Love Letters

My sweet little girl. After quite a few tearful partings, Sofia is beginning to blow kisses and wave when I leave school. We now have a routine where she follows me to the gate and gives me a kiss through a heart-shaped opening and then she climbs up the ladder that overlooks the fence and blows me lots of kisses and waves as I walk down the street. It is blissful. So much love coming from that little girl. When she does begin to miss us, she lets one of her teachers know and one of them will sit with her while she dictates a note to us. It goes something like this : "Dear Mommy and Daddy, My Mommy is the best. She is my best friend. And Daddy is the best too. I love Luca and Silvio. I love my Mommy and Daddy so much. Love Sofia." She writes a few every day and each is full of praises and love for her family. Sofia is such an amazing little girl, who loves to share herself. She has always been incredibly expressive, but I feel like she has begun to understand what love feels like. She will tell me she loves me at any given moment and does the same to her brothers. She constantly says, "mommy, you're my best friend" or "Mommy, you are my favorite." I know. So sweet. Sofia is just full of love to give and share. She is also incredibly affectionate, snuggling into my arms every chance she gets. She loves to give squeezes and needs lots of hugs and kisses throughout the day. I could live in that little girl's arms. I try to revel in every single second because I know these moments are fleeting. There will come the day that she does not want to hold my hand, refuses to hug me, and is silent when I tell her I love her. For now, I will take every single hug, squeeze, kiss, snuggle, and "you're the best" I can get. I am enjoying every Mommy love letter, trying desperately to hold on to my little girl who loves Mommy so much. She is growing up so fast, but she will always be my sweet Sofia, "my favorite little girl in the whole wide world."

Dress Up

Sofia and Luca love to play dress up. Most of the dress up clothes that we have are princess dresses and fairy wings. Luca likes to be just like his big sister so he sometimes wants to put on a dress "just like Sofia." He really likes this dress and constantly tells us that it is actually his and not Sofia's. Of course, he has to put on his tool belt, hold his lovie, and suck on his binky. We need to start thinking about how we are going to get rid of the pacifier, but I truly can't imagine Luca without it. I think it completes his outfit. Luca's smile about tells it all He really is that mischevious, even in a dress.

Big Sister

Sofia adores her little brother. She tells almost everyone we meet, "this is my baby, Silvio." She has always referred to him as her baby and has tried to be a little mommy to him. Sofia has loved him since the day he was born, giving him tons of hugs and kisses. She gives him toys, reads him books, and has even tried to pick him up. Recently, she has wanted to help feed him. She sits on my lap, or Brian's and hold the bottle. usually she giggles and says "I'm feeding Silvio...I love feeding him!" She is the sweetest big sister to both of her brothers. She often dictates a note a school to one of her teachers and she always says, "I love my Mommy and my Daddy. I also love Luca and my baby brother, Silvio." Of course, Silvio absolutely loves his sister and will watch her from across the room. Sofia is always running up to Silvio and snuggling into him, as she says "my Silvio, my Schnugums!" I love that she not only is incredibly affectionate with both of them but she also verbally expresses her love for them. She is such a caring and loving little girl. I know that she will continue to be the little mommy of the family. Not to say that she does not fight with Luca, but she also takes the time to tell him that she loves him and that he is her friend. Whenever I hear her say to Luca "you are my best friend, Luca" I just melt. Nothing makes a mother happier than to see her children expressing love to each other.

No longer a toothless smile

Silvio's first two teeth finally came in about two weeks ago after a lot of drool and blowing bubbles. He is so cute with his new teeth. I can't say I don't miss the toothless grins but alas, he must grow up. Just yesterday, Brian and I were talking about how we would love to freeze Silvio. He is so cuddly, smiley, giggly, and completely full of sweetness. The other morning I woke up at 5:00 AM to Silvio screaming. Brian was snoring a few feet from him...I don't get that at all. Anyway, I rushed to him and picked him up. He immediately stopped crying, reached up and gently touched my face, and said "ah, da, da." I smiled and talked to him while he continued to grab my face. He was looking straight into my eyes and babbling. It is hard to describe exactly how I feel in that moment; my body tingles, my heart pounds, and my eyes fill with tears. It is pure joy. Pure love. I feel more connected to a deep source of love that surrounds us. It didn't matter that I was groggy and tired, I was there with Silvio in that moment, sharing a most amazing moment of connection. There is somethig so soulful about Silvio; it's as if he understands something greater than me. He has always had this way of looking into my eyes in a deep way and communicating with me. Kristen and I talked about this little guy yesterday and she agrees that there is something extraordinary about Silvio. Maybe it's that he is my baby, but I know that he has completed my family in the most perfect way. And I know that he will only continue to give love in more ways than I can imagine. That is my Schnugums.

Tears

Sofia just started school last week (this is a picture of her on her first day back). Although she is still at Miraloma, she is now in the morning program so she has new teachers and new kids. Sofia was very attached to her teachers and her friend, Molly. She has not connected with any of the kids yet and still complains about going to school. This started a few months ago and I was hoping that maybe going to school in the morning versus the afternoon would help since she has much more energy at the beginning of the day. Although she get through her sadness a bit faster, she still is very unhappy at school. She spends a lot of time being sad and crying. Sometimes, I feel like I am torturing her by keeping her at school. I know this is a process but she has been going to school for over a year. She actually did much better last year. Sofia is such an incredibly sensitive child and takes in so much emotion that surrounds her.
Yesterday, we went over to my sister's housein the afternoon so that I could look at her wedding photos. We were in the back bedroom and heard the microwave go on. Stef ran into the kitchen but didn't think anything of it. Then we heard Luca began to scream. We both ran in to find his train and his monkey on fire in the microwave. Stef immediately ran to the sink and filled a glass of water and put out the fire. There was smoke everywhere and the kids were hysterical. They were terrified because they could feel how panicked we both were. It took us a while to calm them down. Luca could not stop saying "my lovie and my train are ruined." He must of said it 50 times meanwhile Sofia had a continual monologue about the fire, her feeling of shear terror and how sad she was. After 10 minutes of this, I tried to tell both of them to clam down and that we were all okay. Sofia then went on to say "mom, I just can't stop thinking about this, I can't." My sister and looked at each other and had a laugh. Sofia is obviously related to us. Apples. She continued to talk about the microwave incident the rest of the night. This morning I warned her teacher that she might talk about the microwave incident at some point today. Sure enough, when I picked her up, there was a note in my box that she had dictated to her teacher about the fire and how she "never wants to go to Auntie Steffie's house again." I think the intensity of my emotion just overwhelmed her and she is till reeling from that moment. Sofia is so incredibly in tune with any emotion that surrounds her. She can be so intuitive and self-aware for an almost 4-year-old which sometimes floors me. Brian and I both know how important it is for us to make her feel safe and to give her the space to express herself and talk about her feelings. She definitely has lots of tears but hopefully we help her to understand where they come from and how to move beyond.

Tales from the ER

Silvio woke up Friday morning with a fever. He was terribly miserable so I immediately called the doctor and made an appointment for that morning. He was quickly diagnosed with Hand, Foot, Mouth Disease once the doctor saw the horrible sores in his mouth. I knew about this weird virus because Sofia had it a few months ago. She also had sores in her mouth and did not want to eat or drink much for a few days. Other than that, she was fairly happy and healthy. Silvio, on the other hand, was a fussy mess. I could not get him to drink anything. As the day and night passed, he was not any better, even with around the clock Motrin. By Saturday afternoon, I began to get worried. He had had about 4 ounces in 24 hours and had only two barely wet diapers. Not a good sign. I decided to call the Urgent Care Clinic and she advised me to go in. At 8:00 pm on a warm Saturday night, I was pacing back in forth in a patient room with a very sad Silvio. The doctor noticed how miserable he was and began to check him. Once he looked in his ear, he diagnosed him with a bilateral ear infection. So this poor child not only had a mouth full of sores, but both of his ears were terribly infected. Well, it was no wonder he was not eating. The doctor went on to tell me how serious this is and that we were to force him to drink a teaspoon of Pedialyte every ten minutes all night. He told me that if he had had a fever, he would have sent us immediately to the ER. Okay, now I am somewhat in panic mode. We rushed to pharmacy to fill a prescription for the antibiotic and went home. Silvio was exhausted and feel asleep as soon as we got home. We let him sleep for a half hour and then woke him for his teaspoon of fluid. This was going to be awful. I began to worry. Brian and I then decided that is we were going to do this crazy regime all night, then we might as well be in the ER. It was then decided that I should just take him in. I packed a few things and tranferred a tired and weak Silvio to his carseat and off we went.
We got to the ER at 10:45 and registered. I noticed the room full of people, but thought that maybe we would be see within an hour. An hour passed and then another, and I began to panic. The group of drunk people began to annoy me. A few of them were there because a girl was bitten by a rat. They had killed the rat and had it in a clear plastic bag. Gross. Not only were they parading the rat around the ER waiting room, they would not stop making jokes about the rat, none of which were remotely funny. Some of the other folks were there because a guy cut his toes open. They were cracking jokes about discount pedicures. Again, they were not funny. All of this people were chatting loudly for over two hours. Needless to say, I found none of it amusing. Rather I found their loud conversation to be utterly obnoxious in a room full of people waiting to see a doctor. They even joked about going in before us, and I about lost it. I had a sick baby who would sleep for a few minutes and then suddenly would wake up screaming. Do you think they could have had some respect? None. Anyway, they only made this whole experience even harder than it already was. At one point, I broke down crying to Brian about how terrible our health care system is. I was a mess.
Finally after two and a half hours, they called us in so that we could wait another half hour to see the doctor. After looking at him for a minute, she tried to convince me that we should feed him. Yeah right. I had been trying to feed him for over a day and she thought that he was going to eat in this crazy place at 3:00 AM. After a moment of shoving a bottle in his mouth, she agreed to give him IV fluids. A nurse came in a few minutes later to start the IV. I asked him sternly if he had done many of these on babies. "Of course" he said firmly. Well, I was not about to let any amateur go poking around my chubby little babies arms. So it is incredibly difficult to even see a vein in Silvio's chubby arms and legs. My heart was racing. How was this gong to work? He finally found a vein in his foot and he went for it. I held Silvio's arms so that he would not flail. He looked at me intently and screamed bloody murder as if saying "how could you do this to me?" My heart was breaking into a million pieces. I want to protect him from all of this; from every bit of pain in this world. I guess that is part of being a mother- having this fundamental desire to keep your child from experiencing any pain. To make it worse, he could not find the vein after poking around and had to try the other foot. He finally found a vein and I breathed a sigh of relief. Silvio calmed down qiuckly and fell back to sleep. I layed down next to him and we napped for a while. It was so sweet to snuggle with the Nug. I was brought back to his birth and our first moments together. I reveled every second of that hour, taking in his sweet smell and rubbing his soft belly. Although it was so sweet to have this snuggle time, I wanted it under other circumstances. I just wanted to get through this. At about 5:00 AM, the doctor came in and took out the IV and told us we could go home. I gathered our things and we were home by 6AM. Silvio went straight to sleep since his poor body was exhausted from the long and grueling night. I was too. I went to bed and about 2 minutes later, I heard Luca's footsteps down the hall. Oh, the life of a mom.
After a few hours of rest, we still felt like Silvio was not himself. We hadn't seen him smile for days and he was beginning to look a bit listless. I called the advice line yet again, and she recommended that we head back to the ER. This time Brian came with me and we were seen within 20 minutes. He was cleared to go home with some new advice for medication. Later that afternoon, he took a bottle of formula and I had tears. I was so happy to see him on the road to recovery. I was so deeply worried about him. I felt like I was in crisis mode for a few days. All of my energy was focused on taking care of my baby. The Nug is about 95% himself as of today. He is smiling and babbling. I feel so incredibly grateful that he is better. Each smile just brings me an overwhelming amount of joy. It was only a few days of a very sick Silvio, but it was so intense. I thought of all of the parents of very sick children whose hearts must ache. I feel like this experience has deepened my understanding of being a mother. I have never felt such deep concern and such an intense desire to shield another being from any suffering. At the same time, I felt empowered by such great love. My children are only teaching me to love more fiercely and more deeply. These little beings come into our to only to change us in such dramatic ways and to help us understand the purity of joy and the depth of love. I'm not saying being a mother is easy in any way, but it sure is amazing. Thank you Sofia, Luca, and Silvio.