The day my life changed forever...

With all the wonder and excitement we packed and got up at the buttcrack of dawn to leave for our much anticipated trip to our family's farm. The kids were beyond thrilled to finally be leaving as we had missed the last year due to mommy's health so the fact that we were getting to leave on a Thursday morning and stay till Monday was perfect to them. Missing 2 whole days of school was fabulous. They bragged for weeks to their friends about how they were going to be riding quads and horses while everyone else would be sitting at a desk. Hubby and I had 3 very excited children.

Off we went. A quick stop for gas, coffee filled up and hit the freeway with the kids all snuggled up in their seats. Jordan sprawls in the back with his sleeping bag over him and the girls strapped into their gigantic britax husky carseats belted in with their blankets.

Forty-five minutes into our journey Hubby and I are chatting away and I can hear some kind of gurgling in the background. 3 kids behind us we expect them to make strange noises to eachother. This consistant gurgling sound was still going on so I looked back...

My beautiful amazing Courtney's eyes were rolled back in her head, she had bubbly foam coming out of her mouth and her hands were curled up so tightly under her chin. She was jerking around wildly and it was not stopping. She was not responding to anything. Dean kept asking me what do I do, what do I do, and I told him to pull off at the exit and pull into the hospital. Thankfully we were just before a freeway exit to a very small town hospital. Just before we got to the hospital she came out of it. I calmly explained to Courtney that she had had a seizure and we were taking her to see a doctor. At Hubby and my best guess it seemed to have lasted about a minute and a half. A grand mal seizure is not something that any parent should have to see their child endure.

The doctor did her vitals and she seemed fine. We left the hospital and imediately phoned our family doctor. He told us to take her straight to our home town hospital and he would have a pediatrician meet us there. Once we arrived we saw the ER medical doc and he said that he suspects that Courtney's previous infections when she was younger such as the blood infection when she was 3 years could have caused some scar tissue in her brain and this could very well be the issue. We then saw the pediatrican and he sent her straight in for a CAT scan. It came back normal and Hubby and I were sooooo relieved. While in the hospital though she began having these tingly sensations that happen all over her body and are followed by feeling nausious for a bit. This happened once in the hospital.

The entire time throughout all of this drama Courtney was concerned about her trip to the farm (it's an 8 hour drive). Over and over again she asked the doctors if she could still go on the trip. We kept telling her to wait and see what the doctors had to say. They said take her so we went. She was fine. She had one tingly episode on the way home and then a dozen more once we arrived home.

An EEG was performed and it came back normal. The why did it happen has us devestated.

The past year Courtney has gone downhill in school from the smartest kid in the class to the scatterbrain that cannot remember, been having horrible rage attacks where she cannot stop herself and doesn't care who it happens in front of and when her brother and her fight and he holds her to prevent being attacked by her she gets this absent look in her eyes for a couple of seconds followed by melting into a puddle of tears and claims she feels like puking.

All of these factors put together have me most worried. We were booked for another CAT scan with contrast dye and the radiologist told us when we arrived that the previous test asks for an MRI and NOT a CT with contrast. We were confused and went to talk to the pediatrician that we saw at the hospital. He has put Courtney on an anti-anxiety med (prozac 10ml) and so far no tingly feelings again so they might have been anxiety attacks. It still doesn't help us to know why she had the siezure or what it means when she fights with her brother and her eyes dialate and she changes so quickly. This pediatrician seems to just want to wait and see if it happens again and not do the MRI.

I don't know what to think. I am happy that she is going back to school (first day back yesterday) and is getting back to normal. She isn't scared anymore and that's so important to us.

After seeing that I don't think I'll ever be the same again. I won't ever look at Courtney the same again. My beautiful amazing daughter...

Why?

Marie-Therese Gown GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!

Marie-Therese Gown GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!

The MOST BEAUTIFUL GOWN I HAVE EVER SEEEEEEN!!!!!

A must see. And she's giving it away!!!

Ohhhhh to be so wonderfully talented.

My daughter's not ready for kindergarten...

It has been a rough start. I seriously would like to just pull Reagan and home school her but I don't think that would be the right answer. She needs to get with the program (for lack of a better way of putting it) eventually. Reagan would see homeschooling as punishment at this point.

You see we all know that Reagan is a "spirited" little girl. Into everything, very busy all the time, feels that she is always the most important person in the room, and very demanding when she needs to let you know what she has to say.

I don't see these as poor qualities in a child. YES I am aware that she has her own ideas and doesn't always follow direction when told to but she also is not a robot child.

Reagan is very interested in rhyming, matching, colors, and what everything is and absorbs everything she has learned from the teacher to date.

SHE CANNOT WRITE HER NAME ON HER OWN!!!! The teacher is having a fit about this. All 22 of the children in the class began with sitting at the table tracing their name a few times and then they move on to centers (read playing with toys). Now she has taken the tracing away and having them just write their name all by themselves. Reagan is lost and the teacher thinks it's a huge deal that Reagan still needs to trace it. I don't thinks so because it will come at her own pace. We practice at home and she now is REALLY embarrassed about the whole thing. Yesterday I printed worksheets for her to trace and write it herself at the bottom and she is having a hard time but she does do it with prompting. She won't attempt writing it alone in the blank lines without prompting and me standing there coaching her. She is really nervous about how. She seems to get nervous and shut down.

This teacher has ALWAYS made me nervous. She is very blunt and intimidating. She is shutting down every time the teacher puts expectations on her that she can't quite do yet so she just sits there.

The teacher is getting frustrated with Reagan and she knows it. By the end of class Reagan is doing her own thing is what the teacher tells me. She is very curt when she tells me this like she is miserable about it. My sister was there when she said that to me and we were both kind of stunned. She says it and just walks away.

I don't know how to help Reagan. I want her to love school and this is not a great start. Almost every day she tells me she almost cried at school today.

The things she has done in Reagan fashion

She put a bead in her ear and yes the teacher freaked and scared the crap out of Reagan. I don't know why she would do such a thing. That's just Reagan.

Then on the playground Reagan threw rocks and got a time out. Yes I was horrified that she would throw rocks and I'm sure she need a time out!

Now the listening issue and keeping Reagan on task is becoming a major one for the teacher and I think Reagan is rebelling against the teacher.

I'm stuck. I talk and talk to her till I'm blue in the face but I refuse to punish her for learning and trying to figure out what this school thing is all about. We are only in the second month.

Yesterday was the worst day for her and she was made to feel badly. She was given a piece of paper like all the rest of the kids to write her name. Reagan sat there. The teacher first took this as misbehavior THEN finally brought Reagan a tracing sheet and did it with her making a big deal of it. THEN moving onto an art picture to which Reagan shut down and did not do. AT this point the teacher took Reagan to be defiant. I am sure Reagan was embarrassed that she missed playing in centers by this time and was sad and confused so therefor shut down and couldn't function the way the teacher wanted her to.

I don't know how to help Reagan love school. This teacher is not helping matters at all.

UGH

Laurie