Doctors, Doctors and More Doctors

This has been a month of Drs appointments, seven visits so far, with one more to go.  We also had two visits to the lab for blood draws.    As I mentioned in my post The World Keeps Spinning my youngest daughter has not been feeling well for a couple of months.    She spent most of the month on the couch, but we are finally figuring out why she has been sick.  

We saw the pediatrician at the very end of February with vertigo, headaches, and light headedness.  She referred us to the ENT.   The ENT did not find anything wrong with her inner ears, and thought the symptoms were being caused by her headaches. He said the next step would to be the neurologist.   A couple of days after the ENT, it was time for our monthly Orthodontist appointment.  She is very close to getting her braces off.  Just a few more months of wearing her bands.  Unfortunately with the headaches she has not been wearing them as much as she should,  so she might have to keep them on a month longer.   A few days after the ENT, it was time for the neurologist.    He diagnosed her as having migraines. He headaches had been becoming a lot worse, and very frequent.   He said he was not going to order a MRI because she was wearing braces. It seems if you have braces you can not have an MRI unless you go to the Orthodontist and have them removed.  Once the MRI is over, you can put them back on. Since we are so close to the end, he said it was definitely not worth going through all the trouble.  He put her on a preventative med that will take a few weeks to kick in.  We were relieved to have a diagnosis, but the headaches seemed to get much worse after starting her new med.  

One of the only things that seemed to help was drinking caffeine.  OTC Ibuprofen was not really helping much. Yesterday he prescribed a daily pain med to take twice a day until the preventatives kick in, which he said could be at least two more weeks.  Last week,  she was supposed to be in dance class, but was having another bad migraine.  She leaned her head back against the wall, and I saw her thyroid was very swollen.  

I took some photos to show the pediatrician, since I was taking her older sister there for her yearly check up this week.  She took one look at this photo and said we had to bring her in right away. We saw the Dr. yesterday. It was not quite swollen as it was the day I took the picture, but it was still a lot larger than it should be.  This is not the first time we have had dealt with thyroid issues in the family.   A couple of years ago I had my own issues which you can read about here.  Her older sister also has issues with her thyroid.  After her appointment, we went straight to the lab for a blood draw.  We got the results today.  Her numbers are good, BUT she tested positive for antibodies.   She too, has an autoimmune thyroid.  Having this could be the reason why she has been having so many headaches and other issues.  There is some positive news to finding out about this so young. With our family history, there was a very high chance she was going to develop it at some point in her life. Since we already knows she has it, we can regularly monitor her thyroid, and keep it in check before it gets really bad..  

A couple of the appointments this month were for my oldest.  She saw went to the Endocronologist early in the month  Remember this?  It took us an hour and a half to drive the 20  miles to the appointment. 

This week she had a well check up, and a routine blood draw.  She is going to have an ultrasound next week because she has been having a lot of stomach pains.  We are checking to make sure she does not have PCOS, or something else causing all the pain. She has been really worried that it is something more serious (thanks internet!) .   Next month we already have several more appointments on the schedule.   We have  follow up appointments at the Endocrinologist, Orthodontist and Neurologist.  I am also going to get into the mix and go to my annual physical (4 months late!)  Hopefully  things will slow down after that, at least go down to only one or two Dr appointments a month.  

The Day I Needed a Clone

I really did not mean to take a three month hiatus from this blog. Things just kind of got crazy the last few months, and I have been busy literally just trying to Survive the Crazy Life. 

During my last post, I shared about our kitty dilemna. I thought you might like a little update. Its been three months, and guess who is still here. We never heard another word from her previous owners.  She has grown quite a bit, and has thrived by eating well and staying warm inside. She spends half her time upstairs, and half downstairs. The other cats are still not sure what to think of her.  Tootsie does not mind her a bit. Reeses,who is usually our most easy going cat still hisses at her at times.  Milo, our male,  has a complicated relationship with her. At times he does not mind her being in the room, and other times he tries to hit her in the face.  When he does that, she goes to the basement door and asks to go downstairs for some alone time.  While she is not fully integrated with the other cats all the time, there has been significant progress. 

August on Overload

I don't know about you, but these last few weeks before the kids go back to school have felt like they are on overdrive.   We were enjoying a pretty relaxing summer, when boom overnight we had a very full schedule.  We have already had in the last week or so, a doctors appointment, two dentist  appointments, and shopping for some school  clothes and  supplies. Upcoming in the next two weeks there are three separate registration days, an orthodontist appointment,, dance open house, another dentist appointment, and a Senior photo session.   There is literally something going on almost every single day for the rest of the month. 

Luckily we do not need much in school supplies now that they are in older grades, mostly just binders, notebooks, pencils and pens.   All three of my kids still have backpacks that are in good shape.  Kara ended up with a bonus backpack, because she really thought her backpack from last school year had a rip in it.  I knew that she always carried a lot in it, and it was very heavy, so I thought maybe she was right.  Luckily the backpack she wanted was on sale, and had an additional Cartwheel discount.  Once we got home, I checked her old backpack.  It turns out she was half right.  Her backpack was ripped, but it was the one from the year before last.   There is a backpack that Kyle really likes as well. If I find it on clearance in the next few weeks, I will pick it up for later.    

The kids also do not need a lot in the way of school clothes.  They still have a lot of clothes that fit.  I did pick up a few new things, but not much.   

Today ended up being a good day. I got to spend it one on one with my oldest daughter who needed an outfit for her Senior pictures.  We spent some time at the mall, and had sushi for lunch. We both love sushi, and don't get to eat it very often.  We found an outfit at Forever 21 that we both really liked.  Now that we know what she is going to wear, we need to figure out the hair.  She is looking forward to getting a haircut after letting her hair grow out all summer. I can't wait to see how it turns out.