Eczema

has taken over my life.  Seriously.  When I’m at work, I think about eczema.  When I’m home or on coffee break, I google eczema.  When I meet new people or chat with my family, we talk about eczema.  Did you know that children with eczema will likely outgrow most of their symptoms by the time they are 5 years old?  Or that their parents likely suffer from hay fever, asthma, or airborne allergies?  Did you know that even if you use Free and Clear laundry detergent you still have to run clothes through a second rinse cycle to get all the detergent’s chemicals out?  Oh, and dryer sheets are the DEVIL.

What started as a few bumps on the baby’s back developed into the worst case of eczema I have ever seen in my life in 7 short days.  We have been to the pediatrician, a dermatologist, and then back to the pediatrician.  We have an appointment with a specialist at A.I. but that’s not until JUNE.  I have tried Cetaphil, prescription foam, Cerave, Triple Cream, Arbonne, Vaseline, Nozema, Formula II, and Aveeno, all the while dosing him with Zyrtec, which I don’t think can possibly be good for a baby.  I think we have finally found a treatment that works.  I give him a bath every night, letting him play in the tub for awhile before washing him, so that he isn’t playing in soapy water.  I wash his hair and skin with pine tar soap, so when he is good and clean he smells just like a woodstove.  After bath, we apply a topical steroid cream prescribed by the pediatrician.  At bedtime he gets 1/2 tsp. of Zyrtec.  We’ve only been doing this for one day, but he is already 75% better.  I think we may have this licked.

Oh, and the doctor told me that if this doesn’t work we will have to do an oral steroid because he may have SCABIES.  That’s pretty much when I involuntarily screamed and scrubbed my entire house with bleach.  Wasted effort, it turns out.  Scabies is caught from other kids, not from dirt, so the baby may, in fact, have to spend his entire life in a plastic bubble.  (NOT SCABIES, by the way.  The treatment is working well, so it’s just plain old eczema.)

Next post:  How I was treated at the WallyWorld pharmacy and why they may never get another penny from me.

Oh My Gosh I Had SO MUCH FUN!

Yesterday was the absolute BEST. DAY. EVER.

I got to work (barely) on time, had a bagel, looked for my wallet and…uh-oh…no wallet.  Where is it?  When did I use it last?  Is it in my desk?  No.  In my truck?  No.  So I took a personal day and went back to the house to find it.  I dug through the diaper bag, under the beds, in the toy box, all my yarn stash, nothing.  Nada. 

Now, here’s the super-fun part.  My license and my social security card were in there.  I know, I know, you should never have your social security card in your wallet, but when we moved last, I didn’t want to lose it so I put it in my wallet and there it stayed.  I just never got around to putting it away.  You know what else I never got around to?  Changing the address on my license.  Hoo-boy!  Talk about a great time!  So how will the DMV replace my license when I can’t prove my address?  How will I get a new social security card without my license as picture ID?  Why would my husband pick that exact moment to call and ask if we had an extra “hundred or so” dollars to pitch in on a trailer for their hunting gear? 

As a matter of fact, we do not have an extra “hundred or so.”  Oh wait, let me run out to the money tree in the backyard and grab that for you!  I just hope they don’t ask for photo ID!

Anyway, the DMV opens at noon on Wednesdays, so I sat around for the longest hour and a half of my LIFE and gave them a call as soon as they opened.  The person on the phone was so great!  I only needed two utility bills and something with my signature!  Then, when I got there I only had to wait about an hour!  Now, I know that seems like a long time, but if you have visited your DMV lately you should know that is very quick.  While I was there, the woman at the counter told me that I was allowed to renew my license ahead of time if I wanted, so I went ahead and did that as well, saving me a second trip in a couple months time.  Awesome!  Oh, did you know you’re not allowed to smile for your license photo anymore?  It’s true, and when the fella taking my picture told me that I couldn’t smile, I just felt the urge, the NEED to smile at the camera.  Too funny.

Once I got my license (with the worst photo in the world), I was on my way to the social security administrative building.  It’s a new building, much cleaner than the old one, but it still smells like urine.  FUN.  I only had to wait about 45 minutes there, and again the woman at the counter was so nice!  I just couldn’t believe it!  I guess all the praying I did before embarking on my adventure did the trick.  I did have to call my parents while I was there because you have to have their social security numbers to get your own card, and my mother said, “You know, after tearing up your whole house, going to the DMV, going to the social security office, putting a fraud alert on your credit bureaus, and taking a day off work, you’ll probably find your wallet tomorrow.”  She’s probably right.

So, all in all, it was a pretty horrible day, but made better with the kindness of the DMV and social security admin workers.  Thank goodness there are still some kind people in this world.

My motherboard is a mother******!

I’m posting away from home today.  The computer started acting a little funny and then just stopped.  We let a computer geek friend of ours take a look and the motherboard is shot, so there’s another $300 out the window.  It’s a real letdown because K-hubby has decided to go back to school, and we need to save up about a grand before summer session so we can pay for at least 2 semesters, using that time to save up for the next 2.  It’s all doable, like I said in my last post we are coming onto much better times than before, it just feels like something is always getting thrown at us!  Anyway, no picture for awhile because I can only do that at home, but I’ll still be posting as time permits, and as soon as everything is repaired I’ll just do a picture only post to get you all caught up on holiday decorations and the remarkable growth of K-baby.

Did I mention the last time he went to the doctor he was 3 feet tall and weighed 27 pounds?  That puts him in the 90th percentile for weight of other babies his age and puts him at the height of a 27-month-old.  A week later, the outfit he wore to the doctor didn’t fit him, so he had another growth spurt after that.  It really is phenomenal, and I’m not trying to be a stage mother, but it seems like the kid was built for athletics, so it will be really exciting to see what kinds of sports he enjoys as he gets older.

Christmas is almost here, and I am proud to say that all I have left is two and a half socks and two hats.  I actually mailed out Christmas cards this year and I plan on making peppermint bark and homemade jelly for the family.  I have been away from home for about 12 years now if you count college and I just felt like an adult this year when I put stamps on the Christmas cards and mailed them out.  When did you finally feel like a grown-up, or are you still waiting for that moment?

Getting closer…

We are so close to the end of 2008 I can taste it.  This year was so hard on us, so hard on a lot of people I know.  Friends facing foreclosures, auto repos, credit card delinquency.  It seems like we are going to pull out of this, and I can’t think of any other reason than God putting his arms around us and carrying us through the toughest year I think we have ever had to face as a married couple.

On December 31, 2007 K-hubby was laid off from his job, and sat at home for four months trying to find a way to get back into the workforce, get through his depression, and start making his way again.  I feel for any person that has gone through this because he was not the man I married.  He was a shell of himself, wandering around the house like a ghost.  We had to take money out of his retirement, and it still wasn’t enough.  He finally started working again, but it was second shift all the way in South Philly.  I never saw him and it was starting to feel like I was raising K-baby on my own.  When the stove broke, I had to find a way to fix it.  When Cocoa passed away (Cocoa was my cat.  Told you it was a bad year), I had to grieve alone, and try not to wake the baby.  We fought a flea infestation like I have never seen before.  Bills fell further and further behind. 

Still, there were small miracles.  When I recieved a repo notice for my truck, K-hubby got an extra paycheck.  When it seemed like our cards were going to charge off, he got a better job, close to home, with all the overtime he wanted to work.  When I thought my truck was going to run out of gas and the small car broke down, the gas prices dropped.  When I knew we couldn’t make rent and buy groceries, our landlord let us pay the rent in two checks, broken up through the month.  K-baby didn’t get sick.  Not once.  There were no extra medical bills, besides the stitches and prescriptions that come along with having a heavy equipment mechanic for a husband.  When I decided our marriage was over, hubby woke up and is still trying to get back to the man he was.

I guess I need to post this today because things have been getting a little weird around the house.  I am terrified that I will open the bank account and it will be overdraft, K-hubby has been really moody, and we are just at each others’ throats right now.  I couldn’t figure out why until K-hubby pointed out that we were coming up on the one-year anniversary of our lives being permanently changed, and our Puritan hardworking values being torn down and the hard work that it has taken to build them back up.  We lived so many years figuring that if we worked hard and we were honest and direct that we would be the last ones standing.  This year has proven to us that there is no such comfort, but it has also shown us that we can still power through the hard times, wallow in shit and come out smelling like a rose.

Along Comes Trouble.

So I’m cruising along life’s highway, trying to get the bills caught up, spending time with my family, constantly forgetting to pay the electric and trash, and BAM!  A phone call to let me know my brother had a stroke and is in the hospital getting tests done.  My brother is about 11 years older than me, so he became a state trooper when I was 9.  I remember how proud I was at his graduation when he walked across the stage in his dress uniform.  I would brag to all my friends that MY BROTHER was a state policeman, the best in the state.  I also remember the meetings we had to have as a family with other troopers who made sure we were prepared should we ever get the call.  If you have family in law enforcement or the military, you know THE CALL.  (Cue ominous music of doooom.)  Anytime I would get a phone call in the middle of the night, anytime someone started a conversation with, “Your brother R,” anytime we couldn’t get hold of him, I would prepare myself for the words.  Lately, he’s been having a pretty rough time of it.  He just had a baby in July (number four), who’s been diagnosed with failure to thrive.  They’ve had to drive him to AI DuPont hospital, get specialty formula, the works.  I know his stress has been at an all time high, and he shoulders it all in silence.  He has never been one to complain about his circumstances or want a lot of attention.  When he had a knee surgery a few years ago he didn’t want visitors or anyone coddling him.  He’s just that way.  So, when I got the phone call last night I was certain I was going to hear the words, either about him or the baby.  It was actually a relief to hear that it was a stroke.  How weird is that?  I was grateful that was all it was.  R is only 42, in great shape, runs marathons, eats better than anyone I know, and still this got him.  I just don’t even know what to think right now.

On Getting Together with Friends.

I can’t really claim to be a person who has very many friendships, but I often want to be friends with people I meet.  Given my background I feel an almost obsessive need for people to like me.  My dad’s a minister for the Wesleyan church, and if there’s a church that needs a new minister the district will contact anyone that might be a good fit, then that person has to “make a bid” for the church.  They have to show up one Sunday, preach a sermon, and stay to meet the board members.  If the board likes you best, you get the job.  Well, let me tell you, it’s not just about being a good minister.  My parents were offered one church only on the condition that they wear no jewelry, including wedding rings.  My parents had three young children at the time, and needed the money, so off came the wedding rings.  They are still in my mom’s dresser, tied together on a white ribbon.  Another church told my dad they wouldn’t be hiring him because he wore a beard and a colored tie.  Oh, yeah.  You can’t make this stuff up.  So obviously, when it comes to meeting new people I don’t really know how to be myself.  Do I really laugh as loud as I want to?  Should I crack that joke?  Are my clothes modest enough?  Trendy enough?  Am I rich enough?  Poor enough? 

I have started hanging out with some people I met on Ravelry.  We meet on Mondays, get drinks and knit for awhile.  I decided this time around to just be myself.  If it works, that’s great.  I hope it does.  I really like these girls.

PCP (Pretty Cool Podcast) of the moment: Brown Eyed Mom.

She is totally down-to-earth, and we share a lot of similar values.  It’s also very interesting to hear from someone on the other side of the country!  I hope she keeps up this great podcast.