Chris
Chris started his 2nd year of dental school at the end of August. We've been hearing about the dreaded 2nd year ever since we got here. The 2nd year is the hardest. The month of October will be the worst month of your life. Etc, etc. Well, it's October! Chris is halfway through his midterms. He averages about 3-4 hours of sleep per night. This morning he woke up at 3am to start studying. He leaves for school at 6:15am and he gets home between 8:30-9:30pm. He is absolutely exhausted all the time. It's so hard to sit back and watch him suffer through it all. He works so hard!!! In other news, he lost 55 pounds this summer. He did the Medifast diet and was very successful. He even coached quite a few people and helped them achieve their health goals as well. As of right now, he has gained about 10 pounds back. Once he started really exercising (he did Insanity) he gained about 3-4 pounds in muscle. It's pretty impressive to me that he's been able to stay healthy enough to gain only 6-7 pounds back. Some people gain more than that when they get off the program. He has set health goals for himself in regards to what he eats and how often he exercises. Until midterms started, he was exercising from 5:00-5:45am before leaving for school. To be honest, I kept waiting for him to quit. But he never did! I am so impressed with his hard work and dedication in all areas of his life. He is a great student, a great father, a great husband, and a great man. I'm so grateful for all of his sacrifices and dedication to making sure his family is loved and happy.
Matthew
Matthew has started kindergarten! He attends Cornwells Elementary School in the Bensalem Township School District. His teacher's name is Mrs. Bocolo. I'll post more on that later, but for now I will say that he enjoys school and is doing well. He is so tired these days, but he has adjusted well and I am very proud of him. He leaves for school at 8:36am (he rides the bus) and he arrives back home at 3:56pm. What a long day for a kindergartener!! I feel so bad for him. He comes home exhausted from working hard each day. Also, they only have 1 recess. Is that normal? I remember having a morning recess and a lunch recess when I was in school. Anyway, his school is great for a public school in the area that we live. He needs to keep practicing his writing and reading, but he is doing very well so far. He also started gymnastics this year. He needs some help learning how to use his body right. He doesn't have very good balance or control of his body right now, so we're hoping that gymnastics will help. It put a bit of a strain on our budget this year paying for it, but it is absolutely worth it. The place he goes to is called Leaps and Bounders and it's great! He started going on Wednesdays from 4:30-5:30, but we recently switched him to Saturdays at 11:30 so that he could have a better coach and be in a class with fewer boys. The hope is that he'll get more one-on-one time. He is such a sweet boy. I miss him so much!
Aaron
Aaron and I have been spending a lot of time together since he is the only one at home during the week. He started Preschool this year at the Picariello Tot Recreation Playground. It was recommended to us by a friend who used to live here. Both of her kids went there and she loved it. It's two days a week from 9-11:30am and it's actually affordable - which is huge for us. Aaron loves going to school on Tuesdays and Thursdays! He is doing very well in his class. Right now they're learning about their colors. He is having some issues with his speech that we are a little concerned with. His lower frenum is attached (he is tongue tied) and we've seen an oral surgeon about it. We're not sure if we will have him get the surgery or not yet. We wanted to wait and see how his speech does. As of right now it IS inhibiting his ability to speak properly, but I'm not sure how detrimental that will be in the future. We'll talk to his pediatrician about it next month. Aaron also has his first 2 cavities. We always knew that Aaron would have issues with his teeth. I'm sad that he has to get 2 fillings, but we found a great new dentist in Northeast Philly that we really like. It's one of the places that runs a pediatric residency for Temple students, so hopefully Chris can get to know that office a bit. As far as other news goes, there isn't much else to write. Aaron is a very sweet and sensitive soul. I love spending time with him like this. I realized the other day that while I got 2 whole years with just Matthew, I never got time with just Matthew when he was the magical age of 4. It really is a fantastic age and Aaron and I have a lot of fun during the week.
Work & School
I am no longer taking classes and it has been so nice! When we first moved here I was taking a full semester of graduate classes in English. I survived 1 year and then decided it would be best to take a break. I am 3 classes away from having a 2nd Master's degree, so if at anytime I want to finish I will have that opportunity. I have been really blessed as far as work goes. I work from home doing online marketing and other random miscellaneous business items. It definitely keeps me busy, but it's nice that I am able to set my own hours. I've often thought about getting my PA teaching certification, but right now it's just more economical and fulfilling to be able to stay at home with my kids.
Photography
Since I'm no longer in school, I've been able to start taking pictures again. My photography business is doing very well here. It's been amazing to see how blessings can come through business opportunities. So far this semester, every unexpected (or un-budgeted for) expense that has come up has been covered by the money I make doing photography. For example, Matthew needed a coat this year and he had a lot of unexpected expenses come up with school. Chris and Aaron needed new shoes. All of those expenses would have normally gone on a credit card because they aren't in our budget. Thanks to the money I make doing photography, we've been able to avoid putting anything on credit cards this semester. It feels great!
Health
Well I've saved the most frustrating thing for last. A couple months ago I started having terrible migraines. One week was so bad that I was in tears almost every night because of the pain. I didn't know they were migraines at the time, but I finally decided to go to the doctor to figure out what was going on. He immediately told me that it's not normal to have headaches daily - even small ones like the ones I was used to getting daily - and he put me on a steroid to stop the week long migraine that was currently going on in my head. He also gave me a prescription for Imitrex for when the migraines come. I went through 9 pills in about 12 days only to find out that my insurance only covers 9 pills per month. I was pretty distraught about that. They are about $25 a pill, so I just figured I would just wait it out. It sucked. For about 2 weeks I was constantly in pain. My poor family! When I went back to the doctor he wasn't happy with the fact that I was still having migraines after the round of steroids, so he put me on something called Topamax. I was actually kind of happy about that because one of the main side effects is weight loss (I have about 10-15 lbs to lose). I started that medication and within 48 hours, I had a bad reaction. My heart rate skyrocketed! I felt it coming on most of the day, but it wasn't until the evening that I realized something was wrong. Chris was supposed to go to the temple that night, but he chose to stay home and be with me. My resting heart rate was 95-100 beats per minute. When I got up and walked into the other room, my heart rate would jump to 145 beats per minute. Increased or irregular heart rate was one of the "rare but serious" side effects, so I called the doctor and he said to stop taking it immediately. He then started me on something else, but I never ended up taking it. I saw a neurologist (Dan Ackerman, who happens to be the husband of a friend that I go to church with) and he has started me on new medications. I took another round of steroids and now I take Elavil at night. I also have a medication that I'm supposed to take in lieu of the NSAIDs that I've been used to taking. It doesn't really work, so hopefully I will get something new. What I like about Dr. Ackerman's plan is that I have a tiered approach to the headaches. For a mild to moderate headache, I take the prescription that currently doesn't work. Then if it's really bad, I add an NSAID. If that doesn't work, I add Imitrex. This is all in addition to the Elavil which I take daily. It's amazing how much it is already helping. I can tell that it's preventing the headaches. It's also helping with my fibromyalgia pain. I don't have daily pain anymore and it's great! The downside? I'm sleepy almost all the time. I take the medication at dinner time and by 9pm I am usually a complete zombie. This is a problem because I usually work from 8-11pm. The other downside? Since I started the medication just over 2 weeks ago, I have gained 5-6 lbs. If I wasn't already a little bit overweight when I started taking the medication, it would be that bad. But as I said earlier, I've had about 10 lbs to lose for almost a year. Now the pounds just keep adding on. I am going to call Dr. Ackerman tomorrow and discuss other options. I love the way it keeps headaches away and takes my pain away, but I can't stand being so tired all the time and the weight gain! I've been exercising 3 times a week. I either swim or cycle. But that doesn't seem to help much. So I supposed we'll see what happens.
Anyway... I know this was a long post and I will be surprised if anyone gets to the end of it! But all of this needed to be written down so I can have it in the future.
Anyway... I know this was a long post and I will be surprised if anyone gets to the end of it! But all of this needed to be written down so I can have it in the future.
1 comment:
I was wondering if you were working from home, besides your photography business. What exactly is it, if you don't mind sharing?
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