We're getting sick

Brody was up five times last night. Over the weekend, he had a runny nose. I was passing it off as allergies and/or teething, but now I have the very very beginnings of a sore throat.

Just in time for our vacation on Friday! We are going to Sun River, Oregon.

I have already started echinacea and Vitamin C. Brody doesn't get either - just his regular vitamins and hopefully lots of sleep.

Jeremy is at the moment unaffected. I really really really hope we don't get truly ill.

Brodyisms

Brody's favorite part of the Olympic opening ceremonies were the drummers - in the beginning. Coincidentally, he is just becoming aware of drums, and when he sees them in books, he says "Boom boom boom."

When we watched the drummers on the opening ceremonies, which gave both Jeremy and me goosebumps with the extraordinary precision and depth and breadth of 2008 people saturated with coordination and exactness, Brody loved it too. He started mimicking the drummers with his arms, and saying "boom boom" when the drums did, and said "Whoaaaaa. . . . . " when the light show accentuated the drums.

When NBC broke for commercial, Brody looked at me, and said "More? More?"

Sad news

I just received word that Avery, the adorable little 4 year old girl with neuroblastoma, passed away early this morning.

Holding her tigerbear, while being held in her mother's arms, surrounded by her family.

For more information on this horrible, deadly childhood cancer, read here here and here.

May peace and healing be with her family.

Procrastination and cloned dogs

I was going to write my surprisingly vehement rant against cloning dogs, how "cloning" money is counterfeiting and it's illegal, how "cloning" a check is called fraud, and that too is illegal, when I searched to find pictures of the woman who sold her house to be able to afford the $50,000 in cloning fees. . . .

I found an article claiming the cloning woman was actually a fugitive wanted for kidnap and sexual assault against a Morman man in the 1970s in England and then escaped from England and disappeared from the grasp of authorities.

I will say that I was fairly suspicious because the original headline I saw was on Fox News, and that is not exactly what I would call a reliable source. I was also fairly doubtful that the woman from the 1970's was the cloning puppy woman. Because (a) what are the chances and (2) wouldn't a fugitive be smarter than that?

Until I saw the photos.







That's the same woman, isn't it? To read the lurid details of the kidnap case, click here.

This makes me even more fearful for the cloned puppies. I seriously question the mental health of someone who spends $50,000 to replace the dead dog (named Booger, which is wrong and offensive to me as a dog lover) five times over.

I'm not against cloning exactly; I think perhaps that for medical reasons it could be very beneficial. For example, if we could somehow clone Brody's kidney, then he would have two and I would stop having my infrequent but annoying 4am panic attacks about needing kidney transplants.

But here, this woman was just sad because her dog died. I was sad when my dog died. I cried for weeks. Years. I would not have cloned him. Lucky was one of a kind. So was Booger: the cloned dog has no memory of the original dog.

Question: What's the difference, really, between a new puppy and a cloned puppy?

Answer: $50,000.

Unless, apparently, you are also the kind of person who kidnaps your crushes.

I wonder, if it is the same woman, if she has thought during the last several months, "Too bad I couldn't clone that guy I kidnapped and forced to have sex with me."

So my point is, my procrastination in posting about the cloning actually paid off, because now we have this fantastic story about the cloning woman actually being a wanted fugitive in England. Sweet.

Baby steps. . . .

I faced one of my problems today.

My teeth. Between my husband and a good friend, I have heard a lot of dental problems lately.

The last time I went to the dentist, I was not yet married.

I've been married for 6 years.

So I went to Dr. White.

That is her real name.

She was the nicest dentist I've ever met. We actually sat down, in a cozy little consultation room, and talked about my teeth. She asked me what I wanted and what I was afraid of, and how my life is.

I told her about my miscarriages and Brody and his surgeries and how I've been ignoring and/or avoiding myself and my own issues, and I said "Now I want to concentrate on myself, take care of myself."

She loved that.

Took x-rays and did a tooth by tooth gum analysis. The staff, and the dentist, were amazed at how healthy my gums were in light of my absence in the dentist's chair for so long. I need a couple of fillings replaced - and they will be WHITE. The last time I was at the dentist, white fillings were a new-fangled technology. Now they are de rigeur.

I'm having a cleaning done this afternoon. I get my [free] teeth bleaching trays on Friday. My teeth are not rotting out of my head, I will not need dentures, and they can be saved.

I've been dreading the dentist for over a year, since a few months after Brody was born. Every day I would think about my teeth and how ugly they are. Every day. I'm to the point of adjusting my smile.

I cannot tell you free and happy I feel.

What do you say

I know a woman whose son is Brody's age, actually 2 weeks younger than Brody. Dante has neuroblastoma, a rare and very dangerous cancer. They found it right after Christmas. A fever that would not go away.

I read Dante's mom's updates on carepages.com. A group of women organized a sort of support group and we try to help by sending gifts. Dante's mom says it helps her. I hope so.

Through Dante and his family, we have heard trickles of news about a little girl, Avery, who is 4. Avery is treated at the same hospital as Dante for the same cancer. Avery's cancer was found at the end of April, 2008.

Avery's doctors just told her mom on Friday that there was nothing more that they could do, that the cancer had filled every part of Avery's brain. Avery has between a few weeks and a few months to live. No one really knows.

I've cried every day since learning about Avery. And I don't even know Avery or her mom in even the slightest way. Except thanks to carepages.com I learned how her mom told Avery's siblings that Avery was going to die, and I learned how it feels to take your child home from the hospital and wait for hospice workers to appear on your doorstep.

I'm not hormonal. I'm not pregnant. I say that because even I think I would be I'm so upset about this news. I've completely internalized it and I think it's a little irrational of me to be so upset. I've known for years that kids have cancer, and die. I've known since Brody was born that his life was at risk.

As I cried into my husband's shoulder last night I kept asking him why, why would this happen. He said we should be even more grateful for Brody and what a miracle he is. I just kept thinking this last Christmas they had no idea it would be Avery's last Christmas.

She's 4 years old.

And how do you do that? How do you watch your child die? How do you make her smile when you are dying inside yourself? What can I say to Avery's mom, a stranger? What do you say to someone you've never met, you never will meet, about their child dying? And why do I care about what to say? How arrogant for me to even think that anything I can say will help or not.

If you're reading this, please spare a good thought or a prayer for Avery and her family. I'm off to a deposition.

I said this sentence tonight

"Say goodnight to the spork, Brody; night night spork."