Had to include a couple shots of Dr. Bradshaw in his new white coat, with his name and all!
Showing posts with label Doctor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Doctor. Show all posts
26 June 2008
Dr. Bradshaw
Had to include a couple shots of Dr. Bradshaw in his new white coat, with his name and all!
29 May 2008
Graduation Pictures
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So, here are a few pictures from Michael’s graduation. It was really great that Michael’s parents, my parents, and my grandma were able to come for that special day. Thanks!
31 March 2008
The Next Survivor Series
I got this e-mail from my friend, Emily Christensen, and thought it was very cute -- this is a reality show I might actually watch:
The Next Survivor Series
Six married men will be dropped on an island with one car and 3 kids each for six weeks. Each kid will play two sports and either take music or dance classes.
There is no fast food. Each man must take care of his 3 kids; keep his assigned house clean, correct all homework, and complete science projects, cook, do laundry, and pay a list of 'pretend' bills with not enough money.
In addition, each man will have to budget in money for groceries each week. Each man must remember the birthdays of all their friends and relatives, and send cards out on time. Each man must also take each child to a doctor's appointment, a dentist appointment, and a haircut appointment.
He must make one unscheduled and inconvenient visit per child to the Urgent Care. He must also make cookies or cupcakes for a social function. Each man will be responsible for decorating his own assigned house, planting flower s outside and keeping it presentable at all times.
The men will only have access to television when the kids are asleep and all chores are done. The men must shave their legs, wear makeup daily, adorn himself with jewelry, wear uncomfortable yet stylish shoes, keep fingernails polished and eyebrows groomed. During one of the six weeks, the men will have to endure severe abdominal cramps, back aches, and have extreme, unexplained mood swings but never once complain or slow down from other duties.
They must attend weekly school meetings, church, and find time at least once to spend the afternoon at the park or a similar setting. They will need to read a book and then pray with the children each night and in the morning, feed them, dress them, brush their teeth and comb their hair by 7:00 am.
A test will be given at the end of the six weeks, and each father will be required to know all of the following information: each child's birthday, height, weight, shoe size, clothes size and doctor's name. They will also need to know each child's weight and length at birth, time of birth, and length of labor, along with each child's favorite color, middle name, favorite snack, favorite song, favorite drink, favorite toy, biggest fear and what they want to be when they grow up.
The kids vote them off the island based on performance. The last man wins only if . . . he still has enough energy to be intimate with his spouse at a moment's notice.
If the last man does win, he can play the game over and over and over again for the next 18 to 25 years, eventually earning the right to be called ‘Mother.’
The Next Survivor Series
Six married men will be dropped on an island with one car and 3 kids each for six weeks. Each kid will play two sports and either take music or dance classes.
There is no fast food. Each man must take care of his 3 kids; keep his assigned house clean, correct all homework, and complete science projects, cook, do laundry, and pay a list of 'pretend' bills with not enough money.
In addition, each man will have to budget in money for groceries each week. Each man must remember the birthdays of all their friends and relatives, and send cards out on time. Each man must also take each child to a doctor's appointment, a dentist appointment, and a haircut appointment.
He must make one unscheduled and inconvenient visit per child to the Urgent Care. He must also make cookies or cupcakes for a social function. Each man will be responsible for decorating his own assigned house, planting flower s outside and keeping it presentable at all times.
The men will only have access to television when the kids are asleep and all chores are done. The men must shave their legs, wear makeup daily, adorn himself with jewelry, wear uncomfortable yet stylish shoes, keep fingernails polished and eyebrows groomed. During one of the six weeks, the men will have to endure severe abdominal cramps, back aches, and have extreme, unexplained mood swings but never once complain or slow down from other duties.
They must attend weekly school meetings, church, and find time at least once to spend the afternoon at the park or a similar setting. They will need to read a book and then pray with the children each night and in the morning, feed them, dress them, brush their teeth and comb their hair by 7:00 am.
A test will be given at the end of the six weeks, and each father will be required to know all of the following information: each child's birthday, height, weight, shoe size, clothes size and doctor's name. They will also need to know each child's weight and length at birth, time of birth, and length of labor, along with each child's favorite color, middle name, favorite snack, favorite song, favorite drink, favorite toy, biggest fear and what they want to be when they grow up.
The kids vote them off the island based on performance. The last man wins only if . . . he still has enough energy to be intimate with his spouse at a moment's notice.
If the last man does win, he can play the game over and over and over again for the next 18 to 25 years, eventually earning the right to be called ‘Mother.’
12 December 2007
Pyloric Stenosis
Since we came to Boise on December 1st Isaac has started spitting up. All of our boys have actually spit up quite a bit when they were babies, but this is different. He has done it about once a day and it is very forceful – kind of a projectile spit up. At first we thought that it was just because he was kind of stuffy, but it has continued for a while now. Michael mentioned once that he was the right age for symptoms to start showing for some medical condition, but honestly I didn’t really think much of that comment because every once in a while Michael learns about medical problems and then wonders if he or one of our family members may have them.
So, after this went on for a while, we were starting to wonder if it might be something more than just his reaction to being really stuffy or something. We were at Cass and Marci Smith’s house for dinner last week (Cass is a pediatric GI doctor), and Michael and Cass talked that night about the condition Michael had mentioned earlier, Pyloric Stenosis. Cass said he thought we should keep an eye on him and keep that in mind. I took Isaac in and had him weighed yesterday morning. He was weighed a couple days before we came out here, and he had lost about 7 ounces since then, and babies his age are generally supposed to gain about an ounce a day, our pediatrician told me. I called our pediatrician in Milwaukee, and he also thought that it was possible that Isaac could be showing signs of Pyloric Stenosis, and that we should have him seen by a doctor here. (I guess this shows me that Michael is really becoming a real doctor and I should pay more attention to his ideas about medical problems).
So, I took him into the emergency room yesterday (our insurance will only cover emergency room visits when we are out of state, so we couldn’t just find a pediatrician here to see him). We were there all day, and Debbie was nice enough to watch the other boys for me while I went (since Michael was on an airplane all day). In the emergency room, they weighed Isaac, took his history, and decided to have an ultrasound done to see if he had this Pyloric Stenosis. I had read a little about the condition on the internet before taking him in. Basically, it is when the muscle of the pylorus (the tube that empties into the stomach) gets too thick, and makes it so that the milk does not enter the stomach like it should. This condition is much more common in boys than in girls, and the symptoms are projectile vomiting, the baby loosing (or at least not gaining) weight, and the baby often appearing otherwise healthy (unless it progresses to where the baby is not keeping anything down, and then the baby can come dehydrated and lethargic). So, they did an ultrasound of his stomach and measured the thickness of the pyloric muscle. They told me that his pylorus looked elongated and was measuring between 2.5 and 3 mm thick, which is thicker than normal. But they said that it would measure 3.5 mm if it were true Pyloric Stenosis, which would require a surgical procedure to fix.
So, the doctor said that we would just watch him and see how he does. Isaac was seen by an ER doctor and a pediatric surgeon, and they told me that this problem will either go away after a few weeks when he may just grow out of it, or that it may develop into true Pyloric Stenosis and require the surgery if the spitting up were to continue and get worse. I talked to the surgeon this morning, and he did say that the majority of babies with this problem will develop true Pyloric Stenosis before they are 2 months old, so hopefully if Isaac doesn’t worsen in the next couple weeks, he will just get over it and we won’t have to worry about it any more. He hasn’t spit up like that for a day now, so I am hoping that it will just go away and we won’t have to do anything more for it. Poor little guy he’s already had enough surgeries for a 7-week old baby, he doesn’t need one more.
So, after this went on for a while, we were starting to wonder if it might be something more than just his reaction to being really stuffy or something. We were at Cass and Marci Smith’s house for dinner last week (Cass is a pediatric GI doctor), and Michael and Cass talked that night about the condition Michael had mentioned earlier, Pyloric Stenosis. Cass said he thought we should keep an eye on him and keep that in mind. I took Isaac in and had him weighed yesterday morning. He was weighed a couple days before we came out here, and he had lost about 7 ounces since then, and babies his age are generally supposed to gain about an ounce a day, our pediatrician told me. I called our pediatrician in Milwaukee, and he also thought that it was possible that Isaac could be showing signs of Pyloric Stenosis, and that we should have him seen by a doctor here. (I guess this shows me that Michael is really becoming a real doctor and I should pay more attention to his ideas about medical problems).
So, I took him into the emergency room yesterday (our insurance will only cover emergency room visits when we are out of state, so we couldn’t just find a pediatrician here to see him). We were there all day, and Debbie was nice enough to watch the other boys for me while I went (since Michael was on an airplane all day). In the emergency room, they weighed Isaac, took his history, and decided to have an ultrasound done to see if he had this Pyloric Stenosis. I had read a little about the condition on the internet before taking him in. Basically, it is when the muscle of the pylorus (the tube that empties into the stomach) gets too thick, and makes it so that the milk does not enter the stomach like it should. This condition is much more common in boys than in girls, and the symptoms are projectile vomiting, the baby loosing (or at least not gaining) weight, and the baby often appearing otherwise healthy (unless it progresses to where the baby is not keeping anything down, and then the baby can come dehydrated and lethargic). So, they did an ultrasound of his stomach and measured the thickness of the pyloric muscle. They told me that his pylorus looked elongated and was measuring between 2.5 and 3 mm thick, which is thicker than normal. But they said that it would measure 3.5 mm if it were true Pyloric Stenosis, which would require a surgical procedure to fix.
So, the doctor said that we would just watch him and see how he does. Isaac was seen by an ER doctor and a pediatric surgeon, and they told me that this problem will either go away after a few weeks when he may just grow out of it, or that it may develop into true Pyloric Stenosis and require the surgery if the spitting up were to continue and get worse. I talked to the surgeon this morning, and he did say that the majority of babies with this problem will develop true Pyloric Stenosis before they are 2 months old, so hopefully if Isaac doesn’t worsen in the next couple weeks, he will just get over it and we won’t have to worry about it any more. He hasn’t spit up like that for a day now, so I am hoping that it will just go away and we won’t have to do anything more for it. Poor little guy he’s already had enough surgeries for a 7-week old baby, he doesn’t need one more.
28 October 2007
An Acute Life Threatening Event
I know Michael posted a quick update on Isaac’s condition that he wrote earlier today, but I just wanted to give a quick update on what the doctor said about Isaac today.
As Michael mentioned earlier, he and I spent a good day in the NICU with Isaac today – he was breathing much better today than he was when he had that episode of difficult breathing while we were there last night. And it was really nice to be able to hold him a lot today and feel like he was doing better. We spent the whole day there with him, and later on in the afternoon the doctor who performed his surgery the other day came to talk to us and answer any questions we had.
Last night when Isaac had the trouble with his breathing, we knew that it must be kind of serious, since there were all of a sudden 8 medical staff in the room. But it didn’t take them too long to give him the oral airway, which resolved the problem pretty quickly and relaxed his breathing a lot.
So, when the doctor came in to talk to us this afternoon and he called what happened to Isaac last night an “acute life threatening event” we were both a little shocked. We knew it was serious, but we had no idea it was that serious. The doctor said that the problem last night was not directly related to the surgery or the anesthesia, and said that their best diagnosis was that the problem last night was caused by reflux, especially since it happened shortly after the nurse tried to feed Isaac a little milk yesterday. We knew that they had given him two different medicines and they said that those would aggressively treat the reflux. When I asked the doctor if the reflux was going to be an ongoing problem for Isaac, I was also surprised to hear that he will continue on both of the reflux medications for 18 months to make sure that he doesn’t have another similar episode like last night.
We asked if the doctor had any idea when Isaac might be ready to go home, (since the original estimate had been that he might be ready to go home today or tomorrow, but we could tell he wasn’t ready for that). The doctor would not give us an estimate, since he said that he couldn’t predict hot Isaac would do in the future. But he did give us some idea when he said that they plan to wait until Isaac is off of all the tubes, the oral airway, the IV, the monitors, and until he is nursing like normal, and then watch him for 48 to 72 hours to make sure that he can do well without any of those extra things before they will send him home. So, we don’t really know how long it will be, but I would guess maybe that it will be another week before we can bring him home from the NICU, as long as there are no more setbacks.
So, it was good to get some more information about his condition, and although we’d love to have him home with us now, we are glad that they are going to be thorough and make sure that he is fully recovered before letting him go. We are glad that he seems to be doing so much better today, and please keep him in your prayers so that he will not have any more setbacks and he can recover quickly. Thank you!
As Michael mentioned earlier, he and I spent a good day in the NICU with Isaac today – he was breathing much better today than he was when he had that episode of difficult breathing while we were there last night. And it was really nice to be able to hold him a lot today and feel like he was doing better. We spent the whole day there with him, and later on in the afternoon the doctor who performed his surgery the other day came to talk to us and answer any questions we had.
Last night when Isaac had the trouble with his breathing, we knew that it must be kind of serious, since there were all of a sudden 8 medical staff in the room. But it didn’t take them too long to give him the oral airway, which resolved the problem pretty quickly and relaxed his breathing a lot.
So, when the doctor came in to talk to us this afternoon and he called what happened to Isaac last night an “acute life threatening event” we were both a little shocked. We knew it was serious, but we had no idea it was that serious. The doctor said that the problem last night was not directly related to the surgery or the anesthesia, and said that their best diagnosis was that the problem last night was caused by reflux, especially since it happened shortly after the nurse tried to feed Isaac a little milk yesterday. We knew that they had given him two different medicines and they said that those would aggressively treat the reflux. When I asked the doctor if the reflux was going to be an ongoing problem for Isaac, I was also surprised to hear that he will continue on both of the reflux medications for 18 months to make sure that he doesn’t have another similar episode like last night.
We asked if the doctor had any idea when Isaac might be ready to go home, (since the original estimate had been that he might be ready to go home today or tomorrow, but we could tell he wasn’t ready for that). The doctor would not give us an estimate, since he said that he couldn’t predict hot Isaac would do in the future. But he did give us some idea when he said that they plan to wait until Isaac is off of all the tubes, the oral airway, the IV, the monitors, and until he is nursing like normal, and then watch him for 48 to 72 hours to make sure that he can do well without any of those extra things before they will send him home. So, we don’t really know how long it will be, but I would guess maybe that it will be another week before we can bring him home from the NICU, as long as there are no more setbacks.
So, it was good to get some more information about his condition, and although we’d love to have him home with us now, we are glad that they are going to be thorough and make sure that he is fully recovered before letting him go. We are glad that he seems to be doing so much better today, and please keep him in your prayers so that he will not have any more setbacks and he can recover quickly. Thank you!
16 October 2007
Contagious
So, Kolby has strep throat. I was pretty surprised to get the call from the doctor this morning saying that his culture came back positive for strep.
Last year both Kolby and Eli had strep throat. We had never dealt with that before, and Kolby had been complaining for a few days that his teeth and his mouth hurt and he had trouble eating because of that. I was pregnant with Camden at the time and thought about waiting another day or so to take Kolby to the doctor – because he was complaining about his teeth hurting, we thought that it might be a cavity – and I remember feeling pretty tired, but deciding to take him in for an appointment anyway just to have it checked out. We took the boys in, and it turned out that Kolby’s throat was sore, not his teeth. The doctor did a rapid strep swab on each boy and both came back positive immediately. It turned out that it was a good thing that we took them in that day, because I ended up going into labor and having Camden that night. And with strep throat they need to take the antibiotics for 24 hours before they are no longer contagious, so it was a good thing that they had gotten started on that before we went into the hospital.
So, for the last few days Kolby has been acting sick, but I didn’t even consider the possibility that it might be strep throat, because it has been nothing like when he and Eli got it a year ago. Since Friday Kolby has been getting fevers off and on – he would seem fine for most of the day and then spike a fever and lay around and act tired and fussy. Then the next day he would feel warm, but wouldn’t have a high fever, but he would act normal much of the day and then act sick again later on. He did that for several days, and then on Sunday we thought he had gotten over it. We went to church that morning, and then after the first hour of church Michael took his temperature and it was 102.7 degrees and his face looked all red. Michael took him home and he got some rest, but Kolby hasn’t had a fever since then. That night Kolby woke up drying several times in the night, so I decided to take him to the doctor’s office instead of his preschool classes on Monday morning, but on Monday and today he has not had a fever or acted sick at all. I took him in yesterday, and we noticed that the red rash on his face was also on his stomach. The doctor did a swab and it came back negative, and since Kolby had been acting normal all day, we figured it was something viral that he was already starting to get over. So last night we took him to a birthday party. I felt pretty bad this morning when the doctor called and said that the culture came back positive for strep today. I had to call the moms at the birthday party and the preschool at the YMCA to let them know that their kids may have been exposed to strep – so, if any of your kids have been around Kolby over the last few days, I’m sorry and I hope they don’t get sick.
Anyway, I have had a cough the last couple of weeks and we had no specific plans for today, so I was planning on staying home in my pajamas all day today. When I got the call from the doctor, I knew that we would have to go to the pharmacy to pick up Kolby’s medicine, and I really didn’t want to get all the kids all packed into the car just for that. Michael is so thoughtful – I called to tell him that Kolby has strep, and he came home from work during his lunch break to get Kolby’s insurance card and went to get the prescription and bring it back home, and then he had to go right back to work. Isn’t that nice? He knew that it was something I could do, and I just really didn’t feel like it, so he volunteered to do that for me. How kind!
So, Kolby started his antibiotics this afternoon. Once he has taken the medicine for 24 hours, he will no longer be contagious. I was glad to find out that he will not be contagious anymore by tomorrow afternoon, because we are having a little birthday party for Kolby on Friday and he would have been so disappointed if we had to cancel it. Plus, if we had to cancel the party on Friday, I don’t know when we would have rescheduled it, because this baby will be here before too long.
It’s interesting that Kolby has strep throat now, with this baby due so soon. When Eli was born Kolby had roseola, and when Camden was born Kolby and Eli both had strep throat. So I have been jokingly wondering what contagious sickness my boys would have when baby Isaac is born. Hopefully our family is all healthy when the new baby comes. We’re getting close – only 14 days to go until the due date!
Last year both Kolby and Eli had strep throat. We had never dealt with that before, and Kolby had been complaining for a few days that his teeth and his mouth hurt and he had trouble eating because of that. I was pregnant with Camden at the time and thought about waiting another day or so to take Kolby to the doctor – because he was complaining about his teeth hurting, we thought that it might be a cavity – and I remember feeling pretty tired, but deciding to take him in for an appointment anyway just to have it checked out. We took the boys in, and it turned out that Kolby’s throat was sore, not his teeth. The doctor did a rapid strep swab on each boy and both came back positive immediately. It turned out that it was a good thing that we took them in that day, because I ended up going into labor and having Camden that night. And with strep throat they need to take the antibiotics for 24 hours before they are no longer contagious, so it was a good thing that they had gotten started on that before we went into the hospital.
So, for the last few days Kolby has been acting sick, but I didn’t even consider the possibility that it might be strep throat, because it has been nothing like when he and Eli got it a year ago. Since Friday Kolby has been getting fevers off and on – he would seem fine for most of the day and then spike a fever and lay around and act tired and fussy. Then the next day he would feel warm, but wouldn’t have a high fever, but he would act normal much of the day and then act sick again later on. He did that for several days, and then on Sunday we thought he had gotten over it. We went to church that morning, and then after the first hour of church Michael took his temperature and it was 102.7 degrees and his face looked all red. Michael took him home and he got some rest, but Kolby hasn’t had a fever since then. That night Kolby woke up drying several times in the night, so I decided to take him to the doctor’s office instead of his preschool classes on Monday morning, but on Monday and today he has not had a fever or acted sick at all. I took him in yesterday, and we noticed that the red rash on his face was also on his stomach. The doctor did a swab and it came back negative, and since Kolby had been acting normal all day, we figured it was something viral that he was already starting to get over. So last night we took him to a birthday party. I felt pretty bad this morning when the doctor called and said that the culture came back positive for strep today. I had to call the moms at the birthday party and the preschool at the YMCA to let them know that their kids may have been exposed to strep – so, if any of your kids have been around Kolby over the last few days, I’m sorry and I hope they don’t get sick.
Anyway, I have had a cough the last couple of weeks and we had no specific plans for today, so I was planning on staying home in my pajamas all day today. When I got the call from the doctor, I knew that we would have to go to the pharmacy to pick up Kolby’s medicine, and I really didn’t want to get all the kids all packed into the car just for that. Michael is so thoughtful – I called to tell him that Kolby has strep, and he came home from work during his lunch break to get Kolby’s insurance card and went to get the prescription and bring it back home, and then he had to go right back to work. Isn’t that nice? He knew that it was something I could do, and I just really didn’t feel like it, so he volunteered to do that for me. How kind!
So, Kolby started his antibiotics this afternoon. Once he has taken the medicine for 24 hours, he will no longer be contagious. I was glad to find out that he will not be contagious anymore by tomorrow afternoon, because we are having a little birthday party for Kolby on Friday and he would have been so disappointed if we had to cancel it. Plus, if we had to cancel the party on Friday, I don’t know when we would have rescheduled it, because this baby will be here before too long.
It’s interesting that Kolby has strep throat now, with this baby due so soon. When Eli was born Kolby had roseola, and when Camden was born Kolby and Eli both had strep throat. So I have been jokingly wondering what contagious sickness my boys would have when baby Isaac is born. Hopefully our family is all healthy when the new baby comes. We’re getting close – only 14 days to go until the due date!
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