Allergies, Allergies, and More Allergies

Well, Diego is now 18 months old, so we got him tested for allergies. And surprise, surprise, he's allergic to everything.

Here's the official list:
Milk
Eggs
All nuts, including coconut
Cats
Dogs

Yup. He's a little nerd boy. It's so frustrating. I never thought I'd have to deal with this since I didn't think it ran in the family. But apparently it does, somewhere. So I will spend my life reading labels and make him separate meals. I've pretty much given up on him out growing this because when they tested him, the milk allergy was the highest it could be. I don't see that going away any time soon.

Ugh, the way they tested him was awful. They had to fill like 27 vials of blood, while we held him down. Okay, it was really 6 or 7, but it felt like a lot more. It took forever, and he just laid there crying and screaming. It was horrible.

Preggo Pics

When I was pregnant with Diego, I took pictures of my belly every 2 weeks. But that was all I took. And then I totally regretted not taking some cute preggo pics wearing cute preggo clothes. It was always the same shot wearing the same shirt. Well, this time around, I vowed to take some cute pics! One Sunday, July 22nd to be exact, I told Marcelo we were going to take pictures. So we went to a park and got some cute shots. Marcelito was born 4 days later, so I'm sooooo glad I did it when I did it. I already digiscrapped the pictures. I printed the first one and have it up in the living room. I love it.

I am such a nerd!

I got a minivan!!!! Woo hoo!!!! I'm so happy! It's a 2005 Toyota Sienna. No, it does not have automatic sliding doors. But yes, it is sooooo much easier to get the kids in and out! I love it.

Adjusting

It has only been a week, but so far things have been going well. Celo loves sleep as much as I do! He's been sleeping for 5 hours straight every night. I have to wake him up to feed him. He barely cries. He just grunts instead. Diego loves him. I wonder if he'll get jealous. So far he just points at him and says "Baby, baby." He gives him lots of hugs and kisses, too. It's sooo cute. A few days ago, he threw his precious teddy bear into the baby's bassinet. He looooves that bear. I picked it up and tried to give it back to him and he turned his face away and said, "No. Baby." I almost cried. He was sharing it with the baby! So cute. I took a picture of it:

I can't believe how big Diego is compared to Marcelito. He's tiny! And tan, I might add. Diego is so white.

Okay, that's all I have time for. Back to breastfeeding (which, by the way, has been a breeze this time, thank goodness!) and watching elmo.

He's here!

Marcelo Evan was born on July 26th, 2007 at 2:32pm. He weighed 5 pounds, 13 oz.

Here's how it went down: I had contrax all night on Wednesday night. At 8am, I called the doc to see what I should do. I wasn't sure if it was false labor or real labor, and I wanted to make sure the baby wasn't under stress. The doc told me to go straight to the hospital to get checked. I started bawling. Marcelo was all excited, and I was bawling. I was like, "What? Go to the hospital? I'm not ready! It's too soon!" We took our sweet time getting ready, and finally showed up at the hospital at 10am. My contrax had slowed down to like 15 minutes apart. They hooked me up to the monitors and made sure the baby was fine. After two hours, I had only had like 3 contrax, so they said they were going to give me one more hour, and if they stayed that far apart, I was going home. By then, I was all geared up to have the baby, so I was a little disappointed that it could be a false alarm. Anyway, in that last hour, the contrax sped up to 10 minutes apart again, and when the doc came in to check me he said, "I don't think your contractions are going to stop. We're going to go ahead and have this baby today." So they started prepping me for surgery. I was sooo scared about the spinal. But it wasn't terrible, and the anestesiologist was like, "You did great! That was the easiest spinal I've ever done!"

YEAH RIGHT.

So the doc starts to cut me open, and I CAN FEEL IT. I immediately tell the anestesiologist, who is by my head, "I can feel that!" He was like, "Yes, you're going to feel pressure." I was like, "No, I can feel the sharpness of the knife." He didn't want to believe me, but told the doc to hold on a second anyway. I could also move my right foot, which I didn't think was normal. The doc started back up again, and I could feel it a little less, but I still knew there was way too much sensation. Then, I started feeling an enormous amount of pressure and pain. It was absolute hell. I started crying and sqeezing the crap out of Marcelo's hand saying, "I'm in a lot of pain, it hurts, it hurts. I feel a ton of pressure." So the anestesiologist started getting worried. He asked me to describe exactly what I felt, so I did. Basically, I felt like I was getting run over by a mac truck. I felt like there were a thousand pounds of pressure on my stomach, pushing all my organs into my back. My back ached like a mother, too. It was the scariest, most horrible feeling in the world. They started to pull the baby out, and it was literally like my whole stomach was going to get ripped off my body. They were tugging and tugging, and I was crying, saying, "Please hurry. Please hurry." Once they got the baby out, the pressure was a tiny bit better. The anestesiologist was instructing the nurses to hurry and get the baby over to me, because he was convinced that it was all in my head and that I just needed to see the baby. Well, no. It wasn't in my head. So I saw the baby, and then went right back to clenching my teeth and trying not to scream. I felt them moving around my organs, I felt them stitching me up, I felt everything. It wasn't like, knives and needles pain, it was just the pressure of everything they were doing. It's hard to describe, but it was freaking horrible. Once it was over, the anestesiologist was like, "They're done. I've given you more pain medication, so that should be kicking in." They wheeled me to the recovery room, with me still in tears, and still in a ton of pain. The anestesiologist was so confused about why I was in so much pain. I kept hearing him tell people, "That was such an easy spinal and I thought she was going to be completely numb because she's so small." So he came and asked me again to describe what I was feeling. I told him I could move my foot the whole time. His eyes opened wide and his face was like, "What? That's not good." So he told the nurses to get me more pain meds, but nothing was working. As I was laying there waiting for them to bring me some morphine, my head all of a sudden started to THROB. Like, intense, crazy, I feel like my head is going to explode, throbbing. I promise you I'm not exaggerating when I say I thought a vein in my head was going to burst and I was going to die. I was soooo scared. I was crying the ugly cry at this point, and asked Marcelo to give me a blessing. They finally got me some morphine, and all the pain started to subside. But from about 2:30pm - 4:00pm, I was in the worst pain of my entire life.

I feel a million times better today. I just need some sleep! Marcelito was born 3 weeks early! I guess he didn't want to be an August baby. He's doing great. He's awesome at nursing, thank goodness. He's much hairier than Diego, and his hair is darker, which is why we decided he wasn't a Cristian. (We almost named him Cristian Marcelo.)

Oh, and my parents were out of town, so they missed it. They showed up at the hospital at like 6pm, totally bummed out.

He was 5 lbs 13 oz. Teeeeny tiny. I was 5 lbs 14 oz. He was 19.5 inches long, just like Diego. Diego met him in pretty bad conditions. We called my MIL at 1:00 to tell her the c-sec was happening, so she said she was coming with Diego. We were like, "No, let him take a nap, there's no point. It won't be for at least another hour." Marcelo, Celo, whatever we're going to call him, was born at 2:32, but no one got to see him till like 3:30, and they didn't see me till almost 5. So Diego didn't nap at all. He was here in a waiting room for 3 and a half hours! So yeah, by the time we saw him, he was pretty miserable. He just said, "Baby. Baby. Baby." But he was totally cranky and kept crying for everything. PLUS, he has a rash all over his entire body, a fever, diarrhea, and was throwing up yesterday. So I didn't really want him to close to the baby. Perfect timing, right?

My mom misunderstood my story, and told EVERYONE in my family that I had felt every single thing during the surgery, including being cut open. So I had my grandma and aunts calling me crying yesterday, saying how sorry they were that I went through that and that they wanted to sue the doc, etc, etc. I was like, uhh, let me clarify. Yes, I felt a lot of pain. No, I did not feel them cut me open like some horror movie. My mom also emailed everyone and told them "Cristian Marcelo" was here. Way to jump the gun.

Anyway, I'm pretty pissy today (not as bad as yesterday, though) because I'm super tired and can't get any sleep. Every time I try to sleep, someone calls, or a nurse comes in, or whatever.

Here's a pic we took last night. Marcelo and I almost changed the baby's name again after everyone left because neither one of us is getting used to calling him Marcelo. I keep calling him Celo, and he keeps calling him Junior. (I hate Junior, by the way.) Anyway, it just feels super weird. But then we look at him and we're like, he's so not a Cristian, or any other name. So Marcelo seems to be the one that fits the most. I don't know. I hope I get used to it soon, because I have to fill out the Social Security papers today!

Yes, I know my robe is hideous, but it's all I have!

And here's one where Marcelito looks a lot like Diego:

Big Boy Bed

We put Diego in a big boy bed!! He's doing great in it. I'm so sad about it because he just seems way way way too little for that huge bed. He's only 17 months old! But I really wanted to do it before Baby #2 comes. (He's still nameless Baby #2, btw.) I can't believe how easy he made the transition for us. But Marcelo and I were talking about it, and we came to the conclusion that he is just a good "transitioner". Everything has been easy. Going from breastmilk to soymilk was easy, going from bottle to sippy cup was easy, and now this. Thank goodness, too, because I already have a ton on my plate to worry about.

I worked really hard on his room and I'm sooo happy with it! Honestly, I like it better than the nursery. I hope he likes it when he gets old enough to care. So here's a few pics.

I'm not done yet, but this is an idea.

Asthma

How did I get such a sick little boy?? I was a healthy kid! But Marcelo was a little sicky, so I guess that's where it came from.

So basically, from the end of December to now, we've been dealing with Wheezy Wheezerstein. Diego has been sick at least once a month with what starts out as a little cold, and ends with wheezing. He must be getting so used to the nebulizer. Well, we went to the doc for the millionth time (another thing Diego is getting used to) and he said he thinks Diego has asthma because of how often he has wheezing spells. Ugh. I'm in denial about it. I'm not convinced it's asthma, but only time will tell. Marcelo and I have decided to get rid of all the carpet in our house. It's old and full of dog hair and who knows what else, and I think it contributes to Diego's issues.

Blah. I'm not exaggerating when I say he hasn't been healthy for more than two weeks straight since December!!