With vomit and poo, what's a girl to do

Lately, I've dealt with a ton of poo and a bucket of vomit. O'kay, I exaggerate. It was probably only a cup or two of vomit, but I'm standing by the ton of poo.


Please bear with me. Writing is therapeutic, but reading this may not be. Feel free to stop right now although I would like you to read the last paragraph. Thanks.


Jakey tends to be constipated ... all of the time. Well, until he isn't, and then watch out. We try to manage his meds so that it doesn't get too bad, but it's really hard to balance. Too much? Diarrhea. Too little? Oh, my. If it's been a while, he may have poo the size of an actual baseball or once it was slightly larger than a soda can. This is not exaggeration. Each poo is usually so big that we can't flush it (I am so sorry, Great Wolf Lodge). I feel for my poor boy. He will do anything to hold in a poo, and when stuff comes out. He wants it out NOW! So we have poo, BIG poo, on the ground because he does not like it in his pull-up. And, how does he get it there? With his fingers. So, now poo all over the fingers, hands, and (ugh) under the fingernails. But, he doesn't like poo on his hands so it ends up on his clothes, his body, whatever he is playing with at the time.


Now, please do not say that I need to watch him more closely. I do. He is incredibly quick. Amazingly so. And so independent that usually won't ask for help. Just takes care of it himself. Ah, poo!


Then there's poor Finn and his poopy pebbles. He really only likes to drink milk, and that's the side effect. Except for the other day when I brilliantly decided to give him pear juice. I was so excited that he liked it. While he was playing nicely, I changed Jakey's poopy pull-up. Never forgetting to scrub his hands, fingernails, sometimes legs, etc. Now, Dyson seemed to be licking something brown off of the couch. I scanned my memory. How? Jakey never touched the couch. Then ... OH MY ... Finny is jumping on the couch and with every jump, liquid poo squirts out of his shorts. That's what Dyson, the dog, was licking.


Now, I had a choice. Try to change him where we were or carry him to the bathroom and get poo all over me. I'm not saying that I made the best choice, but I really didn't want to get poo all over me. First, I kept him still while dabbing up the poo puddles. Then, I made an error. I laid him down to change his diaper. Liquid poo shot out the back of his diaper and formed a puddle on the couch. Yes, brilliance at work. I was finally able to clean him up with no mess by keeping him standing while I removed the offending diaper and wiped up the brown sheen covering him. Lots of cleaning after that ... Finn, the couch, me.


This morning I had to deal with vomit. Chunky milk vomit. Finny must have thrown up during the night and fell right back to sleep. All over his blanky, his bedding, his jammies, his hair. Poor baby. I felt so bad for him. He was fine though. Great time playing. Nice, long nap. Then, Mommy made another error. Oops. He loves to spin so I had him in a big toy tub and spun him around. He loved it until he didn't. Fortunately, it mostly ended up in the tub (still need to clean that out).


Back to non-bodily-fluid stuff ... Now, and extra dose of poo, but not the bodily kind. After a rollercoaster of a ride, we have been told that the iPad giveaway is bogus. It's all rather mysterious and weird. I don't think I have the whole story, and I'm too worn out to go into the details. I apologize if anyone gave money to Marissa's Bunny. They claim that they will return donations if asked. If they don't, please let me know, and I will see what I can do. Two of the families are doing what they can to make the best of this situation, please check out Little Wonders and Blogzilly for more details.

An exciting announcement ... no, not another pregnancy

It's been ages since I've been here. Life is so busy that when I do have downtime, all I want to do is nap and read. As always, I'll try to be better. I want to loosely document our lives before I forget everything. Memory loss happens more and more as I juggle all of our schedules. Sigh.


But, back to the announcement. A couple of months ago I read about an iPad giveaway for people with special needs. Ever obsessed with getting an iPad for Jakey, I entered him. Last month we were informed that Jakey had made it to the finalists. Out of over 350 entries, Jakey moved into a field of 40. 20 iPads were going to be given away, and if the forming foundation received enough donations, then as many as 35 could receive iPads with $500 of apps. 


When I read that Jakey made the cut, I started crying. My baby won something. The little guy --- who never runs a race, never competes for a team, and never enters contests --- made it to the finals. Simply awesome! But, with Brian's help, I dug a little deeper. It's not just that he was on the road to winning, but also that what I wrote about him touched another's heart.


Before Jakey could win, we needed letters from his therapists explaining how Jakey could benefit from an iPad. Of course, anyone who know this technological wonder also knows that Jakey would be in seventh heaven with this gadget in his hands. His ABA therapist at Children's jumped right on it and had a letter for me within a couple of days. Next I approached his case manager and therapists at school. This was decidedly more difficult. First, no one responded to my mails; then, I heard that they might not be able to do it since they were working on a backlog of IEPs. My frustrating was riding high. Their lack of assistance could mean that Jakey wouldn't qualify. Really?!?!? I only needed a couple of paragraphs, if that. Fortunately, one the therapists called me about an unrelated issue, and she agreed that Jakey would benefit from an iPad. A few days later and just in time for the deadline, I received another letter.


The foundation wrote that they would hopefully inform everyone on May 10th about who won the giveaway. Last week moved so slowly for me as I waited to hear.


Cut to Mothers' Day. What a lovely day! Brian packed the boys up and dressed them for church (we're going to Overlake Christian Church since they have a wonderful special needs ministry). After church, we enjoyed a wonderful Mexican lunch. Followed by a short nap and me running away to Tully's where I sipped coffee in a comfy chair with my feet by the fireplace while I read a mystery on my Kindle. After an hour or so, I checked my email on my phone and found the best Mothers' Day gift ever:

"I'd like to say (privately, at this point), that ALL of you final 40 have been selected to receive an iPad.  My bosses hearts were breaking with each tale, so they decided to pony up for five more."

Yep, Jakey won! And, I cried in the middle of Tully's. You see, I fought for Jakey and won. As parents, we decide whether or not to fight for kids every day. Sometimes we win, sometimes we lose; most of the time, we never know the results. THIS time, I fought AND won.


You can find out more about the family behind the foundation and giveaway at Marissa's Bunny.


Plus, if you want an iPad 2 all for yourself while also giving to a great cause, please check out the Marissa's Bunny iPad 2 Raffle.