Almost 5 months!

EPR

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Where does the time go?? After 42 NICU night stays, 48 PICU/OHSU night stays, 3 ER visits, 2 surgeries, 3 Children's Hosp night stays for B, 21 Dr. appointments, and 1 pending lawsuit, I think we are safe to say we have had a jam-packed 2011 so far! We are hopeful that our new start back home will be a fresh start for the entire Waind clan!

Evan: 13lb 7oz, 24 in
Payton: 12lb 12oz, 23.5 in
Riley: 13lb 3oz, 23.75 in

Growing boys!! Payton's weight is falling behind probably because we can barely get him to eat with his reflux issues. Hopefully the new Prevacid tabs we started yesterday will provide some relief- fingers crossed! I will give it 2 weeks before I cry uncle and crawl under a rock until they are 12months old.

I had an emotional week saying goodbye to my work family, I am going to miss them and my job so much!! They had a great BBQ for us yesterday and I didn't even snap one pic :( Brody was quite entertaining and had the best time. There were many times when I didn't even know where all of our kids were (but that's ok, because I knew they were in good hands!) When I told Ben it was bottle time he laughed and said "look at all these people, I'm not feeding a baby!" We love our "breaks" when help is around. I only cried a couple times and tried not to think about what it all meant and just enjoyed the company. I definitely felt weird last night when I didn't have a blackberry or laptop to check :( I hate not being in the know even though I barely responded over the last hectic months- I like to know what's going on! I asked some of the therapists if they would start a blog to entertain me while I am away, they better! I can't say enough about the amazing friends I made during my years at KP, many friendships that will continue on through the distance :) I joked that I can now stop the filtering on here and facebook since I no longer have a job- so watch out! HAHA!!

Ben is leaving now to take Brody to his last day at school (daycare). He has been asked to take some pictures, he better!! We are taking the whole crew in this afternoon to pick him up- the great team at Learning Years has been waiting to meet the trips! This is all happening so fast, I just can't believe it.

Cheers!

Date Night!

We did a pretty good job getting dressed up and pretending we weren't exhausted last night :)

Today has been a really tough day battling reflux babies once again. It seems the meds worked for about a week, and was blissful while it lasted. I am glad gma C is here to witness the torture we ALL go through struggling through feeds. We have been giving her ibuprofen to help ease the back pain involved every 4 hours during feeds. Does anyone have any new recommendations? We have tried everything, and I mean everything. I appreciate all the ideas, but we need to pull out the big guns if we are going to survive. I have heard of giving a half of some dissolvable adults prevacid, but don't have the details. The pharmacy compounded adult doses into liquid for us but I think it loses it's luster too quick sitting in the fridge and that's why we are back to square one.

Let's just say as much as I am stressed about leaving all of the work and babies at home, I am looking forward to going into the clinic tomorrow for a break, ha! I will be going into work for part days this week, in-between all of the appts and chaos we have scheduled during our last week here. I still can't believe we only have a week, it's bittersweet for sure!

All home, and healthy!

We are enjoying a nice Saturday with 4 healthy boys at home! Brody is back to his silly self and his face lesions are healing up great with the antibiotics! Thank goodness, what a scare. We had a very positive hospital experience and loved the peds team! We were happy we didn't have a visit to the PICU other than some friends checking in :) We will have to take Brody in for a check-up this week and see what the blood cultures showed, hopefully that will be our LAST visit to the clinic until we meet our new pediatrician in Minot.

We have been getting lots of packing done with the help of Gma Chari in town, it is all becoming quite real. We are so excited to be close to family again but are equally sad to be leaving what has been a wonderful home for the last six years :( The PNW is a great place to raise a family, and if we would have had our "planned" family of 4, we wouldn't be making this move. Everything happens for a reason, we are excited to see what our future holds for The Waind Party of Six! (We had to name our "new" blog~ we have been trying to figure out a new name so I can combine the 2 blogs I have failed to simultaneously keep up, ha!)

I must sign off and get a another baby feed in before I leave to get a new hair do...before date night tonight, yahoo!!!!

Cars

Thank goodness for Cars the movie and lightening McQueen! Now that our yo-yo is feeling better we needs lots to keep him entertained! His room confinement order has been listed and he is now able to go for walks to the playroom as long as his bandaid is covering the healing sores on his face. This is great news since it means they don't believe he has the meninga-whatever stuff and that he isn't contagious! Best news for our clan in close quarters for sure :)

If B continues to improve we may be able to take him home on oral antibiotics, that would be a blessing!

Thankful

It's too quiet at home tonight without Ben and my Brody, boo-boo, yo-yo ;) I thought we were through with this but I am so thankful for our wonderful families and friends who are carrying us through. I am also thankful for the amazing KP pediatricians: McPhee, Nash, Rozeboom, Donna, and now Dr. Cohen caring for B at the hospital. Dr. Brainer (sp?) from the PICU also came to give me a hug and his cell number and a hug- I was truly touched.

I got to FaceTime chat with Ben and B to say goodnight and it was wonderful. I wish we had these phones when E was in the hospital! Brody is very confused and inconsolable tonight, I pray they both get some needed rest. The trips are sleeping peacefully after a struggled reflux feed :( I was lucky to have great help.

Sent from my iPhone

Old Stomping Grounds, grrrrrrrr

I think I am still in a little bit of shock sitting in an all to
familiar hospital room, this time with my Brody-oh-yo-yo. I relived
the nightmare of being at the peds office with Brody and being told
that an ambulance was being called for us. Why do my boys go down hill
so fast and scare the bejesus out of me like this! Once again I
watched a poor little sick boy get much sicker, very fast. It started
with vomiting and a fever Sunday night but continued to get much worse
this morning as we watched 2 sores (that we thought were eczema or
psoriasis like his dear old mom) grow and start to look worrisome. We
couldn't get him to keep Tylenol or even a teaspoon of water down so
his 102 temp was taking a toll on his little body. I got even more
scared when Brody seemed to have a small seizure in the office while
Dr. MP was calling the hospital. I think that was probably the point I
really broke down and and started asking if there was possibly
anything else that could be thrown our way. The initial thought of
meningicococcal bacteria infection is no longer at the top of the list
after many looking closer at his rash and going over the timeline of
illness, rash and face sores. They are now thinking some kind of
bacteria (to be determined from blood cultures over the next day or
so) either started in his blood and landed on his skin (and causing
the sores on his face) or started as a skin infection and traveled to
his blood. Ugh. I don't quite get it all, I just hope they're right
and it's not the menigi-whatever and that the antibiotics he is
getting will heal him and today will be the roughest day before things
start to turn around. They say that we got him in early and did
everything right but we can't help but think we could have got him in
sooner (Ben was half way to the ER last night at midnight before
turning around because B kept saying he was fine) but maybe if we
would have went in early like before it would have been missed and we
would have been sent home and the story would be much different,
similar to Evan's rapid decline. (I am glad I just talked my way
through that! Phew, I think our parent-senses were right on and B is
getting taken care of)

It's pretty hard watching him in so much pain today, we are trying to
distract him with the movie Cars and his favorite toys. The
anti-nausea meds have helped and he is keeping a bit down now. Ben is
going to stay here tonight and I need to head home soon and relieve
some help (thanks Denise and fellow trip mom, Angela!! They answered
my frantic calls and came through for us in our time of need and we
are very grateful). Ben's mom is on a plane as I type and we are all
thankful and very excited to see her.

We are hanging in there....barely.

--
:) Brooke

Squeaky Clean

 Evan and Riley are excited for bathtime!!

 Payton, Evan and Riley enjoying their first triple bath!!

 Riley is finding ways to get more than just his hand in his mouth!

Brody loves to hold his baby brothers <3 (yes, our couch is missing half of its slip cover, come on IKEA!!)

Bathing is quite the process with so many boys under the age of 3. Sometimes when we we smell Brody we have to question when exactly it was he was last bathed...don't judge!! The trips are lucky if they get a full soak every 4-5 days, all the boys get washed up intermittently in-between on as as needed basis though. Ben is really the only one who consistently gets clean everyday- ha! I did give each trip a wash in the kitchen sink this morning, sadly they are getting too big and I am not sure how much longer I will be able to benefit from that luxury!

We are finally on new reflux meds as of tonight and are praying to the reflux gods that it brings some relief to the boys (and also the parents!!!!!!!!) Poor Payton went down from his 4 month check-up weight of 12lb1oz to 11lb10oz this last Wednesday :( He has it the worst and we struggle to get 1-2 ounces down him every 4 hours. He has also been separated from his bros in bed and moved into the rock-n-play inclined sleeper to make home elevated and more comfortable. We are learning all sorts of new things this go-around after having such a perfect baby the first time (or is it that we have forgotten any problems that Brody had at this age??)

We are also happy to report that our family's homes in Minot survived the flood!! (our hearts go out to those that didn't) We are hoping that they will get the all clear to move back in to them any day now. Another positive is that we had beautiful weather today and the weekend should be even better, is it true....could summer be coming...finally???? Lets hope so!! We are looking forward to our next visitors coming on the 17th (Matt, Melissa and cousin Drey!) who will be helping us tie up loose ends and drive the caravan back home :) We may be blessed with family coming down from Seattle area mixed in as well- yahoo!

Hopefully we will have some pics to post from a trip to the Zoo tomorrow and a BBQ with some friends :)