The closest thing to a baby picture I will ever have
You ask how he messed me up... that look, that face, he stole my heart and has refused to give it back to me. He is my very soul.
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
T - 5 Days
Five days, five days and my son, my first, the one that messed me up forever (in a good way) will be a teenager. The big 13. It is amazing how time flies. How quickly life will pass you by if you blink. I feel like I blinked. I don't think I blinked in a bad way, but I feel like I missed so much. When did this happen, when did he grow? When did my tiny little 28 lb, 32 in tall, 7 year old get so big?
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
4 Surgeries in 4 Months
That is how we roll.
As you can see I am setting a trend of only updating the blog once every 1-2 months. Life is just too busy and way too much fun to sit here and write about it. Too busy living it. But I owe you all an update. So here goes...
In December Jack had his neuro surgery to de-tether his spinal cord. Like all things Motter it wasn't a normal 45 minute surgery. Almost 2 hours in they finished. The doctor came out and said he had never seen a spinal cord so badly tethered in his career and he has done hundreds of these surgeries. He said when he cut the cord it snapped like a rubber band it was so tight. We were told we would be in the hospital for 3 days in ICU, but again like all things Motter, Jack kicked recovery's ass and we went home after 2 days with only 1 day in the ICU. There are pictures in the post below.
Then we had Jack's first Christmas. The poor kid thinks it's a week long event with presents everyday, since we went to many different locations to open presents with different parts of the family. Next year will be shocking.
New Years was a great evening with dear friends, then we all went back to school.
My term started again, the boys hit the ground running. Isaac is finally reading at grade level (huge thing for him) and Jack is of course bored out of his mind at school because of how advanced he is... the only decent thing China did for him.
On Jan. 31 we headed to CHOP once again for a big surgery to put Jack's growing rods into his spine. The surgery went off without a hitch. As you can imagine this was a relief since the last time we sat in a waiting room during this kind of surgery for Isaac things didn't go as planned. Isaac's Surgery
They took Jack directly to his recovery floor at CHOP after they got him off the ventilator in the PACU. He was in a lot of pain the first few days, but by day 3 he was up and walking around. By day 4 he was ready to go home, but of course we got stuck at the hospital for two more days waiting for his new blue spinal brace to arrive.
We are home now. He is standing behind me playing a video game and will have to stay home for the next 20 days or so.
He grew 2.3 inches in one day and looks amazing. His spine had 104 degree curve and they got it down to 52 degrees. Pretty amazing for a single day of surgery.
Isaac is well into his wrestling season. He is currently 9-5 with 3 pins. This is HUGE since last year he was 3-13 with no pins. He is killing it this year. I am amazed every time he walks on that mat. He is fearless. The team has taken to calling him King Kong because of his build. He upper body is something to marvel at.
Now I am sure you are thinking wait that is only 2 surgeries... well in just a few days Isaac will also go under the knife. He has a severe middle and inner ear infection and they have to go in and totally reconstruct his ear on the inside. They are pretty sure the infection has been growing for years (with no symptoms, only my son)... thanks Africa! He is of course not happy since this will put him out for the rest of the season until championships which he should be healed enough to participate in.
Then Isaac will have surgery on his right foot again in March right after Championships. So that will put us at 4 surgeries in 4 months. Jack will have his next spinal surgery in July assuming he doesn't have hardware failure which we have been told can happen easily with the type of rods he had put in.
So that is it. I have somehow managed to continue working, stay at hospitals, make it to every wrestling meet, and snowboard... Some might say slow down, but life is short... see ya soon!
As you can see I am setting a trend of only updating the blog once every 1-2 months. Life is just too busy and way too much fun to sit here and write about it. Too busy living it. But I owe you all an update. So here goes...In December Jack had his neuro surgery to de-tether his spinal cord. Like all things Motter it wasn't a normal 45 minute surgery. Almost 2 hours in they finished. The doctor came out and said he had never seen a spinal cord so badly tethered in his career and he has done hundreds of these surgeries. He said when he cut the cord it snapped like a rubber band it was so tight. We were told we would be in the hospital for 3 days in ICU, but again like all things Motter, Jack kicked recovery's ass and we went home after 2 days with only 1 day in the ICU. There are pictures in the post below.
Then we had Jack's first Christmas. The poor kid thinks it's a week long event with presents everyday, since we went to many different locations to open presents with different parts of the family. Next year will be shocking.
New Years was a great evening with dear friends, then we all went back to school.
My term started again, the boys hit the ground running. Isaac is finally reading at grade level (huge thing for him) and Jack is of course bored out of his mind at school because of how advanced he is... the only decent thing China did for him.
On Jan. 31 we headed to CHOP once again for a big surgery to put Jack's growing rods into his spine. The surgery went off without a hitch. As you can imagine this was a relief since the last time we sat in a waiting room during this kind of surgery for Isaac things didn't go as planned. Isaac's Surgery
They took Jack directly to his recovery floor at CHOP after they got him off the ventilator in the PACU. He was in a lot of pain the first few days, but by day 3 he was up and walking around. By day 4 he was ready to go home, but of course we got stuck at the hospital for two more days waiting for his new blue spinal brace to arrive.
We are home now. He is standing behind me playing a video game and will have to stay home for the next 20 days or so.
He grew 2.3 inches in one day and looks amazing. His spine had 104 degree curve and they got it down to 52 degrees. Pretty amazing for a single day of surgery.
Isaac is well into his wrestling season. He is currently 9-5 with 3 pins. This is HUGE since last year he was 3-13 with no pins. He is killing it this year. I am amazed every time he walks on that mat. He is fearless. The team has taken to calling him King Kong because of his build. He upper body is something to marvel at.
Now I am sure you are thinking wait that is only 2 surgeries... well in just a few days Isaac will also go under the knife. He has a severe middle and inner ear infection and they have to go in and totally reconstruct his ear on the inside. They are pretty sure the infection has been growing for years (with no symptoms, only my son)... thanks Africa! He is of course not happy since this will put him out for the rest of the season until championships which he should be healed enough to participate in.
Then Isaac will have surgery on his right foot again in March right after Championships. So that will put us at 4 surgeries in 4 months. Jack will have his next spinal surgery in July assuming he doesn't have hardware failure which we have been told can happen easily with the type of rods he had put in.
So that is it. I have somehow managed to continue working, stay at hospitals, make it to every wrestling meet, and snowboard... Some might say slow down, but life is short... see ya soon!
Monday, December 17, 2012
A Month and a Half
Holy COW! I am officially one of those women (you know who you are) who blog like crazy leading up to the adoption, then blog like a nut case while in a foreign country meeting this new little creature that is to become said Bloggers child, then falls off the face of the planet the minute the plane lands.
I am that person. Give me my crown, I am their queen. Crap life has been insane. Good insane, NO, Great Insane. I am on cloud nine day in and day out. How did I get so damn lucky. Sexy husband, amazing first "born" who is my very soul, and the sweetest, kindest, dear-hearted darling for my baby. He is my heart! Drexel is amazing (best place on earth to work) and random freelance TV editing to fill in the lull.
A few quick updates.
Sandy Kicked our Ass. Trees down everywhere!
Good Friend came to see us from Haiti...
My dear friend had her beautiful baby
We were being seen by Ortho, Neuro, Cardio, Pulmonary, and Urology. We have been cleared by Cardio and will be cleared by Neuro in the next few weeks. Urology and Ortho will be our life long fights, but this kid is strong, like crazy ass, silent warrior strong.
In fact just a few hours ago he was moved from the ICU at CHOP down to the regular floor to wait out the rest of his recovery from his first surgery. For a neuro surgery this never happens, they spend all their time in ICU then go home, but not my boy, moved to a normal floor because he was kicking butt! He went under the knife for the first time yesterday afternoon and is fighting the pain like a seasoned champ.
This was the first of let's say 10-12 surgeries over the next 3 years. Seeing how he has handled this one, I don't fear the rest. He will come out on the other side stronger than when he went in.
As for my soul, he is doing amazing. He has had a lot of issues with his right foot lately, but he is doing well. He started the wrestling season with a record of 2-2 at his first tournament of the year. Considering that last year he only won 3 matches total, we are off to one hell of a start.
5 DAYS LATER
Like all lazy bloggers it has taken me a week to finish this post. We are home and Jack is already back in school. His back is healing up perfectly and he is of course back to his chipper self. He will be back under the knife on January 31st for his big spinal surgery with Dr. Sankar.
It has been such a sad couple of days in our country. As a parent, I can not begin to speak about what happened in CT. There are no words and honestly I have very few opinions on how to make sure this never happens again. Honestly I don't think you can. I can only pray for the families of those that lost a loved one on Friday.
I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas. Keep your family close and make sure you tell those you love, how much you love them, because none of us are promised a tomorrow.
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Oh the Medical Drama
No I am not talking about "Grey's Anatomy" or "ER"... this is our life, our home, our family. One giant Medical Drama.
The last few weeks have been interesting. We got to spend an evening with another family we met while we were in China.
My dear friend finally got a visa to come visit us in the coming months, we found out that Jack LOVES chicken, and can read a 200 page book everyday for a week and not hate reading.
We have also found that Isaac is really an amazing big brother.
We knocked out a bunch of medical appointment for Jack, got an update on Isaac, and put our cat in a cone.
Let's start with Gary. Yes you read that right, his name is Gary! Gary had something under his skin about the size of a golf ball when we got home from China. We of course thought it as cancer and began to say our goodbyes. But after a few days it busted open and Gary did his duty and licked it till it was nasty. Thinking still that he would die from the infection we raced to the pet hospital and they yelled at us for being bad pet owners. But in the end charged us $200 to tell us that he got bit by something, it got infected, and bam it opened. They cleaned and and put him in the cone of shame. Along with a rabbies booster and an antibiotic shot. One hour later we emerged from the pet hospital feeling a little bad about ourselves with a cat that felt even worse.
Wednesday we headed to CHOP to see what was up with Jack. It was an amazing trip mostly because we had a translator with us that the hospital provided. We got to have full on conversations with him for the first time since China. But the fun stopped there. We found out the following. Spine is not a one time fix (in fact we will have 10-12 surgeries over the next 5 years and his foot needs major surgery. We have to be at CHOP every wednesday for the next month for this appointment or that. This poor kid is going to be in it for the long haul. That being said when we tell him that one day his spine will look like Isaac's and his back will too, he smiles and I know that he will do just fine.
Jack is also taking martial arts. I hate to point out the stereo-types, but he is good. A natural. He has the elegance of someone who has practiced Tai Chi for years. His sansei loves him.
Isaac is doing really well. He is muscling up for wrestling which will start in a few weeks (full-time). We are shooting for one more win than last year. So his goal is 4 wins this coming year. Doesn't seem like a lot but in wrestling it is. I know college wrestler that have 4 wins to their entire college career. It is a tough sport and Isaac loves it.
That being said, Isaac will have surgery on his right foot (again) in March or April (as soon as the season is over.) His big toe is starting to have skin breakdown (exactly what is sound likes) because of the way it twists around in the brace, so they have to go in and break the foot to reset it. Sounds fun doesn't it! But he is looking forward to it, because when the pain is over he will feel a 1000 times better than he does right now. He walks in constant pain and this will alleviate a lot of that.
Jack is still nil on the meltdowns. He is a really happy kid. I will be honest and say there was one afternoon where I asked him to come outside and help us clean up the yard. He wanted to stay in and wear his spiderman costume. His way of showing his extreme displeasure was to give us a death stare like I have never seen before. I swear in his eyes he was telling us that he wanted us dead in the most painful way possible. Of course 10 minutes with daddy picking up leaves and he was all smiles and back to himself, but for the few short (yet felt like eternity) minutes, the fear of God came over us all.
Jack has his 3 hour MRI on Halloween and then we should have a game plan on what we are going to do with his spine. In the meantime... Adios!
The last few weeks have been interesting. We got to spend an evening with another family we met while we were in China.
My dear friend finally got a visa to come visit us in the coming months, we found out that Jack LOVES chicken, and can read a 200 page book everyday for a week and not hate reading.
We have also found that Isaac is really an amazing big brother.
We knocked out a bunch of medical appointment for Jack, got an update on Isaac, and put our cat in a cone.
Let's start with Gary. Yes you read that right, his name is Gary! Gary had something under his skin about the size of a golf ball when we got home from China. We of course thought it as cancer and began to say our goodbyes. But after a few days it busted open and Gary did his duty and licked it till it was nasty. Thinking still that he would die from the infection we raced to the pet hospital and they yelled at us for being bad pet owners. But in the end charged us $200 to tell us that he got bit by something, it got infected, and bam it opened. They cleaned and and put him in the cone of shame. Along with a rabbies booster and an antibiotic shot. One hour later we emerged from the pet hospital feeling a little bad about ourselves with a cat that felt even worse.
Wednesday we headed to CHOP to see what was up with Jack. It was an amazing trip mostly because we had a translator with us that the hospital provided. We got to have full on conversations with him for the first time since China. But the fun stopped there. We found out the following. Spine is not a one time fix (in fact we will have 10-12 surgeries over the next 5 years and his foot needs major surgery. We have to be at CHOP every wednesday for the next month for this appointment or that. This poor kid is going to be in it for the long haul. That being said when we tell him that one day his spine will look like Isaac's and his back will too, he smiles and I know that he will do just fine.
Jack is also taking martial arts. I hate to point out the stereo-types, but he is good. A natural. He has the elegance of someone who has practiced Tai Chi for years. His sansei loves him.
Isaac is doing really well. He is muscling up for wrestling which will start in a few weeks (full-time). We are shooting for one more win than last year. So his goal is 4 wins this coming year. Doesn't seem like a lot but in wrestling it is. I know college wrestler that have 4 wins to their entire college career. It is a tough sport and Isaac loves it.
That being said, Isaac will have surgery on his right foot (again) in March or April (as soon as the season is over.) His big toe is starting to have skin breakdown (exactly what is sound likes) because of the way it twists around in the brace, so they have to go in and break the foot to reset it. Sounds fun doesn't it! But he is looking forward to it, because when the pain is over he will feel a 1000 times better than he does right now. He walks in constant pain and this will alleviate a lot of that.
Jack is still nil on the meltdowns. He is a really happy kid. I will be honest and say there was one afternoon where I asked him to come outside and help us clean up the yard. He wanted to stay in and wear his spiderman costume. His way of showing his extreme displeasure was to give us a death stare like I have never seen before. I swear in his eyes he was telling us that he wanted us dead in the most painful way possible. Of course 10 minutes with daddy picking up leaves and he was all smiles and back to himself, but for the few short (yet felt like eternity) minutes, the fear of God came over us all.
Jack has his 3 hour MRI on Halloween and then we should have a game plan on what we are going to do with his spine. In the meantime... Adios!
Friday, September 28, 2012
My hobby is making modo!
Sorry for the delay in the posts. I won't lie I have been dead tired and all of this is so damn surreal. Life after the marathon can be harder than the training. We wait and wait and wait, then bam one day it's done and you have to deal with all the emotions that come with the rush being over.
It's funny thinking back to when Isaac came home, I think I was in such survival mode being a single mom, far away from family, that I didn't stop to think about how insane adopting an older child really is. One minute you are alone and the next moment you are married with two!
We have been home for 6 days. The jet lag is still getting us all, but it is a small price to pay. The thought hit me this afternoon, "I was in China!" Holy crap that is amazing. I saw a place most will never see. I got to experience a beautiful country, with amazing history, strange culture, great food, and got the most amazing souvenir.
Jack has been doing great. He is still without incident. He will try anything food wise (but does NOT like cereal), sleeps all night, is infatuated with our briard Sasha, and is killing it in school. He is like having a really sweet, cute, high pitched voiced kitten around all day. Isaac is doing well, though I started to see a little jealousy with him today. I think a mom/Isaac date will have to happen this weekend. He needs the alone time.
Steve has been working like a maniac trying to catch up on all the missed work and I started at Drexel this week. My goal is to just make it through the next two weeks (classes, meetings, editing) and things should go back to normal for all. Jack started school yesterday and came home beaming. Today he got in the car and kept saying, "oh my God, very very good mommy!" He is currently in his room singing along to a chinese song on youtube. Thank you youtube. We would be lost without you!
He has so many words and is much quicker to try and speak than he was in China. I think it is the whole threw him in the deep end and added some sharks to the pool.
I haven't taken many pictures since we got home, but here are a couple. My husband put it perfectly the other day. "I have never seen a kid smile so much, if he isn't smiling in a picture it is because he is in-between smiles!"
Saturday, September 22, 2012
Thursday, September 20, 2012
Be Safe, Be Strong...
My favorite moment in the Harry Potter films is in the final film when Lily tells baby Harry, "be safe, be strong! Mama loves you." Every time I see Jack and Isaac I want to scream this at them. "Be Safe, Be Strong! Mama loves you!" You never know when it will be the last time they might hear me say it.
I don't feel safe, not just yet. When our plane takes off from HKG tear of relief will fall. Then my second son, who I have waited all my life for, will truly be mine. He will truly be safe, in a country who will defend him as its own, not throw him away.
God we started this day early. 4 am to be exact. We wanted to beat traffic to the airport so we had to leave at 6 am. Waking Jack up was not easy, but we got out in time and our taxi was waiting for us outside the hotel.
The drive to the airport was fast, there was no traffic. When we got to the airport the shit driver ripped me off by 10RMB. I know it is only $1.75, but it's the principle of it. He played dumb and refused to give me the correct change.
Then the porters at the airport stormed us and grabbed our bags without asking, then charges us 30 RMB. I had had it by then. I hate the GZ airport. Couldn't find a cheap food option so we paid $36 USD for three fresh juices and 6 of the smallest chicken wings you have ever seen. This cleaned us out of RMB which is fine by me. No need to get "cheap" $27,000 later!
I could not get on the free wifi in GZ, and our flight was 2 hours late. We should have taken the train!
Our adoption guides were the only let down on this trip. They don't work for WACAP, but a travel group that specializes in adoption travel. We had to pay them $1000 to do our paperwork in country, and we had to drive them around, when in truth we could have done it on our own with Ping. They really did very very little for what we paid them.
Oh well what are you going to do? Adoption is expensive and this will be our last. This has wiped us out financially, but damn this kid was worth every penny!
Jack was so excited for take-off but then we sat for over an hour on the runway and he passed out. We took-off and landed while he was out.
Our flight from Hong Kong is on time. We are so ready to go home. We will be in the land of true freedom in 17 hours. See you all on the flip side!
I don't feel safe, not just yet. When our plane takes off from HKG tear of relief will fall. Then my second son, who I have waited all my life for, will truly be mine. He will truly be safe, in a country who will defend him as its own, not throw him away.
God we started this day early. 4 am to be exact. We wanted to beat traffic to the airport so we had to leave at 6 am. Waking Jack up was not easy, but we got out in time and our taxi was waiting for us outside the hotel.
The drive to the airport was fast, there was no traffic. When we got to the airport the shit driver ripped me off by 10RMB. I know it is only $1.75, but it's the principle of it. He played dumb and refused to give me the correct change.
Then the porters at the airport stormed us and grabbed our bags without asking, then charges us 30 RMB. I had had it by then. I hate the GZ airport. Couldn't find a cheap food option so we paid $36 USD for three fresh juices and 6 of the smallest chicken wings you have ever seen. This cleaned us out of RMB which is fine by me. No need to get "cheap" $27,000 later!
I could not get on the free wifi in GZ, and our flight was 2 hours late. We should have taken the train!
Our adoption guides were the only let down on this trip. They don't work for WACAP, but a travel group that specializes in adoption travel. We had to pay them $1000 to do our paperwork in country, and we had to drive them around, when in truth we could have done it on our own with Ping. They really did very very little for what we paid them.
Oh well what are you going to do? Adoption is expensive and this will be our last. This has wiped us out financially, but damn this kid was worth every penny!
Jack was so excited for take-off but then we sat for over an hour on the runway and he passed out. We took-off and landed while he was out.
Our flight from Hong Kong is on time. We are so ready to go home. We will be in the land of true freedom in 17 hours. See you all on the flip side!
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Oh My God... Things are going to be different from now on!
Last night Jack fell off the bed while sleeping and without waking up said, "oh my God" in perfect english. We laughed so hard, then picked him up off the floor and put him back in bed, all the while he never woke up.
Today is our last full day in mainland China. Tomorrow morning we will hit the road at 6 am for the airport. We have a one hour flight from Guangzhou to Hong Kong, a 5 hour layover, then we fly direct to JFK were Isaac and my mama will be waiting for us.
This trip has been a life changer just as Africa was 5 years ago. If you would have told me 10 years ago I would be here, sitting by the ghetto pool in southern China with the sweetest son on God's green earth, I would have said, "yeah right!"
Life has a funny way of changing you so slowly that by the time you realize there has been one, you are well past it. My life is full of strange and wonderful change!
Today we hit the walking market near the island. They sell pets and spices here. Strange combo. All the kittens looked at us like, "please save us we don't want to become dim sum". But sure enough I don't think they eat them. It was a bit boring then we headed back to the hotel for some swimming.
Steve kept Jack at the hotel while I ran to the consulate via subway to get Jack's passport and visa so we can leave tomorrow.
On my way to the consulate, there was a woman on the train with two sons. I thought we got a lot of looks, that woman was getting serious death stares. Such a weird thing, the one child policy.
On the way back I stopped at the worlds biggest bookstore and grabed some books for Jack in Mandarin so he can keep up his language skills once we are home.
At dinner there was a wedding happening right by the water. What a celebration. They had fireworks and all.
On the way back to the hotel, an Irishman saw us walking and said to Jack, "hello boy, welcome to a new life, things are going to be different from now on!" It was hysterical! Of course it is the one thing Steve did NOT film!
We got back to the room, packed and are heading to bed.
We are ready. It has been amazing, but we need to come home to truly appreciate it all.
Today is our last full day in mainland China. Tomorrow morning we will hit the road at 6 am for the airport. We have a one hour flight from Guangzhou to Hong Kong, a 5 hour layover, then we fly direct to JFK were Isaac and my mama will be waiting for us.
This trip has been a life changer just as Africa was 5 years ago. If you would have told me 10 years ago I would be here, sitting by the ghetto pool in southern China with the sweetest son on God's green earth, I would have said, "yeah right!"
Life has a funny way of changing you so slowly that by the time you realize there has been one, you are well past it. My life is full of strange and wonderful change!
Today we hit the walking market near the island. They sell pets and spices here. Strange combo. All the kittens looked at us like, "please save us we don't want to become dim sum". But sure enough I don't think they eat them. It was a bit boring then we headed back to the hotel for some swimming.
Steve kept Jack at the hotel while I ran to the consulate via subway to get Jack's passport and visa so we can leave tomorrow.
On my way to the consulate, there was a woman on the train with two sons. I thought we got a lot of looks, that woman was getting serious death stares. Such a weird thing, the one child policy.
On the way back I stopped at the worlds biggest bookstore and grabed some books for Jack in Mandarin so he can keep up his language skills once we are home.
At dinner there was a wedding happening right by the water. What a celebration. They had fireworks and all.
On the way back to the hotel, an Irishman saw us walking and said to Jack, "hello boy, welcome to a new life, things are going to be different from now on!" It was hysterical! Of course it is the one thing Steve did NOT film!
We got back to the room, packed and are heading to bed.
We are ready. It has been amazing, but we need to come home to truly appreciate it all.
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