Easter 2012

This Easter we went to my parent's home. Most of my brothers and sisters and their children and spouses were able to be there. Saturday we had an Easter egg hunt. We candy filled so many eggs that everyone was able to collect eggs until their baskets were full.

This is a picture of all the grandchildren. Wow! Okay, there are 3 missing, but that's still a lot.

Easter Sunday 2012 & the Importance of Journaling.

Here is my gorgeous children on Easter Sunday. We were at my parent's home.

But here is also the thing. I didn't journal about it until three months later. It is now July. This happened in April. And I remember we had good times, but I can't for the life of me remember the details. Or even the not so much details. Crazy how our memories fade so quickly.

 I read an article in the Ensign about how to get back to the basics. Not sure which month it was, I know it appeared in the 2011-2012 school year. But the message I extracted from the article is that we need to slow things down. Not be so busy. If we are too crowded with even good things, but none the less too crowded, we don't have time for the spirit to speak to us. It suggested stripping everything away and adding in scripture reading, prayer, and journaling. Then begin adding in small things. I wish I knew the article so I could read it again. The one thing that stands out to me in the commandment we have to write in our journal.

 I was always so good at writing in my journal until I got married. Not sure what changed or why I quit. But I did. Then I started super scrapbooking and did a lot of journaling in there. The problem with that was that you had to scrapbook a page and at the rate I was adding children, I didn't have much time to scrapbook. Blogging was a blessing sent from heaven to help me with my journaling. I know journaling is important and I do want to do it. I really enjoy writing. And I enjoy reading what I wrote later on.

 Although this post has nothing to do with Easter Sunday 2012, only the pictures correlate to that, it is a firm reminder why journaling is so important. At least for me. My brain cannot remember. Memories fade so quickly.

 Now to just get this blog slurped into a book so I can have these memories if anything ever happened to the Internet or electricity or whatever.

TEE Test

I think I am done with testing. At least for this year. Had that down- my- throat ultrasound done. Don't remember it because I got to sleep through it. Yay!

 I do remember the results.

My regurgitation is moderate. They don't really need to do anything until it becomes severe. So that is really good news. However, because it is moderate, it will become severe. And that means open heart surgery in my future. The type surgery where they crack your chest open, pull out your heart, detach it from your body, fix it, put it back in, and everything is better. Well, better after 2 months of no lifting. 2 months of not being able to take care of my family. But that's just details, right?

I'm almost at peace with where this is at. I know what will happen and I am fortunate it will not be this year.

I can still exercise. I can still walk my kids to and from school. I can still do almost everything I was doing before. I need to take some fun meds to slow the progress of this. I don't like the idea of having to take medications. But I also need to take care of my body so I can be around to take care of my family.

I have a follow-up appointment this week. Hopefully I don't find out anything I don't already know. Shouldn't.

So really, I'm doing good. Everything is okay. It was a bit of a shocker and a little hard to digest the information at first. And obviously my last few posts reflect that. Probably should have deleted them because of how much emotion I expressed in them. But I am resisting. This is my life and it's what's happening. It is very real. And at times very scary. But it will all be okay.

April Fools Day 2012

Happy April Fool's Day! We celebrated it again this year, although it wasn't such a shocker this year. The kids weren't surprised and ate EVERYTHING with hesitation. Imagine that.We started the morning with a breakfast of eggs (yogurt with a peach half.) Lunch was the usual cinnamon rolls for conference weekend, only they weren't cinnamon. they had sausage and cheese in them topped with country gravy to look like frosting. They were super tasty. However, Spencer and Nathan wouldn't even try them. I went back for 3rds! I think I may keep that recipe and try it for a normal breakfast.

 For supper we had ice cream sundaes with caramel sauce and a cherry on top. We also had Kool-Aide and cupcakes with blue frosting. And carrots. But really what was for supper disguised as these tasty treats was mashed potatoes and grave with a cherry tomato, shepherds pie with tinted mashed potatoes, and jello for the drink that was seriously undrinkable.

Can you tell the kids were excited? They really were and had a lot of fun. Well, not Spencer. He kept asking why I was making the food look different. He didn't understand. It kind of made me chuckle. Maybe I will have to take a break from it next year so I can have the surprise factor.

PET Scan results

I am learning too much about the heart. Of course that is usually the case about anything. You have to learn about it when you are faced with problems. I can tell you a lot about trichotilomania. Or breech babies. Or labor with and without an epidural. I know quite a bit about breast feeding. Or scrubbing floors. Or making cinnamon rolls. Or getting out stains.

I finally had some good news regarding my little heart issue. I do attribute it to the miraculous blessings that come through the power of prayer. It seemed like through all my visits to the cardiologist I kept getting bad news. The "regurgitation" problem, or valve that leaks, went from it's original diagnosis of "mild to moderate" to "moderate" and now to "moderate to severe". Severe being the point where open heart surgery is needed.

And then when the doctor tells you that you will be lucky to make it to age 50 on this heart. Getting some good news, even though there is still a lot of bad news going on, seems so refreshing.

I survived the PET scan. It was more intense then I had anticipated. Basically I showed up to the office fasting. They put in an IV, which they weren't successful with the first poke. No big deal, right? Well, turns out my emotions couldn't quite handle that. The nurse missed the vein and called for another nurse to come in and try. All of a sudden I started sweating and the walls started closing in on me. I told the nurse that I needed to lay down fast. Good thing she reclined that seat because I was passing out. The other nurse came in to give my veins a try and asked what the problem was. The first nurse said something like, "she has too many children to be having a heart problem." And that is where I lost it. I started sobbing uncontrollably. And I'm not even pregnant! I quickly gained control and realized how ridiculous I must have appeared to be bawling over a small missed vein. The second nurse had a go at the needle and got my vein with the first try.

Then they had me go into the room with the huge donut. I had to lay on this table which they wheeled inside this enormous circle machine with a tiny small donut hole in the middle which I had to barely fit into. My face was right up against the opening. And I was instructed not to move. To lie perfectly still. Only for 35 minutes.

That is not easy!

So they started some music, which was nice. Don't quite know where my mind was, probably in survival mode. The nurse kept inserting cold liquids into my IV. And then she would walk away to turn the big donut picture machine on. While I am laying there trying with all my might not to scratch that itch on my eye brow, thinking that I am too young to even have to be having a scan like this, guess what song started playing? If I Die Young by The Band Perry. Seriously? Were the techs not paying attention at all to the music playing. And of course the tears start streaming down the sides of my face, which I can't wipe. And my chest starts heaving up and down, I'm not supposed to move at all. And then I started to laugh. Still not moving. It was all too much. Almost like a big joke. And laughter is the best cure.

Then came time to inject me with the stuff that would make my heart beat super hard and fast, make me short of breath, AND cause serious cramping in my legs and arms and feet and abs and everywhere else. Oh, and I had to lie perfectly still though the whole of it.

Okay. Ready to move onto the results.

My heart looks beautiful. No blockage anywhere. Handles stress very well.  That means I can continue exercising. I asked the doctor if I was okay to push myself super hard, harder then I've ever pushed myself on the treadmill and he said absolutely. In fact he told me it would be good for me.

Yes! I can still be active.

I do still have the regurgitation, which will mean eventually valve repair that requires open heart surgery. I have another test this week which will be able to look closer at how bad the regurgitation is. They will be doing a scope at the hospital to get a closer look.  From there they will determine how soon the surgery will be needed.

I'm not scared like I was. I know all will be well. Getting good results with the PET scan seemed to have calmed me down.

Thanks for all your prayers. I know they helped. And thank you, Sunnie, for the M&M's on my front porch. I enjoyed every one of them. And I also thoroughly enjoyed the swim to burn them off.

And a little side note. I have had to stop nursing that baby of mine. You know, the radiation they put in my for the PET scan would probably not be good for that guy. And the anesthesia they will be giving me this week is probably not so good for him either. I can't just quit cold turkey because I am very susceptible to mastitis. So I am pumping. I pumped the night after the PET scan, and the milk had a tint of green.  I HAD GREEN MILK! Good thing he didn't drink that stuff!

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