Its like a roller coaster ride

So a lot had occur ed in the past week to say the least. So much, that i don't even have time to write about it all but it all comes down to this. We, as a family will not be coming home in May anymore. We had a situation(plus one or two) and had to change plans. Its actually been a week of ups and downs that I was starting to get motion sickness from! Instead as our tiny family of 3 we will be going on our very first "official" vacation. We've always considered our vacations to be the 2 weeks we come home, twice a year. Basically there is a lot of stress that comes with these trips as we have to fit in my family and both of chases parents since they are divorced and it just makes things incredibly cramped. We haven't seen most of our friends since October of '07. Some people we haven't seen since long before that, because we just don't have time to fit friends AND family.


To save ourselves the fighting with family (and each other) we will be going to Florida in late June. Chase and I are both excited about this, because as I said we've never had a vacation with just us! We are planning to take Morghan to Magic Kingdom and Seaworld in Orlando. Then in Tampa we will visit the Zoo, as it was ranked in the 'Top 5 Zoo's for Children' in one of my parent magazines. Of course, you can't go to Florida without the beach! There are other things I want to do there, but they just aren't activities we can do with Morghan because she is too young. I've wanted to swim with manatees since I was in elementary school. For year I wanted to be a marine biologist, just so I could take care of them and keep them from extinction. We decided that when we get the chance, just Chase and I will take a weekend trip to the area and do that. (its only 5 hours from here)

As for Texas, my parents couldn't change their vacation so they are going to fly Morghan and I home for 4-5 days. Not sure what all will go on but I look forward to it. I was worried Chase would be angry with the thought but was actually supportive. In the past he's been a little 'jealous' of trips home without him, but i've always said I'm sure his parents would do the same if he talked to them. They could even come out here to visit, though neither of our families have done that since Aug-Sept 2007. Especially now as we probably wont be home anytime in the near future, maybe not even for the rest of 2009.

Chase should be coming back home on the 28th now (3 days sooner), but he isn't 100% sure on this. As soon as he gets back we are going to the beach the following weekend, so that should be fun. As for now I will continue my daily struggle with Morghan to keep the house clean. I swear as soon as I vacuum and dust there are blocks and babies all over the room! My goal is that since Tuesday is my first weekday off in a while I'm going to do some massive spring cleaning/organizing. Perhaps packing up things as a "pre-emptive strike" should the possibility of moving arise (this being the military and all). I went and bought some large plastic containers for winter clothes and all the extra blankets, bedding, etc that's in the closets with NO ROOM! This house is so small, I cant wait until we finally have our own because that house will have HUGE closets!

Half way there... or is it half way to go?

After months of physical therapy my therapist is sending me to and Orthopaedic surgeon for further assessment of my knee. Back in November I fell and injured my knee, the next day I fell again and hurt the same knee. For days I dealt with some pretty moderate swelling and pain. Eventaully I went to see the dr. as squatting down was EXTREMELY painful let alone difficult and I was experiencing popping in my knee along with my knee also going weak while walking. I finally got in to see a physical therapist and we did x-rays which only revealed the there was nothing wrong with the bones. Being that I was still in pain almost a month after the incidents she decided to go through with some exercises thinking perhaps I just had a pretty bad bruise with the possibility of a tear in the meniscus. The meniscus is a rubbery disc that cushions the knee and keeps you steady while balancing your weight evenly across. In early February I did my follow up appointment which really didnt go as well as it could, at no fault other than my own. I had been avoiding certain activities and positions that were uncomfortable and painful. She still had concern for a tear but was also considering plica syndrome briefly. So for the next month I was to do new exercises and do all the things I had been avoiding so that I could let her know things such as does twisting hurt, does it hurt to go up or down the stairs etc.
During the past months I also went through things such as 4 weeks of Phonophoresis and 1 week Ionotphoresis. After all is said and done we did one last test. I stood on my right foot (right knee was injured) and closed my eyes. I was not able to maintain this position for more than 3 seconds. On my left I held it for 30 seconds. As where I was slightly amused at my inability to perform such a simple task, she was not. After more poking around on my knee she told me she feels as though she's exhausted all options in physical therapy and wants me to move on to the next specialist. Based on what is discovered on the MRI we will discuss my options in arthroscopic surgery or even cortisone injections. Although neither of those appeal to me in anyway.


I'm at the half-way point in Chase's deployment. Although last night i was feeling so overwhelmed with everything I my thoughts we more in the "glass half empty" stage. We found out he is not going back to Iraq this year. This puts a dent in my plans to return to school, something I've been wanting to do for a looong time.

In all my absentminded-ness I completely forgot that Morghan's school would be closed for Good Friday and the Monday following Easter, thus forgot to ask off of work. I was able to work out Mondays schedule but unfortunately Friday I will have to miss.

Also with all this recession news we finally learned that we have 120 days to increase revenue and decrease labor costs or we will be shutting our doors. This is a hard hit because we have been trying so hard to have our voices heard and until the department head actually joined our meetings absolutely NOTHING was being accomplished. I've had the girls writing down all their ideas whenever something comes to mind that way we can address everything at our next meeting. There are a lot of ideas out there that my supervisor, and hers and his need to be open to. Now had Chase been scheduled to go overseas this would not be an issue for me to as concerned about as I would be leaving anyway around that time to move home and start school. However, at the risk of losing my job being rather high I will now begin the process of locating a new job on base. Hopefully, this will yield a positive outcome.

We still haven't made the judgement call, as to whether or not we will be coming home for a visit late May. We desperately want to, we just aren't sure we will be able to. We feel pressured by family to come home(especially from his parents), but no one seems to fully understand the financial obligation it causes.

In the meantime, I'm setting myself up to get sick. I've been running myself so hard with nothing to support my body. I get an average 5 hours of interrupted sleep a night, and my nutrition has been seriously lacking. Although I'm able to provide Morghan with all she needs I just find myself uninterested in food. Breakfast has become rare, lunch most commonly cosists of a soup or sald and dinner maybe 3 times a week. One would think with being on the eliptical twice a day I'd wear myself down enough to sleep through the night. Chase is upset with me for this, but I can't blame him. I just need to figure out how to get rid of all this stress.

Long time no see...

So its been a while since I've posted anything on here. Mostly I've just been trying to keep myself busy. Since Chase left, I haven't had a decent night sleep YET! Most nights I'm up till 12am-1am and I'm not sure how I manage that. When Chase is here I'm usually so exhausted I fall asleep on the couch at 730 or I'm in bed by 10pm. Morghan is handling him being away pretty well. She gets to talk to him almost every night before she goes to bed, it will be interesting to see her reaction when he returns home in May. Gosh that sounds so far away... :(

::MORGHAN::

She is rather creative these days, constantly making up the words to songs. Mostly she makes up words to the song "Fare Jacques". One minute its about cleaning the kitchen and 10 minutes later its about a snowman and Santa clause. She absolutely loves to sing and I wish I could sing along, unfortunately I haven't got a clue what songs she sings and that in turn frustrates her. She gets angry when I don't sing the right words. Perhaps one day I should take her in early and hang out and listen to the songs they sing at school.

She's becoming rather stubborn lately. She's always been her mother's child but lately is crazy. I used to be able to "threaten" her with time out, etc and she would stop being bad. Not any more. Now I get to 3 and she's just staring at me, so some things have had to change. I don't like punishing her but she needs to learn not to be rude and misbehave. Its my fault for spoiling her I suppose, but hopefully its not too late!!

Her new favorite phrases/words:

"Mommy, you know what?"
"uhm, because..."
"oh my! That is craaaazy!"

::STRESS::

I'm still struggling with the hospital over a bill. Basically when Morghan was born (2 1/2 years ago) they billed my insurance under my SSN instead of Chase's so the claim was denied. I just found out about it in October of last year when I received a FINAL NOTICE although I had never received an initial notice. The hospital re-sent the claim to insurance under Chase's SSN. Now I had called and spoke to someone twice and wrote a letter to the hospital trying to get an idea on the status. NO ONE KNEW ANYTHING! After we filed our taxes last month I learned that, surprise, it again has been denied since it had been over 12 months. The way I learned is that my state taxes had been seized by the gov't to pay the hospital bill. THIS PISSED ME OFF TO NO END! I now have spoke to a lawyer to get my money back as I am not to be held responsible because the hospital staff doesn't know how to their job. I also have to have them fix any/all damage to my credit score/report they have caused.

Chase is supposedly going back to Iraq this summer, the only issue is trying to figure out when exactly he would ship out. Being in Yuma right now he hardly has time to talk to anyone in his shop back here in SC. I'm not really upset about Iraq, I definitely prefer it over 12 months in Korea though! It does however cause a ripple in our plans for the future so we are considering options. There are so many things to consider and not a lot of time to plan, especially if he leaves in July! Hopefully I can get word of something soon so I can figure out what to do next!

The cow says.... MOO

Funny sayings from my child...

While riding home from school yesterday we are going through all the animal sounds when Morghan stops and asks "Mommy, what does Daddy say?", i said 'I don't know what does Daddy say?'.... Morghan's response was instant Daddy says "HUSH THAT NOISE!!!"


Morghan's almost completely potty trained and so one day she let me know she was going to go to the potty and I said "ok." About 2 minutes later I walk down the hall to see why she hasn't come out and the looks up and says "I can't go yet, I need a book."


She is completely upset with Chase for leaving last night. Tears, anger, denial.. its all there. From the moment we pulled away she started darting her eyes and head every which way going "Mommy I cant see Daddy anymore! Mommy I cant see Daddy anymore" in a tone of complete panic! She doesn't understand why she is gone and I feel so bad for the little one. Ever since my surgery she has been his shadow in every way. She used to get excited when I walked in the door from work, now she gets excited for Daddy to come home. As sooon as she woke up this morning she was running about the house looking for him. I tried to tell her he was at work(which is true, work just moved to another location for right now) but she wasn't going to have it. Every time I said it she came back with "No he's not gone Mommy, that's not nice. Don't say that" This will be a looooong 6 weeks, I can tell already.

Bad things come in 3's,4's and 5's

#1. So Wednesday night I get a call telling me that Morghan is running a fever of 106 F. ... Nearly had a heart attack as I bolted out the door saying I wasn't coming in tomorrow. The whole way home I was coaching Chase on what to do. Strip her down to her panties, get a cool washclothe, grab a pedialtye popsicle, giver her motrin... I felt as if I couldn't get home fast enough. Its so odd that she would have this right now because at almost the exact time last year she was running a high fever as well. Finally I walked in the door and scooped up my little fireball. I felt like I was going to burn myself just holding her!

#2. Still running a fever we stayed home from school/work and hung out all day. By the end of the day she seemed to feeling much better so I loaded her up and ran to the store to pick up some things for dinner. So later that night Chase was outside cooking the steaks and I went out there to check and see if mine was cookedthe way I wanted yet. I didn't realize that Morghan would be standing on the otherside of the door awaiting my return. Now as if a wooden door wouldnt be bad ours is METAL, a big heavy metal door. The only window is so small and high I would have to stand on my toes to see in. Not thinking I ran in to the house to check on the potatoes.

As I run in I slam the door right in to Morghan knocking her back and easy 2-3 feet and immeadiately she is screaming the worst, painful scream you can imagine. I grab her and run to the couch trying to calm her down inspecting her for any and all boo-boos. Its at this point I realize her foot may be broken. I'm screeeeaaaming from the living room for Chase to come inside a good couple minutes before he hears me. We grabbed an ice pack, which she reluctantly place on her foot. We waited for her to calm down before sitting her on the counter to compare her feet. Its pretty obvious that her right foot is swollen already a red/purple color. As mean as it sounds I lightly pressed on her foot to make sure there wasnt some massive break. We didn't take her to the ER because we both know it wouldn't accomplilsh anything. They wont cast toes! The next morning I took her to see her Pediatrician who told me that not going to the ER is ok.
All in all she as 3 broken bones, and as I said they will not put a cast on her. Little ones grow so quickly they'd have to change it every other week. She can walk on it just fine now I just have to keep an eye out to see if she starts limping or has an increase in pain as those could signify a stress fracture.

#3. Today we had a kitchen fire. It was awful, and if Chase hadn't been there I seriously do now know what I would have done. I froze up and my mind was a complete blank. The best I can figure something had fallen under the burner and caught on fire, because I wasnt frying anything that could have splashed out. As soon as I saw the flames I grabbed the skillet and pots and put them on the other side of the kitchen and just started yelling for Chase. He grabbed the fire extg. and went to work. 10 seconds later the fire alarm went off and took Morghan outside so she wasn't breathing in the smoke and chemicals from the extinguisher. We spent the next 30 minutes cleaning the stove up YAY! Lucky I save some time because the pasta kept cooking while it sat on the other counter haha.

#4. Chase is leaving on Wednesday for 6 weeks. Totally sucks.

#5. My daughter's favorite way to torture me is to say I'm not her mom, and she doesn't want to be my friend, and she doesnt love me. I may deserve this after breaking her foot and all.

What goes through her brain...

So the past week has been a little crazy with Morghan. She has been getting in to a lot of different things like shampoo, tooth paste, lotion, soap... if its something smelly she can find it no matter where it is. She must have a super nose! Anyways almost every morning for the past week I wake up to a mess.

There was lotion squeezed in to a glass bowl
hair gel all over the toilet seat
hairspray all over HER
she emptied my prescrition nose spray
lotion all over the carpet
soap all along her foot board rail

I don't know what to do with her. 5 minutes after being punished she acts like nothing ever happened! We discovered last night that she can climb on the toilet to get in to the medicine cabinet where she found Chase's cologne... dear dear dear the bathroom smelled so awful! Today I went out and bought a shelf to put everything on so now there is NOTHING in the cabinet. I also had to get a tooth brush holder that sticks to the mirror up high so she can't get those. I'm tired of finding my tooth brush on the floor and sterilizing it constantly or buying a new one! I'd block off the bathroom but for the sheer fact that she's almost 100% potty trained I dont want to ruin it. We did however bring the baby gate back out and put it in the hallway so she cant make it to the kitchen where she also likes to empty the pantry or fridge. Locks do not work with the little houdini.

Ok so while I'm typing this she's dumping bubble bath into an empty bath tub GOTTA GO!

Feeling Irritated...

I know its none of my business how someone raises their child but when you are putting your child in danger it really upsets me. There is this one family in particular that is just rushing their newborn to grow up, and for a newborn they seem to expect too much! The poor baby was in a bumbo seat at 4 weeks old, at 6 weeks they had the baby in a jumperoo, and now just 2 weeks later are feeding the child actual baby food. Why don't you just go ahead and turn her car seat around to front facing while your at it, oh wait that's already been done. The child is in one of those convertible car seats facing front so mommy can see. THEY MAKE MIRRORS! There are rules and guidelines for all of these things and it just seems like they don't care.

I'm not saying I'm perfect because God knows I'm not but I do my best to take care of our daughter and give her a great live that she deserves. I realize all children are different but some things have safety guidelines for the child's health and safety. At 8 weeks no infant should be on baby food. I know this baby goes to the same pediatrician as Morghan and Dr, Karen would NEVER approve. As for the car seat, that is just ridiculous and stupid! I remember wanting to turn Morghan's seat around but I held off until she was 1 year. I went with the guidelines for the well being of my child not because I wanted her to grow up and accomplish things quickly. If they are in a car accident that poor baby could be killed because of their stupidity.

I wish they would just slow down and take care of that baby. She deserves a happy,healthy life. They need to enjoy her while she's little. I know, and I know that other mom's know how quickly they grow on their own. They do NOT need to be rushed in to unhealthy situations. Like I said, I know its none of my business. I just needed to vent somewhere so I wrote it in here.