Wasting Time

mmkay, so i'm home (well, i've been home since sunday evening). the trip was long but good, and i am very excited to be home and hang out with max. well, actually he's at daycare today, and i really should be working on the dissertation. but i feel the need to blog out my various frustrations first.

first, my house was a complete disaster when i got home, and now i have to waste a bunch of time cleaning it and putting things back where they belong. seriously, i don't think the floor got mopped once while i was gone because it was disgusting. also, none of max's plastic/vinyl bibs with the pocket to catch dropped food got cleaned either, and they were just piled on the kitchen counter, covered in dried-on food. actually, every square inch of counter space was piled up with something. which makes cooking a bit difficult. also, the dishes that i washed tuesday night were still in the dishwasher, even though i specifically told chad that they needed to be taken out because the plastic cups and bowls don't get dry in there, and leaving them wet invites mold and germs. gross. there's really no excuse for not keeping up with household chores because his mom was here wednesday through friday, and she took max to spend the night at her house friday night and brought him back saturday before dinner. i think she hand-washed some dishes, but she didn't take the valves out of max's sippy cups, even though once again i specifically told chad to take the valves out and wash them separately in the basket in the dishwasher. if you don't take the valves out, milk/juice gets trapped between the valve and the spout, and the cup isn't really clean. i couldn't find a clean cup for max sunday night, so i had to wash one, then chad told me the dishes in the dishwasher were clean. but they were the ones that were still in there from tuesday night. and all the plastic things still had water on them. not cool.

chad got his mom to do max's laundry, but i'm pretty sure she either used the scented dryer sheets or put fabric softener in with his laundry, which means i have to re-wash all that stuff. when i opened the drawer to get out an outfit for max to wear yesterday i could smell the strong perfume-y smell before i even picked anything up. even if he didn't have hives, that would be bad for max, what with the eczema and all. what's the point of using hypoallergenic laundry detergent if you're going to use a scented dryer sheet or liquid fabric softener? anyway, i had to do max's laundry yesterday anyway because he only had one clean pair of pants, and his sheet, changing table cover, and high chair cover didn't get washed while i was gone. again, even though i specifically told chad that he needed to do laundry one day while i was gone and to make sure he washed those things. he could have at least passed that message on to his mom.

chad has been working on getting the dining room/foyer prepped for painting for a while now, and while max was at his parents' house he painted the ceiling, baseboards, and trim in there, including the columns and shelves that separate the dining room and foyer and the closet door. he also changed out the light fixture and the doorknob on the foyer closet. i appreciate that he wanted to improve the look of our house, but he left crap piled up everywhere, which makes me crazy.

oh, and i have a cold or something. i feel like complete crap. i kept waking up last night because my throat was hurting. it still hurts. and i am So Tired. i don't want to work today. i'd rather sleep all day. but then i'd feel bad for taking max to daycare today, even though if he were here i wouldn't be able to nap anyway.

yesterday, max had his appointment with the allergist, and that was a big fat waste of time because they can't do allergy tests until thursday. max actually looks a lot better now, even though he hasn't had any atarax since thursday. he still gets a few welts here and there, and they get pretty bad after a bath or when he gets hot, but they don't really seem to bother him.

anyway, so the allergist asked a bunch of questions yesterday about when max last had atarax, what he eats on a regular basis, previous illnesses, if he's ever had peanuts/peanut butter (yes, twice), etc. to determine what allergy tests they need to do. food allergy is definitely a possibility, and some of max's stomach viruses might not have actually been stomach viruses but a reaction to food instead. same thing with his cold/runny nose. she looked in his ears because he kept rubbing his ear (i thought it was itchy; he's been rubbing them ever since he got hives, and then they turn bright red), and they looked fine. she also looked in max's nose, which has been runny again for a week or so. she said one side looked like a cold, but the other side was paler, which is indicative of allergies. she also said that hives caused by antibiotic allergies can last for up to a month, so it could still be the amoxicillin. for now, she said they'll have to treat him like he's allergic to penicillin.

anyway, the reason they couldn't do allergy tests yesterday is because atarax stays in the body for 7 days (even though they told the nurse from pediatrician's office that we had to keep him off it for 5 days). the doctor wrote us a prescription for orapred (if he has to take it, this will be max's 3rd round of steroids) and said to use that instead of atarax if we need it because it won't interfere with the allergy tests. umm, the pediatrician so could have done that. i'm so pissed. we wasted so much time in there, when they could have told the pediatrician that we had to take max off atarax for 7 days (not 5 like they said) and that we should use orapred instead if needed. but no, instead we wasted a day just talking to the allergist (she was really nice, though), and now we have to go back thursday, which is when max is supposed to have more blood work to test his antithyroid antibody levels again. but i might wait for that until friday, because i don't really want to take him to get that much blood drawn and get allergy tests in the same day.

ok, frustrations vented. time to clean/work.