Muddling & Mishaps - Reality Blogging

The word "overwhelmed" seems to resonate in my life at this point in time. For starters, our world has been rattled by our six-month-old son over the past three weeks.  What started as a double ear infection quickly turned into the realization that he is highly allergic to amoxicillen.  After being referred to an allergist and watching the poor little guy endure a skin test, we learned that he's also highly (if not severely) allergic to dairy, eggs and peanuts.  Shortly after the skin test, he got a ridiculously bizarre GI bug that spun out of control and dovetailed into another allergic reaction, resulting in one ER trip, one abdominal ultrasound, one blood test, and a total of five doctors' office visits over the course of seven days.  He's fine now...but, let's be real... My friends - the past three weeks have royally sucked. It's hard for me to wrap my head around Teddy's allergies.  Can you imagine a world without cheese?  Because I can'...

My husband had been preparing for a six month (or longer) deployment for the past year.  We actually knew about this deployment before we were pregnant with Teddy - and even when we found out that we were expecting the sneaky little ninja baby, our plans didn't alter in any way.  We needed the money, he wanted to be with his guys...it was a sacrifice we were willing to make as a family that would be brutally painful in the short-term, but pretty darn good in many aspects in the long-term. There is a whole lot of thought and planning that goes into getting ready for a longer deployment.  I won't even get in to all of the emotional hurdles and changes of mindset that my husband had to undergo to get ready.  That's his tale to tell.  From my perspective, however, I had to get ready to mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually be with two very young children on my own.  In particular, our two year old daughter is beyond attached to her daddy. ...