Sick of it

I am sick of being sick. This is round three this year. I am so tired of being sick. Home ill today (thank goodness mom is up today to take care of Claire) and I am so tired of blowing my nose and coughing. Urgh. 

Letting her go already?

Daycare.

Who would have thought this word could be so scary. We're going to have to put Ms. C in daycare. Pete's workload is too crazy and my sister is going to need to scale back on taking her sometime in the next coming months. We have to bite the bullet and put her in on a part-time basis.

And I'm scared. I can't get over hearing about the bad situations that happen at daycare. I try to tell myself that there are hundreds of other kids who are just fine in daycare. Several of them are my friend's children! But all I think of is leaving her with a stranger. It makes my blood run cold. What will these people do when she has a meltdown? How long will she sit in her poop before they finally decide they can get to her and change her? Will they walk around with her like we do during the day holding her hands so she can 'stretch' her legs? How will they handle the fact that she likes to snuggle before falling asleep?

I just don't think I can do it. But I have to. I have to find a way to let her go and put my trust in some person who doesn't know my daughter.

Oh so tired

Ms. C decided to awaken at 2:43am. I have gotten so used to her sleeping through the night... Plus the day before Pete had an early flight to SD for a biz trip and left the house way early so I was up. The trouble with being an insomniac is that once you are awake it is very, very, very, very, very difficult to get back to sleep. Needless to say I am dragging today.

I need to stay awake and do some work so that I am not carrying that stress around and keeping myself awake at night with worries about 'getting it all done'. I swear. This job is so odd. Peaks and valleys in terms of the level of work. Early in the week all of my 'sessions' were out for review. They are still out for review but somehow by yesterday afternoon I had at least 5 more URGENT 'sessions' come out of some needs assessments. Damn needs assessments. All they do is create more work! Just kidding. They are the lifeblood of me keeping my job and my compass.

Sometimes I am overwhelmed by how much training really needs to be done. I tend to overextend myself and want to do it all now, now, now. But I can't do that, especially with a little one at home and my desire to jet out of here as soon as I can so I can get home and see her.

Ahh....this is what they mean by work/life balance issues.

We are walking, we are walking...

Oh those crazy Austin kids. Check out Carrie's site for some much needed mid-week entertainment.

Reality Check

My step came home from school this week with some pretty tough news. One of her good friend's has been in and out of school as of late. Recent tests came back and confirmed that she has lung cancer. She is 14 years old.

The first thoughts that ran through my head were, "not fair", "shouldn't happen to this kid", "will her mother FINALLY quit smoking now?*".

This poor girl can't go live with her father and she and her mother live in a small duplex. Mom smokes inside all the time and her daughter is exposed to a heavy dose of second hand smoke. According to my step the mother has said she won't quit smoking. We're not sure if that really was the response or if it was more along the lines of "it will be tough to quit smoking". We weren't there so we don't know. Nevertheless, I can't imagine what these two are going through.

14.

Pete and I immediately start to think about how we can help this young lady. We're not in a position to take her in, nor would be want to face that battle with her mother, but we are trying to understand what is happening on the medical front. So we ask, what is her coverage situation? Is there a possible need for a benefit in the future? How far has the cancer progressed? How is she doing emotionally? FYI -getting your information from another 14 year old is not the best route. She hasn't a clue, which is not a bad thing. She shouldn't have to be dealing with this either.

14. I can't imagine it. All I want to do is go hug her and tell her we're here. And to suck that damn cancer out of her.






*Full disclosure - I am an ex-smoker who quit for the second/third time a mere 2 years ago.

Crisis averted

Update on my work crisis. It was averted. The kind folks who gave me a heads up that I would be screwed came through for me (I take back my previous rant about them, kinda) and provided me with a version of the software that has been approved by IT. Thank the heavens! They even gave it to me for FREE! Score! And I get to keep my 2008 version and have offered to do beta testing for them when they start to look at having IT review this version.

Whew.

And I went to the doctor on Thursday and she started me on some meds.

Double whew.

On the home front my hubby was off snowmobiling in northern WI this weekend so Claire and I had a girls weekend full of visits and visitors.

I think she might be cutting her first tooth. She is acting a bit off yesterday afternoon, pulling her ears more than usual and chewing on my hands. She has always been a chewer and drooler so those typical tell-tale signs do not give me any indication if she is actually cutting a tooth. She was running a very low-grade fever last night and yesterday she was just impatient. Nothing kept her happy for very long and she would go from one extreme to the next. It was like a roller coaster.

We just learned that her big sis (who was with us the last 2 weeks) was sick all weekend and is going in for a strep test this afternoon. My hubby called and said he is going to keep a close eye on Claire. We're hoping it wasn't transferred and that Claire really is cutting a tooth and not dealing with something worse. Claire might argue that getting teeth is just as worse but you get my drift.

I'm looking forward to the day when Claire can tell me 'where it hurts' instead of me guessing what is happening to my little bear.