Saying Good-bye

When I met Robert, he was already a soldier. He was always very honest about who he was and what he did. I’ll never forget the day, a couple of months into our relationship, when he handed me a huge 3 ring binder and said, “This will give you a small glimpse of who I am.”

(this is the first photo of Robert I ever saw....before we met)

The binder was full….his journal from war, photos of his platoon, the war torn streets of Iraq and some of the sad realities of war that he assured me were “not the worst” of the photos that he had. It also included page after page of poetry, which was (and still is) the way that Robert processed all that he saw and was a part of in Iraq. Here it all was, this binder full of a reality that I didn’t know that I was ready to confront.
I distinctly remember sitting in my apartment and reading through that binder, with tears pouring down my cheeks. At one point, I picked up the phone and called a very wise woman, who said this to me:
“If you are going to make the choice to love him, then you are going to have to love the soldier that’s inside him too. It’s a choice & it’s yours. But if you take that step, know that you are agreeing to love the Army and all the good, bad and ugly that comes with that too.”
I took that step. I agreed to love, not only my husband, but the Army too. I did then, & through it all, I still do. The Army taught me more about myself and the way that I look at this world than I ever would have thought possible.

The Army taught me that there is a reason that we stand up for the National Anthem and salute the flag….because many good men & women gave their life so that we would have that right.

The Army taught me that this world is a very ugly place.

The Army taught me that loyalty, duty, honor & sacrifice are so much more than just words. The Army showed me how those words are lived out & gave me the opportunity to meet some of the most amazing people that do, in fact, live them all.

The Army taught me that I am much stronger than I ever gave myself credit for.

The Army taught me to never take one single moment for granted, to take lots of pictures and to never miss an opportunity to make a memory.

The Army taught me how to adapt: new places, new people, new experiences…
all at the “needs of the Army”

The Army taught me that I can do anything that I set my mind to do…..
but that I’d much rather do it all with my husband by my side.

The Army taught me how to say good-bye…..
some times temporarily and sometimes until the other side of forever.

The Army taught me to write everything in pencil because life doesn't come with guarantees.

The Army taught me that change is not always a bad thing........

With the turning of a new chapter in our lives, it’s time to start anew. You are all invited to join us as we begin the next phase of our lives on our new family blog: http://www.only1mom.com/
We hope that you will all make the transition with us and follow along...

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"When You Go Home Tell Them Of Us And Say,
For Their Tomorrow, We Gave Our Today"

We remember.

Retired

With a heart full of mixed emotions, allow me to officially announce that as of today,
my husband is officially retired from the United States Army.
I am now, and forever more, a RETIRED Army wife.
Wow.
I have so much to say and quite honestly, am still processing this change.
I LOVE being an Army family.
In many ways, we still are.
We still have our ID cards, all our benefits, the joy (ha!) of dealing with Tricare....
as someone put it....
all the good without the bad
(ie: deployments, PCSing at unexpected times, etc).
Still, it is very hard to realize that the life that we've had,
the life that I have loved and embraced
has had a huge chapter closed.
It's bittersweet.

We went today and had our ID cards redone....changed over to reflect that Robert is retired(and his is now BLUE, which looks so weird). Then we went to Tricare, where I had my first opportunity to prove that Household 6 still knows all the rules and regs...even if she is "retired" ;) All of the insurance issues, category changes, etc are now squared away...lol.

Since I am a picture taking fool, you all know that I was there to document the final moments of Robert's Army career, right? Yes, I cried. Yes, he laughed at me. Yes, it hit him when we were driving off post that this was really it. Bittersweet, indeed.

Here he is (see the dot up by the building) walking into the MP Company for the very last time as SSG Bedford:

This is the final moment: The final stamp on the final Army issued document that signals the end of his military career.

I have so much to say about the Army, what it has meant to our family, what it has taught me about who I am and what really matters in life. I'll be sharing all of that in the coming days.
For today, just know that we are embracing this "new normal" and that we will slowly be getting used to living a normal civilian life....whatever that means!

Grifyn's cleft

Grifyn & I spent a long 4 hours at Children's Hospital today visiting with 5 different specialists. I had no idea that his one appointment was going to be such a big production!! We went to find out if Grifyn has a submucous cleft, which is an opening in the mouth that doesn't close when it's supposed to (when making sounds to talk, eating, etc). Our speech therapist suspected that this was the reason that when Grifyn talks, it sounds like he's talking out his nose. She's actually suspected this since he first came to the US, but she wanted to give his language skills time to develop. So today, we headed to Children's Hospital to get some answers. We went to what they call the "cleft clinic". That means that we saw a variety of doctors that cover all aspects of problems that come with cleft related issues.

We started out with the audiologist. She explained that children with clefts often also have problems with their hearing. Our morning started off with a bang when Grifyn....my child with Down syndrome that has NEVER had any problems with his ears in the 2 years he's been in our family....FLUNKED the hearing test. She started out by measuring the vibration in his ear drums....and the right one didn't move! I knew as soon as she said, "Hmmmm, let's try this again." that things weren't going well. She then did the tone hearing test and he has what is considered mild hearing lost in his right ear. That was not what I wanted to hear first thing this morning! The audiologist told me not to worry...that hopefully the ENT would find fluid in his ears. We'd see the ENT later in the day.

Our next stop was the genetics doctor. This was another surprise for me, since I had no idea that kids with cleft issues often have a genetic component to it. I ended up having a very interesting conversation with the genetics doctor that went something like this:
Him: Are you sure that Grifyn has Down syndrome?
Me: Yes, I am sure (internally rolling my eyes because we get asked this ALL. THE. TIME.)
Him: Was he actually tested in the US or did they diagnose him in Serbia?
Me: He had genetic testing done in Serbia. When we brought him to the US, we requested genetic testing and they tested one cell, found an extra chromosome and that was that.
Him: We can test him to determine what type of Down syndrome he has. (he says this as he's looking intently at Grifyn and then examining his hands)
Me: I don't care what type of Down syndrome he has. He is who he is.
Him: hmmm (as he continues to examine Grifyn's hands...now with a magnifying glass and a light)
Me: I am aware that he does not have the crease in his palm. I am also aware that studies say that this means that he does not have Trisomy 21. Quite honestly, it does not matter.
Him: Well, if you are curious, we can find out.
Me: It doesn't matter to me, not at all. Knowing what type of Ds he has won't change a thing (at this point, what I wanted to say was: It seems to matter to YOU)
He seemed quite perplexed that I didn't want to know if Grifyn has Trisomy 21 or Mosaic Ds. He went on to ask me if I would be interested in taking Grifyn to a doctor at another hospital that specializes in children with Down syndrome. I told him only if the doctor would see all 3 of my boys during the same visit ;)
Now, I could say A LOT more on this subject. We talked for over 15 minutes about all of this. I will say that the genetics doctor was very nice. He seemed genuinely curious and genuinely confused as to why I wasn't jumping at the opportunity to have more testing done on Grifyn. But seriously folks, it doesn't matter. It wouldn't change one darn thing that we do for Grifyn nor improve the quality of his life or anything else, so I don't see any need in having Tricare pay the big bucks for a test just to be able to say "out of 500 cells, ___ have an extra chromosome" (because seriously, how often does that come up in conversation??? lol).

Next, we saw the speech therapist. She came in to listen to Grifyn talk in order to determine if she could hear the noise coming out his nose when he talks. She did. She said that the interesting that about Grifyn that is not typical in a kid that is suspected of having a submucous cleft is that while you can hear the noise when he talks in casual conversation, if he focuses on a word and articulates it slowly, the noise does not come out his nose. Hmmmm.....

Then, the surgeon came in. He examined Grifyn's mouth and he started off by saying, "Grifyn is not the typical case". Leave it to my kid to be the one that doesn't fit the mold! He went on to draw out what a typical mouth looks like on the inside and what the mouth of a child with a submucus cleft looks like. When a child has a submucus cleft, 3 things are present inside the mouth. Grifyn has one, does not have one and has half of the third. *sigh* So, there was no way to know just by a visual exam if Grifyn actually has a cleft. We talked about surgery options...and about the fact that if Grifyn needs surgery, there is not a 100% guarantee that it will help his speech.

The last doctor to join the party was the ENT. He brought in the scope in an effort to try to determine once and for all if Grifyn has a cleft. While he was numbing Grifyn's nose, he checked out his ears (remember that hearing test I mentioned above?). He said that the right eardrum has compacted wax around it. He hopes that this is what is keeping the drum from vibrating like it should. Finally, it was time for the scope. The surgeon and the speech therapist joined us in the room for the scope, so that they could see whatever the ENT found. Grifyn was PERFECT during the scope! The doctor put the scope inside his nose and Grifyn sat perfectly still and laughed through the whole thing! The speech therapist got Grifyn to pronounce certain words so that the ENT could observe the movements inside his mouth while he was trying to talk. It took only 2 words out of Grifyn's mouth before the ENT said, "He has a cleft... a pretty good one too." The surgeon took a peek through the scope, as did the speech therapist. Grifyn continued to charm them all with his laughing and answering their questions(to get him to talk) all while having this big scope up his nose!

The result of all of this is that Grifyn will have surgery to repair the submucous cleft. The ENT will also be there during surgery and he will clean out both of Grifyn's ears. If he finds fluid, he will go ahead and place tubes in Grifyn's ears. Once the ears are cleaned out, Grifyn will have another hearing test to see if this corrects the hearing loss (praying that it does!).
Surgery is scheduled for August 27th at Children's Hospital. As many times as we've been through procedures and surgeries with Xander, this will be the FIRST time that Grifyn has ever been put to sleep or had anything done more than a basic office visit.
His mama is a little worried about all of this right now.....

because I can :)

Look at what the super talented RK made for me to use as my siggy on my favorite online forum! Isn't it just the cutest???!!!!

Xander GI update

Xander & I went to Children's Hospital today for a visit with the surgery consult about his GI issues. The first thing the doctor said was, "If you end up being sent to me, that is not a good thing." Somehow, that was not reassuring. Even though other things have been done, he wants to be absolutely 100% sure that Xander does not have Hirschprung Disease(he said "because he does have Down syndrome after all." Really????) I thought that we did that with the barium enema...but apparently not. The barium enema checks the colon and he needs to check the rectum. So, Xander will have to have a procedure done to biopsy his rectum. They will put him to sleep and...as the doctor described it..."cut out a piece of his rectum". It'll be tested for Hirschprung Disease. If it comes back positive, then he'll treat that (I have no idea how because he said we'd discuss that if we needed to). If it comes back negative(and he thinks that it will & so do I), we only have one option left: Xander will have a port placed in his side. He'll get medicine through the port every day that goes directly into his intestines. The doctor said that it's basically an enema for the intestines. There is no other option.
The biopsy is scheduled for a couple of weeks from now. However, because of child care issues (ie: I have 5 other kids), I will be rescheduling it for late July, when Robert can be home to stay with the other kids for the day.
At this point, we just want something to be done to help Xander so that he can go to the bathroom on his own. The thought of him having a port and daily injections is not appealing...not at all. But, the alternative is just not acceptable. He's getting too big for enemas (ie: fighting it) and I'd really like for him to be able to potty train in the near future....which won't happen until we can get the bloating, pooping, never ending potty issues under control.

Caught red handed

Anyone want to guess who it was that
dumped the trash can over?????