Insect Repellent. Formula. Preschool.

Insect repellent. Formula refusal. Preschool and Ms. B

Insect Repellent

It’s been a busy month for Carter.  We went camping the last weekend in August. The weather was perfect but the mosquitoes weren’t. I wasn’t prepared for a bug problem since there weren’t any last time we went, but they were loving Carter. The local store had an all natural insect repellent whose main ingredient was citronella. I weighed the options and figured a reaction through skin would most likely be delayed and wouldn’t hit until we were already home. The alternative was a little boy covered in bug bites.

We applied repellent, careful to keep any from getting into his mouth. 2 hours later, like clockwork, he started to get cranky and irritable. Then his fever shot up.  His heart began to race. His breathing was quick and shallow. The reflux kicked in full force and he had several vomiting episodes. These symptoms lasted all night. By 7 am, he wasn’t any better. Carter and I came home, while the rest of the gang finished up the camping trip.

Carter napped from 1:30 to 5 pm and then slept from 7:20 to 8:30 the next morning. Lesson learned: Skin reactions can happen as quickly as ingestion reactions.

Formula Refusal

We are also battling a formula refusal. Carter usually drinks 24 ounces of formula a day. He went on a 5 day formula strike. By the fifth day, he barely had the energy to walk.  He finally laid down on the bed, asked to be covered with his blankie, and gave in to the formula consumption, drinking a full 6 ounces. It seemed to be his last resort. He is still not back to regular consumption amounts and we are working on finding a safe multivitamin and entertaining the idea of making our own coconut based formula.  I am wondering if the soy oil in the formula has reached a build up level that his system can no longer tolerate. More guessing. More detective work.

Preschool

Carter started preschool on August 23. He goes 2 days a week from 11:45 to 5 pm. I pack his lunch and his snack and he has goodies in case there is a special treat in class. He hasn’t cried at all when we drop him off. In fact, he cries when we pick him up! He genuinely loves going to school and it was one of the best decisions we have made for him.

When I picked him up on Thursday, he started telling me all about Ms. B. I asked him who Ms .B was and he said, “Me teacher”.  They are taking very good care of him. And we couldn’t be happier.

Ms. B got her first real FPIES experience when one of Carter’s classmates brought cupcakes for everyone.  Carter got to have one of his safe lollipops, but he kept asking for and pointing to the cupcakes. It was a hard situation for her, having to tell him no over and over and redirect his attention. When she relayed the story, she got tears in her eyes.

Just as Carter affects everyone he meets with his warm smile and contagious laughter, FPIES leaves its own mark. It is not just family that struggle with FPIES and it’s not just family that make an FPIES child’s care their priority.  We are all in this together.

Men and Sex. Women and Worry.

Today’s blog is dedicated to all the men out there: dads, uncles, cousins, grandpas, nephews and friends. I hope this will help shed some light on the thoughts of a mother.

Thanks to the wonders of science, we know that men think about sex every 7 seconds.  Every 7 seconds! That’s pretty much all the time. Science has also told us that they just can’t help it. There is nothing that can be done to change how often a man thinks about sex.  This statistic is just an average. I bet if you asked a man, he would say he thinks about sex even more than that, if he’s being honest. Now if we tell a man, “Hey, don’t think about sex. Stop. Think about something else”. What happens? He’ll think about sex even more.

OK, now that we’ve established that and we are all in agreement, I want you to try something. Let’s take this fact: Men think about sex every 7 seconds, and lets transform it to apply to the one thing moms think about every 7 seconds. Anyone have any guesses? Anyone?  We are replacing SEX with WORRY.   So what do we get now?

Moms worry every 7 seconds. Yep, it’s true. Every 7 seconds we are worrying about something.  It is a constant dialogue going on in our minds. We cannot shut it off. We cannot make it go away. And if you tell us not to worry, what happens? We worry even more.

What do we worry about? EVERYTHING. Are the kids happy? Did they get enough hugs before they went to school? Do they like it at school? Are they making friends? Did I turn off the coffee pot? Did I close the garage? Did I lock the door? Is there a doctor’s appointment today or tomorrow? Did I brush my teeth? When was the last time I took a shower? Does the baby have a clean diaper? Did I pack enough formula? Did I make enough for dinner? Did I kiss my husband goodbye this morning? Did I brush me teeth before or after I did that? Do I need to shave? Do my kids know how much I love them? Does my husband know? Is that bump a rash? Does my child’s head hurt? Why does that lady keep stating at my child? Does she think he’s too skinny? Is my little one eating enough? Am I spending enough time with my kids?

All those thoughts took place in less than a minute’s time. No, really. We worry that much.  A woman cannot help but worry, and a mother losses full control of her worrying ability once her child is born. A mom worries about the little things. A mom wakes up at 2 am and worries about whether she packed her child’s toy for show and tell. A moms last thought before she goes to bed is the worry that her kids are either too hot or too cold.

So men, do me a favor. For the next hour, pay attention to all the times sex crosses your mind. On average, you will have thought about sex over 500 times. Now pretend you’re a mom. Each one of those 500 thoughts about sex for you, was a worry for a mom.  Just remember this, the next time you start to tell us that we worry too much. We can’t help it anymore than you can.