ace’s blog

Update: we found Ginger about 10 minutes after I put out a bunch of signs around the neighborhood. She was two doors down from us. She apparently didn’t realize that she was at the wrong house! We brought her home, gave her a bath and took her to the vet the next day. She checked out ok and is now back at home!!

Ginger is missing. Ginger is our cat. This is the most recent picture we have of her.

Ginger

She’s been missing since Sunday. I noticed that I hadn’t heard her meowing at me to feed her or change her water. We adopted Ginger from the Jacksonville Humane Society when Meri and I were still dating.

Right now, we are developing some signs that we’re going to put out in the neighborhood. We are planning on offering up to a $100 reward to anybody who returns her to us.

To develop the signs, I’ve been following some guidelines put together by Missing Pet Partnership that I found on the web.

I’m fairly optimistic that either Ginger will come home or that she will be returned to us.

Aaron was talking about Ginger quite a bit tonight. He asked us where she was and we showed him the above picture and said “look, she’s in your room”. We aren’t ready to have this discussion with Aaron yet. He loves that cat so much, we all do! I keep describing Ginger as Aaron’s mobile pillow when he was learning to walk. He would lay on her and fall on her. He would pull at her fur and tug on her. Most cats would run away from him or get upset and hiss or claw but not Ginger, she was always very good about being gentle, especially with Aaron. We are all hoping for her quick return!

Aaron’s started VPK this year and we just got his first weekend project. His teacher traced his body and we were supposed to decorate it to look like Aaron. Here are some pictures.

Before:

After:

I’ve had a cold for five days now. Last night, after I got home from work, I had a “stuffy” right ear. No big deal, I thought, the pressure will just go away. I deal with the pressure in my ears when I fly and am accustomed to it just going away after a few days. I assumed the pressure in my ear now would do the same. So I woke up this morning, by myself in Aaron’s bed (don’t ask) and I noticed right away that the pressure in my right ear was in fact gone!  w00t!…? No. It moved to my left ear (where it is currently residing).

Meri asked me to go to a Centra Care last night, when the symptoms first appeared. I didn’t. Why? cuz I’m a guy and guys don’t go to doctors [generally speaking of course]. So I finally went this morning.

So what does all of this have to do with the title of the blog post? Patience…

Well, when I finally got home, Meri was visibly upset about something. Whatever could it be I wondered?? So I did what I (now) view as a dumb thing, and I …(wait for it)… asked her – woops.

So we start arguing about how I don’t listen and I should have gone last night and blah blah blah. In the middle of arguing, I say something along the lines of “I don’t need this right now, I’m sick” – wah wah wah. Long story short, childcare was the reason for the anger! My wife needed to dump her frustration and I was the moron that opened the door. No big deal, it happens all the time.

Still, you’re probably wondering what all of this has to do with the post title, right? Ok, here goes.

Well, right after I said “I don’t need this right now, I’m sick”, Aaron hops off of the couch, with his Gameboy in hand and he walks over to us. Aaron put his hand on mine we had a small heart-to-heart talk:

Aaron: Daddy, do you know what will heal you?

Daddy (me): What will Aaron?

Aaron: Jesus. Jesus will heal you and make you feel better. My teacher prayed for me and ask Jesus to heal the boo boo on my knee.

[Mommy and Daddy start laughing, stop arguing]

So there you have it, straight from my 4 year old son, Jesus heals!

Aaron had eye surgery on Thursday, July 10th. Meri and I were a total wreck that day. Aaron was brave, as he always is. I posted the key events of the day on plurk.com and on twitter (via ping.fm on my VZW BlackBerry). All of my updates, via plurk.com, several hours before the surgery, leaving the house, out of surgery and sleeping in the recovery room, finally getting to see him, bringing him home, and finally, later that night, Aaron’s running a mild fever. Also, on twitter, a person (mgrossfl – Marc Grossman) that I only knew via twitter, expressed his concern throughout the next few days (via summize.com).

We arrived at the the Arnold Palmer hospital around 8am and registered and finally went to the surgery center. We spoke to Aaron’s ophthalmologist, then met the anesthesiologist and finally all of the nurses that would be helping during the surgery. They were all extremely nice.

The surgery itself lasted about an hour and went well, by the book according to the surgeon. Aaron was in the recovery room, sleeping for about 90 minutes after the surgery, in which time Meri and I patiently waited in the waiting room until we could finally go back and see him. When we got to see him, he was eating an orange popsicle that the nurses gave him.

We now have to give him eye drops three times every day, for three to five days post surgery. His first drops didn’t go so smoothly and it took 45 minutes to apply them! We are doing much better with the drops now; we stop them tomorrow.

Aaron’s eyes are red on the outer left portion. Over the next 3 weeks, they will become more red, possibly enveloping the entire eye, then turn yellowish and finally back to a normal white.

Now that the surgery is over, I’m finding the most difficult thing to do is wait for 4 – 6 weeks to know of the surgery was successful. According to the paperwork we were given, 70% of those who had the surgery only required it to be performed once. 30% needed multiple surgeries. Of those 30%, 20% needed one to two more surgeries and the final 10% needed 3 or more surgeries.

Needless to say, Meri, Aaron and I are hopeful that Aaron will be in the 70% range.

Not to be lost in all of this is Eli! He’s our now 4month old chunky baby (17lbs as of this writing!) who had to be cared for during the procedure. Thankfully, Meri’s aunt Paline was able to come down and help us out! We were very fortunate that she was able to come down on such short notice (she flew in EARLY Thursday morning, around 1am.

I’m ready to stop talking about this now, it has been difficult for all of us. Ready for some cuteness in this post, here it is. Aren’t my boys just so handsome?!

Tomorrow is the day that Meri and I have been dreading since Aaron’s diagnosis back in December 2007. He’s having his eye surgery. I’m not going to list all of the potential negative effects of the surgery because he is going to come out great and the surgery is going to go strictly by the book. There aren’t any negative effects to worry about. My son is a champion, he will get through this, even with his mom and dad sitting idly by with teary eyes. My son is the best son a father could ask for, he makes me feel like I’ve never felt before. I love him more than I ever thought I could love another person.

Aaron’s intermittent exotropia I discussed previously has been getting progressively worse. Meri and I have both been noticing that he is squinting more and more, even when he’s not outside in full sun and even when he’s wearing sunglasses.  Meri and I have had a bad feeling about what we both [pessimistically] thought would need to happen next.

Meri took him to the ophthalmologist again yesterday to have him re-examined (since it’s been 6 months since he was first diagnosed) The doctor is one of the best in the area (from what we’ve been told).  Meri works in an ER and has spoken with several opthamalogists that stroll through there and they recommend him (and more importantly, use him).

The doctor looked at Aaron’s eyes and told Meri that his condition was deteriorating. He told her that the only solution for Aaron’s case was to have the corrective surgery.  We knew this day was coming and have talked about what we should do next.  We’ve done a lot of research and have both anguished about this decision for a long time – we decided that Aaron should finally have the surgery.

I can’t speak for Meri, but I am not fearful that the doctor won’t do a good job and I am fully expecting that the surgery will be successful.  We are both very worried about Aaron having to be sedated for the surgery. Meri working in the medical for so long is both a blessing and a curse in that she knows a lot about what to expect.  Knowledge can be power but it can also be crippling, especially in the case of surgery for one of your kids.  While the surgery is not exactly necessary (in my understanding anyway), if successful, it would greatly improve Aaron’s quality of life.

So the surgery is scheduled for just under two weeks away (July 10th).  We have a pre-op appointment 7 days before the surgery so that we can hear about all of the details. Meri spoke briefly about recovery time and the doctur said that it would only be a few hours for Aaron, but he couldn’t go to the pool or play with sand for a week after the surgery.

Today, my sleep-deprived wife made me a big breakfast when she woke up.  Aaron drew me a card and actually wrote several sentences in it!  It was one of the best cards I’ve ever received.  Meri got me a picture of my boys together and a picture of their hand prints. She also got me Metroid Prime 3 for our Wii.

Aaron and I had a fun day. We played the beach ball game in the house a couple times, we went to the pool, we watched T.V. together and we did about 4 or 5 puzzles together. Aaron had his final soccer game of the season last Thursday (6/5/08).

The coaches had a party for both teams and all of the kids got a trophy for playing. They had all kinds of great stuff for the kids, pizza, cupcakes, fruit and veggie platters, soccer tattoos, a trampoline, a tire swing and a cool tree house. At the end of the party, all of the kids got a cool trophy.

We came back from Aaron’s soccer party tonight and started the bedtime routine about 45 minutes late because of the party. We came into Aaron’s room and I put some water into his fish tank since it keeps losing water somehow. Meri came in with Eli and was looking at the tank and I said “I put extra water in it” and she said “that’s not why I’m looking at it”. It turns out that one of Aaron’s fish, named Orange (see picture below) died. R.I.P. Orange, Aaron will miss you very much!

We bought Aaron a fish tank as a reward for behaving so well for a long time. He loved it. Here are a couple of pictures of Aaron’s fish tank and his final surviving fish, Grapey.

Well, not literally a ton but he does weigh about 16 1/2 pounds! I don’t think Aaron weighed that much until he was about 8 months old. The biggest difference between Aaron and Eli’s weight is that Eli doesn’t spit up nearly as much as Aaron did. When Aaron was Eli’s age, he had acid reflux which caused him to spit up all the time.

We got back from our trip to mass. on Tuesday. The trip was like our
normal trips, some fighting, some fun, more uncomfortable than anything
really. We had Aaron’s birthday party on sunday, in mass. He had a lot
of fun and got quite a few gifts. We had to mail ourselves a box full of presents even after we filled up the extra bag that we brought to fly some presents back with us! When we got home, we gave Aaron the presents that we got for him: a slushy maker and a fish tank! Meri took him to the pet store and got him a couple of small fish. He named them “grapey” and “orange”. He gets really excited when it’s time to feed them.

We got back Tuesday and I went to the 2008 LANSA User Conference here in Orlando. I got to talk to a few people I worked with at Terminix and attended some of the WAM sessions. Those were great! I found the AJAX lab to be a bit lacking and the speaker wasn’t that good in my opinion.

I worked from home yesterday and now it is Friday and I am back at the office. I haven’t been here for a week! I must’ve saved a ton of money on gas (well, like $60). Now I’m on-call for the weekend.

Yesterday, when I was working from home, I took a break for lunch (which is unusual for me), I sat with Eli for a bit and I was playing with him on the couch. I started making some weird noises and poking around his mouth to try and get him to smile at me. Normally, it’s difficult for me to get him to smile but he smiled at me for about 20 minutes! It was awesome! I loved it when Aaron first started smiling at me and I love it now that Eli is doing the same. I can’t wait until Eli is walking and talking as well.