So much to talk about...

So, I am officially back at work. The night before and the morning I left were the hardest, I cried before I went to sleep and I cried when I woke up... but on Tuesday when I went to work I only cried a little when I left... and this morning I was just really sad, but no tears. Kyle brought her to visit me at lunch today, which was awesome. She puked all down my arm and I worked the rest of my day smelling like vomit, but I didn't even care. It was totally worth it :) I'm just taking it day by day! Payton is totally oblivious to the fact that I'm leaving her and I'm traumatized, she doesn't know what's going on anyway! It makes me feel better too that I'm leaving her at home with Kyle, not dropping her off with a stranger... but I am still SUPER happy to come home at night! Nothing has really changed at work. I was nervous about scanning when I came back, but turns out it's like riding a bike. I started scanning my first patient of the day, and it was weird, my fingers were pressing all the right buttons, I didn't even have to think about it. Only made some minor mistakes, and so I'm back in the swing of things!

We spent Memorial weekend in Pacific City with the Halls. It's on the coast, about 20 miles north of Lincoln City. We met everyone at Lincoln City and hit the outlet malls! Payton did really well considering we were totally interrupting all of her naps. She hung out in her stroller and people watched while we shopped! I spent most of my money on buying her clothes though, not me. Her clothes are so much cuter! I'm still in the "nothing fits me right" stage, but I can't really complain... it's a bit unrealistic to hope that the baby weight just magically falls off without effort. :) We stayed at a huge campground that also happened to have cabins, and when they told us it was small, they were NOT kidding...

Our little shack!

Imagine seven adults and a baby in this spacious living room!

The boys in their matching free t-shirts from our shopping trip :)

The cabin was great... just very cozy! We spent Saturday and Sunday night there, hanging out and going to the beach. Payton fell asleep in the car when we drove onto the beach, so we let her sleep in there (I was right next to the car with the window rolled down) while the girls relaxed in fold out chairs and the boys did... various activities!

Golf

Catch

Whale watching

Us :)

All in all it was a really fun weekend! We were glad to come home though... our little house felt so spacious!

Dad likes playing around :)

Napping with Uncle Tanner

My first game!

Grandma Sue bought me a new hat... isn't it cute?!

Ready for the beach!

My family was really proud of me for holding the baseball :)

Another really exciting thing happened this weekend... Payton started sleeping through the night! We were VERY excited, as you can imagine! She finally fell asleep Saturday night around 10:30, and when I woke up Sunday morning I heard birds chirping... it was 5:30 am! I put a binkie in her mouth and she slept for another hour... I was amazed, needless to say. She has been doing it every night since! We put her to bed around 9:00pm, and she's been waking up around 6:00am, getting a bottle and going back to bed for another hour or two. It was a very nice gift for her to give her working mommy! :) We also decided it was time for her to move to her room and start sleeping in her crib. I was sad but I definitely think it's best. She's a light sleeper and can startle easily, so she sleeps better in a dark quiet room where she can't hear anything, and I sleep better because I'm not waking up at every little noise she makes. We just hope that it continues like this, it's going really well so far! She's still not really on a nap schedule, so that's my next goal... to get her to take good long naps instead of shorter cat naps, which she tends to do. I'll let you know how it goes!

We switched Payton's reflux medication about two weeks ago. I was frustrated with the constant changing of dose, and it seemed to only work part of the time. Her doctor had mentioned another medicine that we could try, and when I researched it a lot of parents said they had much better success with it than the zantac. It's generic prilosec, and has to be made at a compounding pharmacy by a pharmacist. From what I understand, the zantac is an acid reducer, but the prilosec blocks the acid from being produced altogether. I didn't want to use such a strong medicine if it wasn't necessary, but the zantac just wasn't cutting it and I am happy to report that (knock on wood) she has not had any "reflux" episodes since about three days after starting the new medication. We've seen a definite improvement, and thankfully haven't had to make any trips to her doctors office the past few weeks. Yay!

Unfortunately though, poor Payton can't seem to catch a break. We started to notice last week that the area by the hemagioma around her eye was looking a little puffy, and her eyelid looked like it was starting to... droop, for lack of a better word. There was a part of me that just hoped I was imagining it, but Kyle's mom noticed it too when she saw her, so I knew I needed to get it checked out. I had a gut feeling that maybe it was another hemangioma... so I called her doctor's office and asked for a referral to a dermatologist. They gave me the name of a doctor at OHSU (Oregon Health and Sciences University for those of you who aren't Oregonians), which is known for being the best hospital in the state; they do a lot of research, and have all the cutting edge technology and specialized doctors. I looked up the doctor they referred us too, and it turns out he is the director of pediatric dermatology and he specializes in hemangiomas and other vascular birthmarks. Basically, he was exactly the guy I wanted Payton to see! We were able to get in the next day, which was awesome. The dermatology unit is on the 16th floor of a building on the waterfront, so the view was beautiful.

I know I'm a huge dork for taking a picture, but I couldn't resist the view!

Payton's appointment went ok... his opinion wasn't unexpected, but it was still hard for me to hear. Basically, he agreed with me that it looks like there is a hemangioma growing under her skin too. They're called deep hemangiomas, and he said when they happen around the eye they treat them pretty aggresively. Depending on how deep they are it may take a while for them to be noticed, until they have grown enough to be seen, which is why it took so long for it to present itself. They took pictures and measurements of her other hemangiomas as well. The one on the top of her head is starting to flake a lot, and he said that may be a sign that it has reached it's peak growth, which would be good. We have to put vaseline on it a couple times a day to make sure when it flakes that the skin isn't splitting, because that could cause it to bleed and it could become painful and infected. Something we definitely want to avoid! Anyway, back to the main issue... the problem with this new lump is the fact that it's basically a mass of blood vessels that is rapidly growing inside her skull, and we don't really know the extent of it. If it's starting to push on her eyelid, it could be putting pressure on her eyeball or other nerves as well, which could affect her vision or other developmental abilities. I'm sure this is all worst case scenario, but still scary to hear about your 3 month old baby. :( He wants her to see an opthamologist right away to check if it's affecting her vision, so she has another appointment at OHSU on Monday with an opthamologist. He also wants to see her next Thursday at Doernbecher's, which is the childrens hospital at OHSU. He said we will probably put her on propanolol to treat it, which is a blood pressure medicine. I know that sounds weird, but I guess it's a really recent treatment. About two years ago a doctor was treating two infants with heart problems, and the babies also happened to have hemangiomas. While they were on the medicine the doctors noticed that it shrunk their hemangiomas as well, so it was an unexpected side effect! Apparently they noticed a difference in 24 hours, which is pretty amazing. They've been using it since to treat dangerous or disfiguring hemangiomas. The traditional treatment used to be taking an oral steriod, but that has side effects like insomnia, irritability, and could possibly stunt her growth. Not something I want her to take if it's not necessary! The blood pressure medicine hasn't undergone any clinical trials or anything in children though, so it's still pretty new and unexplored frontier. The only side effect they've seen thus far is low blood pressure (duh) and low blood sugar, so she has to take it with a bottle. It will also shrink her other hemangiomas in the process, which is a bonus. Before she can go on it though they wanted her to have a baseline EKG, so she had that done yesterday. She did such a good job through all these appointments and being poked and prodded all day, she just laid there and was a champ! When they give her the medicine she needs to stay for observation for at least an hour, and anytime they change or up her dose she will need to be monitored too. Hopefully, this will take care of it... we really really hope so!

I don't have a really good picture that shows it, it's really subtle... but you can kind of tell (especially when you see her in person) that her left eyelid is taking on a different shape...

So, to sum up (I know this is a ton of information, trust me my head was spinning yesterday!); she's seeing an opthamologist on Monday, and the dermatologist again on Thursday, when we're presumably starting the blood pressure medicine. I'll let you know about her appointments as soon as I know something!

I would like to end on a happier note, and I think this video will do that... :)