Abort! Abort!

Apparently Peanut's surgeon is a bit of a daredevil on a bicycle. Cracked ribs and a broken collarbone make it difficult to perform surgery, to say the least, so her surgery is cancelled, re-schedulement pending.

Yes, yes, it's annoying.

T-Minus

Peanut's surgery is 9:40 Monday morning. Supposed to take an hour, and she'll mostly likely come home the same day. Pretty minor in comparison to the last two, but general anesthesia and the phrase "pain management" never make me happy.

Let's keep our fingers crossed the the bad x-ray was as wrong as our bad ultrasound was, and her hip is just fine. Because there is just no way she's going back in that damn body cast. No way.

My Kid Is So Cool

She really loves Beatrix Potter books, and gasps each and every time Mr. Jeremy Fisher gets swallowed up by the trout.

She puts a diaper on her head, and instead of it being a hat, she becomes a house, with the diaper as the roof, her nose as the door, and her eyes as windows. Who lives in the house? Why, boogula whales, of course.

Speaking of those, tonight she pulled open my shirt, looked down at my cleavage, and announced, "There's boogula whales!". Indeed.

Big Daddy

I never wanted kids until I met Big Daddy.

He's an even better father than I imagined he would be. My friends are all jealous.

Happy Father's Day to truly the best dad Peanut could ever have. We love you.

To Hell With Holland

Sometimes, when I am watching her, I get a vision, unbidden, of her with normal legs. I see her running through the grass after the dog, pigtails bouncing. And I wonder for a moment, when I see her face fall when the dog walks away from the chair she is sitting in when she's trying to pet it, what she would have been like with legs that worked.

I really, really, hate those times.

An Offer You Probably Should Refuse

Want to lose 8 pounds in four days (not including water weight)?

Want diet motivation you can't ignore?

Do I have the answer for YOU!

This amazing new diet system is called GALLBLADDER DISEASE!*

It's so simple, even a glutton like me can understand it!

Eating food = Moderate nausea, mild to moderate abdominal pain

Eating fatty food = Moderate to severe nausea, vomiting AND severe, unrelenting upper gastric pain

No food other than toast + severe nausea and vomiting = 8 pounds + 4 pounds water weight lost in ONLY FOUR DAYS!

Plus, it comes with an optional, most-expenses-paid** trip to a very clean room with expert caregivers ready to check on your well-being every four hours, and to take care of your every need with a simple push of a button!***



*Not recommended for anyone I actually like

**By insurance, if you have it

*** Bring your own pillow with a colored pillowcase, as theirs are always kind of flat and hard

Mom Told Me To Write This Down So I Won't Forget It

You know how little kids all have at least one word they mispronounce really cutely? Peanut can say "rhinocerous" perfectly clearly, but every night that Big Daddy is home with his laptop, we have to spend a few minutes looking at "Boogula" whales via Google Image Search.

Where I Write A Lot About Other People Who Write More

I have been doing some reading lately. Mostly about disability. I have a long blog post I have been writing in my head, but until I can articulate what I am thinking (if I ever can), it might be helpful to point you to a couple of places with stuff I found interesting, so maybe you'll be able to understand where I am coming from when I write.

First, the blog A Letter to My Children. I found this blog a while ago, read the archives for hours, and then somehow lost the page when Big Daddy took his computer back and I couldn't remember the exact title. I've finally found it again, and I was going to link to a couple of posts in particular, except that they are all so good I couldn't decide. I can't explain how invaluable it is for me to read something from the point of view of someone with a disability, particularly someone that doesn't spend a lot of time on "this is just how God made me and He must have some purpose for me, because He does everything for a reason". I am not saying that to denigrate anyone who feels like that, not at all. It just doesn't calm me to believe that about my daughter, and I find that often the conversation stops there when I really need it to continue. It is also terrible and scary for me to read, because it is particularly hard for me to believe that the problems with people's attitudes and the health-care system that she writes about will be improved by the time Peanut is an adult.

Then, this piece (and the one it links to at the bottom), which I emailed a bunch of people who know Peanut IRL, because it made a lot of sense to me and is how I am trying to think about parenting her. It goes against a lot of people's first instincts, I think, to not talk so much about her being "just like all the other kids" (it was certainly my first instinct), but the older she gets, the less that really works for me, and, I think, for her.

There are others too, but these are a start. Feel free to tell me what you think.