Our Family Blog: Settling In

It's been a really long week! It's been nice to be home but it was a big adjustment for Tyler. He's used to the bright florescents, the beeping IV machines, the nurses coming and going. Here it's darker, quieter and with less people to spoil him. I don't get meals delivered and they sure don't make themselves, so Tyler has to get used to playing on his own.

The first day he was really clingy, I hardly put him down for anything because he'd scream. When he screams, he gets really sweaty and his chest dressing comes off. Yesterday I put him in the ring sling and worked for about 90 minutes. I got a lot done but my shoulder hurt. A couple people are sending other types of carriers, they are supposed to be easier on the back and shoulders. I heard from the other cancer moms that their babies were clingy and often needed to be worn or held all day. Can't really blame them, they are sore and feel like crap. With Tyler's upcoming round of chemo, I'll be needing that. He'll be on steriods and chemo, which was the worst time emotionally for both of us. He was moody and clingy and it was hard seeing him that way. The other moms refer to it as "roid rage" and for a good reason!

It seems like every method I learned from Dawson just doesn't work in Tyler's case! It's like starting all over again. I worked so hard not to spoil Tyler, he was so content, he even learned how to coo himself to sleep in his crib at just a few months old. Now he refuses his crib. I'd love to say he sleeps in there, but he doesn't. I have no clue how, but it doesn't matter how deep of a sleep he's in, when I try to transfer him to his crib, he screams. Not just lowering him in, he knows when I stand up to move him and he stirs. So I stand there and shush him back to sleep. Then I walk slowly to his room, feels like this takes minutes to even get there. Never fails, as soon as I walk into the room he fusses. If he doesn't fuss then (rarely), I'll be lowering him into the crib and he'll wake up, scream, arch his back and flop off the boppy pillow onto the crib mattress. Then he gets to his hands and knees, backs up to sit, reaches for the crib railing and is standing up. In seconds!! I have no clue how he can go from sleeping to actively climbing up in his crib in a matter of seconds but he does. Then he's WIDE awake. So we sit down and do it all over again.

Sometimes he sleeps on the couch, which I really don't like because he can move. I cram couch pillows all around him and he really can't move when he's on his back, so he just squirms and screams when he wakes up and I run in there and get him. He usually wakes up in the middle of the night once, so I bring him to bed to nurse. A bad habit, but after a couple nights of getting no sleep, trying to get him to sleep in his crib, I gave in. I need sleep to keep up with these 2! With Dawson I let him cry to sleep at this age. He knew it was bedtime, and it got easier each night we did it. I can't with Tyler, he'll sweat too much. So I'm at a loss. This will only get worse once we start the chemo, so I'm really hoping to get a routine established before then and stick with it. The other big thing is that he shares a room with Dawson, so his crying wakes him up. I would put Tyler to bed first, but Dawson cries when put to bed also, which wakes up Tyler. So it's a lose-lose situation. We're debating moving Tyler's crib into our room or something. I'm hoping he'll miraculously start sleeping well before it comes to that!

Tyler still isn't eating baby food but he's closer to it than before. He's playing with the spoon and a few times if we took it slow enough, he'd grab onto the spoon, stare at it a while and then open his mouth. The nurses and everyone were more pushy which really turned him away from eating solids. I always thought it's best to go easy and make it an enjoyable experience. I did get some in there a couple time just so he knew what it tasted like. He didn't seem to mind too much, so hopefully he'll start eating soon.

Dawson has settled in well. He's back to his old routines and old toys. He loves being home. He even puts up with Tyler a little better than before. I think he realizes that this is as good as it gets! He seems very happy to be home. He's been saying "hot" more often now. I haven't heard the other new words again though. I haven't heard from the EI (early intervention) lady yet, I'm hoping she'll call Monday since Tuesday will be crazy (if Tyler makes counts). Tomorrow we get a visit from Home Care to do labs, so I'll know sometime tomorrow afternoon if we're going in on Tuesday or not. I'm not looking forward to getting up at 5am to get there by 7! Thankfully chemo days shouldn't be that early, it's only a biopsy thing.

I'm doing pretty good. I've been having some weird abdominal pain. Tyler was standing in my lap and stepped right above my hip and I think he bruised something. Sometimes I don't feel anything, sometimes it hurts when I'm carrying someone around. I have no more jaw pain but that section of jawline, part of my lip and chin are still numb. 3 of the holes are healing up well. The one that keeps getting food stuck in it isn't healing so well. It's red and a little sensitive. Hopefully that'll start healing soon. I need to use that mouthwash more often, I've been bad about that!

I've been getting more done in the last couple days. I finally unpacked! I got the bottles washed, they just use and rinse them at the hospital, then send them all home for me to wash. I got everything sorted, including the medical bags from the last few times. I have quite an impressive drawer of ointments. Mostly diaper ointments, but also eye treatments, bone marrow site cream, even some aromatherapy. I'm moving some supplies to next to the changing table. They are currently across the room, which works well because I can't have that high of a thing on the tall dresser. I also need a spot for all the chemo stuff that's coming that needs to be higher up than his basic supplies, so this should work well.

I got my summer clothes put away, and my maternity stuff that I kept putting off. I can actually start using my dresser again! My next projects are the kitchen and getting the tree up. I need to sort and find homes for a bunch of stuff before I'm able to do the tree but I'm really hoping to get it up this week. The boys will love the lights so I'm excited to get it up. Yet I'm not looking forward to dealing with them messing with it!

Here's a really cute pic of Dawson