Romancing the Trash Pile

I'm going to file this in the "odds and ends" category. Focusing on the odd part mind you. Last week was a bit of a rough week having two sick kids and a really sick husband home. I was running here and there, toting kids to and from the doctors and hoping and praying I would stay well through it all. Monday morning I'm standing at the kitchen window enjoying my coffee when I notice something over by the horse trailer. We have an old piece of furniture that needs to go to the dump sitting by the trailer and there was a pig perched up on this piece of wood. Yes, a pig. A really ugly, brown pig. He was, uh, having his way with this old piece of wood furniture. It ranks up there with some of the stranger things I've seen in my life.

I, of course, went over there to see if he was wild or tame. He didn't run from me and even let me touch him if I had cat food. He smelled awful. He decided to hang around for most of the day (can't imagine it had anything to do with the can of cat food I gave him). Might have been he just couldn't drag himself from his new girlfriend (my trash pile). He played with the dogs and really enjoyed the watering hose during his day stay with us. Naturally, every neighbor in a 5 mile vicinity showed up on my front porch asking if the strange pig that was frequenting their houses was mine. Luckily he wandered off after two days and I haven't seen the stinky pig since. Thank goodness.....because I really don't need another animal around here.

Here he is romancing the trash pile.

One ugly, stinky pig.

A bit of a ham with the hose.

Free at last

This is one of those blog postings that get labeled with the "things I blog about but shouldn't". Can't say I didn't warn ya.

Now if you missed the exciting story about the vasectomy go here.

Then if you missed the follow up story about the sperm count go here.

So our story continues. Almost exactly nine months have passed since that fateful day that Sean had his "man surgery" and consequently was taken to the hospital via ambulance. Per orders of his doctor he has been returning to the doctors office every two months to make his "man deposit". In most cases it only takes two months (or less) to get a sample that is free of sperm. My husband? It took nine months. Nine months of going: "Ah crap, they must have botched the vasectomy".

This week he dropped off his sample and the nurse called with the all exciting news that there were indeed no swimmers! It was kinda funny how excited she was.

The doctor was going to give it a year and then figure out what had to be done. We are so glad it didn't need to come to that, what with the whole initial experience and all. Never again. So we are officially done with kids. It's nice to know there will be no accidents, no oops, no botched vasectomies. Lord almighty we're free at last!

Blasted Mobility

You might recall back in August that my husband got a vasectomy. Actually it was done on August 13th,  Friday the 13th (should have been our first clue). If you didn't get to read that delightful post, HERE it is. It was a day we all won't soon forget. So here we sit exactly five months later and I think we can officially consider it a "botched" vasectomy. No, I'm not pregnant thank the good Lord. You might need a brief history of "after vasectomy care" to understand why I might refer to it as botched.

1. Bubba goes and gets a vasectomy.
2. Two months later Bubba provides a "sample".
3. Lab uses microscopes to search for mobile swimmers.
4. Bubba gets an all clear from the doctor.
5. Bubba no longer has the ability to procreate.
6. Yippie! No more Bubba Jrs.

This is what we all thought would happen. A fairy tale ending to our reproductive life.

So Hubby provides the "sample" to the lab two months after the procedure. The nurse calls back with the news that there are 0-2 mobility. That means that in the sample provided there are still live swimmers. Ok. Bummer. She said come back in a month to provide another sample and in the mean time ejac evacuate as many swimmers as possible. November 13th rolls around, time for another sample. The nurse calls with the exact same news. 0-2 mobility. Said to try again next month.....and be sure to get out as many swimmers as possible. Hubby makes it his part time job to follow nurses rules on a daily basis (I'm a cool wife, but I'm not that cool). December came and went with the same results. This time nurse said that he'll have to talk to the doctor if another month has the same results. We're thinking exploratory scrotum surgery. Fun times!

So today was yet another sample day. The fourth sample. We were both a little anxious for the test results to say the least. The nurse called and said it was down to 0-1 mobility. She talked with the doctor and he said in rare cases it has taken up to a year to get a clean, non-mobility sample. *sigh* So he goes back with yet another sample in two months. This has been a frustrating experience and we will be oh so happy if and when it's over.

So far I'm not really an advocate for vasectomies.

It's bad, stinky and we're almost out of toilet paper.

I'm back home. This Thanksgiving will go down in history as my most memorable Thanksgiving. Ever. We left for New Mexico last Sunday, cramming the car up to it's gills with everything needed for a week away from home. The car drive down there went smoothly. I thought Greta would be more of a handful than she was. She did beautifully considering it was 16 hours each way. Wesley was slightly annoying chiming in with the "I want to go home" or "Are we there yet?". Luckily this didn't start until Albuquerque, only leaving 4.5 hours of this annoying chatter. It was wonderful getting to my in laws house. They are sweet people with a warm and inviting house. We always have a great time enjoying everyone's company. I got to see all my darling nieces, man are they growing up fast! Wesley and Greta had fun hanging out with all the girls. I sincerely wish we all lived closer.

Thanksgiving was delicious. There were 24 people there for dinner. My in laws are very generous people that opened up their house to people that didn't have anywhere else to celebrate Thanksgiving. I met many interesting people that evening and ate way too much food. Any weight I gained from Thanksgiving is gone now along with a few more pounds.

It started Saturday morning, the morning we were to leave for home. We awoke to the sounds of Greta throwing up in her crib. It was 5:30 so we cleaned her up and brought her into our bed. Poor thing threw up four more times before we even got on the road. That was the beginning of the end. Luckily she only threw up one more time while we were in the car. About an hour into our drive I look in the back seat to find Wesley throwing up. He got a full breakfast that morning so you can just imagine how much vomit was coming out of the kid. I didn't even have a bucket or anything so he completely covered himself, the car seat and stuff under his feet in the car. It was seriously awful. We pulled off on the first exit we could find to figure out what to do. Luckily it was southern New Mexico and the weather was in the 60's so we took the poor kid out of his car seat, stripped him down on the side of the road, and cleaned him up. I scooped up vomit that was in his car seat, there had to have been two cups just there alone. We ran out of baby wipes and resorted to using clothing from the suitcase. There are several things that probably won't be ever worn again.

The strange thing about kids when they puke is that you would never have known that they were sick before or after the event. Here was Wesley kicking, singing and all around being a three year old, then the next thing there is chuck everywhere, then he's back to kicking and singing. It's totally bizarre. As a bystander you might have not even know anything happened except for the hysterical woman in the front seat exclaiming "OH MY GOD, WESLEY'S CHUCKING EVERYWHERE.....HOLY COW IT'S EVERYWHERE SEAN......OH MY GOSH OH MY GOSH". This of course upset poor Greta and she started screaming at the hysterical woman (me).

So we get back on the road after our thirty minute clean up stop. We find a toy bucket that will suffice as a chuck bucket. Wesley proceeds to throw up every half an hour for five hours. Luckily he's at the age where he knows he's about to throw up and can remember to use the bucket. So we don't have anymore messes to clean up.  Every half an hour we would pull off on the nearest exit. Pull over, pour out the bucket (which contents got smaller and smaller) and pull back on I-40. If you were following us it might look like a game, we were constantly pulling over. After about five times of doing this we decided to just start pouring the chuck into a drink cup, then pouring hand sanitizer over it to mask the smell. It was awesome (please note the sarcasm).

We decided to drive home in one day rather than stop near Amarillo, TX and get a hotel. We thought if we were to stop and then get sick ourselves then we'd be stuck in the hotel for who knows how long. So we traded off sleeping and made it home at 3:50 am Sunday morning. The kids slept well in the car after their ordeal. We had no throwing up after 6:30 pm. I thought all was well. Wesley was keeping stuff down. We stopped and got some Pedialyte.

Then last night Sean and I got it. We were hit hard. All night long we were hugging the toilet. The fun thing about this virus is it affects you on both ends. During the night I got up after dry heaving to find poor Wesley sleeping in the hallway with his pants pulled down and his little potty full of diarrhea. The little guy had gotten to the bathroom but didn't make it back to his bed. He just gave up and was sleeping on the floor.  It was a bad night for everyone. The kids aren't throwing up anymore but the diarrhea is awful. Greta has the worst diaper rash I've ever seen. I just can't keep her dry.

I think I'll just stop here. I could keep writing about how bad these past two days have been but I think I've painted a pretty vivid picture without going any farther. It's bad. It's stinky and we're almost out of toilet paper. Pray for us.

.....and then I had to cut his underwear off.

Several months ago we made the easy decision that two kids were enough for us. We are two and through. If you were to visit our house for dinner any night of the week you'd understand (and then go screaming into the night). One kid will be kicking the table while trying to drown his broccoli in milk while the other is screaming nonstop flinging rice in all directions. I feel mentally and physically beat up at the end of the day. We are SO done with kids. The decision to make that permanent was made and yesterday was Sean's big day. This wasn't a hard choice, in fact Sean's been pleading to go get a vasectomy since before Wesley was born. I made him wait until after the second kid was here.

***I must warn you that if you are on the fence about getting a vasectomy then you should stop here and read no further. Seriously. Don't say I didn't warn you.***

The day started out normal. Sean's appointment was for 12:30 so around 11:30 he took the recommended Valium. This is given to help sooth the nerves associated with this procedure. I guess they get a lot of anxious men in that clinic. Imagine that. We dropped Wesley off at my Mom's house and took Greta with us. Sean was pretty relaxed and calm for the trip, I'm thinking it was the Valium.

The procedure went smoothly. He had another nurse sit in due to the fact that this doctor is one of the first in our area to use the "no needle" vasectomy. This is where an air gun is used to numb the area with a local anesthetic before the incision is made. Sean said it didn't hurt at all. The nurse that sat in for the procedure actually said "Wow, he didn't even jump!" I guess these poor guys usually jump when the needle goes in (again, imagine that!). All in all that part went well.

I was waiting in the lobby with Greta when he tenderly walked out of the room. We all loaded in the van and off we went to fill a prescription for pain meds. About two miles away from the clinic he said he didn't feel right and the next thing I know he's unconscious. His head in hanging down, his pupils are big and dilated and he's making this raspy gurgly noise. It was the scariest thing ever. Ranks up there with running down a mountain in a lightning, sleeting, hail storm (my family knows what I'm talking about). I start freaking out and yelling at him and beating him on the chest. I grabbed my cell phone and called 911 while pulling into the nearest parking lot. I thought he died. Seriously. It's funny what runs through your head in situations like this. I kept thinking "there is no way the cause of death on my husband is going to say: Vasectomy." I ran around the van to his side of the car and kept yelling at him all the while telling the 911 operator where I was. A nice older lady must have saw me wildly waving my hands and acting hysterical and came over to help. Luckily Sean came to about that time. He didn't have a clue as to why I was yelling at him. If it wasn't so scary it would have been funny.

A few minutes later the fire truck showed up (guess this is normal) and several firemen came to help. They asked what was wrong and I told them he passed out after his vasectomy and the guy actually laughed. Out loud. He said this was pretty normal, even a few guys at the station had passed out after their procedures. Who knew? The ambulance showed up and the medics checked Sean out. His blood pressure was low (80/50). They think that would have done it. The dilated pupils were most likely due to the Valium. They were afraid he might pass out again so they decided to take him to the ER for observation. Much to Sean's humiliation they brought the gurney over to the van and strapped him in since they weren't sure how stable he was on his feet. Poor guy.

Greta and I stopped to buy some formula since I know how long ER visits can take. We then drove to the hospital except it wasn't where I thought it was, I went north when I should have gone south and ended up driving about half an hour out of my way. We did finally make it to the hospital and found Sean's room. He looked a lot better and had an IV going to get fluids in him. His blood pressure was back up where it should be and after three hours we got to go home.

He's sure happy that day is over with, to say the least. He actually said he'd do it over again, just to know that there will be no more babies. That's how done we are. Oh and on a side note, the doctor told Sean not to get the incision wet for several days. The glue they used to close it needs to stay dry. Well, right now it's been 105 degrees outside for at least two weeks. You combine that with what happened to poor Sean and the result is a "sweaty situation". So (if you haven't figured out where I'm going with this yet) his incision got wet. The glue adhered to his underwear. Yep. I mean, really, this is just the cherry on top of an all around wonderful day for Sean. We put a call into the doctors office to see what to do about this situation and the doc said to just slowly peel the undies off of the incision. I think any man reading this just crossed his legs. We decided to just cut the underwear off, leaving a quarter sized piece of fabric where needed. Yesterday was a day full of firsts for Sean and I: first time to see someone go unconscious, first call to 911, first time visiting the ER, first time traveling in an ambulance and first time cutting someone's underwear off of them.

Sean and I are both glad that day is over.

Diary of a Potty Training Momma

Today was day one of big boy undies day (for Wesley not me). We got up and dressed and all was good. He went in the big potty three times without prompting. I was starting to think this might be easier than I thought! He was pumped to get new candy (gummie worms) and all went well until the first pool of urine appeared in the kitchen. He looked down in amazement at the puddle forming around his foot and declared that the dog had just peed. Poor guy didn't understand that he made the puddle. Thus instigated the second pair of undies and shorts. We then went outside during Sissy's naptime and he helped me water the flower pots with his watering can. He was chugging along going from pot to pot when I heard "Look Mom, I'm watering the ground!" I looked over to see his watering can sitting on the ground, unused, and yet another puddle forming around his foot. *sigh*

It was then that I taught my child how to pee on a tree. Not that I've had any experience in peeing on a tree or anything, but I understand the general concept. Point and shoot. He thought it was fun. On to undies and shorts number three for the day. Thirty minutes later another puddle. Now he's in a diaper and shorts number four. We'll attempt it again tomorrow. You're right Randi, it's like having a puppy in the house.