So Far

{ image via }

Max is doing great after his surgery, you guys. Thank you for thinking of us, thank you for asking about him, thank you again for your kindness. It's fills up my heart to know that we have so many friends out there. I love you all!!

If you're interested, here's how everything went down:

I woke up at 5:15 on Tuesday morning and got ready. I had packed our bag the night before {diapers, slippers, books, crayons, stickers, and Christian's iPad}, so at 6:00 I scooped Max out of bed, put his coat on over his jams, and put him in the car. It was still dark when we arrived at the surgery center, but Max was happy to be awake and didn't seem to notice being hungry. There was a fish tank in the waiting room {did I take that as a sign, again, that we were in the right place? Yes I did, of course I did} and my phone to keep him entertained before we got checked in.

Once paperwork was signed, a nursed called us back and gave me a tiny hospital gown {not as tiny as Maggie's, though, thank goodness} and three Cars stickers. I made a big deal of showing Max how cool the stickers were, got him to say "car" for each one, stuck them on the front of his gown and patted them down, then quickly distracted him with crayons. Because Max is the kind of kid who likes to rip stickers off his clothes and then play with them in his hands until all the sticky is gone, and then he ends up sad and confused. I signed more paperwork while Max dumped all the crayons in his lap.

Soon after we were bored of playing with all the things in my bag and Max was working hard on rearranging the apps on Christian's iPad, they were ready for him. The nurse had said to me earlier, "If you don't mind, when they take him back please just stay standing right there until he can't see you anymore, so he doesn't think you've left. That'll help him feel better." To which my heart said both duh! and sob. But then the second he was through the doors, she was all, "alright, back to the waiting room with you!" And I didn't have the emotional capacity to be annoyed with her because I was concentrated on the fact that I could still see Max every few seconds as the doors kept swinging open, clutching his Foofa and looking forward.

Here's the thing: it doesn't get easier, handing your child over to the doctor and watching them walk away with your baby. Even for a surgery as simple and routine as Max's. I know there are mothers out there who have been through much more with their children because of medical conditions. I know how blessed I am to have three healthy kids. But it doesn't get easier, and it's still scary.

The good thing is that literally ten minutes after I sat down in the waiting room, the doctor came to find me to tell me that he was done. Everything went well, and they found a lot of fluid behind his ears. Soon a nurse came to take me back to Max in the recovery room. Unlike the times that Maggie has woken up from anesthesia, and has been a little upset but mostly groggy and tired and clingy, Max was upset and in pain and MAD. He was red-faced and inconsolable, with Tylenol dripping out of his open mouth. I soon gave up on calming him down and just got him dressed so we could leave.

He started to feel better in the car, and once we got home he was doing well. Throughout the morning he would sometimes start crying and tug on one of his ears, but by the afternoon he was totally back to normal. That boy, he's a tough one.

Every time someone asks me how Max is doing, I hear this subtext {whether they mean for it to be there or not} of "AND CAN HE HEAR NOW??" And I'm hesitant to respond. His doctor said that it could take a while for there to be a noticeable difference, which is why his follow-up visit and hearing test at the ENT aren't scheduled for another couple of weeks.

I don't want to say that I can't tell a difference as much as I was expecting, even though it's the truth, because I feel like that's resigning myself to disappointment. I don't want to say that I think I've definitely noticed some difference, even though that's also the truth, because I don't want to turn out wrong. I'm holding off on making any definite conclusions for now. I'm trying to be patient until we know for sure.

The Heavy Stuff

You may remember that almost three weeks ago I published this post, which was completely normal and ordinary {and maybe a little boring, as is often the case with Instagram dumps} except that I mentioned that we were going through "some heavy stuff" and I wasn't ready to talk about it yet. I thought I would be ready to talk about it later in the week, and I wasn't, and I apologize for not mentioning it again until now. But I'm ready to talk about it now.

In this post I talked about how Max might need speech therapy. After a couple months and a few evaluations, we've decided that yes, we are pursuing that option for him. While he seems more interested {much more!} in communicating now that he did then, his speech and comprehension are still very limited.

Part of the process involved with getting him qualified for speech therapy was doing a hearing test, to make sure that his slow speech development wasn't connected to any kind of hearing loss. And at first I didn't pay much attention to the possibility. But then in the days leading up to Max's hearing test, I started to feel a terrible sense of dread in my heart. It's like nothing I've ever felt before, this ongoing heaviness that weighed on me and stressed me out {and caused me to be extremely grumpy with everyone around me, as I'm sure Christian will attest}. I became suspicious, and then almost positive that his hearing wasn't perfect. The way he was often so focused on whatever he was playing with, the way he had trouble pronouncing the few words he knew {saying "gah!" for "car"}, and the way he sometimes just mouthed sounds instead of vocalizing them added to my conviction. I was worried about what hearing loss would mean for him, in his life.



When we did have his hearing tested, the results weren't surprising. He isn't deaf {of course; that's something we would have noticed before now}, but he did exhibit minor to moderate hearing loss. The audiologist explained that she also couldn't detect his eardrum vibrating at all. She suspected a problem with the middle ear, and not permanent hearing loss. While he can hear loud sounds, most vocal sounds are indistinct, so it sounds like he's underwater. While that was all good news, I left the audiologist that morning feeling frustrated. I had braced myself for a difficult diagnosis, and instead had been told that the results were inconclusive, that we should have his ears checked {she kept saying that she wasn't a doctor, so she couldn't say for sure, but that he probably had fluid in his ears from his most recent cold, three weeks earlier, and recommended scheduling a visit with our pediatrician, who might then pass us along to an ENT}, and that we could have his hearing tested again in four weeks.

I wanted this hearing problem of Max's to be fixed as soon as possible. I wanted to communicate with my son, and I wanted to do it yesterday. Instead it just felt like I was stuck in a web of red tape.

I ranted about the audiologist a little to my friends and family, and then made an appointment with an ENT for as soon as possible. I didn't want to go to the pediatrician and have someone tell me AGAIN that they weren't sure for sure what was going on. We were able to get in to see the ENT sooner than I had anticipated, for which I was grateful. When we went, the waiting room had a big tank of fish, which felt like a sign that we were in a place that could help us {for no other reason than Max loves fish, and I was feeling very emotional}.

The doctor came in quickly, examined Max quickly, and quickly explained that Max had fluid behind his eardrum, and we could either give him antibiotics and hope it went away, or put tubes in his ears. Since Max had been on antibiotics recently, I said yes, please, let's put tubes in his ears. The doctor agreed with me that the fluid has almost certainly been there for longer than three weeks, and has probably been there long enough to inhibit his speech development {a year or more}. He was confident that tubes would drain the fluid and restore Max's hearing completely.

And that's where we are now. Max is scheduled for surgery to put tubes in his ears on Tuesday. The main emotion I'm feeling is excitement for him; I can't wait for my boy to be able to hear perfectly. {Although part of me is just remembering the two times Maggie has had surgery, and how hard it was to hand her over to the doctor.}

I had a dream last night that took place a couple months from now. Max was sitting on the couch just a few feet away from me. When I spoke softly to him, he heard me. When I asked him "where's Max?" he patted his chest and repeated, "Max." It was everything I'm hoping for us in the coming months; that Max will hear, that his speech and comprehension will skyrocket with the help of therapy, that the world of sound will bring him incredible joy and understanding.

Goal Three

You guys remember my New Year's goals? {How could you forget? I bring them up at least once a week, I think.} My third goal was to re-do our living room and kitchen, and I've been meaning to talk a little bit more about my plans.

About our house: I love this house we're living in. It's such a blessing to our family. I wanted to buy it the moment I saw the listing when I was casually browsing for houses, four months before we started seriously house shopping. I knew it was the perfect home for us when I first set foot in the living room. It was as though could feel the emotions {the love} that we would experience in that room echoing back and resonating in my heart. {Sappy? Maybe. But I'm unapologetic about that this year. Deal with the sappiness, guys.}

I love this house, but also I love what this house could become. I am constantly making plans for how I could improve our home, even though I know that we don't have the time, energy or money to make most of those plans a reality. Add a garage! Increase the counter space! Move this wall! Tear down the shed! Replace all major appliances!

You may think I'm kidding, but no. I have shouted all of those orders at imaginary work crews. I am the kind of person who likes to dream big in her head before facing practicalities. HOWEVER, I have trimmed my ideal down to a few goals that I think are actually accomplishable. After all, I just want to re-do the living room and kitchen this year, not our entire property inside and out.

I took the opportunity on Thursday to snap a few pictures of our living room {in its natural state; don't mind how everything is a disaster}, since it's the room I want to tackle during the first half of the year. I've made a few notes on what I'd like to change as a kind of to-do list for myself.



It's a little overwhelming at times, how much I want to change. I'm trying to take it one step at a time. First, we need to take down that popcorn ceiling {gross}.

Have you done any house updates lately? I'd love to hear about your projects.

A Picture An Hour

8 am

9 am

10 am

11 am

12 pm

1 pm

2 pm

3pm

4 pm

5 pm

6 pm

7pm

8pm

Here is our day, in a nutshell. Lots of playing, reading, snacking, napping, and of course, getting so excited when Daddy comes home. I'll admit, these pictures make us look a lot less frustrated {me} and whiny {them, for the most part} than we are in reality. The sun looks brighter, our mess looks charming instead of chaotic, and no one is watching TV. Sadly, I also don't have pictures of the kisses my children give me, or when Lucy is hungry and tries to burrow through my shirt, or Christian laughing at Downton Abbey. Needless to say, this is only one side of the life we're living together.

Idea for this post taken from this lovely series.

Important Thoughts 28.0

28.1: I love Tina Fey. {But who doesn't?? I mean, other than my mother. My mother does NOT love Tina Fey, or even like Tina Fey, and in fact she dislikes Tina Fey so much that she also automatically dislikes everything Tina Fey has ever been in. Including Megamind.} I love Tina Fey, but I love Amy Poehler more. I think Amy Poehler is some kind of hilarious genius and I want to be her best friend in real life. When I picture me hanging out with Tina Fey, I imagine us having lunch and she's giving me all kinds of advice that I'll never actually have the courage to take. With Amy Poehler, I imagine us going to the movies and throwing popcorn at the screen and laughing like crazy people.



28.2: I sometimes fantasize about what I would tweet if no one knew who I was. If I had a completely anonymous Twitter account and I could say whatever I wanted about whatever was going on in my life. And then I think, "probably I spend too much time on social media if this is what I fantasize about." And, "I have a lot of pent-up anger." And, "that's never going to happen because my dad is on Twitter." My dad, you guys.

28.3: I've had this thing with Rice Krispies Treats lately. As in, I've made two pans in the past week, and each time I wanted to eat all of them right away. {Instead I settled for eating hand-sized squares whenever Christian wasn't looking. And sometimes when he was; you may have seen his tweets about it.} I kind of think I'm not going to get this craving out of my system until I eat my fill, regardless of judgmental comments from my husband. Anyone... want to do it with me? Eat as many Rice Krispies Treats as we can until we never want to eat one again? Yes?



28.4: If you've ever wondered, here are all the shows that I'm currently watching: The Good Wife, Downton Abbey, How I Met Your Mother, Happy Endings, New Girl, Ben & Kate, Modern Family, Up All Night, 30 Rock, The Office, Community, Parks & Rec, Elementary, Fringe, Saturday Night Live, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Portlandia, and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. I'm also catching up on episodes of Parenthood {I'm right at the end of Season 2}. Possibly this is too much TV for any one person to watch, but I think I'm okay with that.

28.5: Christian just turned to me and said, "You never published the second half of my books post." To which I answered, "You never sent it to me." And then HE said, "It was all part of the same document, dipstick." I checked. He was right. Whoops. So, coming soon to the blog...

28.6: Speaking of books, I'm still on page 46 of Life of Pi. I really need to get on that, but I have a hard time finding an opportunity to read. {Maybe it's all the TV I watch?} Do you have any tips? When do you read?