The Russell Update

About a week and a half ago, I took Russell to the psychiatrist. Apparently we are not her typical client. Russell is our biological child, he lives with both parents, has biological siblings (one yet to be born) and I did not smoke or drink while I was pregnant with Russell or any other child for that matter. In fact when she was asking me about the smoking thing when going over family history and Russell's normal birth, Russell said to her "Smoking is bad for you; it turns your lungs black." And his tone was one of 'my mom is not bad and how dare you even ask'. It was pretty cute.
I had to fill out a lot of paperwork beforehand and I brought in examples of Russell's schoolwork, report cards dating when the issues started, a progress report showing his difficulty now, time lines of all the speech and language evaluations Russell has ever done, example of our behavior/chore chart at home, anything and everything I could think of to show what is going on with Russell. So we were reviewing all of it (I think she was a little overwhelmed by everything I brought) and Russell is just being Russell - chatting about things in and out of context, playing with his hands, getting up and examining things all over the office. She is watching him the whole time and carrying on a conversation with me, sometimes asking Russ questions and then after about 20 minutes she asks, "I am seeing Russell how you see him at home?" Yes. "Is this what he is like at school?" At school he knows to stay in his seat or he gets his name on the board, so he can control some of it. Then she says "You have really done most of the work for me, let's talk therapies."
I am thinking, that's it??? 20 minutes with her and that's it, she's decided??? So, I ask, "Really, that's it? Do you think it's ADHD?" Yes. "You don't think it is immaturity or anything developmental / language processing disorder related?" No. Then she tells me if I hadn't told her that Russ was in speech or language therapy, she wouldn't have guessed that he was. She said she could see some of his language issues - talking out of context and syntax errors - but not enough to the point that he'd be in therapy at school or privately.
Okay then!
We are already doing everything at home with his behavior / chore chart, rewards and consequences that needs to be done. Russell's teacher already makes accommodations for him in class, so the next step is some type of medication to see what results we get from that. She wanted him to see a pediatric cardiologist to make sure his heart is healthy and has no structural abnormalities. He even had an EKG, which was very exciting for a 6 yr old who likes science! Of course, Russ's ticker is in good shape (he has minor benign murmur that he has had since birth), so he was cleared!
We are trying a medication that you sprinkle in applesauce, (no pill swallowing), in the morning and it is an extended release med, so only once per day. Today is our third day on it. He started over the weekend and we noticed a couple of differences, but we aren't supposed to 'judge' it until he's taken it for 2 weeks. And then we go back to Dr. Chason to check in and make any adjustments if needed.
This certainly isn't an easy road to take, but I think I said before, we just have take this journey one day at a time.

Rachel Turns 3

Gone are the days of the 'terrific twos' and now are the days of the 'thrilling threes'!!!! Rachel's birthday was pretty uneventful - no big party this year, just a couple of friends over to help celebrate : ) Adam's mom, Jamie, came for a long weekend visit that coincided with Rachel's birthday, so it was nice that she could be here to celebrate too.

So, I have decided that Rachel is already bummed about getting older. Anytime we sing Happy Birthday to her or someone wishes her a happybirthday, she puts her face in her hands and whines. Get over it, toots, talk to the rest of us when you hit at least 30.

Adam took his mom and Russell deep sea fishing last weekend while Rachel and I farted around the house to get ready for the birthday dinner. They had a blast and caught so many fish, they gave some away. Meanwhile, Rach and I stayed in our jammies until like noon and had a quiet morning.

On Monday, there was no school (Fall Break. Whatever that is) and Jamie and I took the kids to Gulf World Marine Park. It is a smallish local marine park with a dolphin, sea lion, and bird shows with birds and other critters to look at. They did have sharks, so Russ was happy about that. We hadn't ever been and I can't say that we'll go back, but we had a good time.

Okay, a belly update.... We have pretty much settled on a name - shocking! Rowan Andrew Bright. Rowan seems to be growing at a pretty good pace now and so is my chest - yowza. I am at that point where it is getting harder to bend over and pick anything up. He is still most active when I am hungry and his kicks, punches, etc. are much stronger than before. My biggest complaint is leg cramps at night. They hurt and are so sharp, they wake you up; not any fun. It does seem to help when I take the time to stretch at night before bed.

More baby stuff from Jess came this weekend, including a breastpump (what a lifesaver!!). In the boxes were all of Russell's hooded towels from his newborn days. They still looked brand new - how that is possible after being used by 3 children is beyond me : ) Lots of blankets and bibs inthe boxes too. Jamie has decided by the time Rowan is born, we'll only need diapers! What can I say? We have amazing friends and family!!!!

Chan-ya, You Rock!

Before I forget, I wanted to post this funny story about Russell and then I'll get to TJ.

In Atlanta when I was taking Russ to the Dr. for his croup, we were checking in with the nurse and Russ was talking about how he loves sharks. He was saying that sharks are his favorite animal. The nurse was saying, well, aren't sharks a fish? Do you like any animals like dogs and cats? Russ says - oh yeah, I like cats, we have 3 cats. And then, (and remember we are in Atlanta, home to Michael Vick....) Russell says - But I love Dogfights. The nurses eyes pop out of her head and Russ is going on and on about killing the enemy, how dog fights are cool, blah blah blah. I am cracking up because he means 'dogfights' with airplanes like in WWII. So, I explain to the nurse what he means and she starts cracking up b/c obviously this little boy knows nothing about dog fighting with dogs and all that is going on with that!!! I thought it was so funny - of all the places to say you love dogfights, Russ has to say it to some stranger in Atlanta!!! That is one for the books!

Last weekend there was a message on the machine for from Tonja (of Garland and Tahoe fame, for those who need a reminder) saying that she scored baby boy stuff and that we were set. Let me quote the message "I scored like 2 Macy's bags full of boy clothes. You know, the big bags with handles". How I do know and miss the big Macy's bags with handles!!! Ha! Of course, I had to call her back... It turns out that her mother's group in Napa was doing a children's clothing exchange and almost everyone wanted and needed girls clothes, but had tons of boys clothes to trade. So, after asking the participants if she could share the wealth with me, Tonja scored big time!!! As we were catching up on the phone on other things, she was counting and counting. I can't remember the final tally, but the onesie count was near 30 and the sleeper count was near 20 and then there was a lot more that I can't even remember, it was that much. The baby will not be naked!!! Anyway, I just wanted to tell her again, Tonja, you are awesome! And thanks so much for thinking of us and scoring the great clothes. You rock!!!!

The Big Ultrasound

We have been looking forward to this ultrasound for a long time. Would it be a boy like we thought it was, would it be another girl? Whose generous offers of hand me downs were coming our way??? This baby is enough of a surprise, so we really wanted to know what he or she would be. In fact when Dawn had been teasing me that she was hoping this baby might be shy and we wouldn't be able to tell, I promptly said I would pay for another ultrasound myself if I had to!! I scheduled the appt. when I knew Adam would be off from work (before we left for Atlanta), after Rachel's soccer tots, and after the academic portion of the school day for Russ, (so he could come too and he'd only miss lunch and art).

We picked up Russell and headed over, we are all very excited! We get in the room and the nurse turns off the light so we can all see the big TV that projected all the images and Rachel starts crying. Then I get up on the bed/table so the nurse can start and Rachel is screaming. She wants on the table, she wants to sit with me (no room), she wants, she wants, and oh yeah, she wants! She's getting louder and louder and Adam says he has to take her out. She had passed the point of no return, she was that worked up. He had to take her to the car, screaming the whole way, lots of staring, he gets her a juice, she slurps it down and falls asleep. Poor guy. He stays out there in the car, not wanting to repeat anything that just happened!

So, that leaves me and Russ watching the ultrasound. Russ was a lot of fun and was so into it. He could see a lot of what she was pointing out. Every once in a while she'd print a picture just for Russell to keep. The nurse is measuring everything that needs to be measured and she goes quickly past the legs and I saw it. I turned to her and said do you know what the sex is? She says she is pretty sure was going to wait to do that part when my husband returned. I laughed and said, Rachel is done, she was so far gone that he won't be coming back. I thought it was nice of her to want to wait, but I knew Adam wasn't coming back. She goes back to the area and sure enough, we see it again. Definitely a boy! Sch-wing! Ha! No extra ultrasound for this child. I told the nurse about Dawn and she laughed and said she's pretty good at finding it when the parents want to know so they don't have to pay for another one.

Now, something new for this pregnancy is the 3D pictures you can get from an ultrasound. The baby has to be very still in order for it really to work. And this baby was moving nonstop. She even asked me if I had just had some sugar or OJ or caffeine - the kid was a mover. And, he kept his face covered with either his hands or his feet! It turns out that the baby moves a lot when I am hungry and I was hungry at the ultrasound. She did manage to get two 3D pictures, but they look like he has holes in skull, which he doesn't. Apparently the pictures can look a lot better than ones we got, which is pretty amazing since the ones we got are that bad, minus the holes of course!

We did get to see the baby's tongue stick out and he moved his mouth for us too. That was pretty cool - I hadn't ever seen that before. He is still laying side ways in my belly instead of up and down, but there's still time for him to move into position. I guess the placenta is a little lower than normal, but I think Rachel was the same way and it moved up. The concern there is to not block the way out for the baby! So, we might get one more look at him in a couple of months to make sure the placenta has moved up, we'll see. The nurse is hoping to get another chance to do a 3D picture!

The baby still has no name! We definitely like Andrew for his middle name. Right now we have been going back and forth between Rowan and Ryan, but we may just go for a non R name. For some reason I think he won't get his name until he's born and we can see him.

Atlanta Adventures

First of all, in case you don't know - we had our ultrasound and the baby is going to be a boy! But I'll post about that later.

After the ultrasound we got in the car and headed for Atlanta, which turned out to be about a 4.5 hour drive. Not too bad! We arrived around dinner time, so we checked into the hotel and headed over to the mall to find some dinner and let the kids run around. And, yes, indulge me in a bit of shopping at Macys!!!

The next day we all actually slept in until after 8am - hurray! We packed up and headed to the Georgia Aquarium. We really enjoyed it. It is huge and we have heard about the crowds, so we went first thing and were pleasantly surprised, no crowds. It is organized very well - all the galleries branch from the center of the building and that was helpful. I am not sure that this aquarium is better than Monterey; I think I like Monterey better. The highlight was definitely seeing the tank with the whale sharks. The aquarium currently has 4. One or two have died recently and we didn't ask why, we were too busy looking at all the fish that were in the tank with the whale sharks. They have one hammerhead shark and that was Russell's favorite. They also have (in other tanks) Beluga whales, seals, penguins, and pretty much every fish you can think of!

The aquarium shows a '4-D' movie whose main character is 'Deepo' and looks a lot like Nemo, minus the stripes. They are quick to point out that Deepo is NOT a clownfish. Ha! This was Russell's first 3D movie and he loved it. Rachel wouldn't wear the glasses, but the theatre blew bubbles at appropriate parts and she loved that!

Of course the trip wouldn't be a trip without some potty incident. Rachel is potty trained and LOVES public bathrooms. So, we didn't think any thing of taking her in undies (brought a spare change just in case!). She always tells us when she has to go. So, we are at the aquarium and she hasn't mentioned it and we hadn't even thought of asking her. We are at a touching tank, uh huh, you see where this going.... she has her hand in the water and pees all over the herself and the floor. We are walking away, thinking how did she get so wet on her shorts??? Duh! So, off to the parking garage to get the change of clothes and go back in top the aquarium to see Deepo and everything else we hadn't seen!!!

The World of Coca Cola was across the park from the aquarium, so we went there too. It wasn't a great place for the kids, but I have to say the staff there was very accommodating to families with young children. The highlight was the tasting room at the end. There you could taste all Coca Cola products from all over the world. Fanta sodas in flavors you didn't think existed! Sprite that didn't taste like Sprite. Most were good, a few were bad, very bad.

Okay, so that takes us to Saturday. Croup. Yeah, croup. Russell woke up Sat. morning with the croupy cough. Thankfully not in the middle of the night, but when he woke up. We tried all the tricks and they weren't working, he was upset, so off we went to the doctor. I found an immediate care center for children, called and spoke with the nurse, and took him there instead of the ER. What a relief that was. Quick, easy, they gave him the steroid treatment for croup and off we went for more adventures! Adam was ready to pack up and go home, but the doctor said as long as Russ wasn't running around and was in good spirits to stay and finish our weekend. So we did just that.

The rest of the day we spent at the Fernbank Natural History Museum. A small and pleasant museum located in the middle of a very affluent neighborhood near Emory University. It was typical - dinosaur bones, etc. The funniest thing was eating lunch in the cafe area and this elderly volunteer comes in and starts playing this baby grand piano. He was terrific and obviously very skilled. It was funny b/c here we are eating our corn dogs, chips and what have yous and we are listening to very classical music coming from a beautiful piano.

We hit the zoo after that. It was close, we had already bought our tickets and the weather was fantastic. Well, I think every other family with children under the age of 4 were there too! It was an okay zoo, nothing to get excited over. But the kids enjoyed it and that's what counts!

Sunday we headed home and got back in the early afternoon. It was a really fun weekend and we are so glad that we took the time to go. I'll try to post tomorrow about the ultrasound experience b/c that had its moments too. Well, Rachel had her moment.....