I've Hit the Exhaustion Wall...And I Didn't Slide Off...I'm STUCK

So, been away from the good ole blog for a while now. I've got lots of catching up to do, from Bella Grace's birth to birthdays to first days of school to Halloween to Thanksgiving...you get the picture. But, I'm stuck. On the exhaustion wall. You know in cartoons when the guy runs into the wall and then slides down off of it??? Well, that's how I feel. Except for one thing- I hit the wall and got stuck! I haven't had the luxury of sliding down.

Let's go back to when I think it all started- late September. (What's that Green Day song??? Wake Me Up When September Ends?!? I agree with them!) The whole (first) run in with mastitis and dicloxicillin. I thought I made it through and we moved on to October, with pumpkin patches, leaves and Halloween! A good month. :) Then, I had a super fun girl trip to Atlanta the beginning of November. The next weekend Robert had his testosterone trip out to Kansas to hunt. Right after he returned my father came to visit (on like 4 hours notice!) Next thing I know it's the week of Thanksgiving. I get a little phone call from one of Robert's coworkers saying that they are taking Robert to the ER. Long story short, he had horrible kidney stones (yes, plural) and a bad UTI. Whoa! We get my dad off the next day only to turn around and get ready to travel for Thanksgiving. Yes, travel to Tennessee with Robert in a pain- antibiotic-infection induced state of misery. We survived our travels, enjoyed the holiday and made it back home. Holy moly!! It's December!! Gotta get the tree up and figure out the whole shopping thing. Yikes!! But wait, all six of us came down with this nasty cold/cough/fever nasty virus thing. Bleh...We survived and managed to get all of our holiday preparations taken care of just in time to travel back to Tennessee! We had a fabulous Christmas and I headed back the Monday after with all the kids in tow while Robert stayed and hunted for the week. We made it back to the 'Nati and I'm thinking SUCCESS!! I survived the holidays and now we have a week to get ready to be back in our normal routine. WRONG!! New Year's Day the nasty little thing called mastitis decided to make another appearance...and Robert was still gone...without his Blackberry...because he dropped it in the duck blind...awesome...not really. So, I get my lovely little antibiotics, Robert makes it home, I get some decent rest and YAY!! We're back to normal. Um...NOT SO LUCKY. The infection has caused tons of swelling and inflammation and lymph involvement in the affected side. My OB/GYN refers me to a breast specialist who does an ultrasound and determines that the infection is clearing up (slowly) but there are cysts that are aggravating the situation...Okay, making progress in the right direction! Ummm....WRONG. AGAIN. I wake up early on the morning of the 9th itching like mad and becoming increasingly covered in hives. What the heck?!? Total misery. Totally covered head (literally, I had them on my scalp!) to toe (yes, between my toes!) in hives. Long story short, I ended up in the ER (TWICE!) because my neck and lips and mouth were swelling, saw a specialist and am now totally messed up on steroids (and more steroids!) and antihistamines (like 3 different presctiptions!) and to top it all off, all the meds and stress on my body is making my milk supply drop. Not cool. Really not cool considering I have a 6 month old that has never taken bottles. So, we are up to date now!! Oh, wait. About six hours ago, just after midnight, we woke up to Graham vomiting all over his bed. Multiple times. I'm guessing he's sick, what do you think???

Needless to say, this is all why the blog has been somewhat neglected. Maybe I'll eventually get caught up on some posts, maybe not. But, quite frankly, it's pretty low in the to-do list. Hopefully I will become unstuck from the exhaustion wall very soon. Of course, that's doubtful. Robert has to work this weekend and I'm still whacked out on meds that make it impossible to get good sleep for another week or so. But, this too shall pass. And, life is still pretty good. And, my precious baby girl is curled up (literally in the fetal position) in my lap while I sit 'criss-cross-applesauce' style (had to say it, it's what the boys say!) typing this post. And, everyone else (excetp for steroid-antihistamine-crazy me) is sleeping and not vomiting. Oh, and I forgot to mention that I am that small percentage of people that have the opposite reaction to antihistamines- they DO NOT make me drowsy. :)