The Purpose of this Blog

The goal of this blog is to provide education and bring about higher awareness about Down syndrome. It is to share that life with Down syndrome (DS) is not scary, horrible, or to be feared.

My experience comes from raising my daughter, Nebraska Larae (Braska), born November 2006 with Down syndrome.
The posts on this blog are related in some way to life with DS or disability, and they are reposted here from my other family blogs. There are links to those blogs in the margin on the right side of this blog if you would like to visit them directly.

Thank you for coming by.

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Doctor Therapists Realtor

I knew this was gonna be a busy week, but today was a little ridiculous.

9 am: Braska pediatrician appt. Just to get established and make sure she had all the right info. It was pouring rain when we left, and I'm no good at kid and rain combinations. We made it barely on time. My first concession of the day was to go out in schlumpadinka fashion. Yep, I've gone there. Capris, neat shoes, and cute top--didn't happen. Yoga pants and T was it. What has happened?!?

10:15 am: Back to the apartment. It's so darn trashed there's not anywhere on the sectional to sit down. But I feel rough, so it's plop in the recliner for me while Braska plays. Dealt with some work and emails but mostly I just sat still and tried not to be dizzy.

11:00 am: Knock at the door. The PT is here. Forgot about that one. I sent an email to find out when my appt was, but didn't get a response. Darn email keeps going to spam. Ok, welcome to disaster central. Braska did great, made some big strides with pulling up to her knees at the couch. But I could hardly keep my eyes open.

12:10 pm: Feed the kid in 3 minutes. (Thank God for tube feedings at times like this.) Rock her for a minute, put her to bed, and collapse into bed myself for a quick nap. But it doesn't happen. I can't nap. I always just race through the things I need to do and what I'm NOT getting done by resting. I get so mad that I can't go to sleep that I end up more agitated every minute. I laid there for about an hour and closed my eyes even though I couldn't sleep. We've got so much to do still today! I need to get some energy!!

1:10 pm: M comes in from work for lunch. I get out of bed. I've made no lunch obviously, so he has a pudding cup and some pretzels. Thank goodness he's not a foodie. We chat a minute. He gets Braska up because speech will be here in a few.

1:30 pm: Jocelyn comes for ST. Braska plays and cooperates some. She's not much for mimicking on command yet. But she had a good time. She likes Miss Jocelyn. M heads back to work at 1:45.

2:30 pm: We leave as Jocelyn does, heading out to the realtor's office. I had texted my sister Rachel to pick me up some food on the way to meet us there since I hadn't had a chance to eat yet. She came along to corral the kiddo while we visited several places.

2:45 pm: We met up with Sandra the realtor. Headed out on our tour of 6 places. We ruled out 3, I'm on the fence about 1, and we like 2. That's not bad overall. Houses in this price range are going quickly here, so a few that we had wanted to see had already sold over the weekend. I was pleased we found a couple standouts at this price point. It was really hard to actually walk through places that we were considering. I love looking at houses. Love it! But we are downsizing, and that's proving to be more of an adjustment than I expected. We loved our 2-car garage, but no more. We loved having 2 baths, but no more. We loved our spread out room for us and guests, but no more. It will be fine. We'll have room to be, but it will be an adjustment for sure. Not to mention the pool....... but it's ok. It really is. It'll be less for me to keep up with, and I like that. I actually was pleasantly surprised, as were Rach and Sandra, at the good places we saw. I was afraid everything would require a great deal of work, but two of the options are just about turn-key. That's important since we're trying to get all this done and moved in by 8/31...the end of our short-term lease in the apartment.

5:15 pm: Back to the realtor's office. We head home. I collapse and hand Braska to M. The local DSA meeting is in 45 minutes, but nope...just can't do it.

And from that point on, my mind races. I'm replaying every bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, finishes, carpet, neighborhood, etc. I'm betting there won't be much sleep tonight. My brain doesn't have a turn-off switch when I need it. So I pray God will show us "our house" just like he did 4 years ago, clear as day. I gleaned a few little hints today, so maybe more will come. We go back tomorrow night, me and M, so he can take a look at the top 3. My hope is for a clear choice or more rule-outs.

No comments: