I’m a little sad tonight for a 5 year old boy in Ethan’s pre-k class. I spent the morning at his school and accompanied them on a field trip to a play. This little guy came to school, but didn’t end up going on the outing. During morning circle time he was sitting in a crunched up position rocking and appeared to be in pain. The teachers all attended to him and decided to call in the principal to assess the situation.

What I didn’t know is that the little guy had been seriously injured a week ago and was just returning to school. He and his older brother had been playing with matches, and he received second and third degree burns on his stomach.

It was obvious that there was no way he would be able to participate in this field trip. The bus ride alone would have been terribly painful. He could barely move. They decided to have the mother return to pick him up immediately and I heard the principal explain that they would need a doctors release before he could come back to school.

The mother was very put out with the situation and remarked, “I have things to do and can’t care for him at home. He’ll be fine in a few days. Just let him sit and watch.”

I’ve been around this little guy before and honestly always found him disruptive and needy. The more interaction I’ve had with his mother (and father) I’m beginning to see that his outward behavior is probably a result of his home life. She is a stay-at-home mom and anytime I’ve seen her outside of the classroom she hasn’t been friendly. In fact she can be pretty rude.

His parents never remember to dress him in the field trip t-shirt, so the little guy always looks like the odd kid out when everyone has on a red shirt and he’s wearing something else. They never remember when it’s his snack day. If it’s 40 degrees outside he’ll be dressed in shorts. If it’s 90 degrees outside he’ll be dressed in long pants and long sleeves. It’s just the way they roll.

Those things alone do not make them bad parents. Letting your child hear that you don’t care if they are hurting however, is cruel. The teachers have all dealt with this family for several years and have a way of handling them. I think I’d have a hard time keeping my mouth shut if I were in that role. She can’t or won’t care for her own child?

Have you ever had one of those days where you come home so exhausted that you’re just done. Well I’m well done. Someone take me off the grill. I spent all day listening to presentations given to teenagers on making good decisions.

At home I was greeted by a little boy who had this in the front of his hair.

For the record Ethan, this was not a good decision.

Somehow during nap time the blue sticky tack fell off the wall and into his hair! Can you believe that? We tried to comb it out, wash it out, grease it up with butter, everything…then two rather tired, frazzled parents just cut it out. (Ok, I did the cutting while Nate was downstairs doing laundry.) After a little scissor action it was apparent that we would have to shave his head.

Thus began the five year old drama - “I don’t want to be bald! Don’t cut all my hair off it won’t grow back! You’re trying to kill me!”

After the buzz he reached up and felt his head and said, “I feel like dad.” Yes son, he did contribute some sperm to your genetic make-up. You may have hair like him, but you got the drama from your mama!

I am laying in a hospital bed just down the street from my house. Thursday afternoon my ankle/foot started hurting and by Friday morning I could not put any weight on it.

This is the ankle I had surgery on exactly a month ago and it had gone really well (in comparison to previous surgeries I’ve had). Not to gross you out, but my incision had opened up and there was A LOT of yucky stuff coming out of my body.

I told my husband that we were either going to the ortho surgeon’s office or the ER, because the pain was that unbearable. So off I hobbled on crutches and they worked me right in.

The instructions that followed were not at all what I had expected - go directly to the hospital, admission for 3-4 days, surgery later on tonight to clean out the wound and IV antibiotics to treat it.

After several hours of admission paperwork, signing over my life and giving vials of blood and culture tests I found myself back in that cold operating room, with my arms strapped down and my body in the shape of a cross. I woke up in post-op shaking, crying and hyperventilating.

I didn’t sleep at all last night. My body bounced back and forth between chills and hot flashes. The infection finally caught up with me, as I ran a fever of 102 for a while. I reacted to the germs by throwing up anything that came close to my lips.

The combination of phenergan, percocet and morphine kept the pain minimal, but when they wear off it gets pretty bad. Thankfully, I have my own room, a flat screen TV and my laptop to occupy my jail time.

I’m now under the care of an infectious disease doctor (a new specialist to add to my list). My cultures came back positive for a staph infection and they are waiting to see if it is MRSA - which is methicillin resistant bacteria.

The specific type of infection will determine the course of antibiotics I’ll need. One possible explanation as to why a month later my incision would develop into this type of serious infection, is that I do not have a spleen (from the car accident) and it has left my immune system compromised.

Having internet access from a hospital bed may not be the best idea in the world. I read this about MRSA and started feeling sick to my stomach.

This lovely bed that moves up and down will be my friend for the next few days. At this point I’m thankful for single patient rooms and morphine! It’s the little things that make me happy. But I’m also thankful for a loving husband who is keeping me company and laughing, and my family who has helped care for our son and visited.

This week is seriously kicking my rear. I’m not sure if it has something to do with being in charge of my son’s Halloween party at school, taking on more projects at work than I can handle, coordinating a fundraiser through an organization I volunteer with, accepting the reigns of a new project (which I will announce next Monday!), or just plain life in general.

Add a sinus headache and drainage that has me downing DayQuil during the light hours and NyQuil when the sun goes down. I’m fairly certain I mixed them up a few times too.

And the icing on the cake is hearing some rather bad news regarding the health of a friend’s mom, another friend’s pregnancy in trouble and things such as that which have me feeling guilty for complaining about the above.

Either way Friday can’t come soon enough. Thankfully, we have a quiet weekend on the schedule and I have some serious catching up to do. I’m thinking a pajama Saturday will be in effect for our household.

You’ll have to forgive the fact I haven’t been keeping up with your blogs this week. Half the reason I entered the Fall Bloggy Giveaway was because it would keep things hopping on here in my absence.

I feel like I’m drowning in responsibility. Someone throw me a life preserver.

I’m not sure how woman who are desperately trying to conceive handle all the pressure from the outside world. Even hearing my doctor say it out loud sent shivers down my spine yesterday.

Despite knowing our situation and how many surgeries I’ve endured, I constantly get questioned from people with that dreaded sentence:

“So when are you guys going to have another baby?”

I used to be polite and felt as if it was my responsibility to say things like, “Oh, I’m not sure.”

Now I’m more honest in responding. I figure if you’re going to be blunt and ask personal questions, then you can handle the truthful answer.

Thanks for all the well wishes, good thoughts and e-mails regarding my appointment. The news wasn’t terrible, but the river runs deep with issues. We’ve started with some blood work, a few upcoming tests and scheduled a few consults to get other opinions.

We’ve been pondering whether it is worth the risks to proceed with trying to have another child and in the back of my mind I wonder what fuels this desire. Right before the car accident we had just decided to have another baby. Ethan was turning 2 years old and it was a good point in our lives to add on to our family. But life got interrupted and since then I’ve felt robbed of that chance.

Please don’t get the wrong impression. I feel incredibly blessed having our son. He is amazing in more ways than I can even begin to describe. My heart is more than full with his love.

It’s human nature to always want more though.

Even if our wants aren’t met, our needs already have been.