EEG Results and reflection on the past year March 27, 2008

Keagan’s EEG results came back today and they found nothing abnormal. That apparently does not rule anything out though and we will still be following up with his neurologist. Which is nothing surprising. I don’t actually have to make a new appt as he was going in next month for his 1 year follow up anyway.

I can not believe all of the craziness that surrounded my little guy’s birth was almost a year ago. I still can’t fully describe the pain we went through. Having your baby taken away from you so close after birth and worrying if he is ever going to live a normal life- or live at all- is terrible I wouldn’t wish it upon anyone.

We have been so blessed to have him be as healthy as he is. He is such a smart, happy little guy. Just how he should be. Today he said “bye-bye” for the first time. It was so cute.

I wish that I remembered happiness when I thought of his birth. I really don’t. There are happy moments in there, but more pain and fear surround it than anything. The day we brought him home from the NICU- that was a happy day.

I recently heard the term “birth rape” for when doctors force procedures upon women in labor and delivery. I don’t know if that’s exactly how I would describe what I went through…. but it may be close. I feel like I had my choices taken from me, I feel like I was violated. I know that the neglagence of the hospital hurt my son and I know I live with pain from it every day. Is that rape? I don’t know. But it isn’t right.

So as I get ready to celebrate my son’s birthday, I feel happy of course, but I also feel some of that pain brought up again. I hope one day I get to have a normal birth an a healthy child who gets to be at home with me right away. I wish I could go back and time and change things with Keagan, but I can’t. I can love this little guy more than I ever knew was possible, however.

Off to spend some time with my beautiful son whom I am blessed to have the joy of loving.

If you need to laugh, read this. March 5, 2008

So today I went for lunch with my mother and my son. On the way back to the car, I felt a pain on my leg. And then I felt it again… and again. It started to really hurt. I hopped around a bit and then told my mom to take Keagan so I could figure out what it was. Then I felt something crawling on my leg. Some sort of evil little creature had somehow gotten into my pants and worked its way to my upper thigh.So there I am, in the parking lot of Panera, hopping around like an idiot trying to decide how to deal with this. I wanted that creature out of my pants and I wanted it out NOW!

So my mom takes Keagan and wanders off somewhere and I go into the car and take my pants off. I had several welts up and down my leg left by whatever evil creature worked its way into my jeans.. I wanted to shake out my pants, but I don’t want said creature free in the car. And well, being half naked, I didn’t want to get out of the car and shake them out myself.

I tried to first wave to my mother, who had wandered away in the courtyard. She was showing Keagan a flower. I swear to God she looked right at me, and then back to Keagan and the flowers. So I honk the horn. She looks to the Saturn again and goes back to Keagan and the flower. The windows don’t roll down unless the key is in, so I opened the door to yell at her to come take the pants, exposing bits of my half naked self to half of Gig Harbor. Once again, my mom looks at me and then goes back to playing with Keagan. So I hit the horn again and finally she realized it was me making all that noise and she came.

She swears she didn’t know it was me…. she thought it was coming from another car…I think she was secretly mad at me for something…

Anyway, back to nearly naked Steph and the angry pants creature….
I handed my mom the pants and she handed me Keagan. She shook them out to no avail. I turned to the seat.

And
I
Screamed

(like a little girl)

on the seat was the biggest dead bee I have ever seen. I am not kidding, this thing was HUGE. I really didn’t mean to scream, but it was just so large. That, and I was not positive it was dead yet.

So mom takes Keagan back (who at this point is crying because Mama screamed) I fling the bee out of the car and close the door. In trying to wiggle my way back into my pant in the crowded back seat I flash the remaining half of Gig Harbor and we move on our way.

My leg still hurts and I still have that creepy, crawly feeling.

Just thought you may have needed a comedic break to your day.

Big Day for a Little Man February 26, 2008

Keagan’s third tooth cut through today and he was hardly fussy at all, thank goodness! I knew it was close. It’s his first top tooth and it has me worrying a bit about biting during nursing! I am sure it will be fine, though.

In other baby news, Keagan said a new word today! Dog! He loves our dogs, so I am not surprised that “dog” is among  his first words.

This is Max and Roxy

So far Keagan says:

Mama, Papa, Hi, Yeah, Boob, Dog and Boo (book)

Go baby, go It is so incredible to watch him learn and grow. He was so proud of “dog” tonight. He said it over and over and squealed with joy. It makes me so happy to see my little man thrive. I know it’s nothing amazing in the grand scheme of things, but to me it is such a miracle to see the way children (especially mine!) develop all around. Language skills are such a wonderful gift and it’s so amazing to watch these skills come into being. In the not terribly distant future, I will be able to hold a conversation with my little man. Wow.

Neurologist February 21, 2008

So the doctor said that there’s a good chance it was just a Febrile (fever induced) seizure. Because of Keagan’s age and history, there’s a very good chance he’ll have more, so we have to be careful when he may be coming down with something. BUT to be sure that it was just Febrile, they want to do an EEG. If they EEG looks good, then they don’t have to do an MRI. If it does not look good, then we’ll have to do an MRI and sedate him etc, so I am really hoping that it shows nothing abnormal. His last EEG looked great. Then again, he was two days old when he had that one.

Anyway, that’s all the Keagan news. Keep us in your prayers.

My little lacitvist February 19, 2008

My little man said his 5th (?) word last night.

“Boob.”

Over and over again. He really does love to breastfeed. I am wishing I had called it a breast when talking to him  now

Oh well. At least I know he’s fond of nursing!

Poor little Keagan February 19, 2008

He’s broken out in a rash. I think it’s from the amoxicillin. I am allergic and so are both my grandpas. Of course I didn’t know this until AFTER he’d broken out all over his little body. So we have to go to his pediatrician later today.<br><br>He sees his neurologist tomorrow. Poor kid is always at the doctor it seem

Scary February 18, 2008

Keagan had a seizure on Saturday.

If you only know us from this blog, you probably don’t know that Keagan has some neurological problems from an injury caused to his brain from improper use of vacuum suction on his brain at birth. We’ve known that he is at risk for seizures,  but we have not had any experiences of it since he was released from the NICU at 11 days old.

Keagan was a bit off all morning on Saturday. He had a slight (99) fever, but he still wanted to eat, play etc, just at a slower pace than normal. He was napping on my lap and started to shake a bit. At first I thought he was just waking up and wasn’t pleased about it, so I tried to get him to nurse. He started shaking harder and his little arm came out from under him and flailed about. It last somewhere in the range of a minute, it’s hard to say really how long it was. I was pretty much in shock. It was so scary to see his little body move like that. I can’t describe it… He cried for a few minutes and then seemed fairly okay… but I was pretty sure he’d had a seizure and we have been warned that is a big possibility for Keagan because of his history, so I knew I needed to take him to a hospital right away.

I tried to call Nick, but had no luck. He was snowboarding up at Crystal so his phone was in the car. I went to my mom’s (she lives near by) and had her drive us to Mary Bridge because I felt like I was too upset to make that drive safely. (Nick did get ahold of me about an hour later and came as quickly as he could)

When we got there, his fever was 102. They gave him Ibprofin and then we waited for the doctor. After checking him out and talking to me, he kind of got nervous and said he was going to have the head doctor talk to me. He came in and said I was probably right, it sounded like it was a seizure. He said since Keagan’s fever had gone up so much that it could have just been a Febrile seizure, but with Keagan’s history we needed to be more concerned. He has to go to his neuro this week and they will schedule an MRI to make sure his brain looks good.

He also has an ear infection (most likely the source of the fever) so he’s on an antibiotic, motrin, tylenol, and they gave us an anti-seizure med in case he has another one. Normally, I wouldn’t want him on all of that, but they are worried about him getting a fever since it could cause another seizure.

He’s doing well now. He’s actually been in a pretty good mood since his fever went down. Unfortunately, we’ve had some problems with diarrhea as a side effect from the antibiotics. This is worrisome because the doctors said that dehydration could cause a seizure as well. Hopefully, we are able to avoid any more seizures.

As of right now, we don’t really know what is going on. We’ll know more after he sees his neuro this week.

Photo fun :) February 12, 2008

Ten months February 12, 2008

Keagan is ten months old today. In two months he’ll be a year old! These ten months have been wonderful. Watching him grow and learn has been so amazing. He’s doing really well, too. He is such a determined little guy! And happy! I love waking up with him next to me and my hubby in our bed every morning and seeing his big smiles! It’s great. He is also getting VERY big! I can not keep up with his clothes because he is growing so quickly! I am going to have to come back and add some photos to this in a little while. He is changing sooo much.

Travel-mania February 9, 2008

So over Thanksgiving, Nick and I got new phones. These phones came with free flights, which is pretty awesome. Soon we will get vouchers and be able to schedule our trip.
Neither of us has traveled much. I want this trip to be tons of fun. We can’t decide where to go. We have the following options:

New York, NY
Atlanta, GA
Boston, MA
Orlando, FL
Miami, FL
Chicago, IL
Las Vegas, NV
Washington DC
Los Angles, CA
Dallas, TX

Who has been to one of these places? Was it fun? Boring?

Our first thought was to go to New York, but it’s pretty pricey (hotels,etc) . Both of us have been to LA so no need to go there.We thought about going to Dallas as we’ve talked about moving that way some day, but our friends who used to live there told us it’s not a great vacation spot.

So tell me…where should we go?

Oh ya, we will be bringing Keagan, so factor traveling with a toddler too.  (Ack! Toddler! But he will be by the time this trip happens!)