A New Belly Button
The Lion has a pretty big belly button. Actually, it’s a belly button hernia (the technical term is umbilical hernia). Unfortunately, hubby and I are directly to blame for this because we had them at birth as well. As it turns out, these hernias are more prevalent in blacks as well. Gadget had one, too, but his closed up before he turned two. The Lion’s did not close up, and it appears to be getting bigger. It is so big that when he is watching his brother pee in the bathroom, he holds his belly button as if to go pee with it. Hubby took him to a pediatric surgeon for consultation, and we learned that he has a second hernia even higher up in his abdominal walls. We could see a little bulge, but this hernia poses a higher risk than the umbilical hernia since food could become trapped inside it. According to the Mayo Clinic:
An umbilical hernia occurs when part of the intestine protrudes through an opening in the abdominal muscles. Umbilical hernias are most common in infants, but they can affect adults as well. In an infant, an umbilical hernia may be especially evident when the infant cries, causing the baby’s bellybutton protrude. This is a classic sign of an umbilical hernia.
Most umbilical hernias close on their own by age 1, though some take longer to heal. To prevent complications, umbilical hernias that don’t disappear by age 4 or those that appear during adulthood may need surgical repair.
Umbilical hernia is a common and typically harmless condition.
During pregnancy, the umbilical cord passes through a small opening in the baby’s abdominal muscles. The opening normally closes just before birth. If the muscles don’t join together completely in the midline of the abdomen, this weakness in the abdominal wall may cause an umbilical hernia at birth or later in life.
Well, the Lion’s hernia gets very big when he cries, but it’s big all the time for the most part. So, on Tuesday, the Lion is having two outpatient surgical procedures. As his mom, I have been praying non-stop this weekend for wisdom, patience and God-guided hands for the surgeon, anesthesiologist, nurses and anyone who touches my baby. I pray that the procedure will be complication-free and that his recovery will be swift and painless. I especially feel this way because even though the surgeon felt as though this was a functionally necessary procedure, part of me feels like this is cosmetic surgery, which I believe to be totally unnecessary for the Lion. On the other hand, the hernia is so big that we intentionally cover it up. Other children always focus on it, and we don’t want him to grow up being self-conscious about being shirtless and wondering why we never did anything when he was a baby. Men go bare back all the time in sports, especially swimming and basketball, and I don’t want him to feel awkward because of cruel jokes from insensitive kids.
I took all of these thoughts and feelings to church this morning and gave it to God. I was carrying a spirit of fear, but I prayed this scripture, “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind,” and now the surgery is in His hands.
Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
Gadget has started taking Jiu-Jitsu. He goes three times a week, which is great, and so far hubby and I have only missed the Wednesday classes for the most part. He did a week of trial classes, and unfortunately he was not as excited about it as we had hoped. In the middle of class he asked the teacher “if it was almost done.” But, he has learned a lot from the class. Subconsciously, he is training his muscles. The other day he was running and fell, but he fell exactly how he was taught to fall in class so as to avoid injury (it’s called a break fall). After we saw this, we decided he would finish the season even though he did not want to. As I mentioned in my Gadget update, he’s got some challenges when it comes to coordination, so we know this class will give him the physical discipline and training his body will quickly retain.
Overall, we are very pleased. The boys run around on the mat before class starts, in which even the Lion can participate. The others boys in the class and the teacher are great, and the instructor’s wife and two young daughters watch the class as well. Gadget is the youngest in the class by far. The next youngest child is six, and the instructor was initially worried that Gadget would only play and not pay attention, but Gadget has pleasantly surprised the instructor. Of course, he has had a day or two where he was more focused on drinking his Gatorade during breaks, but lately he has asked when is his next class. Yay for Gadget and learning something new, and yay for hubby finding the class and getting Gadget set up in his little Jiu-Jitsu gi (we have to roll the sleeves and pant legs and we dry it on high for extra shrink).
2 Years, 2 Kids, 2 MBAs was Easy Compared to This
I’m three weeks into my new job and whenever I tell the story about how hubby and I attended business school together with two kids I have to explain that it was not so tough, because we had Marina Poppins, and she was the best ever. In the past 21 days I have become totally amazed by all working mothers. I mean, I know I worked after I returned from maternity leave in 2007, but that seems like eons, no, light years ago and our family was 25% smaller at the time. I don’t remember the pangs of dressing small bodies in the morning, or fixing breakfast, or packing lunches, or really any of it. But then again, I hardly remember how painful childbirth was.
You know on TLC, after a first-time mother sees her precious beautiful miracle for the first times she sheds tears of joy? That was not me. Of course, I selflessly, unconditionally love my children, but my first thought after I saw Amari was ‘he’s going to be an only child.’ Because I am never ever ever eva doing that again. So, with time, memory fades, and thus, I cannot remember feeling so burdened as a working mother years ago. I do not feel the guilt that so many moms say they experience. I am overjoyed to return working. I love what I am doing and where I am so, and I would not trade that to spend all day with my sons right now.
Whoa, yes, I just said I would rather be at work than playing, cuddling and kissing my boys all day. And there is a very logical reason for that. There are many, many things that come with the blessing slash chore of being a stay at home mom. The past two years at NYU I had so much flexibility that I had the best of both worlds, and now I am slave to the ‘get-through-the-day-so-that-you-can-get-ready-for-tomorrow’ task masking.
I woke up at 5:55 and hit the snooze button one time too many. After getting showered and dressed, it was 6:50 and then it was on to the boys. I got them dressed, took Amari to the potty, brushed his teeth, put oil on his hair, and then began all over again with Joshy. I changed it diaper, which thank God was just number 1, wait no, it was a number 2 this morning, got him dressed and then packed him in the stroller.
I put ice packs in the lunch boxes hubby packed the night before and then grabbed my laptop bag and headed for the car. It takes about 10 minutes to walk from our apartment door to the car and get both boys strapped into their carseats. We headed to daycare, and then parked and unstrapped, got the lunches and headed inside. I got Joshy and Amari set up at a table to eat breakfast (oh yeah, I put two bananas and cinnamon rasisin bagels into their bags before we left home). While they started their day off with a wholesome meal, I filled out their daily status forms, changed the sheet in Joshy’s crib and then initialled the sign in sheet.
By now it’s 8:10 and traffic on the Merritt is thicker than I would like. At 5:03 PM I head back to the car to do the reverse of everything I did this morning, except it’s the Thursday before Labor day, so traffic is really bad, and I’m not going to be there by 6, so I exit off the Merritt to trek through the back roads of North Stamford to make it to the daycare by 5:48. We get home (after a car ride full of questions about where’s daddy and where’s Traci), and daddy’s home! Woohoo! He fixes dinner while I finish a sell deck for work, and then I feed Joshy some spaghetti (with jerk – it was nasty, don’t do it). I put on a movie for Gadget and then head downstairs to exercise because I have not felt sweat drip down my face in the past seven days. And now I’m writing this post and it’s 10:34. I still have to shower and put up the dirty dishes. So what didn’t get done today? No one bathed the boys, but we did lay out their clothes for the week on Sunday.
And I will repeat this routine tomorrow.
