I am moving. . .

The blog, that is!
With the start of a new month, in what still feels like a new year,
 I am officially moving the blog to
I Am Dirt Bike Mom
I hope you will visit us there.  You never know where this ride will take us.!
Blessings to you!
Michelle

Ugh! This Child!

Michael. Yes, Michael! He has a Hate/Hate, no win relationship with Math. He has since maybe 1st grade. In 3rd grade, he would have the assignments, but put them, well stuff them into his desk when he got bored and not complete or turn in the assignments. It was that point that I decided I needed to either sit in school with him or bring him home... we know how that worked out.

So, his 5th grade and 6th grade Math teachers have become my best friends. Really, this year I get as many emails from Ms. Groce as anyone else on my contact list. I guess the part that pisses me off the most is that he is a smart kid. Real smart. Perhaps too smart for his own good. He gets bored with the repetition of Math. To add to this, he missed several days during the first and second six weeks, so it was easy to fall behind.

Bless his poor little heart though. Mom has been here since my surgery, and she loves math! And, those of you who know my mom, know he isn't getting away with anything while she is here. They have been sitting at the kitchen table for 2 hours working together to get him caught up on his Math. And I am confident that when he goes to school in the morning, he will have all his assignments caught up!

I'm a HysterSister!

I really should blog more. I don't know why I don't. Really my intentions were to go back at the end of each year and print the blog like a book and save for my grandkids to read. But this year has come and gone, and I haven't said much. LOL!

Anywho, let's play catch-up, for the grandkids sake! Well, we are in November now. Thanksgiving is a week from tomorrow! WOW! really, WOW! where has the year gone. Anyone who still reads this i feel certain already knows that I just had a hysterectomy. November is hysterectomy month :) If you recall, when I had Major in 2008, we almost had a tragic ending, and my body has pretty much been screwed up since then! My monthly visit from Mother Nature just sucked. I had considered it last year, but pretty much chickened out. Then, this year, when we had met our insurance deductible by July, I figured NOW was the time. Lucky for me, my GYN was trained on the DaVinci Robotic Hysterectomy in the year that I chickened out!

So, after much discussion and examination, we decided to do it. I like to think of it as just removing the old, rusty parts that I'm not going to use anymore. Of course, the only reference I had was when my mom had hers. I was in 6th grade, so probably 28 years ago. I just remember she was in bed for a LONG time. Later I found out that she wrote each one of us a letter just in case she died while in surgery! So, me, the one who will worry about not being worried, checked the morbidity rate for robotic hysterectomies. In case you are wondering - it is 1 in 600,000. Obviously, there wasn't much to worry about there. I considered writing letters, then decided that would only depress me and I don't have time for that.

As the boys all left for school last Thursday, I did feel sad. I told each one of them how wonderful they are and that I love them and would always love them. Once we got on the road to the Hospital I cried. I just had to release some of the anxiety. Mark said "why are you crying?" I said "I'm afraid." He said "afraid that you won't come home?" Then I boohooed. He told me I he was sorry, but that I would be coming home and I was not lucky enough to be 1 in 600,000 of anything. LOL! I love that man!

We got there, they prep'ed me for surgery and me, Mark and Mom had a chance to chat for a little while. I remember the Anesthesiologist putting a shot of something into my IV and saying, "OK, you have about 19 seconds." I said by to mom and Mark and they rolled me out of the room. Then, it seemed like 5 seconds later I was waking up and asking "have I had my surgery yet?" Indeed I had. It was a three hour surgery. That entire aspect of it is just remarkable to me.

I spent the night at the hospital and came home about 3pm on Friday. It has been a really great experience. The gas in my chest the first two days made me think I was going to die, which would freak me out, and in turn make the pain worse. But Friday night, Mark helped me work that out and it has been smooth sailing since then. Well, as far as recovery from surgery goes, anyway. Praise God!

Whaaaaat a week!

What a week this has been. Of course everyone started off dog tired on Monday, just because it was Monday I suppose. Tuesday we had Michael's follow up appointment at Texas Scottish Rite Hospital. It was a good appointment. He wasn't much, well any, better on Tuesday then he was when they saw him four months ago. They decided to increase the dosage of his injection. We will return in two months to see how the increase has worked, and if it is good, then great. If he has not improved they will add a medication. In the mean time, they want us to get an MRI done on his right foot, which is giving him a lot of trouble. As a matter of fact, his range of motion had decreased in that foot from our last TSRH visit. Michael and I had other Dr. appointments this week, so there was a lot of running around for us. Major has started "school" on Tuesday and Thursday, so I try to schedule as much as possible for when he is in school. When I am not able to make appointments on T/Th, mom comes over and stays with Major. We are so fortunate and blessed to have her so available to us! I don't know how we would make it without her! I went to my Dr this morning, and she and I are finding it medically necessary for me to have a hysterectomy. I think that all the problems I had after delivering Major blew holes in my uterus, and it has been a piece of junk since then. Anyway, it looks like that will happen in November, prior to Thanksgiving. Obviously, I am very nervous about the surgery aspect of it, but I am very much looking forward to all the other stuff! This afternoon is the "Howdy Dance" at Michael's school. He was very excited about this. I could tell that he was in pain this morning, but he didn't want to take crutches or his chair. He wanted to be able to walk into his first school dance. He is just an amazing little guy. He doesn't let it get him down most of the time, and whatever the situation is that day, he just deals with it. Only once or twice has he asked "why did this have to happen to me?" He is a blessing and an inspiration. Last weekend, I took the boys over to Mom's for some dirt bike riding. Michael has a pretty big Kawasaki dirt bike. Literally, it is big. Anyway, he has decided that he is not going to ride it. He doesn't feel good about it or secure, at all, so this afternoon, while Michael is at the dance, Mavrick, Major and I are going to look at a 4-wheeler for him. I think that it should be perfect. Michael does want to ride, but is scared of hurting himself. Hopefully he will feel more secure on 4 wheels! It also has an automatic start, where the dirt bikes have a kick start, and this will make it easier for him to be self sufficient on his own bike.

Crazy Crappy Day

Today was the last day at the beach and in South Padre. I really enjoyed our trip down to south Texas. We had so much fun. The strange thing was, Mom and I seemed kind of rushed the whole trip.

We had arranged for a late check out of the hotel, so the day was supposed to have us going to the beach, swim a little, clean up pack and out of the hotel by 1:00, lunch in Brownsville then travel to San Antonio and arrive by 8:00. Sounds like a good plan, right?

We woke up, and the hotel we were at last night had a "breakfast." It was probably the crappiest breakfast I have ever seen. Of course, MOM of the YEAR told the kids they could eat the leftover pizza for breakfast. Major happened to be in the worst mood and didn't want to go to the beach. So after a brief "discussion" of who would take the older boys to the beach left me putting on my swim suit and Major finally agreeing to go.

Our hotel was only a block to the beach, but Major cried the entire time. We got to the beach and got all our stuff set up and Michael and Mavrick wanted me to walk out to a sandbar with them. I didn't want to. You see, I was a bit frightened. I don't like to go out into water that I can't see my feet. I will walk out that far, but when it gets to where I can't see my toenail polish I have gone far enough. So, with Major still crying and sitting on my hip, I started walking with all the boys and then I couldn't go anymore. Mavrick's face was burning. Major was crying. I was scared. So the three of us headed back to the hotel. Before we could get back to the car, Michael flagged us down and said it was too rough and that he and mom were going to go too. The whole trip to the beach was a bummer today.

We went to the pool and the boys swam while I washed the sand off of our stuff and mom went and vacuumed out the car. We got cleaned up and packed and loaded the car all by 1:00. Then we headed to Brownsville. It was a good opportunity for the boys to see a boarder town and experience a different culture. We had a not so good lunch that was made at a local restaurant. Then we walked around down town. So, Michael was scared. He kept saying it was a bad place and he didn't want to stay. The entire time he was freaked out. The whole trip to Brownsville was not a cool experience for Michael.

We got on the road headed north by 4:00. I started trying to get us a hotel in San Antonio about 5:00. Every time I would think I had a reservation made, we would lose service. I worked on this crap till I had a headache. Once I finally got a room reserved - like 2 hours later, mom says "we are almost out of gas, the light is on and it is 56 miles to the next gas station. I said a little prayer. I know mom was praying too. And out of no where, BEFORE we ran out of gas, there was a station that was not on the GPS. Yeah God! We were so thankful to have made it!

As we pulled up, mom jumped out to run to the restroom. As she got out, she took the keys out of the ignition and laid them on the console. However, I didn't know that, and when I got out I looked for the keys in the ignition and since they were not there, I locked the doors and went inside with the rest of the boys. Everyone had a potty break and we went back out to the car to find it locked. Ugggghhhh! Mom went in to try to make some phone calls. I started looking for someone who looked like they might know how to break into a car. It didn't take long till I had asked a guy who had a friend who knew a guy ... it wasn't very long until we had four men working on getting the car unlocked. And it wasn't long after that that they had the car door open. Thank you God!

We finally ended up in San Antonio about 9:00, so glad that the day is over because we are DONE!

How did we get here?

Tomorrow I am putting Michael and Mavrick on a plane to Austin. They went for the first time summer before last. They are so excited! I think they have every alarm clock set in the house so nobody will sleep too late. Mavrick keeps saying "I can't believe it's tomorrow."

I keep thinking, where has the time gone? Michael will be 12 in October, which will make him old enough to fly by himself. (Right now they fly as unaccompanied minors) Mavrick just turned 10. They both seem so grown up at times. And I just keep asking myself "how did we get here?"

I was telling Mark earlier this week that it was just yesterday that Michael was a little bitty baby. So small that he was scary. His first Christmas was when we met Marla for the first time. We were in a two bedroom apartment, and Marla was very allergic to dogs, so she sat on the porch snuggling with little bitty Michael all wrapped up in blankets. I bet this trip to Austin is the time he is finally taller than Marla. Where has the time gone?

I am so proud of the young men they are becoming. I hope I am teaching them everything they need to know. I hope my example is good enough. I wish I could slow time down, just a little. I hope I am enjoying them enough! I can't wait to see who they grow up to be. Oh, so much, so much, I wish for them true love, true friendships, joy, and peace. Lots of peace.

Mark and I celebrate 18 years of being married next month. In February, we will have been together for 20 years! That is half my life! But it has gone so fast! We have come a long way from a little one bedroom apartment on the lake in Garland. But, WOW! that still seems like yesterday. When I think about where we've been, what we have gone through, and that we are still here, it is sometimes hard to believe that we made it this far. We are so blessed.

Where do I fit in?

Living in a house full of boys is usually fun. They are messy. They fight, argue and yell. They are smelly sometimes, and they are gross sometimes. But for the most part it is fun.

But lately, it has become for difficult. And I think it is due to Mark and my difference in upbringing. I was brought up in an atmosphere where you talked to each other, truthfully. We could trust each other. And we loved each other enough to be honest and let each other become people that we liked and that we wanted to be. Mark was raised in a different atmosphere...and I believe this is my source of irritation.

He feels that there are some things better left unsaid. Ok, I can agree with that. But I also feel like it is vitally important to have open communication and not be afraid to say or tell something that is even just the least bit important in who you are and who you are becoming. I think it is important to share stories of our days together - especially since he misses so much of that time!

Bottom line is that it just really pisses me off that I can't be who I am. I can no longer say what is on my mind, or tell cute stories of what the kids did, because it may embarrass them. I am having a real hard time figuring out where I fit in.