Confessions of a Blogaholic

1. Midwife appointment today. Am now switching to appointments every 2 weeks. She said my weight gain is spot on--exactly where it should be, which makes me feel a little less cowish. Baby is doing very well with a very strong heartbeat that the midwife finds immediately every time. The good ole' ute is measuring 27 weeks, so a little ahead. Glucose test at next appointment. Fun times :)

2. The home passed the inspection with flying colors. Just a couple of minor things to be fixed (clean the chimney flue, clean the garden tub drain, replace counterbalances on the windows), and one "major" thing (cost= approx $1500), to replace a couple of the windows whose seals have broken and are accumulating condensation. We'll see what comes of our "request to remedy" paperwork, but all-in-all, those are pretty small repairs.

3. My windshield on my Jeep cracked for the second time in less than a year. Perfect timing for that one, but we're waiting until the house is settled to do anything about it.

4. Exams this week, which means a relatively light workload for me. Then, we start the research paper which is a helluva project until mid-March.

5. Baby shower is scheduled and I'm pretty excited about the whole thing.

6. Slowly but surely beginning to pack and clean for the big move. So much exciting stuff going on!

since I'm a HUGE blabbermouth and think that EVERYONE wants to know EVERY detail of my entire existence...

WE GOT THE HOUSE!!!!!!

I keep coming to my blog to look at the pictures I posted the other day. I CANNOT believe we are going to be the owners of that home on March 29. How exciting! Plus, the way our mortgage works out, we will only be paying a couple hundred more a month FOR A HOUSE!!! I feel so satisfied and content with this whole thing!

Already??? Seriously??? I don't know what it is about getting older, but it seems like every year of my life just goes faster and faster. As my "To-Do" list gets longer, I have less and less time to get it done!

On the list now...
--Call tax lady
--Schedule hospital walk-through for February
--Get these people to accept the terms in our offer for their house!!
--Semester exams in a week
--Baby appointment next Monday
--Alexis' boy's b-day party next Saturday (must remember to ask what we can get him that is decent in price since we're scrounging!)
--Buy said b-day gift
--Grade exams
--Get grades into progress book for Qtr 2 and Semester
--Print and copy stuff for Qtr 3
--Fax all offer paperwork tomorrow morning
--Send thank you card to Nate's uncle

This list goes on and on...Luckily, I'm organized to a fault, so it will all get accomplished, but the minute one thing is crossed off, another 4 are in line to take its place. Such is life, though, eh? During the summers, when I'm off, I NEVER have a to-do list, because the minute I think of something that needs done, I do it. No waiting. No lists. I've got nothing but time, so I do it. I'm sure all of that will change this summer, though...

Speaking of the baby coming along, I really need my organs to stop pressing on my right lung. What started as a small problem a month ago when I would sit down too long has turned into a persistent and extremely painful ache in my right lung and upper back. You know how when you run (which I don't do) you sometimes get that painful "stitch" or cramp in your side, and to make it stop you stretch your arms above your head? Yeah, that "stitch" is what I am now feeling MOST of the time, except no amount of stretching makes it go away. It is EXTREMELY painful, and it feels like there is just no room in my chest for all of my body parts. I hope that like the sciatic nerve pain I had for a couple months, this goes away soon. I certainly can't stand up every minute of every day until the baby comes, ya kno?

Back to school tomorrow. Looks like no snow this week, so nothing to look forward to as far as days off or late arrivals. Good thing, though, since exams are next week and the kiddos need all the review time they can get!

Here's the 4 bedroom, 2.5 bathroom house we are making an offer on...(The pictures are in reverse order, sorry!)

View of the house from the backyard


The master bath


View of the master bath from the master bedroom


Master Bedroom


Formal Dining Room


Kitchen


Kitchen


Living Room


Formal Sitting Room


The Home

I'm trying to get my mind off of all the stuff floating around in it right now...so, let's answer a random journal prompt (the same prompt I gave my kids today for their journals).

Question: You have to get rid of three things in your house--What do you get rid of?

Hmm.....That's tough. I try not to keep a bunch of "junk" lying around, but some stuff ends up accumulating anyhow.

1) The first thing I'd get rid of is the old King-sized comforter off our bed. It snagged on the U-Haul when we moved to this apartment over a year-and-a-half ago. Plus, it was NEVER washed (gross, I know!). The only reason I find myself hanging onto it is because it was so expensive. It was a $300 comforter that we got at M.acy's for like $85. We have since replaced it, and it is completely useless, but I just haven't gotten around to throwing it out.

2) The second thing I'd get rid of is my growing stacks of mail that haven't been filed. Most of our bills and what-not are online now, but I still feel like I have to keep anything that even remotely might be important. My filing cabinet broke when we moved, so I've been using just a little crate. Because it is upstairs and I open my mail in the kitchen, the stacks pile up on the stairs--must take care of them!!

3) The third thing I'd get rid of is the laundry room door. It suffered a minor casualty soon after we moved in when Nate and his friend were trying to bring a speaker into the laundry room storage. The door now has a hole in it, so it has to be replaced before we move (the $$ the apartment will charge to replace it is much more that Lowe's would charge for a new one).

I'm finally coming to terms with everything that happened to Stink. The dermatologist left me a pretty sweet message in which she said none of this was our fault (something I had been thinking), he was just a pretty sick cat, and that we have gone above what could ever be expected as a pet owner. I can now talk about him without bawling, and I now understand that we did what had to be done...it doesn't make the fact that it happened any easier, but it helps to deal with it. His ashes are back, and we've set up a pretty nice display for the little guy. All we can do now is move forward...

And in moving forward, we are off to begin looking at some houses tomorrow despite the massive amounts of "white death" headed our way. We're set on closing on April 1, so we need to be in contract by the end of this month. Luckily, once we changed our expectations for the types of homes we were interested in, we've gotten a consistent and steady flow of houses popping up in our search. Right now, there are 22 on our list. That's a lot of houses to look at, so I'm hoping the right house is in there for us.

...is having to know when and having the courage, strength, and unconditional love to let them go.



Stink was an amazing cat. He was smarter and more personable than your average cat. He was our Alpha male, and he totally ruled the roost in our home. When he was younger (until he was about 2.5), he played fetch just like a dog. You could throw a toy and he would go and get it and bring it back to you. Sometimes, he would pop up in bed (while we were trying to sleep) with the toy in his mouth and meow to get you to play with him. Many, many mornings, we woke up with toys all over the place in the bed. He was also a cuddler. He loved to be held at night from the time we first got him. He'd lay right next to you and let you wrap your arms around him all night, or he'd curl up at the end of the bed and wrap himself around your foot. He was precocious and persistent--always wanting to be in your food and on the counters when we were cooking. He'd eat ANYTHING!!! He was obsessed with drinking water out of dirty dishes that were left in the sink. He stunk to absolute high hell sometimes and was probably the dirtiest cat ever--never cleaned his claws, never covered his horrific smelling poop, I always had to clean his ears for him. He was so sweet....until the end, he would sit in my lap for hours at a time and purr while I held him. In the last two months, he developed this cool talent of peeing in the toilet--no clue where he learned it, he just randomly started doing it one day. It was pretty cool. He was pretty cool...no, he was fantastic and amazing and we'll never find another cat like Stink.

Yesterday, we were faced with the decision that nearly all pet owners have to make at some point in time. Our baby, Stink, was 3.5 years old, and for all of the those 3.5 years, we have had him in and out of doctors, treating him for this and that, paying for this test and that test, giving him this shot and that shot. 3.5 years of feeling like we were shooting in the dark in the hopes of finding a cure for the little guy. Last June, he weighed in at 14 lbs when he was diagnosed with allergies, and we did what the doctors told us to do and followed his immunotherapy program to the T. We gave him the exact amount of the needed shot on the exact day. Every week, his skin and itching got worse and worse, and no one would listen to us. When I continually called the vet to tell them something was very wrong, I was repeatedly told that I needed to have patience and that he would get worse before he got better. Stink lost all of the hair on his head, neck, and a big strip that ran the length of his back.

In November, we were finally given a referral to a dermatologist at O.SU...after paying nearly a thousand dollars and trying several more meds, it seemed on some days like he was getting better. Some days, he would eat 3 bowls of food, which was great. Some days, we could see signs of the old Stink....lying on his back waiting for his belly to be rubbed (like a dog), running downstairs when someone was in the kitchen, jumping up on the counters, meowing. I felt like he was gaining weight...I felt better about him. We scheduled a skin biopsy for next Friday, Jan 8, which would be able to tell us what was infecting his skin; though the dermatologist told us from the beginning it was likely that the immunotherapy had compromised his immune system so much that something more serious could be going on inside him (lupus, AIDS, etc). I was holding out so much hope for this biopsy...I just wanted an answer for us and for him. I wanted it to be done--I wanted to know the cure and to stop stabbing in the dark.

On Thursday, Stink started missing the counter at my mom's house when he would try to jump up there. Not unusual...all my cats have had that problem before. On Friday, he was stumbling every time he walked. Moving around, he would twitch and look so weak. I spent so much time with him on Friday, cuddled up in the bed like we used to do or holding him, wrapped in a towel, on my mom's couch. I knew he was sick, and I knew how bad he looked. I called the emergency services at O.SU, and after being told it would cost $150 just to bring him in, I decided to wait until Saturday to take him to his regular vet.

After a nearly sleepless night tossing and turning and worrying and remembering how Stink used to be, I got a call from my mom at exactly 8:30am. She said he looked much worse, and in my heart, I knew that by the end of the day, I would no longer have my amazing Stink...We headed straight to my mom's, and when we walked in, he was swaddled in a blanket looking so sick and small and so much like a kitten. I held him in the towel the whole way to the vet and while in the examining room. He was down to 7 pounds. We waited, waited, waited for the vet to come in, but I was somewhat thankful for the wait because the longer we sat there, the more time we had before we had to know the truth. We were both a mess. We tried to let Stink walk, but he couldn't stand without falling down. My heart was breaking, and I could see Nate's heart breaking in the tears that were falling from his very soul.

When the vet finally came in, we knew from the look on her face it was over. She told us several scenarios. Either whatever had infected his skin had made its way to his cerebellum causing severe neurological problems, or he's always had some sort of immune system deficiency that has never been caught and has been the underlying root of all his problems. She said we could try another antibiotic to see if it would reach his brain, but the chance of success was only 25%...she said we could do a spinal tap on Monday, but who knows if he would survive the anesthetic. But...if we have learned anything from Stink's life, it is that no amount of money, no matter how great or small, is capable of fixing some problems. We could've paid for the meds and the procedure, no problem, but it was just going to cause him more pain, and we would have to watch him suffer. We made our decision with the utmost love and care; his whole life, we have given him everything and tried everything we could, and he, in return, has given us unconditional love and every last bit of his strength. It didn't matter how much we had fought him to get a pill down his throat, he would turn right around a minute later and love on us like he knew we were only doing it for him. How much more can you ask from an animal than to try as hard as he has try and to fight as hard as he has fought his whole life.

We got some time with him before the time came, and my mom (thank God) came up to sit with us. We all held him and loved him and told him how much he meant to us. I kept telling him how sorry I was...sorry for making him worse with the immunotheraphy, sorry that his life ended up this way, sorry that we didn't have more time with him...I was just so sorry. He looked at us, so weak in his blanket, and I kept feeling like his eyes were begging for this to be over. At one point, while I was holding him, his little hand reached out from the blanket and landed on my lip...someday, I will see that as the sign for "it's ok," but I can't see it that way now. I feel too guilty and too hurt from our decision. Holding him and waiting for the moment to come, all I could think about was how I wished I didn't have a soul so I never had to feel this kind of pain. I wished my heart wasn't so big, so there was less of it to break when things like this happen.

Then, at noon, it was over, and we left the vet empty-handed. My baby, OUR baby was gone. I just hope he knew how much he was loved and always will be loved. I hope he knew how much it hurt us to make that decision and how painful it's going to be to get through our grief. I've never felt so much pain...I've never cried so much...I can't seem to get the hurt to stop. Good memories, bad memories, memories of his last moments, memories when we got him as a kitten, it all hurts. I know that no matter what we did or how much we would pay (which we would've given EVERYTHING if it would've made him better), our original Stink was gone. What we've had for the last year or so was not our baby, but it was a fighter...a fighter who gave his all, but some days couldn't get up long enough to live.

Our beautiful, amazing, cool, fantastic, pesky, loving, cuddling, playful, wonderful, talented, smart, dirty Stink will forever be in our hearts, and eventually, my soul will stop aching long enough for me to see the humanity and love in the decision we had to make.

Rest in peace, my Baby Bean...