Who Needs A Thyroid Anyway?

In the first few days of March 2020, I went to the Davis Hospital to have a thyroidectomy. After years of trying to get my Graves' disease under control, my doctor and I decided that it would be best to just take the whole thing out.  He sent me to an ear, nose, and throat doctor to perform the actual surgery.

Of course David took the day off and came with me. We had lots of help from family and friends with our kids.  I think everything went smoothly - I mean, I was pretty much out of it the whole time, so I'm not SURE...  I THINK I might have told the doctor and nurses that the Davis Hospital is a "white trash" hospital right before the anesthesia kicked in.  I hope I didn't say it out loud.  But seriously - I've had a LOT of surgeries and this was the least impressive hospital of them all...

The recovery room in the "white trash" hospital was an experience.  David was allowed to be with me. It was a room with several beds divided by a curtain.  The man in the bed next to me was VERY vocal!  He was in pain, I guess. He moaned and whined very loudly!  It made coming out of anesthesia very strange.  But, after a while, he left us in peace.

 As far as the results went: in post-op lab work, they found a small cancerous tumor in my thyroid.  So I guess it was the right move to remove it!  The recovery was very fast and the scar is hardly noticable now (thanks to my ultra wrinkly neck that hides it). 

 

Quinton Turns Six!

What a darling little Birthday boy!  Quinton's sixth birthday was one for the history books!

I sure love this kid!  He is SOOOOO loved by his entire family - you can totally tell he's the youngest! He gets away with everything! When he's naughty, we all just laugh and say, "Isn't he adorable?"  But seriously, isn't he?!?

His day started out with opening his presents.  Then he went to school.

His kindergarten teacher is the BEST - literally!  All five of my kids have had excellent kindergarten teachers, but none have been as good as Ms. Angella.  She is a special human being!

Birthday celebrations in Ms. Angella's class are next-level.  They do it right before school ends, so everyone gets their backpacks and coats on, then they sit in a circle and the birthday kid comes up.

The birthday kid walks in a circle around a sun while the class sings, "The Earth goes around the sun, and Quinton turns one." Then, he stops and the student's parent shows everyone a picture of them when they were one. They tell the class what the kid was like when they were one - what their favorite thing to do was or their fave food, etc.  The whole process is repeated - the song while they walk around the sun, the picture and story - until they turn six. 

Then, instead of bringing treats (NDPA doesn't allow food in classrooms due to allergy issues) the birthday kid gives a birthday gift to the class. It is their favorite book which will go into the class library. Quinton chose "Fortunately." 

Finally, the birthday kid goes around the circle and each kid chooses whether to hug or high five them. Watching the kids genuinely celebrate Quinton was my favorite part of the whole thing!  It was so sweet!

Once kindergarten was over, Quinton and I still had half a day alone. We went to the store and he chose his own birthday cake.  This was the one he chose.  

Then I took him to his favorite restaurant for lunch. Yum!  Chinese food is the best!!

That night, we took him and the family to Golden Corral.  Talk about spoiled!  The staff even came over and sang to him!

After eating dinner at a buffet, nobody could eat the cake. So we just sang to him, let him blow out his candles, then we saved the cake for the next day.

Pretty good day, right? I think for our little six year old, it was "Practically Perfect In Every Way."

Some Random Pictures

So I obviously have very few pictures from the month that I was in bed dying.  But here are the few that I have:

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One of the worst parts about having neuropathy is that sometimes I will be going about my normal day and I'll look down to find something like this.  I have no idea how it happens. I just find myself bleeding, or a huge blister, etc.  It's happened more than once.  I have to visually inspect my feet daily.

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While I was sick, our neighbor Easton invited Quinton over to make a cute teddybear cupcake craft.  His mom, Melanie sent this photo to me a few minutes later.  Quinton's cupcake looks a little more....um....abstract than Easton's.  Ha ha! 

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One day, Quinton's class had a Spanish fiesta. He wore a red bandana with his white shirt and looked super dapper.  He's the one on the left in the middle row.  

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One night when I was super sick, my brother Dave called and said that he wanted to feed my family dinner.  He took everyone's orders and brought them food from Burly Burger!  I mean, full-sized meals and giant shakes!!! I don't even want to imagine how expensive it was for him! But it was so thoughtful! Everyone was so excited for their Burly Burger picnic on the floor.  What a kind, generous thing to do! 

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Quinton needed to get a cavity filled in February. He is pretty funny when he is on laughing gas.  He is always very quiet and stoic around people he doesn't know. The laughing gas didn't really change that. If anything, it made him even more stoic.  But, he did raise his hands slowly off the armrests of the chair and start performing a flowy, hula-like dance with them in the air when he thought no one was looking.

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I olny have three pictures of Valentine's Day. I had planned on being in surgery for my thyroid and not really celebrating, but my illness bumped that back a little ways. So I was home after all and recovering from pneumonia.

David surprised me by giving me a huge, soft, Minky Coture blanket.  When he gave it to me, I bawled my eyes out!  I'm not sure if that was the effect he was expecting it to have on me, but I was so grateful and touched! It was beautiful, unbelieveably soft, expensive, and the most thoughtful, timely gift I've ever recieved! I probably didn't do anything for him. I was a loser that month, I tell ya!

The other two pictures I have from Valentine's Day are of food (shocker). One is of a tray of Sushi from our local grocery store.  Sushi is kind of a love language for most of the people in this family.

The other is of our traditional heart shaped pizza from Papa Murphy's. It just wouldn't be Valentine's Day without it.

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This one doens't have a photo to go along with it, but I want to keep it in our family history.  One day while I was lying in bed with pneumonia, I overheard Bronson and Quinton in the other room.  They were being kind of snippy with each other - not really fighting, but certainly not being kind to each other either.  Quinton said something (I don't remember what) and Bronson retorted with, "Sucks to be you, Quin." I wasn't thrilled with this kind of talk and honestly, I expected Quinton to say something rude back. Then it would escalate into a full blown fight within a matter of minutes as usual.  Instead, Quinton quickly replied, "Actually, Bron, it doesn't suck to be me. I have a really good life." And the fight ended there. Basically, I'd witnessed a miracle.

The Month That Time Stood Still

 On Monday, January 27th, I went in to the Crossfit gym for my scheduled turn at the playcare center. On the drive there, I started to feel a little sick. I thought, "Oh no. I don't want this right now!" Luckily, I didn't have any toddlers or kids that needed me to hold them that day, so I just tried to keep everything sanitized and not hold any kids on my lap that day.  By the time my shift ended, I was feeling pretty miserable. 

This is the one and only pic I have from early on in the month during the strep throat week. I think I was trying to show off my cool nails.

I went home and set up an appointment with my doctor's office. Oddly enough, I don't really have a doctor per se.  I have a MILLION specialists, it seems, but not a regular family doctor.  So I just saw the person on call.  I went in and told them my symptoms, they ran a strep test, and it came back positive. Slam dunk. Strep's easy to treat!  I picked up my antibiotics, climbed in bed, and waited to feel better.

But as the days went by, I didn't get better.  In fact, I got really, really sick.  I drove the kids to school, then I would go home and lie in bed, staring at a wall for most of the day. It sucked!  But I was hesitant to go back to the doctor because I was already on antibiotics.  After a week, however, I caved and went back.  This time a different doctor was on call.  I told them my symptoms, they ran a flu test, and it came back positive.  So now, the strep was gone, but I had picked up influenza. Crap. It was a bad one. Puking, fevers, cough.  I'd had my flu shot too!!

Back to bed I went for another week of wall staring.  Again, as the days past, I got more and more sick.  Finally, after two solid weeks of being virtually bedridden, David took me back to the doctor's office for a third time.  I don't even remember it super well.  All I remember is that I was so tired and hot and out of it that I wanted to lay down on the floor in the waiting room, but David said I shouldn't. Again, we saw the doctor on call.  This one ended up taking an x-ray and diagnosing pnemonia. I THINK he said something to the effect of "I would send you to the hospital right now, but your oxygen levels aren't bad enough." but maybe I imagined that part. 

He prescribed some pretty heavy duty drugs and I eventually started feeling better. But it literally took a month out of my (and therefore my family's) life.  I missed so much! My kid's school and sporting events, my church calling, my business, even family dinners, etc. were just put on hold for a month.  

People brought us food, treats, took my kids to school and events, and checked in on us often.  I was so grateful for all the help others gave us.  But the REAL hero was David! He worked all day, took care of the kids and the home and the laundry, etc at night, and nursed me with patience and gentleness. It's no secret that he doesn't love doing all those chores (nor wrangling the kids to help) but he literally did it without complaint. He was so wonderful! So were the kids, really.  They helped out a lot during that time and were very understanding of how absent I was for a while. I was very blessed. 

More January Fun

January was a busy month. Here are a few highlights:

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Quinton's stitches healed up nicely.  If only we had thought to ask his doctor to stitch him up in the shape of a lightning bolt!  How cool would THAT scar have been?!?

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One great thing about funerals is all the family time they create.  I think Quinton and McKenna got tired of hanging out with us, so they played video games together most of the time. McKenna was super cute and patient with her MUCH younger cousin.

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Basketball season was on!  Joshua played on his fifth grade Jr. Jazz team. 

They did really well, and I LOVED watching Josh get more and more confident in each game.

Nicole played on her Jr. High team. She wasn't really lovin' it.  She didn't want to even try out, but I convinced her to at least go to one day of tryouts and see how she felt.  Well, she accidentally made the team.  She was SOOO mad at me for making her try out.  I told her that I would support her quitting if she would be brave enough to tell the coach herself.  She tried.  He wouldn't let her give up. So she begrugingly stayed on the team.  I think in the end, it was fine.  She even liked it in some ways.  But it was the last year of her basketball career.

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For Christmas, Grandma and Grandpa Gee gave us movie tickets.  We went to see Jumanji 2. Here, the kids are recreating the movie poster (Quin is the baboon).

It was fun.  I always get a little thrill when I see all my kids lined up in a row.  They are the best!

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Our annual membership to the Sea Quest Aquarium was about to expire, so I took the littles one last time.

This pirate was teaching the boys something. I was proud of them for acting like they didn't already know every single thing he said.  They have a TON of knowledge about marine life (especially the stuff at the aquarium since we had an annual pass) but they were polite enough to just sit an listen.

Last time posing on the tortoise statue for who-knows-how-long.  We have a million photos of our kids on this guy.

Trying to touch a shark.

Look at the little guy! They are pretty shy. It's not very often that you actually get to touch one.

But that never stops the boys from getting arpmit-deep in fish poop water trying to touch them. They always left with soaked shirts. There wasn't enough hand sanitizer in the world to satisfy me whenever we left the aquarium. 

The thing the boys were going to miss the most was these little fishes. You put your arms in the water and they come up and nibble on you.  They eat dead skin. Oh how the boys love it!  They would stay all day if I let them.

I HATE it!  It makes my skin crawl (pun intended). Maybe it has something to do with my neruopathy, or maybe I'm just a wimp, but it really gives me the willies!

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Alison was having a BLAST on the Davis High School debate team!  She discovered that she was actually quite good at it (I told her she would be)!!! 

She and her team mate Malani did PF (Public Forum) together and often won - or at least placed in their tournaments. Parents aren't really allowed to go watch (or at least no one ever does and it's kind of embarrasing if someone's parent does come) so we never saw her compete and we never took any pictures.  These were stolen from her Instagram. But judging by her trophies, she was really good!

A VERY Close Call

Do you remember how I said that my sister Kristin had nearly talked me into getting a dog when she drove me to Grandma Church's graveside service? I think I mentioned that we visited a shelter on the way home, right? Well we didn't go home with an animal that day, but the people at the shelter discussed the possibility of me becoming a foster home for them. They had one animal in particular they were needing help with...

HAZEL...

Would you just LOOK at that face?!? How could I resist?!? 

We met this gigantic beauty while we were there, and I instantly fell in love with her.  She was a 1-2 year old mastiff. Her story was heartbreaking.  It was clear that Hazel had very recently given birth to a litter of puppies.  But the owner had dumped her at an animal shelter in the middle of the night.  See, Hazel has a genetic spinal disease called spondylosis that is semi-common in Mastiffs. The person who bred her probably thought it would be easier to sell the puppies (who probably also have the genetic disease) without their sick momma around.  Jerk...  Hazel was in a lot of pain and was very depressed from being dragged away from her puppies when she first arrived at the shelter. She lost a ton of weight and had to be hand fed for a while. She was doing better, but she still wasn't expected to live for more than a couple years.  Because of that, the shelter was looking for a family to love her and care for her in a hospice kind of situation.  Now THAT is sadly something my family has done before.  The shelter was willing to pay for her meds (she takes a lot for pain) and vet visits - and even help with food if we would take her.  It sounded like a win/win to me. So of course, I said we'd give it a try.  We filled out all the applications, etc. and went to the shelter to pick up our baby. We told them we'd need a weekend to see how it went before committing to anything.

This is a very short video of us picking her up from the animal shelter and getting all her supplies.

From almost the very instant we got her in the van, I started questioning my sanity.  I have always loved big dogs. They are my faves and I've dreamed of having a Rottweiler or a Mastiff.  But I never FULLY comprehended the strength and power of them until I had one in my van trying to sit on my lap!  She was enormous!  Like, her back legs were on the back seat of the van and her head was resting on the front console!  

Most of the time, Hazel was so sweet! But remember, she was only 1 or 2 years old - she was still a puppy!  She had a ton of energy! And puppy energy is cute when they are 10 pounds, but terrifying when they could literally fit your whole face in their mouth. Not to mention the fact that she could (and did) eat food right off the kitchen table without even trying to jump up. Nothing was really safe from her!

There were also times when Hazel would become agitated.  I think it was because her meds were wearing off and she was in more pain.  Poor girl!  But still - poor girl or not, she seemed kind of dangerous.  Even I was a little frightened, and I'm 6 feet tall!  Once we left Hazel with the kids for a few minutes while David and I ran to the grocery store and when we came back, the kids were standing on the kitchen table in fear.

When her meds were first administered, Hazel was lethargic and sleepy. That was also heartbreaking to watch - a poor drugged-up dog!  Then, she'd be playful and destructive, then she'd be agitated and in pain. It was a constant cycle. And it was staggering how much food that girl ate! Feeding her would be a very expensive endeavor! Plus, walking her would be impossible! Of course, she was probably in too much pain to walk much, but if she wanted to dart out and attack another dog - or a person for that matter - we wouldn't be able to stop her. She did slip out of our front door once and the pannic it created was REAL!!

By the end of the weekend, we all knew that we could not keep Hazel. She was just too powerful for us! It KILLED me to admit it! I didn't want to make her go back to a kennel.  And my pride was bruised - I didn't want to admit defeat. But another part of me was glad to take her back and let our home return to DEFCOM 1. We sure lucked out that we decided to give it a trial run for the weekend! What if we had outright adopted her?!?  I was waiting at the doors on Monday morning to give her back and say it wasn't going to work. 

But I think we all wish it could have turned out differently.  We talk about Hazel often and in hindsight we can laugh at how destructive and terrifying she was.  We all love her, and we hope she found the right home for her needs.

Grandma Church's Burial

On the day after Grandma Church's funeral, a few of us went to Delta for her burial. Not everyone could come because of work and school. From our family, only Quinton and I went. We drove with Kristin and Payton. We had a fun time, but by the time we got there, Kristin had nearly talked me into getting a dog. She's very persuasive. We even stopped at an animal shelter in SLC on the way home. Luckily, we didn't come home with any pets.

Delta is the hometown of both Grandma and Grandpa Church. Several relatives still live there. Even though I've only visited there, it's always felt kind of like my home town. I love everything about it and if David wasn't so darned allergic to the sagebrush all around, I'd demand that we live there.  It's kind of hard to believe that we don't really have any reason to visit there anymore. No more family reunions, trips with the grandparents, etc. I am going to have to make an effort to go once every few years or so - maybe on Memorial Day or something.

Here are seveal photos from the day.  For some reason, they're all scrambled up, but I'm too lazy to rearrange them so here they are in random order:

The Smith family daughters: Katie, Kelley, Kristin, Jenny

David and Jenny

I'm not sure who took this one, since I'm in it. But it's a nice photo of the crowd,

Payton, someone I don't recognize, and Scott.

Kristin and Scott

Quinton walking amongst the headstones. He was in kindergarden at the time, but I knew I wouldn't be able to take him or pick him up so he had to skip school and come with me.

Payton. I love this picture so much.

Me and John's wife, Christy.

Cousins: Payton, Quinton and Megan. Quin was SOOOO mad at me because I wouldn't let him stay in the car and play games on his tablet.  Oh, brother.

We interrupt the graveside photos for a photo of our family eating at the Rancher Motel Cafe afterwards. This is a favorite stop of ours every time we visit Delta. 

All five of us siblings at the cafe: Scott, Kristin, David, me, Katie

Jenny, me, and my cousin Paul's wife Mandy

The headstone

I don't know the names of these people (except my mom and Sue). They are some of my mom's cousins that still live around Delta.

A special, hallowed place in my family. Lots and lots of relatives there. Kind of like the Sugar City Cemetary on David's side of the family.

Rest in peace, Grandma.