Worth a thousand words....

Merry Christmas, love Simon

MMR and more....

...so we took the plunge again. Each time I give Simon an immunization I hold my breath waiting for something weird to happen to him and when nothing happens I am always incredibly relieved and shocked at the same time. The other day Simon had his first MMR, yes the one scheduled for 18 months, yes the one many have tried to link to the development of autism in children, yes the one loaded with preservatives and horrible chemicals that do not need to be coarsing through the bloodstream of my little boy. But I did it anyway, along in the past year with three DTaP and one Hib, which resulted in one boy with a mom in NH on rotation at the ER with a fever of 105.5, but that's a story for another day.

I wrestle with this. Obviously. I feel like I'm damned if I do and damned if I don't. If anything happened to my son because of an immunization I had willingly given to him I would never forgive myself. Likewise if he ever was infertile from contracting the mumps or hospitalized with whooping cough I would also never forgive myself. Sometimes being a mom is so hard. Fortunetly I think we have the worlds best family doc (well...except for those of you I am training with!) and she has been incredibly supportive of our very delayed and very selective immunization schedule. I just could not stomach pumping my very small, premature son full of nasty things when he was fresh out. No way.

When I was eight months pregnant I went to this incredible scary talk about the dangers of immunizations and why we should not be vaccinating our children. The next day I sat through a lecture on the dangers of NOT immunizing our children on my pediatrics core rotation. Which left my very pregnant brain swimming and seeking out more information and occasionally in tears due to not being able to predict the future and know what was best for my son.

So we struggle, we did MMR the other day due to an outbreak of mumps in our community. Simon handled it so well, he is still a little crabby, but no tears during the shot itself. He has carried on with his everyday life while I analyze his expanding vocabulary every day watching for any new defecits or delays, and check on him in the middle of the night to make sure he's not an inferno....see this is what happens when anxiety goes untreated for too long...

In other news, the house went under contract with another buyer. Sad for us. We got a call today from a friend who has a lovely home we have coveted for years who is going to sell! Horray for us, sad for her. We'll put in an offer hopefully before the weekend! I don't think this one can be jinxed (famous last words) so I'm letting myself get a little excited!

Mama no teeth....

It has been a while, I apologize. The holidays tend to be a crazy, busy fun time of year for us and this year has been no exception. The most exciting news at our house this week...Kim (finally) got her braces off!!! She was trying to explain this to Simon the night before and he kept looking at her with a very puzzled expression saying, "Mama no TEEF?" And once they were off, well he couldn't get enough, he just kept trying to stick his fingers in her mouth and touch her new TEEF. I'll post pics of Mama Kim and her new teeth soon.

Simon is his usual wacko self. He came home from daycare the other day and told Kim that he bit his friend at school, "SI-MIN BITE NO-NAH". To which Kim replied, "you bit Noah?" with a shocked expression. Simon's response was a cheerful and proud, "YEAH!" They proceeded to talk about biting and how its not okay to bite or hit and then Kim did some play therapy with Simon about biting and hiting and friends with his little people....I swear this kid is going to be the most in touch with his emotions little boy...every night is play therapy night at our house. So in I go to daycare yesterday to drop off Simon and talk to daycare about what happened when Simon bit Noah, turns out it never happened. Our boy has a very vivid imagination. Oh well, maybe we've perhaps prevented Noah from getting bit in the future by Simon and his very sharp teeth.

Med school progresses...one day at a time. I'm struggling right now with a dinner I was invited to attend on Thursday with my attending in Kennebunkport and some fancy schmancy restaurant. Turns out this meeting and dinner are sponsored by a drug company. Here I go selling my soul to the devil. I guess I will eat with guilt knowing that my hundred dollar dinner is taking medications away from people who can't afford to pay for them and I am listening to incredibly biased research conducted by the company buying dinner. Good thing I have a filter...my first choice residency program doesn't allow drug reps to come in at all. I really hope I get in!

Birthday fun continued....

Today was the day of Simon's party. It was lots of fun with Grammie, Grumpa, Uncle Eric and Merma. He loved opening his presents and playing with each one before moving on to the next. He even spent some QT with his new nightlight that mommy and mama got for him. On, off, on, off...

Happy second birthday big boy!

And so the breastfeeding ticker...

...starts all over again! YAHOO! I wonder how far into this year we will get? Happy birthday big guy!

Simon's birthday, thus far, has been uneventful, as I think it should be for a very easily overwhelmed two year old. We spent the morning looking at houses, which surpisingly Simon likes quite a bit. He begins every stop with, "I SEE NEW HOUSE YEAH?" I think he like the exploration of these older homes we're looking at. One that is very very promising. I'm not going to say too much so as not to jinx it, but I'm keep blogland posted.

Following this trip to house hunt was a trip to the doctor, for Simon's never ending upper respiratory infection. He's fine, just a virus, just as I suspected. There's something satisfying about taking your child to the doctor and having them confirm what you already know, but at the same time what a huge pain in the butt. So that's been our day so far. A sick Simon, a beautiful home, and a nice long nap for both of us!

More on Simon's birthday later!

Blog slacker...

I recognize my failures as a blogger and I embrace them wholeheartedly. Boards both Step 2 and COMLEX-PE are complete (hopefully successfully), Thanksgiving madness over, one more rotation down, 98 more days (including weekends) of med school left, and a fast approaching second birthday for our little guy.

I hope everyone had a lovely holiday. Our was just great. Thanksgiving really is my favorite holiday. No presents not a whole lot of commotion, just lots of family time, which happened to include this year and overnight with Ninny, Uncle Donut and the Donovans four, a trip to LL Bean where I completed most of my Christmas shopping, a delicious meal (catered to avoid the craziness), and many funny funny comments from a grandmother who tends to imbibe a little too much on holiday including referring to my aunt, who is merely 15 years older than me as a, "dear old thing..." Many laughs were had and food lots and lots of food.

Simon enjoyed the holiday tremendously. He is finally old enough to run around with his cousins. This was certainly new to me too, and I enjoyed the peace and quiet of the adult living room while he stayed with the kids doing whatever it is kids do on holidays! He slept through the beginning of dinner, but of course was awake for dessert. I don't think my son has ever had so much sugar in one day, for review, Simon ate yesterday:

1. Two cinnamon rolls, fresh out of the package with the gooey icing to top 'em off.

2. Three blueberry things from my grandmothers house, I think they were supposed to be tarts, but they also were topped with plenty of sugar.

3. A banana (perhaps the only healthy thing all day)

and here's where it gets good...

4. For dinner, three peppermint patties, thank you Grump.

5. More dinner, iced sugar cookies, thank you Aunt Kim.

6. A piece of chocolate cream pie with plenty of whipped cream, thank you Grammie.

I made a feable effort to encourage the intake of the delicious turkey and beans and squash, but all a got was, "ALL DONE, SI-MIN PAY WITH KIDS!" Oh well, he's on his sugar crash today.

We're heading our for thai food tonight with the Meadows family and Merma. It should be fun, I'm debating whether or not to take the kids to the tree lighting at monument square, we'll see, I think we all could use an earlier night! And tomorrow we're going house hunting, just one, one that looks very promising...we'll see!

I'm going to post some pics of the babe, some from Halloween, some from the car, and some from his first leaf pile. My boy is growing up. Five more days until he turns two...and I'm still left wondering, what will happen to the breastfeeding ticker in five days? Stay tuned!

Halloween

The first Haircut...

Sleepy boy.

The leaf pile with my mom..

Time warp...

I can't believe it's been since October since I posted and what is it now, nearly Christmas right? I think I got lost in a time warp somtime between before Halloween and now. Somewhere between the beautiful mid-fall days with family in Mass and the freezing cold Maine mornings when I have to leave the warmness of my bed and my snuggly family and nursing toddler and join the working world in Raymond, where by the way, I am rotating with a wonderful, compassionate family doc who makes learning interesting and gives me the autonomy I think I deserve as someone who is going to graduate in only 3.5 months (!). But oh wait, this is a blog about my son, not me...

So I seem to have a hard time getting the pictures I take from the camera to the computer to the blog, but I will try hard and soon to get them up. After I get back from a 36 hour trip to Philidelphia tomorrow for boards, literally 36 hours down and back. Ugh. Simon had a wonderful Halloween, he has been parading around in his chicken costume ever since. He really liked trick or treating of course and by the end of the night way saying "Si-MIN want CANNY!" when the lovely neighborhood folks opened their front door. Fortunetly he got the understanding pretty early on, by about the fifth house, that we don't actually go INSIDE peoples homes. No matter how exciting they look, or what eager pets meet us at the door, we merely take their candy, say thank you and move on. A hard lesson for a curious almost two year old.

Let's see what else? Simon had his first hair cut yesterday. He was a good little guy and sat still for the most part. He had to have it cut since he insists on twirling it into little knots that he calls "PONIES" and we have to cut them out. This has not stopped the creation of Si's ponies, but at least for 24 hours he had a decent hair cut that was nice and even. He enjoyed jumping in his first ever leaf pile today with Mama and Molly. He thought it was a riot. I watched these fun happenings from the window of the office as I sat with my nose in a book trying not to notice the fun that was happening around me, wallowing in my own misery. Don't worry you'll stop hearing about it on November 21, last round of boards for now. Well, maybe not until February 29, the real end of the road. We'll see.

I'll try and post more pics from the last couple weeks when I get back on Tuesday, or when I really have a free minute on Wednesday. G'night.