Mutiples and more Question Of The Week

OK, so I'm a day late. But better late than never. This weeks question:

Where and when was your best family vacation?

This is a tricky one as I've had so many great family vacations. It's a close call between the trip to Disney land with my parents and three sisters when I was 14, and a recent family summer holiday we went on to Napier over this past christmas. I'm going to go with the Napier trip, simply as I got to enjoy it with my parents and sisters, AND also all our partners and kids so it was very special.

As what was meant to be part of our christmas present (We all somehow still got rather a lot of gifts on the 25th..) my parents paid for us all to go up, accomodation and food as well as all other expenses. We got to take the kids through a maize maze, visit the aquarium, go to splash planet, go to Napier Prison on a tour, go shopping and go to the beautiful ice cream store.

It was a great holiday filled with laughter and fun. In fact I enjoyed it so much it is the destinations for AN and I's girly trip coming up this summer. :)

Foxy

I just finally caught up and installed Firefox. Now I have a lovely customised pink toolbar, bookmarks etc. So cute.

I'm just checking the blogging add-on to see how it works. Quite a boring entry huh?

Baby Love...

I have been putting off a post all week. I've logged on almost everyday of said week and just stared at my dashboard, before checking out everyone elses blog updates. I've had such an up and down week it never seemed like to right moment to sit down and pour my heart out. Either I felt too down to make myself even more sad, or was having a great time and wanted to ignore the issue which has been playing on my mind for the last three years and has just decided to make a come back.

When I was diagnosed with Dilated Cardiomyopathy it was made very clear that under no circumstances should we contemplate a pregnancy at that point in time. To the point my Cardiologist made sure my GP went through suitable contraception options mere days after my first visit with him. This was the first time I began to wonder if more children would ever be in our future. Our plan pre-children had always been to have two, but after having the twins we realised we would love to add to our family one more time.

In fact, when I was diagnosed even though I was extremely unwell I had been to so many doctors that didn't believe me that I thought once I had lost some weight I would be all better and we could try again for another baby. We decided this at the end of November. This would be my new years resolution for 2007, something to aim for and look forward too. We were hoping to have a 2008 baby. I was diagnosed in early December 2006 and all those plans fell away.

I was much too sick for this thought to really play on my mind much. As time has worn on I've noticed that it is now when I am most sick the thoughts of having a baby plays on my mind. Bizarre, as I am not afraid to admit I struggle so much with the two beautiful children we already do have on these days. In fact, to have any hope of having the energy to get through the entire week my boys are in care/kindy 18 hours per week. How in the world would I cope with a newborn? Is this just a matter of wanting the one thing I can't have?

Added to this have been the recent opinions of both my cardiologist and the doctor we would most need during a subsequent pregnancy, my obstetrician/fertility specialist. My cardiologist is absolutely against another pregnancy right now. He's not sure what the future holds, but even if I fully recovered and came off all meds he'd be very nervous about another pregnancy. My obstetrician when I saw him said he would be very scared of leaving three children and a husband without their Mother and Wife. It's certainly not something these top specialists would be pleased about.

The fact is, I tried coming off my meds and my heart function declined. I now have fainting spells, I am carrying too much weight which is making it difficult enough for my poor heart let alone adding pregnancy to that stress. I have PCOS which means it's unlikely I could fall pregnant on my own anyway, hence needing support from a wide range of specialists even if the best case scenario - that I was fully recovered and off all meds.

I just wish I could stop yearning for something I can not have. I want to only focus on my recovery/health (and of course my family and friends).

I must add though that in no way am I upset or jealous of other people having babies or adding to their families. I am especially excited when someone I know is having a baby, as I know how wanted and loved they will be and I'm lucky enough to be a part of this new little persons life. The feelings I have are actually very selfish ;) Considering I'm lucky enough to have twins, I really don't know why I'm having such trouble with this.

I am feeling better about it all tonight, thus my being able to talk about it here. Hopefully by next week I'll be back to cringing at the thought of being woken at 2am by crying, followed by being spewed on and probably pooped on.

Multiples and More; Question of the Week

This weeks question is all about Dads, given it's Father's day in the States today. Since I have already spoken about my Dad here, and to avoid my Mum being becoming jealous again (I did write about my Dad first, but I was waiting for Mother's Days to write about/to my Mum. I'll never live it down!) I'm not going to share this post between two of the most important men in my life. I am going to instead write this post just about one, the Father of my gorgeous twins, my darling husband.

What makes him a great Father?

Taken three years ago, must update our Father-son pictures!

I have always truely believed in the train of thought that the best gift a Father can give his children is to love their Mother. This being the case Craig is gifting those boys one huge magnificent gift. My boys have such an amazing role model in their Dad that I have no doubt he is the one growing them to be little gentlemen.

Often in the weekends it's Daddy time. My boys spend the whole weekend trailing their Dad around, wanting to do whatever it is he is doing, wanting him to play with them and read with them. Calmly and lovingly Craig helps them to join in the household chores, and even when the two begin fighting over who is going to push the washing machine button, or which of them is allowed to feed the cats Craig lets them know they will each get a turn and has an amzing knack of remembering whos turn it is.

Craig is an amazing Father. He isn't afraid to let his boys know he loves them. He comes home after a long day at work and every night bathes them, reads them stories and gets them to bed (More often than not he also makes sure they have nice full tummies too!).

I feel I'm just not doing justice to Craig, and the amazing Dad he is. But this is a start. I love him so much and he makes me so proud.

Busy, busy life

Things have been pleasently busy around here lately. I have new pics of the boys I took on a very special day for them. I'll upload into another post later today, all things going to plan (does that sound slightly sarcastic? Things very rarely go by my best laid plans do they?).

I've been unwell. I've felt better. I've felt unwell again. Through all this I have been living my life, enjoying my boys, having great times with friends, exploring holiday options for over the summer when I will be off on a girl's holiday with Nuka while my darling husband stays home with our twins. Going out to the movies with Claire and having a wonderful time. I've been resting, Chatting lots at with Craig, crying at the end of Marley and Me, attending four year old birthday parties with the twins, getting terrible headaches I can't shake, ignoring said headaches to watch Ben10 for the millionth time with the twins.

I also have phone calls I haven't replied to yet. And emails. And a bit of washing to be done. So things haven't been quite perfect this week. Luckily I'm not aiming for perfection. Just to be living my life with happiness.

I get by with a little help...

I was taking my nightly meds and realised just how much my life has come to depend on these little marvels of medicine.






Thes medications that I take were found to be effective for patients in heart failure/ diagnosed with Cardiomyopathy sometime in the early 21st century.


Nine years ago.


Looking back to 1980 there was a high rate of mortality for those found to have the exact condition I do. They were given five years at most to live. Many did not even make it to one year past diagnosis. If you've seen the movie Beaches, this is what one of the main characters died from.

I am currently sitting at two and a half years past diagnosis.


I have little tablets that clear my body of excess fluid to help my heart pump blood more easily. I have little tablets that slow down my heart rate, lower my blood pressure so my heart can rest and hopefully heal. I have meds that keep me safe from blood clots developing. Not to mention the meds helping my insulin resistance and iron deficiency.



Along with all the positives these meds bring, of course there are side effects. Severe tiredness, forgetfulness, a heart rate that now at times goes too low. My kidney and liver function are checked every three months to see how they are dealing with all this toxicity.



I wouldn't trade a thing.

These little marvels of medicine? They saved my life.

Update on blogging scam

It seems that the perpetrator of one the scams I talked about here was tracked down through her business and facebook accounts. It's all so very sad, but I thought others may like to read about this latest update, and read about the news paper article done on this here.

I'm exhausted tonight. I have no energy to add more on this, and feel I am unlikely to want to discuss it in anymore detail at all. Just keep safe lovely blog readers.