Battle Hymns of a Hot Mess Mom

I love fireworks. Back East it was common to see fireworks, you could drive down the LIE and just see the fireworks for all occasions. It was always beautiful to see. It doesn’t see as common here on the West Coast for fireworks to just happen at whim.

Camping was a lot of fun, we decided at the last minute to come home a day earlier instead of trying to fight 4th of July traffic. It was a great decision, the drive was super smooth with only a small patch of slow down merging highways. We made the decision to head on home at 3:15pm and was home around 6:00pm. We put off unpacking until the next day which isn’t my normal process. I’m the person who wants to unpack and get the laundry done the moment I’m home. I’m also the person who needs to have the dishes washed and the laundry done before a trip. Everything needs to be reset in the house before I leave so that when I get home – it’s like I never left. So just having left the truck unpacked until the next day was very out of routine for me. Though that meant I got to watch the baseball game with J when we got home while we ate leftover chicken. When we headed to bed, the kids were still full of energy rearing to go but we didn’t have the energy.

This morning I opted to unpack the truck instead of walking. It was a good idea as after all the unpacking and laundry – I was exhausted…Another night of salonpas. Between folding the laundry, vacuuming and cleaning the doggo…the tank was empty. We decided to head out this evening to see the fireworks which was spectacular! We rode over to the lake on our bikes while I held on to J. We all enjoyed the ride there, on the way back S fell on her bike at a turn, but thankfully only a tiny scratch. I try to not rush her and give her the reaction decision. I was never good at that when she was a baby, I picked her up and fussed at her whether it was a little bump or a bigger fall.

I was on a call when she was 15 months and rolled off the couch and landed on a toy airplane. It impaled the side of her lip which resulted in 7 stitches. I’ll never forget the huge hole in her little mouth. My heart damn near died looking at her little face taking her to the hospital. It gives me the chills to this day to think of her in this way. Baba Yaga has never forgiven me whenever I see a tiny scar on the corner of her mouth.

Tomorrow is a big day, it’s picc day. I’ve been anxious about this since I booked the appointment. I know chemo will be easier with it but the day to day will be harder again. Harder to sleep, shower and move around overall. I’ll need to find the right type of wrap that doesn’t irritate my skin so that the tubes stay in place when I sleep and don’t dance around all over the place. The risk of infections increase so I need to be super careful with how it’s wrapped and my picc line covers. I limit where I go and who I see because of the increased risk. I tried the last session without a picc line and boy was it rough. Collapsed veins, fishing, or a complete inability to get an IV line in. It was miserable. This picc gives one central line for chemo, blood and transfusion. One stop shop, though I still have the scars from the rash I got when the picc line was removed. Tomorrow is a big day. Picc line, chemo and then the orthodontist for L.