Thursday, April 30, 2015

If It's Not One Thing, It's About Five Things

I'm currently watching The First 48 while listening to the dishwasher here in this hotel room in Springfield, Illinois. As I type, there are pink flakes of calamine lotion falling onto the keyboard from my right forearm. In fact, the itching I feel is overwhelming. It's on my neck and chin, too. Right beside my eye. My ear. My boob. It's intense, really.

I've been living here since last Tuesday and doing archaeology in the day. It's been nearly five years since I last packed all of my khaki pants into a suitcase and lived out of hotel room. It feels good, really. Working in the field is sometimes like living in a monastery. You work all day, spend nights alone (if you choose, or if you don't really know your co-workers), and have fewer distractions. It's a great time to contemplate life and choices and the years gone by.

I'm here to make a little bit of money and regain my sanity after the last job I had. So far, so good.

The part I don't like about being here is not getting to see Cyrus. We skyped on Sunday, though, and we talk on the phone occasionally. It sucks to not cuddle him, but it's even worse when he's feeling bad and I can't be there.

He had an appointment today because he's been retching lately. Apparently, he ate a strawberry the other day and then said he was full. When I asked tonight how he was feeling he said, " I feel sick." When I asked what was going on he said, "My mouth is too full."  Even just a little bit of food makes him retch. This just started a day or two ago. His pediatrician said he needs to see the gastroenterologist who put his feeding tube in and did the Nissen Fundoplication. The point of the procedure, so many years ago, was to keep his reflux from being so bad he couldn't eat. We thought maybe he just had a virus lately. He can't throw up, so when he gets those, he just kind of retches and spits up spit. But he's able to take his tube food without getting sick, so it must be something else. It must be something strange that has to do with a procedure that was supposed to fix him. Once we figure something out, some strange, new malady comes along. This is our life.

I was too busy to tell you all about Cyrus' kindergarten registration process. Mindy and I sat in a room with 10 professionals as they told us Cyrus would need a "para" for kindergarten. That means, I guess, someone to watch him all day and help him walk up and down stairs, help him remember how to eat, help him not get knocked over by other kids. The good news, or what seemed good, is that he'll be in "normal" classes for about 80% of the day. They even said, "Sped," when speaking about his education.

Now, I know you've heard me whine and cry about this before, but it never fails that every time we start to think everything is going okay, something happens. All the therapies and doctors. All the seizures. All the random problems that we just deal with.

Besides all the medical stuff, I'm still working on the adoption. Your money has been incredibly helpful and appreciated. So far, I've spent $502.50 for the cost of filing some papers, and 350$ for the update to the home study. That leaves about 1300. I'm hoping that will cover the cost of the lawyer (who bills at 200 an hour), but I've heard that can be upwards of 2,000. If I get enough over time here, I might be able to save for that.

It was just a month or two ago that Gaby said, "Your life is so hard."  At first I was offended, like she was saying that Cyrus was a burden. But then, I just cried and cried. Because it seemed, for the first time, that someone really saw me, saw all of what we go through, and understood.






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