What I love

So I did a pet peeve post which probably left everyone thinking I was some cranky mccrankster {which may not always be that far off} and then I did my big singulair post, which is a must read, all be it a kinda scary must read.

Things need to lighten up around here. Wouldn't you agree?

Without further ado I present, the things I love, aka "the-things-if-I-had-to-go-without-my-head-would-probably-explode-and-I-would-be-divorced-and-in-jail-because-I-sold-my-kids-on-ebay" list.

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First on the list and most obvious to anyone who knows me
Flyboy isn't a soda guy so he doesn't understand my strong {moderately unhealthy} obsession with this nectar of the Gods. It's just delightful. All fizzy and yummy. And none of that diet crap, which is why I'm cutting back to one a day. Quite a testiment in restraint I think.

I don't smoke, I don't drink, I like me my coca cola. That's my vice. When my kids stress me out or life tosses too much crap my way a nice cold coke {fountain preferably} helps to correct all that is wrong in the world.

Really we should all try it. Maybe that's what the middle east peace process is missing?

And don't try to slip a Pepsi in there. I can tell. And I will hunt you down.

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Second which has to do very much with the first is Sonic Happy Hour Deeeeelightful fountain sodas. Just the right amount of ice and soda in a Styrofoam cup that doesn't sweat even when its 103 degrees.

{Yeah that's right Al Gore I said I like me my Styrofoam, you're a perv and I like Styrofoam guess which one of us is a yuckier human being? I'll give you a hint its not me.}

And half price. I'm getting a bargain and a soda. LOVE IT!

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Third on the list flip flops. I have quite a selection of flip flops and I love them all. But these little industrial ones hold a special place, nice and simple and comfy enough to wear as you walk around disney world.


Yes folks, I did a week at disney world, pregnant, in the summer, in flip flops. These flip flops.If I could I would I would wear them year round, but sadly the foot of snow on the ground for five months makes that a bit impossible. So as a rule once the snow starts piling up till right about when the last snow piles melt I put the flip flops away. And then I get sad.

But right now its flip flop weather so I am staying positive.

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Number four on the list would have to be the crazy stuff that comes out of my kids' mouths. Really its almost enough to make me forget when they call me a poophead or tell me that I'm the worst mom ever.

{Attn: all you other moms out there, give it up, I have it on good authority that I am in fact the worst mom ever, in case your curious why, I make them make their beds. Awful. Someone report me.}

Just the other day I caught dash-2 getting ready to sink his teeth into dash-1. He's fancy's himself a bit of a vampire apparently, but as I gave him that look and asked if he was about to bite someone he corrected me.

"I wasn't going to bite I was just putting my teeth on his arm."

Oh well in that case. In a matter of seconds my kiddos can make me laugh, even when I should be the adult and not give in but really. Sometimes its' just too hard.

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Number five: comments.

I write for myself, yes yes I do, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't like comments.

I mean I can do without the nasty ones that ask me if I think I'm really going to change someone's opinion, I'm obviously simple minded {ha if only they knew} and a mean hearted shrew.

I don't get those comments often, in fact they are pretty rare {thanks uniform purse post}. Mostly I get really funny, nice comments out there. Either sharing a story of their own, commiserating with me, or just letting me know that they read the post.

Comments are nice. Comments with an email attached to them so I can reply to you guys are even better.

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Number six is my dear, sweet, beloved

Yeah that's right. I would use quite a few of the same adjectives to describe my blackberry that I use to describe my babies.

I double, no triple, heart my blackberry. I get my emails right away {which means I get my blog comments right away}, I got my ubertwitter on there, flyboy and I can text away, the internet is where ever I need it. Oh and it's a phone too.

And it doesn't talk back. EVER.

Really I don't know what I would do without it. Now I email from where ever whenever there is a quiet moment. FabUlous.



There they are.... some of my happy things. See even this heartless shrew has things she loves. And I didn't even touch on my kids and flyboy because well, those are just obvious.

What do you love?

the dark side of singulair

I am my kids mom.

I'm also the one who said "Sure, lets try it!" and put him on a medicine without questioning it, that turned out to lead him, to lead all of us, down a dark tunnel.

Over the past nine months I have thought that my kid was at times an awful kid. That flyboy and I were awful parents. There were times I hated being a mom.

And now I cry just thinking about it.

I've been known to blog about pregnant cows who have cankles {and I mean the farm animals}, elmo underpants being flushed down the loo, and my long lasting love affair with baking soda. But now I sit here, staring at my computer debating how much of this ugly story do I tell.

It's hard to ever admit that your child isn't perfect.

It's one thing to tell stories of the funny ways they disobey us, the time dash-2 stripped down naked in the hallway and stared down flyboy for a good solid 5 mins is a classic family tale, but to tell people, be they strangers or friends, that your five year old battled with rage and aggression is hard.

To tell the world that he told his prek teacher when he got angry one day that he wanted to kill himself, has to be the hardest thing yet I've written.

But I'm going to. I'm going to tell the whole ugly tale so that everyone knows, the more people know the more people will make the connection should it happen to them.

And I don't want it to happen to anyone else.

Dash-1 is my delightfuly inqusitive 5 yr old. He has bright blue eyes, a smile that reveals his missing front tooth, and blond hair that is almost always in a high and tight. He is brilliant, but then again I'm his mom, he is obsessed with space, he runs around the house at least 3 times a week in his astronaut suite ratteling off his knowledge of space and planets.

But he also has that pesky little thing called asthma. And reflux and allergies, both seasonal and food. Since birth he's been on something, and really, nothing's ever really caused any problems. The prevacid was a life saver and goodness knows the Allegra is oh so necessary.

He was diagnoised with Asthma in late 2008, it took quite a while to get it all under control. In case you've never really dealt with it, Asthma is a bitch. Really, its like the house guest who comes, stinks up your bathroom, eats all the good food, and then never wants to leave.

After a while we got it under control but he had this constant barking cough. It. Never. Went. Away. It sounded like a really bad croup cough. Once at walmart he got into a coughing attack and everyone in line moved away {as if they weren't already going to catch something in walmart}.

His pediatrician {new to us at the time, its the military when isn't your doctor new to you?} suggested Singulair. She said to keep an eye on any "hyper" behavior.

I was prepared to watch for him running around the room in circles, not for rage and paranoia.

Oh and in case you're wondering what the possible adverse side effects are take these in: agitation, aggressive behavior or hostility, anxiousness, depression, dream abnormalities, hallucinations, insomnia, irritability, restlessness, somnambulism, suicidal thinking and behavior (including suicide), and tremor

To say that I didn't know what I was getting into would be the understatement of the year.

It took the cough away. He was silent. He wasn't waking up at night in a fit of coughs. He didn't sound like a barking seal. People weren't giving us nasty looks for taking a sick kid out. He was quiet.

I thought it was perfect.

I'm not really even sure when the side effects started. I wish I could say "on this day such and such started". I certainly wouldn't have let it drag on for nine months if I could have pin point it now would I?

But I can't. We thought it was a stage, maybe this is the terrible five's! Maybe its the school, it never seemed like a great fit. Maybe this is just him. Maybe we've done this to him someway, we've been too hard or not hard enough.

As if parenting isn't hard enough toxic side effects can be a real doozy.

Over time we were noticing some things, he was starting to cry. About everything. Asking him to do something and you would end up with a whiny litany of how he had to do everything. Never mind that all we asked of him was to show up at dinner, not back talk, and get the pee IN the toilet and not the toilet seat. And really, even the later we were flexible on.

If we forced an issue, as in "take in your own bookbag" or if he had to be corrected for something, what we could expect was a 30 minute breakdown. I'm not proud but we had been known to say to him "Dash-1 you cry more than your two younger brothers put together.".

Like I said, I'm not proud of that, but we were at our wits end.

And then there was the rage. And the aggression. And the headaches. And the pins and needles in his arms and legs. And his sleeplessness. And his blaming us for everything. And some odd ocd behavior. And self-loathing talk.

Oh and the whole I wanna kill myself in prek.

That was fun.

These certainly weren't the whole of him, he was still a bright eyed little boy underneath it all it was just starting to be more and more about breakdowns, crying, yelling, hitting, fighting and less of the old him. He was losing his spark. His spark was being replaced with rage and aggression. If you corrected him his eyes would become slits, his fist would ball up, his whole body would go tense.

We were starting to catch on to something. Hey it only took us nine months, he is our oldest, we'll have this parenting thing down for sure by the time dash-3 is 5.

My days were spent walking on eggshells. I was tired of the up and downs of our days. The good times were great but the downs were so down. There were days I didn't know how I could go on. If this is what parenting was I wasn't sure I was cut out for it. And how awful that I felt like that.

I remembered somewhere hearing something or reading something about the nasty side effects of Singulair can have on kids. Thanks to google I got my search on and was shocked. Reading about other parent's experiences on it was like reading something I had written about my own son.

In that moment I decided this wasn't going on one moment longer. I took him off the meds before I even heard back from the doctor.

When the doctor did call back she asked what side effects I was seeing, there was the obvious rage and aggression, who could miss all the crying, but there was also self-loathing talk when he was corrected, "I'm the worst, I hate myself".

Oh and the paranoia, that was fun, if he tripped over a rock, he would flip out because surely, surely, flyboy or I, or clueless dash-2, we put that rock there to get him, we did it.

Some others:
-He complained of headaches and pins and needles in his arms and legs.

-He couldn't fall asleep. Forget going to be well at 7:30, he would be up till 9 or 10 and then up for the day at 6:30 or 7. Ever see a 5 yr old with anger issues who doesn't get a lot of sleep?

-He seemed to need to have total control over things, he wasn't able to go with the flow or adjust midstream at all.

-He became even pickier about food, what he would eat before he started picking them apart eating them in a weird precise manner, he had collections of everything stashed under his bed, random things that he just had to have, everything had to be kept.

It's been two weeks. Two weeks to the day since Singulair was taken out of his pill box {yes he has a pill box} and the old dash-1 is back.

His spark is back. His eyes are clear again, rather then dark and angry. Now he helps me bring in the groceries rather then yell about how I make him do everything. Time out is a rarity rather then his place in the house. Best of all, I know that this is the real him.

I'm all for being honest on my blog. Life isn't always sunshine and roses, but I also think that somethings needn't be put out for all to see. I debated when I wrote this, but ultimately I wanted as many moms and at some point to be moms or just people who may know someone on Singulair to be aware of these potential side effects.

From talking to pharmacist, doctors, and reading the FDA sites, they say reactions like this are rare, but I wonder how rare it really is. It seems like there are a lot of parents out there with stories JUST LIKE this one. The more awareness out there the more people who will connect the dots.

If you think that your child is having problems with Singular this is a great site, http://www.parentsforsafety.org/ and it is very important to contact the FDA and file a MedWatch report so that they are aware of the side effects click here.

I wish I had been told more by the doctor. I wish this pill came with informed consent, I wish its dangers were spelled out very clearly. The school year would have been different, our home life would have been different, the past nine months would have most certainly been different. But it didn't come with any of that.

All the bottle said was chew before swallowing. At least they were concerned with his choking, never mind his depression.

If your kids aren't on Singulair this post can still apply to you, its taught me a very valuable lesson. I am the one responsible for what my child takes. I read those little papers they give you but it takes being more vigilant then that. More questions need to be asked of the doctors and pharmacist, more reading needs to be done. Take an active role!

If anyone has any questions about Singulair and it's side effects please feel free to email me at tryingourbest {at} yahoo.com

the morst expensive dollar

Dash-1 is very excited that the tooth fairy came last night and left him 4 quarters.

He is unaware that that is one of the most expensive dollars I've ever spent. EVAHHHH!

To get that 1 dollar from the tooth fairy {aka mom and dad} mommy and daddy had to spend:

-2 THOUSAND dollars for the dentist and the anesthesiologist
-7.99 for the shirt that was someone bled on in recovery
-10 dollars on some flying airplane toy thingy as his reward for being so good
-8 dollars on get well balloons

So to get that one stinkin dollar we had to spend $2025.99.

And the worst part? The damn tooth fairy gets credit for the one dollar.