Invasion of the swine

FLU anyway. Well, it hit our house this week. My youngest caught it, but not sure where from. She started running the high fever, then the cough and runny nose came on pretty fast as well. She has been a lump on the couch for 2 days now. We went to the doctor this morning and he gave her and me some Tamiflu. Hopefully it will do it's job for her and cut things short, and prevent the flu from settling in with me! I do not want to deal with it myself! I have been feeling a little rough on and off for the past few weeks anyway and not really gotten sick, but just been achey with headaches. I have been a little more run down feeling lately and tired but hopefully it is nothing. We have been running and doing quite a bit!

My Baby Kennedy (TMI.....for the weak)

It is hard to think of anything serious being wrong with your child. I have friends with children that have a range of diseases or illnesses or conditions, but my kids have always been the healthy ones really(we thought). I guess that has been a blessing since I am the one who is always getting sick or having something going on medically. Last week we wend in for along overdue and needed "well-child" check up with our pediatrician. Kendra was overdue on a couple of vaccinations and so we caught her up on them - nothing too major. Kennedy on the other hand, well, I had many issues that we have discussed over the years that we needed some follow up on. Mainly - her bowel issues. Since birth she has had BM problems and it has never really been an easy one to resolve. She produced meconium for longer then she should have after birth, and since then she has had issues going poop. We initially switched from breast feeding to formula, then to lactose free formula and that helped a little but she struggle to go poop all the time. It seemed painful! We went through Karo in the bottles to Miralax. Once she started on table food, we tried lactose free milk when she quit formula. After she turned 3 or so, she quit drinking milk, but loved yogurt, and cheese and all dairy. Since then we have had issues with getting complete potty training down. It has been a battle of wills at some points, other times it is just a sheer volume issue. The kid can back up a toilet like nobody! Now she is my daughter and she is stubborn, but I played with things some (in her diet) and notice a difference when she is not eating dairy....but it is still not "right". She is not in control of things the way an almost 6 year old should be......So the pediatrician referred us to the GI doc and we saw her today. She took xrays of the belly (which showed a large amount of stool in the bowels), did a rectal exam and noticed the hard-ness of her poo, took 3 vials of blood to run tests for Celiac disease, thyroid issues (which is in the family big time) and allergies - so hopefully we will find out something from this. If not, she will see us back in a couple weeks, and we may have to do a scope and take some pictures of her insides. We are also doing in process of a bowel cleanse with magnesium citrate to "clear" things out. I know TMI....

Just another exciting day in the Ballard household.....what's next??

Blogging Limbo

I seem to have been in a blogging limbo lately. I have not felt like doing it. I have been pretty busy.....we are back in school now and I am also working. This is also our busy time of year, from September to January. I am pretty healthy - just doing infusions right now. Been losing weight and since this time last year have lost 40 pounds so that is great!

Ken was recently asked by one of the heads of the local MS chapter to blog for the next 6 months while he fundraises for the MS150 in May and gets ready for the ride. He saw one of his videos on You Tube that he made about me and MS last year. The guy just thought the video was awesome and wanted to link to it on his You Tube tab as well. Ken makes some pretty cool videos, but then again I am partial to his work.... :)

Our nephew, Geramy, and his band, American Lab Rat, are doing a show to benefit MS, Dallas Rockers 4 MS coming up on the 25th. This is pretty hard metal music, but it is also pretty good if you dig that type of music! Check them out, and come out to support the cause! It is so strange to think that Ken got him into guitar when he was 13 and now he has a band that is making a name locally for themselves and doing things for the community at the same time. I am pretty proud of him - he kept himself out of trouble in his teen years by taking the music route and when many people did not believe in him, we have always supported his love. I would love to see him go far, he is a pretty great guitarist!

School's in Session

We started school the week after my surgery. I had to do something and I was motivated and we went full on into it......and it was good. We have been on a regular schedule and so far there has not been too much of a melt down, or struggle but a little slow walking by the eldest child. Some days she makes school an all day task. Today was a good day and we had fun....we need more of those days! Other than that I have been planning the year's field trips and outings and trying to get our schedule locked down around my various appointments and work.

I go in on Thursday to have the Power Port put in so I will not be bruised up anymore when nurses cannot locate my poor little veins. I am bruised on both arms from last weeks infusion where there was three misses before the vein was found. I look like a addict who shoots up.....yuck! Anyway, I should not have any issues with that after Thursday afternoon, God willing.

"Parts is Parts"

And I have a couple less inside me then I did yesterday. I had my gallbladder removed and some tissue around the colon that had twisted up and died. Dr. McQuaid took loads of pictures taken of my insides for the Gyno. to take a look at. He found signs of Endometriosis and more cysts on my ovaries along with a part of the abdominal wall grown over on itself, that he detached while he was in there. The gallstone(s) were gone so they had passed but the gallbladder was inflamed and did not look good so it was a good thing it was being removed anyway, and I will not have more issues there. I feel like I was kicked in the gut and the side and the back. I think 2 c-sections were less painful than this surgery! It was laproscopic but they blow you up with CO2 so they can see and have room to move and work and there is 4 incisions - one being in the belly button.....that one is where they remove the parts through. I am very sore there today. I will be going back to the doctor's office today to have the dressing changed on the belly button as it is still oozing and tight now. Fun stuff right.....? I have been blessed with many prayers and calls and friends offering dinner or making dinner and offering to take the girls so I can rest. Ken is off until Monday so hopefully I will be much better by then!

Another Sunday night....

in the ER for me. We came back from a nice little overnight trip to OKC to visit some friends and I had been experiencing some pain in my side for a few days and it was getting worse. I started running a low grade fever as well and we were worried that I might have appenicitis. We headed for the ER about 6:30 and got in pretty fast but that was all that was fast about the evening. Ken and I sat and sat for hours waiting on things to happen. I finally had a CT scan around 10pm, then after midnight the radiologist finally read the results and they decided it was NOT appendicitis. They could see I had a rupturing cyst on my right ovary and also happened to find out that I have gallstones - fun stuff! At least it was not just gas! At his point I have multiple bruises up and down my arms from infusions, blood draws and IV attempts/misses, and look like I was beaten or do drugs one. I have an appointment tomorrow with a surgeon to see about removing the gallbladder. My regular doctor said it was probably the best thing to do since I have so many other things going on right now and we have already met all out of pocket costs on the insurance. The surgery will be laproscopic so it will most likely be a day surgery. Who knows, maybe the doctor will be able to do the port at the same time??

I hate getting stuck....(warning for weak stomachs)

with these dang IV needles every two weeks (and more with random blood draws). I have the smallest little veins and they are so finicky and like to roll and run away from the needle once it has penitrated the top layer of skin. I do not have the typical normal elbow area veins where most people would have and IV or blood taken from, those are almost no existant. I had an IV for 4 solid days during the induction of the IVIg 2 back in early June that was on hte mid right forearm and it is still bruised and the vein is still weakened. They tried to give me the IV there uesterday and it seemed to be working fine for about 30 seconds, then it blew the vein about 3 inches from the insertion point. My nurse, Sharla, was just shocked at where it blew as she had never seen that happen before. It makes a nasty bubble under the skin, then it bruises nicely. I bruise so easily anyway thes type of things do not help! After that happened, she moved up to my upper arm close to the armpit and found a pretty good vein there and we got the infusion going. Allwas fine through the 3.25 hours - I even slept about 2 hours of the time curled up in the chair under a blanket listening to Pandora. Once it was time to pack up to go, I guess I pulled the IV some and caused an infiltration (where it pulls out of its place) and the last 10cc's fed into my arm under the skin instead of in the vein. This med is actually designed as a subqutaneous treatment so that is not a problem - EXCEPT it hurt, itched, burned and caused a huge knot on my arm when the meds were sitting. It looked like I had an extra muscle on my inner arm -HA! I came home and put the heating pad on it for a couple hours and the area went away, so all is good now. I do have a bit of a bruise in the area and it is a bit tender, but what do you do?

So when all of this was going on, the nurses were asking me why I did not just get a port (portacath) put in for these infusion. I spoke to the doctor about that in the beginning and she did not persue it. I have such issues with my veins I think it is something I will be looking into further. i know my brother hated his, when he got it for cancer treatment. I also think that he was dealing with alot of pain associated with his cancer ravaging through his body at the time. I am tired of being dug on and bruised for weeks at a time and sore from the needles. I have to do this treatment every two weeks now and give blood often for testing. This would make all of that so much easier!! I think I will let the nurses look into it.

This coming week I will be having the first MRI since I started the IVIg. I hope and pray there will be some improvements on the lesions showing that this treatments is doing something for the MS as well as the immunity issues I have been having.