The Drapela Family: Tubes & Mama

Yesterday was the big day and we had P's tubes put in. I was extremely nervous but all went GREAT! We had to be in downtown Houston for a 6 am appt. so that meant we left around 4:30 am. I explained all to P the night before what would be happening and it must have been too much for her (LOL!) because she was up from about 1-2 am and then up for good around 3 am.... (this is not normal for us) so that meant NO sleep for Mommy either. :( We got there and checked in (they always start with the youngest patients the earliest as they cannot eat/drink after midnight). By 7 am they were taking her away from us (TEAR!) and by 7:15 the Dr. was coming to get us. WOW! They put her under, did the tubes, and had her back in recovery all in about 15 minutes. It was soo hard seeing her in recovery since the bed sheets were white (in a big ole bed) and she was wrapped in a white sheet and you could not even see her-just her tiny little head. They let me sit by her and touch her and promised me within 5 minutes she would be waking up. It is crazy the way babies can be under anasthesia, have a procedure done, and bounce up like nothing ever happened, whereas adults are tired and groggy and take a few days to recoop. She sat right up (wrapped in sheet and all) and was ready to go. We were able to give her a bottle (just no milk). They gave us some apple juice to give her....that was a first--she has had one drink of apple juice before (when she was sick and would not eat or drink so I was desperate and trying anything) so this was a nice treat for her to have. It was VERY diluted with water--no juice allowed in our house yet, but she was soo hungry she sucked it all down. :) We recovered for a little bit and then we were free to go. She slept all the way home (we were home by 9:30 am) and was ready to go and her usual BUSY self by the time we got home. She was a little more clingy than usual, but otherwise you could never tell what she had been through. We have ear drops for a week and no water in ears for a week and then we are good to go.

We had talked at out previous appt. with the ENT about culturing the fluid in her ears to see if there is something in her little body lurking around and causing all these infections (remember April & May were one big double ear infection that we could not fight)....well lo and behold she is finally infection free so there was no fluid for him to culture. UGH! That is good news the infections were gone, but since she had them for so long it would have been nice for it to get tested. Oh well...hopefully we will be ear infection free for a LONG time!

She also started saying MAMA yesterday!!! YAY!! We have been working on this for a long time! She has been saying DADA forever now, and says, lala, baba, dada, nahnah, etc. but would not say mama....now my heart just melts even more that she is saying mama....even though dada has been and still is her all time favorite word (just like he is her favorite person). :)

She has the sweetest little voice ever, but man has her sweet little voice turned LOUD! OMG this child is loud! Sometimes N and I cannot hear each other over her. One of us ends up taking her out most weekends in church now because of all of her "talking". You sure are eating your words now N, arent't you?!?! Today at the library she was shouting for all to hear...omg! :)

In baby news: I have been feeling the baby a little bit here and there for a couple of weeks now. It is no where close to the movements with P but we think it is just because I am soo busy with P that I don't even realize every time the movements are occuring. I know it usually takes a few weeks to feel the movements from the outside, but the other night I was touching my belly and I was able to feel the kicks from the outside. I called N over to feel it and of course the baby would not cooperate. UGH! :) Oh well, I can feel them from the inside and the outside and it is just another reminder of how blessed we are! :)