The Last Year

2010 has been an interesting year for our family.

My mom was diagnosed with cancer. This has been really hard. As the medical person in the family, I was asked to attend all her appointments and give advice on the course of action. This was really hard on me but I did it anyway. Turns out she has melanoma (skin cancer) and the treatment would have only given her an 8% chance of prolonging her life by 1 year. My advice was no treatment as she was showing no signs of sickness and was feeling good. This is no longer the case. She is starting to show small signs that she is getting sick - nails chipping and lots of weight loss. It breaks my heart but I still hold strong that this is the best way for her to go - on her own terms and not those of chemotherapy.

Pregnancy - we had been trying since our wedding in June 2009 to get pregnant. I had been on depo-provera which is a birth control injection and it was taking it's sweet time exiting my body. Finally on March 5th(Kaylee's birthday) we got our positive pregnancy test. I felt pretty good at first and by our trip to Vegas at the end of March I had some pretty good morning sickness. I still enjoyed my trip though and the 24hour car trip both ways that went with it. Got back to work the second week in April and that is pretty much where things went really wrong. First shift back I had some bleeding and ended up in the ER. Everything was fine but was told to take it easy for a few days. My next shift after my rest went well and I was feeling great (so I thought) until about 11:00 that night. I started bleeding very heavily and we all got in the car and went to the ER. After a few hours of sitting there and not really getting any answers or anything we were sent home and told to come back in the morning for an ultrasound. Expecting the worst we went into the ultrasound knowing that our little bean was gone only to see a little beating heart and a little bouncing bean. We were so happy. That was the beginning of the very long and difficult journey to get our baby out. I was on bed rest, off work for the entire time, and ended up with uncontrolled blood pressure issues. I also had a week long hospital stay due to breathing issues from an allergic reaction to an antibiotic.

Birth and hospital stay - I'm not going to go into detail too much about this in this post as I think it deserves it own. I was induced due to high blood pressure and low platelets. Induction went well and I gave birth to a beautiful baby boy. Due to breathing difficulties he ended up spending 9 days in the NICU and was intubated during that time. It was very scary and I have a new appreciation for the medical world.

My daughter has had some ups and downs this year and we are still trying to figure things out with her. Her whole world has changed in the past year and a half as she's moved to a new city, started a new school, gotten a new dad, had to endure my difficult pregnancy and now has a new brother. She's had some difficulties adjusting but we are working on it.

My marriage has been good and I'm very happy with how it has progressed. It's difficult some days as I feel like I try harder than he does but I only really see my side of the coin so it's hard to judge. He has put up with a lot from me in the last year and I love him so much for that.

Me - I think that since Daxon was born I may have a bit of post partum depression (another thing that Scott has had to deal with). There are days that I just can't see to be happy and all I want to do is cry. That is why I think that this blog is a good idea for me as it will allow me to share my thoughts and feelings. I don't have too many friends here in the city - or at all for that matter so it will be nice to let it all out.

I have great hopes for the new year!!