain me through this. Ben is having to really step up and help because I can hardly function. I know God is going to use this situation for good and He has a purpose. I still constantly struggle with being depressed over how my life has been turned upside down and how I feel like I'm a shell of a person right now but I'm comforted and thankful to know at least why I feel the way I do and trying to be patient as I wait for my treatment to start. I have to take it one day, sometimes one moment at a time and trust that God will get me through.

21 months and 1 month

A little late...

So since Kyle and Elias's birthdates are so close (15th and 18th) I've decided to combine their updates into one post each month. And because as time goes on, the pictures of them will probably be with them together anyways. Kyle: You are 21 months now and I know this last month with you becoming a big brother has been the hardest. You are doing so well though buddy. You love you little brother to pieces and always want to give him kisses. You get so worried when he cries and always rush to give him his pacifier. We are having to teach you to be gentle though, because you like to point out his eyes and mouth to us which usually invovles a few rough pokes. I know you've had to adjust to not being the center of attention and not getting what you ask for so quickly and you are doing a good job. You also got the worst cold you've ever had this last month and are just now getting better. It's been a hard month but you're been such a good sport and are adjusting well.

Elias: I can't believe you are a month old little buddy! You've grown 2 inches and gained 3lbs 13oz since you were born. You are now 11lbs 1oz and 22 in long. We are finally getting into our schedule and you are doing so well napping now. Sometimes you cry for a minute or two but then you go right to sleep. I'm hoping you'll start stretching out your feedings at night because feeding you 3 times a night is rough...you went 6 hours between feedings the other night so I know you can do it! You really are a content baby though and only cry if you're hungry or tired. I'm excited to see your little personality come out as you grow.

Two under two week 3

So has ended two under two week 3. I honestly don't know how you moms of two or more kids do it? Sometimes I feel like I'm going to lose my mind. I've got a toddler needing me constantly and a newborn who is trying to learn to sleep and eat and be in this new world. How do you do it without feeling like you're going to be ripped in half? All my mom friends of two+ kids says it gets easier. So I'm hoping it either gets easier or I just learn to deal with the stress better because lately it's been enough to send me to tears multiple times. And how do you sleep? Last night it took Elias forever to get to sleep. He's waking 2-3 times to eat in the middle of the night, so that's not bad but coordinating his sleep with Kyle's has been hard because I can't always count on him to sleep for naps all the time. I just try to take it one moment at a time because thinking about more than that is just about too much to handle.