starting a new hand

Ted turned 6 years old today! Kind of crazy to think about. We've been celebrating for several days. Which I'm really fine with. It kind of takes my guilt away for not having an official friend birthday party. I'm just not ready for that. Plus we don't know lots of kids Ted's age. Mainly what that means is I don't have many friends who have kids Ted's age. They're all Sophie's age or younger.

Friday, Grandma, Doh and John Pap came over (Gary Pap was out west). Doh made another fantastic birthday cake. They were here when Ted got off the bus. We opened presents and then took 40 minutes to drive across town to Cheddar's (Ted's favorite restaurant) and then waited for about 45 minutes for a table. Note to self: Friday at 5pm is not a good idea to do such things! Next time we're having them bring a PJ's pizza over.

Putting together the puzzle that represents the new bike Ted
will be getting when we get our act together at get to Toys R Us.

Tuesday we blindfolded Ted and took him back to Cheddar's for
a Cookie Monster. Which thoroughly confused Sophie b/c she
was expecting the real Cookie Monster.

We killed it! It's a huge chocolate chip cookie with ice cream,
whipped cream, chocolate sauce and topped with a cherry.

Today after school we took Ted to Pinnochio's (a locally owned toy store on High
Street) to let him spend some of his birthday money. He chose a Play Mobile
boat that is super cool and my secret personal pick.

Mountaineer Dress Up Outfit

This morning when we were waiting for the bus, Ted said, "Hey! I'm starting another hand today!"  Yes, Ted, you are.

I think the word I would use to describe Ted as a 5 year old would be "brave." Even though there were segments of this year where fear really ruled over him, he found a way to really cope with and overcome those fears. I'm proud of him.

This morning he got up way too early. He crawled in bed with Ben and I and we each shared some things that we really remember and are proud of him for this year. I'm pretty sure Ted's love language is "words of affirmation" and I could tell her really loved it.

So, some highlights of year 5 . . . being the tallest kid in his preschool class, learning to swim, doing the zipline, tubing for the first time, getting glasses, learning to ride a bike, graduating from preschool after 3 years and starting Kindergarten, starting to read and write words, starting soccer, going a whole year without throwing up, playing big kid card and board games, riding the bus, sleeping under the Christmas tree for the first time, being a kind big brother to Sophie as she learned to play with you (and being patient with her developing hide-and-seek skills), showering on your own, and watching you really love learning new things in Kindergarten.

It's been a great year, Ted! We're so proud of you. I love watching you grow, learn and take things in. Your observation skills, the questions you ask and your imagination never cease to amaze me. Thanks for challenging me to listen, to answer and be engaged - because you want nothing less. I'm so thankful God gave you to us!

locks of love

Since June, I've been talking about cutting Sophie's hair and donating it to Locks of Love. Today was the day. I was a little nervous. Ben was not thrilled with the idea at all. Sophie's hair has always been one of her dearest and most recognized characteristics from the time she was a baby. She's had one and a half haircuts - 1 in January when she had a couple of inches cut off the bottom and 1 in June when we got about half way across and then she melted.) I'm so glad we did. It's so CUTE! And hair grows.

Before:

During:

As you'll notice, seeing her ponytail freaks her out for a minute.
But then she loves looking at her short hair.

 

The ponytail we'll send in.

 Right after the ponytail cut. I think this is the length I would like to let it grow to.

While it was being cut she kept saying that she and I are going to be twins.

Sophie and David

I felt like she was a little like Rapunzel in Tangled when her hair gets
cut and it turns dark. Her hair looks so brown!

And she looks so stinkin' cute!! 

ted's story (part 2)

So Ted came home on Day 23.

 

Right at the beginning of winter. And flu season. And RSV season. The doctor gave me strict orders not to take him anywhere. Preemies, especially white boys (not kidding), struggle with lung development. And getting the flu or RSV was very dangerous. So we went to the doctors and we went to the River Ridge Church Office. At the time, it was in the basement of an old church. It was me, Matt, Ted and Alicia. He slept all the time. For months. So I took him there to get out of the house. But that was it. We didn't spend Thanksgiving or Christmas with our families. I didn't go to church for months because Ben led worship and had to be there. Thursday morning bible study was my sanity.

One of the best things about the NICU was that Ted came home on a 3 hour eating and sleeping schedule. And he could sleep through anything after all that noise from beeping hospital machines. 

 

 

Ted slept in a clothes basket the first couple of weeks. It was just easier to tote him around the house like that. He had a heart rate and breathing monitor that was attached to him for months. If he stopped breathing for too long or his heart rate went too high or too low, the machine would beep loudly in attempt to scare him awake or kick his heart rate back. It usually went off in the middle of the night. Usually when the leads were getting unsticky. I'm not sure if it was ever really for the real reason. But, then again, I'm really not sure if I want to know.

 

He came home on reglan for reflux and caffeine to stimulate both his heart rate and breathing. Ever purchased caffeine before? It ain't cheap.

They told us in the hospital that since Ted was 2 months early, he would do everything at an adjusted age. You think newborns at full term sleep all the time, check out a new born that's months early. He was never awake and hardly ever any sort of alert. Christmas Day I remember him being alert and awake for about an hour. It was awesome. If he had been full term, he would've been a couple of weeks old. He was coming along right on schedule.

The entire month of January Ted cried. It was miserable. We later found out he had heart burn. God bless our pediatrician who put him on liquid zantac and it cleared that issue right up. I also took him off caffeine cold turkey - not thinking he might have withdrawl from it. I'm sure that contributed some, too. We were at some sort of doctors appointment regularly. Weight checks. RSV shots. Eye doctors. Follow up NICU visits. I honestly don't even remember all of them.

Towards the end of January, I saw these two pictures and we took him in for a weight check. It made me so sad that he was still so small and pitiful looking. So the doctor decided that we should supplement with an extra calorie formula (also not cheap!).

The change was almost immediate. He grew before our eyes. And then he turned into a cute, chubby little baby. By the time we started taking him out in April, everyone wondered if this was the same kid. We spent a week in New Martinsville meeting all the family he'd never met. We got out into the real world. It was wonderful and freeing.

Sometime around the 3 or 4 month age, we started getting Birth to Three Services. We had a developmental specialist and a physical therapist come to our house once a month to measure milestones and make sure he was keeping up. Kellie, our PT, was a girl I had worked with before. So it was extra special getting to visit with her. That also helped with our cooped up time. Ted was late (even according to his adjusted age) on sitting. But once he got there he was good to go. He graduated from the B-3 program a little after he turned 1.

For the next 2 years, Ted struggled with his lungs. We were always doing breathing treatments and even a few hospital visits. It wasn't until we were finishing year 2 when I realized we hadn't used the nebulizer in about 3 months. That was our breaking point. Since then Ted has met every milestone and surpassed many. He's one of the tallest kids in his class and it's good to know that extra calorie formula hasn't had long term effects - he's a stick!

Anytime anyone has a baby early, all this stuff comes right back. Although a lot of it is a blur, a lot of it is as raw as the day it happened. That changed the direction of our lives in many ways. And I'm thankful for it. I never would've stayed on staff at River Ridge - that wasn't part of my plan. That was the only place I could take Ted. So I quit my other jobs. I'm darn thankful I did.

We paid off all of Ted's medical bills the right before Sophie was born. Young Life has the best insurance. I never had to fight with them or make phone calls b/c they didn't pay. It mainly ended up being two years of deductibles and out-of-pocket maximums. As best I can tell, he cost about $100,000 his first 6 months.

So Ted Tuel. There you have it. The condensed version of your first 6 months of life. Sorry I wasn't technologically savvy back then in the blog world. I had lots of time on my hands to have told way too much information about your life! You are a fighter. You are full of spunk. You are my not-so-little man. I love you!

ted's story (part 1)

I started this blog/scrapbook just before Sophie was born. Her life has been well documented from the beginning. So, I thought it was time that Ted's beginning got a little shout out. Ted is turning 6 next week. Hard to believe this was all 6 years ago. Seems like forever and yesterday all at the same time. We got our first digital camera the day Ted was born. So anything pre-Ted are in photo albums.

So, here's Ted's story . . . .

" . . . all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be." Psalm 139:16

I found out I was pregnant with Ted in April 2005. Ben made me take 3 pregnancy tests and still didn't believe them. I was excited and naive about anything baby. We went to the doctor and got a due date of December 10. Around the end of April I started getting sick. All the time. I could barely get out of bed. Everything made me sick. The smell of coffee. The smell of anything. Food commercials on tv. Looking at food. I could barely work. At the time I was working two part-time office jobs and tutoring. I took some time off of one job and would drag myself to the church office and tutor as much as a I could.

Everything I ate came back up. Everything. So I was very particular about what I ate. Mostly carbs. Mostly neutral colored things. Cheerios. Potatoes. Toast. That was about it. And I had to eat every 2 hours. I threw up morning, noon and night. Parking lots. Sides of the road. Toilet. Wherever.

I thought I would feel better by the end of May. But no. Well into July I was still sick. On assignment that summer at Lake Champion I had moved to yogurt and other cereals. We had the upstairs room which was nice to be away from everyone. But I would have to run down the stairs and down a long hallway to throw up in the community locker-style bathroom. That was real nice. At 5 months pregnant, I had lost 10 pounds.

After assignment, I started to gain a little weight and actually looked like I could possibly be pregnant. At the beginning of October we starting taking birthing classes. We were the only couple in our class that didn't know if we were having a boy or a girl. It was so fun and drove people crazy!

The morning of October 19, after our 3rd class (of 4), I got up around 5:00 am to use the bathroom. I immediately got back up again - why I don't remember. And my water broke. I was 32 weeks pregnant.

We went to the hospital. Honestly, I thought they would put me on bed rest and, at most, keep me in the hospital. In triage, they gave me an ultrasound and determined that they would let me labor, after not believing me that my water did actually break (if that's any sort of correct terminology or tense). I had lost enough fluid that the baby could not stay in. They said that I was having regular contractions (that I didn't feel at all) and that I was 0 centimeters dilated. They put me in a labor and delivery room and that was that.

We didn't bring a thing with us to the hospital. No camera. No clothes. No nothing. Ben was getting ready to go home and get stuff when the doctor came in and said, "The baby's heartbeat is dropping with every contraction. We need to do a c-section." 30 minutes later they said, "It's a boy!" The OR was filled with NICU people. The wrapped our baby boy tightly and gave him to Ben for about 30 seconds. All we could see was his eyes. And they took him. It was so fast. I don't really remember most of it. He was 4 pounds, 6 ounces and 16 inches long.

While I was in recovery for many, many hours, Ben and both sets of our parents got to see Ted. (He was nameless at that point!). There was a steady flow of doctors and nurses giving me information. And it was like that for days. Finally, 6 hours after he was born, they wheeled me over to the  NICU to see him. By that time, he was covered in all sorts of wires and stuff.

For 3 days this was all we saw. There was so much information. So many emotions. They let me stay in the hospital an extra day so that I could be close by. It was surreal going home without a baby.

On the 3rd day he rose again (just kidding - I wanted to see if you were paying attention and give you some comedic relief!). When he was 3 days old, they finally took all his stuff off so we could see him. His eyes and face were all swollen. He was pretty crusty because he still hadn't had an official bath yet. He had tape all over him to hold tubes and prevent irritation. We were not allowed to hold him.

 Sometime in those first couple of days, we named him Theodore (after Ben's Dad) Charles (after my brother and grandfather). We had not agreed on a name to this point. But this was so fitting. Ted seemed like such a big name for such a little baby. But I love, love, love it now!

All the while he was getting stronger. He had CPAP to help him with his breathing for a very short time, but never any major breathing help. He had a feeding tube through his mouth that eventually moved to his nose that they gave him what I had pumped. He wriggled that sucker out several times. Everyday was different and a new thing for him. Sometimes it was a tent. Sometimes a few less beeping things. Always new information. Always moving forward. I remember the first day they dressed him in little preemie clothes.

Day 6 - He gave up the CPAP and moved into a tent.

Day 7 - Open tent

Day 8 - Incubator type weird thing

Day 9 - They dressed him. It made such a difference for me to see him dressed.

Ben would always go first thing in the morning and call me with an update of what was new. I was still moving pretty slow as I was recovering from surgery and pumping. I would spend a large chunk of the day there. Ben would go back in the evenings. I quickly learned that I was too emotional in the evenings to go. The other babies made me more sad than anything. Ted was getting healthier and stronger by the day. Other babies had a lot tougher road, were smaller and had many, many more obstacles to overcome.  

When he was 10 days old they let us hold him for the first time. It was glorious. I still didn't know enough to realize how small he was. After that we would hold him whenever we were there.

Soon after we started to hold him, they moved Ted into a smaller room off the NICU named "Crib Corner". His roommate was Larry. Ted and Larry - I'll never forget it. It was more like a nursing home than a NICU. Larry had been there awhile, had several surgeries and had a long way ahead of him.

Day 11 - BIG DAY . . . Moved from Little One Lane to Crib Corner with Larry

Then all the grandparents got to come hold him.

 That was the day my Mom swears she saw Ted's dimples for the first time.

We gave him a bath for our first time.

It was the first day he was really alert. We saw his eyes which were really gray.
And his hair fluffed up nicely!

Days 12-15 we spent a lot of time holding and feeding Ted and watching him get stronger everyday.

Meanwhile, on the home front, we had NOTHING for a baby. Nothing. When Ted was born, I had a kid sized sweatshirt blanket from YL camp. That's all. Between the time that Ted was born and when he came home, I had 3 baby showers and his room was started and finished painted, cribs and dressers were assembled, and we had every baby accessory we would need. I remember that being a huge turning point for us in Charleston. Charleston was our home. Our family. We felt loved, cared for, prayed over and encouraged by our church and Young Life families. And people were so generous. Oh my the generosity. Our living room was full. Our fridge was full. Our lives were full.

Also during that time, we had the Young Life Banquet, the Beyond Ourselves Campaign for the church building finished up, I had our yearly girls weekend and I went back to wearing my pre-pregnancy clothes (which was not the reality I needed when Sophie was born much later in pregnancy!). Thankfully our girls weekend had already been scheduled for Charleston. It was a gift to spend time with my friends who I love so dearly with trips to the hospital in between. Really, when I think about that, it's all crazy!

Back at the hospital, Ted was moved to the new born nursery sometime between Day 15-18. I can't remember exactly - my journals are in the attic and our pictures are a little vague those days. He had moved forward enough for him to leave the NICU. All he needed to do was eat and gain a little weight. I loved the NICU. I was seriously comfortable with him being there for as long as he needed to be. But the nursery was a whole different story. It was awful. And the miscommunication. No rooms for us to be with him. I sat with him in the nursery once with a baby being circumcised on the other side of a curtain. I'm not kidding. We couldn't get him out of there fast enough.

On Day 23 (November 10, 2005) Ted came home. He was eating from a bottle well enough (just a few ounces at a time), he passed his car seat test (they put preemies in a car seat for a certain amount of time to make sure they don't have any apnea episodes), we took a CPR class and we were out of there!

Part 2 to come tomorrow!