clearly i suck at this

hi. how hard is it to write a post or two a week? i don't understand why i'm not better at this.

we took Paudie on his first airplane ride this weekend. he was totally enthralled with the turbulance on the weigh there. he would giggle each time we hit a bump - i would feel my stomach flip and then he'd laugh. it hit me that his stomach was flipping too and that he was enjoying it. i guess he'll be a thrillseeker type.

the flight home was a different story. paudie was a mess. it was an unfortunate situation for us all. particularly the people around us. luckily jetblue gives out headphones so most people were watching TV. but not us. apparently parents of small children don't qualify for headphones. we have to suffer and suffer well.

suffice it so say, we are all feeling a bit anxious about our flight to Ireland in a few weeks.

in other paudie news... he is rolling like a fiend. back and forth. his sitting has improved but he still can't really manage it for too long on his own. the drool continues to flourish, yet the teeth are mia. he's also starting to demo a little bit of a temper. it's a riot but i have to give him props. i know how he feels when something you aren't supposed to have is taken away and god bless him for screaming about it. i'd be a much happier employee if i could unload over otherwise trivial matters.

catch that buzz

i'm going to depart from my downer type entries for a bit with this ode to my boy. the last week or so with paudie has been just the best. i don't know what it is, what has changed. but right now, i just couldn't be more in love. he is so effin cute. this week he has started to march his feet in his exersaucer. he tends to do it when there is music or to his dad's sad beatboxing. but i love it. it's like, he gets it. he's grooving. he's also starting to really interact with us. there is some give and take. the other night he woke up at like 11:15 and started to laugh and kick and smile. those times are so special. i love that he just goes with it. he knows no boundaries or rules or norms. i love to feed him appley yogurt and see him lap it up. it's awesome to know you are giving you child something they love.

i am totally going to get him a pony or send him to spacecamp.

i love that when he sleeps in between us he gets a full night's sleep. that tells ms he is exactly where he wants to be, feels the most comfort.

paudie paudie paudie.

i want to have like 5 of him.

did my parents ever love me this much? i don't know.

his hair. his skin. his smell. his infectious laugh. his toes. i just can't get enough of that boy.

when you know what you're missing

I went out with my girlfriends Saturday night - my first time out in nearly three years. While I was excited about a night out with my oldest and dearest friends, I also felt anxiety. Or a sense of conflict. With our first son, before he was sick, my husband and I both worked so essentially we both missed out on a good chunk of his life, from 3-5 months. But I didn't get too hung up on that because I thought there would be years and years of opportunity to be with him. Alas, I was wrong. And once he was gone, the agony of missing him was just plain cruel. But you adapt, slowly.

Now that Paudie is here, I hate to be away from him. I feel as if he is awake, and I can be with him, that is where I need to be. Because I don't want to miss any more than I have to (working). All I can describe it as is this pressure. Self-inflicted of course. I sense that is a difference between my husband and myself currently. He is home with Paudie for now so he gets hours of quality time each day so there is no guilt (I presume) should he want to do something for himself.

I guess my point is this: I hate that my life, my priorities, my needs, were rearranged for me. I didn't really need to lose my son to realize what is important and I certainly don't need to suffocate under the weight of the forced reprioritization, but I might.

ahead of the game at 5 months, 17 days

I love that photo of Paudie. So intent. So digging the slot machine-like toy on his exersaucer.

So Sunday came and went. Paudie reached the milestone of 5 months and 17 days and no cancer diagnosis. No health issues to speak of. This is huge milestone for our little family as the last time we had a baby boy reach 5 months and 17 days, by 10:00 that night we were informed he had cancer. Instead Paudie's 170th day on this earth was an uneventful. For that we are incredibly grateful. Our next milestone will hopefully be reached when he is 7 months and 6 days.

Personality wise, Paudie is a real firecracker. In Paudie's world, things are either so good, or its polar opposite. The kid is either on top of the world and the tears are flowing copiously. He is getting the hang of rolling over from belly to back, but we still have some work to do on the return trip. He is also able to sit on his own for a bit which is too cute. Teeth are still MIA, though with the lines of drool and red rosy cheeks, it seems like his gummy smile may only be with us for a little longer.

Paudie has become an adept grabber. Loves to pull at our faces. It starts with a good slap, then a fierce grab hallmarked by razorlike little fingernails that are never short enough no matter how often we cut them.

Next week Paudie is participating in a research study at Children's Hospital that seeks to understand more around how babies recognize faces. I think that will be pretty interesting. Maybe the researchers will tell us we have a genius on our hands. But chances are he'll just poop and attempt to eat any pictures they put in front of him.

embracing the power of negative thinking

Paudie is 5 months old. Our first son was 5 months old when he was diagnosed with neuroblastoma. Now that we are here again, it's extra hard to believe how little Cian really was when he was diagnosed. In our memories he is larger than life.

Given Paudie's age, we elected to have a proactive ultrasound done of his belly just to make sure nothing is there that shouldn't be there. It haunts us to think if we'd had even one of those with Cian, the outcome may have been different. Anyways we had the scan done last week, the second one we have done with Paudie. I know the doctors think we are nuts - Paudie is at no additional risk for the disease so there really is no medical rationale for doing it. But I suppose they realize the value of our peace of mind - even though it is a small piece of peace. The scan was clear. Though the reading radiologist was kind enough to point out that just because the belly looked clear, that's not to say disease couldn't originate further up his chest. Thanks doc!

It's also amazing to experience the differences between the two boys. Cian was very physical. He rolled over early and spent a lot of his time rolling over, playing on his activity mat, bouncing in his bouncy. Paudie is much more verbal. Always making noise, laughs very easily. I see the differences and it is somewhat heartbreaking. Maybe they are just different boys - I know that only rarely are siblings alike - but I can't help but think how truly awful Cian might have felt for a few weeks prior to diagnosis. He didn't chat or laugh like Paudie does, but he was always smiling. Even through toxic chemo treatments, the kid would sit there smiling.

Here I am rehashing it all again. I need to stop that.

So - moral of the story: Paudie's scan was unremarkable and as parents we can breathe a sigh of relief for a little bit. I try really hard not to get obsessive with my cancer fears - I like to spread my fears out evenly. Kidnapping, SIDS, accidents - I worry about them all in some feeble effort to prevent anything bad from happening. It's an approach I intellectually know is useless but I gotta work with what I got.

drat.

I am so disgusted that I haven't been devoting sufficient time to waxing poetically about my wonderous little booboo. Work is really interfering with me exercising some creativity, and some demons. I first thought this would encompass way too much boring and useless information for anyone to read - clearly hasn't been the case. Bah. So not the chronicle of Paudie's infancy I had envisioned. Damn you corporate demoralization. I will do better. In the meantime, check out Paudie rocking his antique baptism gown.

Paudie - Now Sin Free!

Yes, Paudie was baptized this past weekend. Welcomed into the Catholic Church, all traces of original sin banished from his little body. It all turned out to be more enjoyable than I expected. It was a small gathering, 3 kids in total, with a deacon doing the honors. Guess when you come from a different parish you don't qualify for a bona fide priest. Still the guy was genuine, nice... a little too jokey but there are worse things. As per usual, Paudie was his ridiculously cute rock star self, flirting and smiling.

How can such a happy child come from such a glass-half-empty sorta ma. Must be the paternal genes.

Meanwhile I continue to carry around an extra 10 pounds that may just become a permanent fixture on my body. It's so hard to lose baby weight! And pretty damn unfair. I don't know when I am going to find time or willpower to exercise and stop eating sugar. I think I still feel sorry for myself and thus have this belief system that I deserve what I want. I am actually considering like Jenny Craig because if the food was in front of me, that would help half the situation. Maybe I should just come to terms with the fact that my body will never truly be the same. Wah. Or I could just get pregnant again. That actually feels like the easiest solution. That's probably why that wacky family has 16 kids, cos the mom didn't want to deal with losing baby weight.