love and other drugs.

We've had ourselves a February to remember.

Ambulance rides, sparkly shoes, and circumcisions have filled our days.

Its always a party in the C House.

About two and half weeks ago, the girls were sick. On a Thursday morning, Carly puked 4 times before 9:00. We were set to drop our kids off at a friend's house so Chris and I could attend the viewing and funeral of a sweet friend, our bishop's wife, together. Instead, Chris attended the viewing, and I was blessed to attend the beautiful funeral. At the end of the funeral, the queasiness I had been feeling turned to hot flashes, dizziness, and intense nausea. I thought I was going to have to get up to go throw up. I made it to the end, and rushed out (pretty classy . . . rushing out of a funeral). I got home, and thought I'd be ok, so Chris went off to campus. And for the next 5 hours, I puked and, you know, other things you do when you have a stomach virus. It was constant. I have never been so violently ill in my life. I could not keep anything in my body. I was texting Chris, and my first ones were calm . . . but my last one only read "Hurry". Angels watched my children for two hours while I rotated from bathroom to bed. Carly, that amazing girl, played with John (Quinn slept) so sweet. At one point she came to my door and called for me. "Carly, I'm so sick," I croaked. She closed the door and I heard her go use the bathroom all by herself without complaint. That is a big deal for her. I was so proud.

Chris finally arrived. He brought me soup and Gatorade. I drank a few sips of Gatorade and immediately threw it up. I went upstairs while he watched the kids. I was standing in the upstairs bathroom when I realized I had absolutely nothing left. My body was done. My head started going fuzzy, and I laid down on the floor before I collapsed. I could hardly move, and my vision was fading. Our bathroom cabinets have no padding on them, and when you slam them they make a really loud noise, a trick I learned from the twins. I reached out and slammed the cabinets over and over so Chris could hear me. He came up the stairs, and found me laying there. I couldn't move, I could hardly talk, and I was fading. He called a few people. He asked if I needed help, and all I could croak was "Yes". I knew I did. I could not move my body; I was telling it to move, I was telling it to speak, but it wouldn't. Chris decided to call 911, and I felt relief.

The EMT guys came and tried to get me to wake up. I kept humming at them so they knew I could hear them. It was crazy, because I could hear everything, and my mind was thinking, but I couldn't use my body. It was a very scary feeling. They wrapped me up and carried me down the stairs in a tarp, then put me on a stretcher. I could hear the babies screaming. I managed to open my eyes and saw Carly jumping on the couch. She looked totally excited. "Can I watch? Can I help them? Can I go in the big truck?" Luckily the sight was not traumatizing her at all. Great friends helped with the kids, and Chris bounced back and forth from hospital to home.

The ambulance took me to the hospital and I was in the ER for 4 hours while they pumped me full of IV fluids. Everything they gave me, I lost, and every time they stood me up, I went fuzzy and nearly passed out. On the third try, I did pass out, and the doctor decided to admit me. Thanks to Zofran and Imodium they got my symptoms to stop by the time I went upstairs; now I needed to be re-hydrated  During the first 24 hours of my stay I received 11 liters of IV fluid. They took me off the IV my second night, and I was sure glad to get rid of the little robot that followed me around and beeped at me whenever it didn't like the position of my arm. 

I dare say the worst part of my stay was the fact that they admitted me to the cardiac area. They were concerned about the impact the dehydration and fainting had on my heart, so they kept a monitor on me. But the Cardiac floor . . . people, eat healthy and exercise so you never have heart problems. I wasn't allowed to shower, and my diet was the "cardiac diet" meaning no sodium or taste or goodness. Plus, it was gluten free. I could not eat the dry plain meats and mushy veggies they brought me. There was no way I was going to recover without food, so Chris may have sneaked me a few things. But when you have a baby it is like this wonderful world of happy pink nurses and endless chocolate milkshakes. The cardiac area is NOT. My second day was spent making sure I was good to go, watching Vampire Diaries, and waiting around for a doctor to release me. I was weak and nauseous for about 5 days after my release, and my mother-in-law, who came up right away to watch the kids, stayed a few extra days until I got my feet under me. Unfortunately, both she and Chris had their own dance with the same sickness, and it was a little wild. For the record, we have no idea what it was. The doctor thought it was possibly the norovirus, but we never received word and don't think we will. But reading about the norovirus, and how it is fast and furious, makes me think there is a good chance that is exactly what it was.

In the week following my release, Chris and I both felt a lot of fear and anxiety. I had trouble sleeping; he  had trouble leaving (which he had to do overnight to a conference). I felt so fragile. In the wake of our friend's passing, I had told Chris I was feeling very mortal. When you are young, years are long and your whole life is ahead of you, but now I feel the years flying, my babies growing, and my body aging. I know I'm young, but I'm not as young as I once was. And this experience showed me just how fragile we can be. It took a lot of prayer and talking for us to start to feel normal again, and we are still working on being fully at peace.

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Two weeks after (to the day) my hospital adventure, John was scheduled for one of his own. His little boy part is unique, shall we say, and when he was born the OB could not circumcise him. He needed to be fixed a bit and circumcised by a urologist. It would not be a typical circumcision and would require general anesthesia.  We had two visits with the urologist, and set up the surgery for Valentine's Day. Isn't that special?

In a blessing I can not be more thankful for, the whole experience went off without a problem. He had food restrictions, and he actually handled it really well, not freaking out until right before surgery. That was a big deal for a kid who gets mad when breakfast is late. I was able to rock him to sleep right before they came to take him away, so he didn't scream and reach for us; they just rolled him away peacefully. That was a huge tender mercy for me, as I was already shedding tears when the OR nurses came to get him. They ended up giving him a "baby epidural", which only effected his hip area. I was nervous about this, but the doctors said it would mean they wouldn't have to use narcotics. The urologist loved it for babies, so we went for it, even though it added to my anxiety. But I sure loved my epidurals, so I thought I'd give that gift to John, too. Ha! 

We waited in the surgical lounge, and our beeper went off once with an update phone call from a nurse in the ER. About 45 minutes later, the urologist came to tell us how everything went just perfectly. And shortly after that, our boy was waking up. When we got to him, he was fussy and disoriented from the anesthesia.  I took him and calmed him and he fell asleep. He slept for a while in recovery, and after they saw that he could hold liquids without vomiting, they sent us home. His recovery has been so much better than expected. He didn't move too much the day of the surgery, but these two days following he has been crawling and playing like nothing happened. Then once in a while he will scream out in pain, poor kid. But he is healing quickly, and after all the worry and anxiety we felt about the whole experience, we are thankful to have it behind us and to have had it go so well. 

John's surgery took us back to the hospital where he and Quinn were born almost exactly a year before. I parked in that same garage and walked through that same lobby over and over again as I went to see, rock, and feed that sweet teeny tiny boy with the feeding tube in his nose. He wouldn't stop sleeping to eat; now we won't stop eating to sleep. My heart was full and my emotions on the surface. We are so very blessed to have children so healthy that these relatively minor experiences scare me so much.

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In the middle of all this craziness came the season of love. I do love myself a holiday, and I have a particular fondness for the smaller ones (St Patrick's Day is my super favorite; I'm so excited!). Despite our special brand of turmoil, we celebrated Valentine's to the fullest. We made Valentine's for uncles, aunts, grandparents, and great-grandparents. Carly cut them out herself and wrote letters on all of them. She even wrote out the entirety of "Mimi", a simple word, but her first full word other than her name. She also licked all the envelopes and placed the stamps. We had lots of cute matching sister outfits, 5 days of Valentine's prizes, yummy treats, a preschool party and a playgroup party (both put on by yours truly . . . have I mentioned I love myself a holiday?), and heart covered doors telling our kids just what we love most about them. I do love our three amigos quite a bit. They are beautiful, amazing, fun kids, and while they bring a whole lot of chaos to our lives, they also bring a whole lot of perfection. And my baby daddy? Well, he has cleaned more of my puke than any man ought to have to clean for anyone. If that's not true love, I'm not sure what is. I'm forever grateful for my best friend; God blessed me with the best.

In January we had a little photo shoot for the Valentines we were going to send out. And I was reminded why we don't pay for professional photography in our current phase of life. 

But after deciding to keep it "real life", and a little PicMonkey magic, we found a winner.

It's been a wild and wacky February, to say the least.

Chris and I attended the temple today, and in the car we talked about how we would just like a bit of calm.

Normal and boring would be really nice.

I'm not sure the C House does normal and boring, but if nothing else . . . 

here's to no more hospitals.

xoxo.