Starting over

So I gave in and finally ordered the Visalus shakes everyone has been talking about. I started them yesturday, my goal is 30lbs in 3 months and another 40 after that. I will first do a daily log of it and then start talking about the fam.

Day 1 - shake tastes like a vanilla pudding flavour, so not bad, you had 2 scoops of it with 12 oz no fat milk and you can add stuff for flavour, I tried it plain for my first drink. It was good. I also took a metabolisim booster, omega pill and multi vitamin, and their hunger curb thingy. It was easy to drink. At mid morning I had a snack of 1 hard boiled egg and 1/2 cup cucummber. Lunch time I had the shake but added 1 banana, 1/2 cup plain 1% yogurt, and 1/4 tsp vanilla for a shake that was supposed to taste like a banana cream pie (their recipe), it really didn't taste like that and was just ok. After that was all regular meals, healthy snacks, I had 10 almonds and like 5 slices of a small red pepper, 4oz boneless, skinless chicken,1 cup uncooked broccoli and a side salad, no dressing, we never do dressing here, and last snack was 1 large celery stalk with 1 tbsp pb and about 11 raisins. I drank a shit load of water, and to be honest, skip this part if you get grossed out easily..........................I pooped alot.

Now onto family life.

I think Reiko is finally out of the break cycle, its been a few weeks since his last break. He is also moving about now, all the time, if you put him somewhere on the floor he will scoot himself on his back and side to another part of the room, it  is a beautiful beautiful sight! He has been very happy and his personality is really starting to come out now, he has a bit of attitude but is relatively happy for the most part lol.

Kai was going through a stage last week where he was having accidents everyday, some in my bed, some at school, at the park and a pool, we kept reminding him to go, his teachers at kinderoo said they would tell him to go but they weren't sure he was actually going or lying..but this week he is back to normal, thank goodness! He has been a very good boy though, and the other day he went kayaking with daddy for a few minutes and loved it! They ended up falling in the water as he was getting out but he didn't care. We also went to Marine Land last weekend and he got to touch and feed the baluga whales, he was very happy with it. We went with my sister's family, and they were all great, even Reiko was in a great mood! I found MarineLand more fun than the Toronto Zoo.

Life has been good here, and we are finally enjoying summer! speaking of which, time to go!
Take care
Jessica

New course and life

I am starting another course today, Patient Preparation. I am honestly not excited at all about this one, only because I will be travelling twice a week for the next 6 weeks to London, but it could be worse, I digress. Life has been pretty good this last week. Derek went on a bachelor party weekend to Ottawa with 19 other guys, they went white water rafting and bungee jumping, what a thrilling weekend for him! I will put up the video of him bungee jumping soon! He was quite tired when he got home last night, I picked him up at 1am from a dropoff area, but we stay up for a while talking about his weekend. I hope he had a wonderful time, Lord knows he deserves it. My weekend was pretty good as well, Oma took Kai Friday night, so after I picked up a new inflatable pool and umbrella stroller for Reiko, we came home, played alittle and then it was time for him to go to bed. Saturday morning I made up a dessert for the pig roast, went to pick up Kai in the afternoon and Oma and I got the big inflatable pool set up for Kai, he loved it! There is obviously no room at our house for a pool, that would require a front or back yard, then after playing outside for a few hours we went to the pig roast at my aunt and uncles house, the very last one, and I only saw Kai in passing the whole night, he was having a blast with his cousins! There were fireworks as well, alot of them,, more than the Goderich fireworks on Canada Day lol, but the first set of them were not properly put in the ground and one of the fireworks literally almost took of my sister's husbands head, if he had not bent down to grab his daughter the second before it would have been a disaster, Thank God nothing happened to him. We were all on edge after that, especially with Reiko around, but he loved the fireworks, I just plugged his ears when they would get loud, I was so afraid they would break the bones in his ears, I think he did just fine though. I couldn't believe it he actually stayed up until 11 that night too, so you would think he would have slept in, nope he got up like 5 times that night and was wide awake at 7am...ugh I was so tired. So I did the laundry, cleaned the house and tried to keep Kai from having meltdown after meltdown, yesturday was a bit of a hellish day with him...I wanted to go for a walk, he was happy and then he had a complete fit for no reason that lasted approx 2 hours..here watch a video of my day all day yesturday...

the joys of a toddler.

Once Derek wakes up I am totally going to have a nap before I head to school tonight. Oh Reiko found a way to get himself around too, he now lifts his back or side to scoot himself around, I can tell it tires him out though, so he only does it every once and a while. He left leg is doing amazing though, you can't tell at all he broke it 2 weeks ago! he is using it so well, I can't believe the strength he has. He has this darn heat rash that wont go away too, he sweats so much and its been very hot, so it goes away and then later that day it is back at full force, the worst place is the wrists, they look alittle painful. I have no idea what else to write about today, hopefully if the week goes good with Reiko we will be heading to the Toronto Zoo on saturday to meet up with some other parents of kids with OI, then the weekend after that is Marine Land, the weekend after that a wedding, the weekend at that is the Backstreet Boys concert, followed by Montreal later that week, Derek's triathalon the 15th, and then another wedding that weekend! this summer is going by so fast with how busy we have been, and then my little boy will be in kindergarten..time is flying by.

Ok thats enough chatter!!

Take Care!

Jessica

Getting better

It was a tough few weeks, and June really sucked for Reiko, but now it seems to be getting better, KNOCK ON WOOD! We took Reiko out of the brace today, he has a rash on his body and it was also on his legs, looked like it would have been painful with the brace rubbing it, and he handled it really well. He was moving his leg around and didn't seem to have any pain. we put it back on at bedtime though, speaking of bedtime, my child(Reiko) has decided sleep is not a necessity...he has been up continuously every night, making me very very tired, and so when Derek comes home from work, I head to bed til 12, then its his turn to sleep...not so enjoyable in the summertime. Yesturday Reiko really wanted to get onto his stomach, mind you he hasn't been on his tummy in over a month now, and he was so determined I didn't stop him, well he did a full roll over, and his arm that is healing from a break from the 25th of June got caught behind him and he let out the cry, so of course I thought he broke the arm again, but I picked him up, brought him to the break box and he was absolutely fine! WTH??  I don't know if just doing a full roll over scared him or what? I am assuming it had to have hurt the healing arm, but he is acting like nothing is wrong with it. the boy confuses me lol.

Kai has started Kinderoo this week, which is a 6 week program to get him ready for Kindergarten. Yes, kindergarten this september! AHH! He likes the kinderoo alot, of course I am sleeping when he is dropped off and picked up, so I don't get to talk to the teachers, but they say you get to find out how they are doing half way through the 6 weeks. I just can't believe that my little boy is starting school already, I know now that time will just go by so very fast from now on, I will try to treasure every moment with him. We have been trying to keep him busy, last weekend was Canada Day so we went to all the celebrations in town, fireworks on the 30th, which was also Derek and I's 4 year wedding anniverasry, he loved them, then saturday we went to the wading pool, and then the teddy bear parade where he and some of his friends had a balloon sword fight, sunday we went to see the reptiles and then went to one of his friends house where he played with 4 other kids! he had a great time! tonight we went to the beach, the water was nice, but Kai is scared of pools or lakes, so he fought me the whole time, I got him in but he wanted out right away, Reiko wasn't to fond of the water either, he was scared but he handled it better than Kai lol.

I only have like 4 more weeks of my first 2 courses! I have 1 more quiz to finish tomorrow then I will have the unit test and final exam at the end of the month for Basic Human Anatomy, I am doing really well in that class. My computer class has been going really good too, I have gotten like 94% on both my assignments and I handed in my other assignment last week, I don't know if it will be as good as I didn't put as much effort into it as the other ones, with everything Reiko was going through, from being in the hospital to just feeling horrible and sorry for myself and him, I didn't care. I hope its good enough though, I think I did everything I was supposed to do. we will see I guess. Its due tomorrow, so within 2 weeks I should know. I start my 3rd course on Monday, Patient Prep, I am keeping my fingers crossed that I wont have to go down every week for the course, its a split course, some in class/ some online. But the course has no textbook, and that kind of stuff in hands on, so I am assuming its mainly in class, the only reason I care is because I would be driving to London twice a week for that course and my computer course.

So when Reiko broke last week, it was the hardest one for me. I felt like I was a horrible parent to him, he didn't want me to touch him or go near him, I could tell he was so scared everytime I went to pick him up, because of the pain he would go through. I tell ya, there is absolutely nothing worse than seeing your child scream in the most horrific way, and then watching them pass out from the pain...especially a 15 month old. I would start to cry just thinking that he blamed me for the pain, it was just so awful. It just scares me honestly, it scares me to think of what worse fractures he will sustain and having to watch him go through it. I don't know how I will be able to be strong for him in those moments, I wasn't very strong last time, I yelled at Kai when he leaned on his new broken leg and had him crying, then I ran up and cried in my room after Reiko had passed out, then Kai came up and kept saying "I'm so sorry mama" and it broke my heart more, because I never ever want him to feel responsible for this disease. So I scooped him in my arms and cried and told him he was a good boy and its not his fault. But I felt horrible that I yelled at him, because these breaks are scary for us all. And then I cried everytime Reiko would have a spasm because it was horrible watching him go through it...I cried alot, and wasn't strong around my boys when they needed me. I don't know how to be strong in these moments. I guess I am rambling on, sorry. Just please please say some prayers, send some good positive energy or thoughts Reiko's way, he needs it. I am just hoping that this stupid fracture cycle is over with, for a long long long time. Its hard to believe in a month he will have his next treatment! Thank Goodness! Ok goodnight to whoever still reads this.

Take Care,

Kai's spider man facepaint on Canada Day, he always gets spiderman, and I think it is catching on with the other boys now too lol.

Jessica