That's the edge of the earth, not a blade.
I can't believe I haven't posted since July. Well, yes, I can. I've had a bad case of busy and a worse case of completely unmotivated. I've been blue on a daily basis since about September, not so much depressed as not wanting to work, unable to focus—an absence of will.
I've been tested for low thyroid about 3 times in the last 4 years and nothing is ever wrong. I asked my general practitioner (GP) for some hormone tests—a friend mentioned I might be going through the change of life kinda early. The freaking GP told me he did the tests, but he didn't. He treated me like some kind of stupid, imaginative housewife and didn't listen to me at all. It's gotten so bad, that I finally called for a GYN appt.
And a MIRACLE OCCURED.
Normally, I can't get in to see the GYN without a trip to my GP (the jerk) unless I needed my annual poke and prod. I did happen to need one. And there was an appointment... if I left in 5 minutes. Usually, it takes two to three months to get an appointment with a real GYN. But I got one that very day!
Anyway, sorry if this is too much information, got my poke and prod and then talked to the GYN for quite a bit about what was bothering me. And surprise, surprise, she LISTENED. She is now doing the tests that the GP said he did. Which reminds me, I need to go get blood drawn tomorrow before breakfast.
It would be really nice to be able to link all these niggling, demoralizing health problems together. It would be nice to know what the problem is. It would be really nice to feel better!
We'll see.
So, back to September...
I got the kids back to school. My eldest is struggling through 5th grade... her first quarter interms were 2F's and 3D's. Turns out that she had not been doing her homework... and then lying about it that she had. So, we had a shit-hit-the-fan few weeks. Now, she's mostly doing her work... I guess. She is still sneakier than I have the presence of mind to ferret out. But I keep hoping that she will learn that it is easier to do it when it's due than to do it late, take the hit on grades, get in trouble at home and feel bad.
Sigh.
Some days, I really hate being a parent.
My middlest started kindergarden. Most days she does just fine. Some days, like day before yesterday, she shouts, disturbs the class, has tantrums, and throws her shoes. So, after my own health problems, my littlest's, making sure my oldest doesn't fail 5th grade, and laundry and dishes for 5... oh yeah, and being a successful journalist and author, I need to do something about my middlest.
Does your five year old throw her shoes in school?
God help us, mine does.
Now, on to my littlest. If you've been reading the blog, you know that she's not been well. At first they thought she had some really scary kind of muscular dystrophy. Then they weren't sure she had anything. Now... the question marks are only more questiony and marky.
I took her to the neurologist yesterday. He saw her get up from the floor, run, picked her up (to see if she slipped down, a sign of poor core strength)... and so on. She did well. But at the same time, something is not right... at least from my point of view. I worry that I'm being paranoid, but the doctor is taking me seriously. "There's something I can't put my finger on," I say. "She's not overtly weak, but she's not 100%"
I kind of wonder if I am so anxious about another "episode" (as the Neuro calls it) that I see weakness where it is just normal development. Littlest DID regress significantly... back to early toddlerhood as far as her physical abilities go. It's been a good six months since it was really clear that she was gaining ground on the muscle weakness. It wouldn't be abnormal if she was still a tiny bit behind in places.
Anyway, the doctor was clear. He trusts me not to be hysterical... he is always saying what a "cool customer" I am. I think he means it as a compliment... but it's hard. Because I know he thought ill of me when we missed seeing him in May because of galivanting off to a funeral, cross country on a moment's notice. Though I DID leave a message on his nurse's voice mail, it's obvious he never got it. He teased me about it yesterday. He's hardly in a position to know it's a sore spot, but it was... anyway, he could see why it wasn't such a big deal, because she had been steadily improving in May.
I am, I guess, a cool customer. I deceded in the beginning that if I didn't maintain some sort of serenity about this, that I was going to go crazy and be completely useless to everyone. Getting all upset was not going to make me more effective! I DID get all upset. You all saw it. I got completely hysterical and cried for days... but it was nearly two months before she saw the neurologist. I had come to terms with the worst possibilities and accepted that maybe all I could do was fight a losing battle. I couldn't stay freaked out for that long. I have a family to take care of!
Sigh.
I'm getting behind myself.
The upshot of this is that the Neuro doesn't think I'm hyterical and paranoid—even if maybe I think I am. "Trust your intuition," my friend Adele whose son has Duchennes says. The Neuro feels sure that Littlest has some kind of either mild muscular dystrophy or mild metabolic muscular disorder. With her CPK (the measure of muscle fluid leakage that is a primary indicator of MD) being normal now, there is no point to doing a muscle biopsy. Doc wants to see her next summer. He said we should continue to keep an eye on her through out her childhood, and be vigilant in case she has another episode. We're here through 2010 and he's here through 2008, both of which are good things.
So beyond having Doc's orders to maintain a healthy level of paranoia, there are only a couple other considerations. When Littlest is no longer little and wants to have rug rats of her own, she may need genetic counseling to make sure that none of hers are born with whatever she has. If she has another episode, we'll need to pursue it to finding out what's wrong... but she may never have another episode. Finally, if she needs surgery, the anesthesiologist needs to know that she has some kind of non-specific dystrophic or metabolic muscular disorder. Doc says weird things can happen under general anesthesia when there's a muscular disorder.
That's it.
After everything we've been through, it doesn't seem all that bad.
Oh wait, I almost forgot!
I went to Skate America this year (Oct 18-23). I stayed with my friends Ruthie and Trudi and had an absolute BLAST. I took a ZILLION pictures with my new camera (a Canon EOS 20D for the curious and now insanely jealous). I'll post the URL later when I get more of them up.
Sigh, I will also post a very funny story about Aaron Parchem, Julia Obertas, and Tamara Moskvina. but, now I have to go to a book fair at my kids school.
