Christmas Day!!

Wow what a day. I can't believe it is all over. It is funny how it can take a couple months to plan for a day and as soon as it gets here it is over with. I have been really busy with work and appts for Preston. I am pretty tired but it has been worth it. Today has all been a day full of emotion. It is always hard to celebrate a holiday with out a love one but to celelbrate them with out your child is exspecially hard. I have done good but it just isn't the same not having Hayden with us. I also watch the other two babies play with all their new toys and feel such an emptiness in my heart. Here are a few pictures of earlier today. I will post more pictures soon. We also went to see Hayden and leave him a few things that Santa left for him. He got a stuffed santa and a stuffed Penguin.


Before the kids tore into the presents



















After the kids were done part of the living room















Another shot of after

Never a dull moment!!

How I wish that my life was boring. It never seems to end it is always something. Then when I think things are going good something else happens. I know it makes me more thankful for everyday I have with my children. It also reminds me that I am not in charge and that anything can happen. Preston had to go to Akron Children's for botox injections in his legs for his cerebral palsy. This is the second time that he has had it done but the first time he was knocked out cause it is when he had some other things done. This time they put him under heavy sedation. We stayed in the room with him. They gave him a couple of med's through an IV and when they started doing the injections they got one done and he started to wake up. The whole point is to keep him still and so that he doesn't feel the pain. Well when he started moving around they gave him another med to get him back under. Well it worked to well and he had an apnea spell. An apnea spell is where they quit breathing. So they started bagging him right away and they finished the botox injections. They stopped the one medicine they were doing and we were watching him. Then he had another Apnea spell on us. They bagged him again and then suctioned his nose out and he woke up. It scared the crap out of me. To me it was like living the day we lost Hayden all over again. I was watching these people around my son today putting a mask on him with oxygen and then bagging him and all i saw was Hayden laying there and all the people working on him. It was very scary for me and very hard to watch. After he woke up he was fine and we stayed for four hours so they could watch him. If he would of had anything weird they were going to keep him over night. He is acting fine now and we are home. Thanks to all who prayed for him. Prayers do wonders just look at my kids and they are all answered prayers.

Cookie Fun!!

Tonight I had to do some baking. So I let the kids help me do some cutout cookies. Good thing 2 year old's get bored fast. Gabe started helping me first and he is pretty good at it. Then after the babies had their bath I let them have a turn. Maddie liked it and did OK with it but she kept cutting out the same cookie and then why they were cooling on the table she kept stealing the cookies and trying to eat them. Preston wanted to be a part of the action as soon as he saw me making the cookie dough. He was thrilled when Scott held him up to the counter. He knew what to do right away. He even took the rolling pin and started to use it on the dough it was really cute. Before we did the cookies Preston decided to get into the food cupboard and throw things every where. The fun life of a 2 year old. I am really loving this age they are a lot of fun now and I love being able to do more things with them. It is harder at times but I like being able to bake with them and starting traditions with them. Here are some pictures of tonight..


Preston and Maddie making a mess
















Gabe making cookies

















Maddie


















Preston

Big day tomorrow!!

Tomorrow is another big day for us in the Sheridan house hold. Scott and I are getting one of the best Christmas presents ever. No we are not having a baby or getting a puppy. Way more awesome then that our little boy will be hearing with both ears. Yes we go tomorrow to get his second implant turned on. I am really excited but nervous at the same time. I love watching his face light up when he hears something new or how he watches us when we are talking to him. It is one of those things we take for granted until you have a deaf child. When I was growing up I always wanted to learn sign language. I always thought it would be a good thing to learn and at least know some of it. I never thought I would have a deaf child and then would have to learn it. Of course when I was growing up I didn't even know what a cochlear implant was. We started looking into the cochlear implants when Hayden was still with us. We were still waiting to get more testing done on both of the boys but we were pretty sure we were going to do the Cochlear implant with Hayden. Hayden most likely would not of been able to use his hands to talk to us through sign language. Now i also know that he might not of been able to talk. A lot of kids with cerebral palsy that is as severe as Hayden's would of most likely been are not able to talk. I wanted my baby boy to hear and hopefully communicate with us. When we were told that Preston had severe to profound hearing loss in both ears it was hard. I knew he had some hearing loss but never thought it was that bad. Hayden was most likely totally deaf. Preston has always been a very vocal child and he uses facial expressions alot. So all of the times I thought he could hear he couldn't. We still treat him like a hearing child and now more then ever it is important to do so. We talk to him all the time and everything else. I think everyone that is around us should learn some basic signs. We are teaching Preston to be verbal and hopefully by this time next year he will be talking alot but there will be times that he will want to sign or won't have his implants on. It is important to us that people still try to communicate with Preston like they would anyone else but we also have to learn how to communicate with him his way. One day he might decide he doesn't want to hear and not wear his implants at all. I hope that doesn't happen but we don't know. We did these implants to give our son a better future. He is a very bright child and him not hearing is holding him back in a lot of ways.

Goodbye Buffy!!

This morning we had my parents put our dog down. Buffy has been with me since she was about 6 weeks old and she would of been 15 in March. She was a really good dog and even knows we have not given her alot of attention lately we really did enjoy her. She was a mix breed but she was great with the kids. Most small dogs are real nasty around little kids and she wasn't. She would warn the kids with a growl or something but that is it. She would never try to bite them or anything and the kids could be mean to her. She was sick and it was her time to go. Now she is heaven with Hayden and probbly running like crazy. Hayden when he was with us always wanted to play with her and grab her when she ran by him but couldn't. He is probbly getting all sorts of kisses right now from her and probbly laughing his butt off. We will miss you Buffy and thanks for being such a great dog

Need to vent!!!

I just need to vent and this is about the only place I have to do that. First off today has marked 18 months since I lost my little boy. Today 18 months ago my life changed forever. My baby boy was taken from me I didn't get the chance to tell him goodbye. I was the one that found him in his crib. I was the one that couldn't do CPR and try to save my son. I was the one that freaked out and couldn't do anything. I was also the one that was blessed for 14 months with Hayden. As time goes on their are not that many people that talk about him anymore. It is heartbreaking or when I am telling people about my children I always mention Hayden and tell them that he passed on. I want someone to ask what he was like or something. Not basically run away cause my child passed away. I didn't ask for my child to pass away. But it is something i have to deal with everyday of my life. The first thing I think about when I get up is Hayden and he is also the last thing I think about at night. I thank God every night for my babies and I really know how lucky I am to have them.
When we found out I was having Triplets it was really hard to get excited at first. The first thing's going through your head is how are going to afford three babies, how early are they going to be and several other things. Then as the time went on I got excited how many people can say that they carried triplets or that they have triplets. I also felt very blessed that God gave me these three babies and that he thought I was strong enough to handle them. I think every child is a miracle don't get me wrong but when you see three babies be born that are 16 weeks early you really learn what a miracle is. I watched me babies open their eyes for the first time and they were two weeks old. I watched my daughter fight for her life for over 24 hours and she was maybe 1 pound at the time. These kids have taught me so much and they have taught me not to take life for granted. You do not know what is in store for you and you do not know if tomorrow is a given. I have learned that. If I could of kept my babies in another ten weeks i would of stood on my head and not complained about it. I would change things that happened when I hit that big 24 week mark. i would of gotten out of that bed for another couple of weeks no matter how much physical therapy I would need to regain my strength. What really upsets me are these people that do not listen to their doctors. That think that they are better then everyone else. That nothing will happen to them. I do not wish anything on anyone but some people just do not get it. I tried for over three years to have a baby. I had to take meds to get pregnant. I lost my first pregnancy cause it was an ectopic pregnancy. I then got pregnant with the triplets then watched them fight for weeks to live and still lost one after 14 months. I would of rather had Hayden for the 14 months then not have him at all. Of course i would rather have him still be with us but, I can't change that. Some people just need to wake up and see that anything can happen to them just because you think your crap doesn't stink does not mean anything won't happen to you. And no amount of money is going to change that either. Here are a few pictures of Hayden how I miss him. He was my baby and always will be. I love you baby boy and we will be together again someday.

Preston got his second Cochlear Implant

Well today was a big day for Preston. We left the house this morning at about 5:30am. We went and picked up grandma and off to Cleveland we went. I do not know how anyone lives in that town and deals with the traffic everyday. One time every so often is enough for me and I don't even drive it. We got lost and then got confused in the hospital on where to go. Rainbow children's is hooked to about five other hospitals and if you go the wrong way you are out of luck. We got to where we needed to be late but it was ok. We went back to pre op and sat back there for little more then an hour. He went back to surgery at about 9:40 am and then we all went to another waiting room about 5 minutes away from where he was. Which I didn't care for but they had this Ronald McDonald room and it was for anyone that had a child that was having surgery or was in the hospital. It was pretty nice and we were able to have a pop and wait for Preston. The audiologist came and got us a little after 11:00 am and told us everything went great. They tested his implant before they closed him up and it all went great. In a couple of weeks my baby boy will be able to hear out of both ears. When he got to recovery we went back to be with him and he was asleep. He woke up and we didn't have a very good time. He was pretty cranky of course and his oxygen levels were not the best. We were in recovery for a little over two hours waiting for him to get his oxygen levels up. We got home about 4:30 or so this after noon. Right now he is watching TV with daddy. He is all bandage up and looks like he has been through war. I do not know what they did to him in the Operating room but I am not very happy. I expect some things to happen to him but he is bruised around his eyes and nose and then has a couple of bruises on his chest. This is from the tape that they used for his eyes and the leads that were on him. This has not happened before and it really looks like they must of yanked everything off of him. I am pretty ticked about it. They also did not clean up his face from where the tape was that was holding his breathing tube in place. So he has sticky stuff all over. He did get to have Denny's on his way home and he was starving. Here are some pictures of him.


Picture of him















You can see the bruise on his nose and around his eye
















His other eye