PTSD

One of the things I didn't realize after Charlotte's accident was that it would continue to haunt me. August is the two-year mark from when she and I got hit. I would have thought that by this point, the memories wouldn't bother me, but they still do, in unexpected ways.

The first few weeks after her accident, I replayed the scene in my head. There was nothing I could do to stop it; I would be doing something and have an immediate flashback. My mind took me places I didn't want to go, worst case scenarios, the what if's, back to the emotions. Eventually they flashbacks stopped and I was able to hear an ambulance without remembering our ride to Columbus, or go into the ER without looking at Trauma Room 1 and remembering the fear in everyone's eyes.

About a month after her accident, I was walking with the girls to a friend's house. We reached the friend's house and were standing in their front yard when I saw a dad ride by on his bike and he had a young toddler in a bike seat behind him. Neither the dad nor his daughter had a helmet on. I had a minute of tunnel vision-- the only thing I could see was this baby girl without a helmet. My mind flashed through the image of them getting hit by a car and her head being unprotected. I had the urge to run after them and yell, "Get a helmet on her!" I didn't see anything but them, not my children, not our stroller, not our friend's house, not the cars...nothing. Then the father rode out of view and I became aware of my surroundings again. Nathalie was standing on the curb, Emily was waiting by the stroller and Charlotte was crying in my arms. This all happened in a split second and I was disoriented.

When I get stressed I have two types of dreams-- cockroach dreams (seriously, and they are HORRIBLE) and dreams where my children are harmed. Since Charlotte's accident, a high proportion of my stress dreams are of my children getting hit by a car. Sometimes I can save them, sometimes I can't, sometimes they are fine, sometimes they aren't. When I start having these dreams I know I'm really stressing about something.

About 6 months ago I was grocery shopping and had Nathalie, Charlotte and Lydia with me. As we left the store, a man in a motorized wheelchair began backing up. Charlotte was right behind him and he didn't check to see before he started backing up. For a moment, I panicked. I grabbed her arm and hauled her out of the way. Of course, as soon as I did that, I realized that it was a motorized wheelchair, not a car, and so I probably didn't need to panic since I could stop the wheelchair with my hand. But I had had a flashback of her falling again.

About two months ago I was at the same grocery store with all four girls. We had left the store and were walking out to our car through the parking lot. As we passed a handicapped spot, the car started backing up. The woman wasn't looking behind her. Charlotte was between me and the car; she would have been hit first and she's not tall enough to be seen over the car. I flipped out. I smacked the back of the car over and over until it stopped (it's the same thing I didn't when we got hit and it saved our lives). No one was harmed, the car had probably only backed up one inch. The driver apologized and we kept going to our car.

My heart was racing, I was sweating, I felt like I was going to scream or throw up, I was breathing fast. The girls were staring at me because I was obviously agitated about something. Rationally, I realized that Charlotte hadn't been in danger, that I could have scooped her out of the way. But I couldn't ignore my body's reaction and I couldn't stop the flashbacks of us getting hit, over and over.

Right at the moment, Matt called me. "Why am I still reacting? Will it ever get better?" He told me it would. That it would all be okay. Eventually I won't have these involuntary reactions anymore and I'll be able to remember without the feeling of panic rising in my throat.

This is a strange thing, because I don't walk around in a state of panic. I rarely think about her accident anymore, unless I'm dealing with her settlement or I'm at the doctor's office filling out paperwork and answering "Has your child ever been hospitalized?". I rarely dream about it, and I certainly don't stress about it every day. It's just these isolated incidents that have made me realize that perhaps I was more affected than I knew, and that something as positive as an accident where she was fine could create such a strong reaction. The only thing that I really think about on a daily basis is when my children ride their bikes without helmets, because then Mama Bear comes out and I make them wear helmets.

Any thoughts? Has anyone else experienced something like this? Writing it out helps me process my reactions better, and allows me to quantify my associations between memory and feeling.

Going crazy for Nan

And last but not least.....Nan had a birthday today! Nathalie is the spice of our family. She brings joy and hilarity and enthusiasm and a sheer passion for life!

She also loves to alter her appearance, as you can tell by the stamps on her arms. And her chopped chunk of her on her forehead. Oh Nathalie, when will you stop cutting hair?!

Nathalie is my most easy going child. When she's upset, her emotions are right out front. The storm passes quickly and she's back to blue skies so easily.

She loves absolutely anything girly. Princesses, hair, nails, makeup, shoes, jewelry...you name it! She desperately wants me to do her hair fancy so we compromise with accessories to spruce up her short hair.

Nan is so creative. She has a huge imagination and doesn't need anyone or anything to have a great time. Some of her best imaginations have been all by herself. She loves to create with everything. She thinks outside the box.

Nathalie absolutely adores the outdoors. This girl needs to be on a farm. She loves animals, plants, growing, creating...she just has this huge zest for life and we love it.

And she's a sweetheart. She is such a sensitive soul, worried about people who are sad, scared of the dark, heights, and wasps. She loves to love passionately. She has so much love to give.

Nathalie has the best smile and laugh. We love to get her going because her laugh is absolutely infectious. She loves to be silly and sometimes she's so clever about it that we can't help but crack up. She is incredibly bright and we try to channel that into constructive forms, but even we have a hard time keeping up with her!

Oh Nathalie, we love you so much. Happy Birthday!

Doodles aka Miss Lydia

We have another one year old around here!

Thursday night I was replaying the events that had happened the year before. The contractions before bed, scrubbing the floor on hands and knees, taking a bath, waking up to contractions and then having our beautiful Lydia very quietly and peacefully at home.

If I'd know then what I know now......this girl has taught me so much about patience, so much about perspective. Each healthy day is a good one, even if it's not necessarily a "good" day. Patience means waking up with her night after night after night for who knows how long, so that she stays healthy.

Patience with myself and realizing that I had to let go of things, say no to things and scale back everything in order to preserve my own self and to make my family succeed more. Perspective in knowing that this won't last and someday I will miss cuddling my baby every day.

I have loved seeing her develop a bond with Matt. It's only been in the last month that she allows him to feed her a bottle or food, allows him to hold her and play with her. And now she loves him! Which, quite frankly, is a relief because 11 months of being the center of her universe is great and all...but....

I've loved seeing her develop a beautiful bond with her sisters. Well, at least with Emily and Nathalie. Charlotte is still gives too much rough love. But those big sisters are her favorites!

Lydia has an incredible sense of curiosity. She always wants to grab, touch, walk, squirm. I should have realized this when, as a little baby, she was happiest when there was a lot going on around her. Even now, she will skip a nap for an entire day if she knows there is stuff going on.

I have loved seeing her develop her personality and opinions. Yogurt is yummy, chicken is yummy, broccoli is yummy, bananas are yucky.

I love her big eyes. Dark, soulful, so deep. She watches things.

This girl absolutely loves to be outside. No matter the weather, she bolts for the door as soon as it is open. Rain, sun, cold, hot-- she is happiest when she's outside. This basically fits in perfectly with our family.

She also loves water. We're going to have problems this summer because she heads for any and all water as fast as possible! I will certainly be busy at the beach.

Also, Lydia loves chalk. And sticks. Those are basically her favorite foods, or at least they would be if I let her.

 Even this young, Lydia is our little diva. She loves to carry around shoes, she has a fake cry (true!) and she can ham it up for me. But when strangers try to get her to laugh, she is stonefaced.

 This is the first girl that I have really dressed up. It's been fun for me, and I love that she has some cute clothes. I figure that I might as well dress her up, I mean goodness, fourth time is the charm!

 She was looking really confused in this picture.

 I love her little chin and her little button nose. I grab her cheeks all the time and do little nose kisses, which she thinks is hilarious.

 Lydia has a killer sense of humor as well. The best is when I hear her laughing in her carseat watching her sisters do something really silly. Emily likes to make googly eyes and silly hands, which just sets Lydia off.

 Lydia loves all animals. I think she can say dog, but it could be duck. She loves our rabbits and I frequently see her out there with them.

 Oh man, that little face. I just love it.

Happy Birthday dear heart! I'm so grateful for you.

Seeds and Weeds

Just a few pictures of our garden this year.

Peas! We planted a lot of peas and have already gotten more than we ever have in the past. Normally, they don't even make it into the house.

Lots of spinach and lettuces.

Squash! We harvested two zucchini squash today and had them in a delicious stir fry. We have a bunch more growing!

Three Beautiful Years!

Oh my sweetpea. You are three today!

I was so excited to have you. You have been a joy since before you were born. You are still a joy to us! We call you our love bug because you have so much love inside of you and you give it so freely.

You are a spitfire, just like your sisters. Especially right now as you are trying to exert your influence in our family, sometimes you forget your sweet nature.

You are a cheeseball too. Your silly camera smile is hilarious and I love it.

When you're not acting your age, you are so easygoing and happy. You love anything fun....reading books, playdough, playing outside, your scooter (oh, you love that scooter!), sweets, mac and cheese, balloons, swimming, going to the park, swinging....

You're going to be a heart stopper when you grow up! We'll have to lock you up!

Sweetheart, I'm so glad for every day with you. There was that time that we almost lost you and I don't know how I would have done losing your joy. You have brought joy. You are a gift.

You want to be so grown up. You have your phone (an old broken iPod), your purse, your "keys", and your baby. I wish you were as gentle with Lydia as you are with your baby! You try to be just like those big sisters of yours, not realizing the sweetness of your babyhood.

You love to be outside, just like the rest of us.

And you're such a goofball!! What a ham. But we love you even more for it. Happy happy birthday little girl!

 

Charlotte as a newborn, 1 yr old and 2 yr old.

P.S. Don't you love the sequence of Lydia going into the street? I think it's funny I caught that. It's good thing we live on a really quiet street!

Bzzzzzzzzz

So....call us crazy, but we got bees!! It's been a saga too.... hold on to your hats and humor me for a minute! Matt really really wanted bees this year. So he built himself a top bar hive (using scrap wood we found!) and we ordered 4 lbs of bees and a queen from a local beekeeper. We got them towards the end of March.

See that little box on the bottom of the picture? The queen is in there with a worker or two. She is blocked from coming out by a piece of marshmallow or something like that. You put the bees in the hive, put the queen's box in the hive and supposedly, the bees will the eat the candy from one side, the queen will eat from the other side and when they reach each other, she will smell like candy and the bees will accept her and start doing her bidding, like building comb.

Only, that's not what happened to us. Something happened to the queen (we're not sure what) and the bees swarmed. Swarming is when they all leave the hive at the same time. Well, the girls were playing outside and ran inside because there was a huge cloud of bees in our backyard. I ran to wake up Matt. The bees gathered on a branch that was low to the ground, so Matt covered the bees with a pillowcase and tied it off, then sawed off the branch and shook the bees back into their hive (and he didn't get stung!) where he blocked their entrance. He was hoping that by trapping them for a few days, they would start building comb and they wouldn't want to leave.

We also got some honeycomb from a friend and put it in their hive to entice them to build comb. For two days, they stayed. Then one day they left and never came back. Matt was really down.

 

A day after that, a friend at church who has several hives called us and said that she had found some queen cells (eggs) in one of her hives. She offered the eggs and half of the bees from that hive to us. This is because once the queen is born, she will take half of the bees with her and the other half will stay with the old queen. Well our friend didn't want another hive, so she offered it to us. The queen was supposed to hatch in a week or two.

 

 So Matt went over to her house, built a traditional hive using her hives as a template, and collected half the bees, plus the queen cell. And we waited. For a little while, they were doing great. Then, about two weeks after, we noticed that the bees were dying off. The queen hadn't hatched yet and since worker bees only have a 10 day life span, they were dying without a replacement. Eventually, so many of them died off that they refused to leave the hive to look for food. When Matt looked in on them, the queen cell was empty, there were only 30 bees left and we have no idea what happened.

 While the second hive was dying off, we got a call from the same friend. Some of her bees were actively swarming and she wanted to know if we wanted a swarm! This was great news because in this case, the swarming was happening because there had been a second queen in one hive and she was leaving the hive! Matt went over and helped our friend catch the swarm, then brought them home in a nuc box (a box with some frames for comb building and some honeycomb with honey already in them). He left them in the nuc box for about a week.

In this picture, all those black blotches between the lid and box are bees working hard. Within two days, the swarm had built a good portion of honeycomb and the queen was laying eggs. It's been about two weeks, and they are going gangbusters! They have filled one frame with honeycomb already and they transferred easily to our hive.

So......what happened to our other two hives? We're not exactly sure. Matt went to the beekeeper society meeting the other night and asked one of the leaders of the society. This guy has 30+ hives, some top bar, some traditional. He's been doing bees for decades. Matt explained what happened and the guy was perplexed.

In the meantime, we have one thriving hive. We're hoping that our friend's bees will swarm again this summer and we will get a second one, or that our hive swarms this summer and we get a second one from that.

Also, a funny story from beekeeping:

The day Matt went and picked up the actively swarming bees (our successful hive), he and our friend were trying to get them into the nuc box. The bees were already a little agitated because they were swarming and then it started raining. Bees hate the rain! They started stinging. Our friend got two stings on her eye, and Matt got SIX stings on his arms, face, neck, torso. He was doped up on Benadryl for a few days and we thought the swelling was bad....until the day Matt decided to check on our dying hive. Unbeknownst to him, bees don't like to be checked in the evening because they are getting ready for bed. So he opened up the lid just a little bit and immediately two or three bees flew out and stung him around his right eye.

It was SO bad. He looked like Quasimodo (no joke!!) but he wouldn't let me take a picture. Within 12 hours his eye had swollen completely shut, the bridge of his nose was about three times it's usual size so it had swollen over into the vision of his left eye. His forehead looked like he'd had a Botox injection and he took so much Benadryl.

But now he knows!!!

Also important to note: bees are not aggressive. We keep our bees right next to our rabbits, which means that the children (like Lydia) and we are walking right past them several times a day. Emily and Nathalie like to go sit about two feet from the hive and watch them. The only time they've stung is when they were deliberately agitated (by rain, or by Matt). Other than that, they don't bother us ever. It's so interesting!