welcome to spiceland.

Last night at dinner, we were at a restaurant. I was feeding Heidi bites of baked potato with butter and cheese and signing “more” to her with each bite. I looked away to participate in the conversation, and when I looked back at Heidi, she was signing “more!” What a smart girl!

We got the results from the EKG and the EEG today, and both were normal! This means that Tru’s episode wasn’t due to a heart arrhythmia or defect or a seizure disorder like epilepsy. Great news! We were told the EEG results wouldn’t be back until next week, but it’s a big relief to have gotten them back earlier.

Logging GPS in Keith’s RC Plane

We put a custom designed GPS logger in Keith’s rc plane. The cool part of the video starts 2/3 of the way in. I take the logged data and show it in Google Maps and Google Earth.

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Here are some direct links to Google Maps (click on “view in Google Earth” for the really cool version) :
Keith’s RC Stryker
Keith’s Green Plane

We had Tru’s EEG to measure brain activity this morning. An EEG (Electroencephalography) records the electrical activity of neurons firing in the brain. EEGs are especially effective at diagnosing epilepsy and other seizure disorders. In preparation for the test, we had to keep Tru awake until 1 AM last night. Wonderful, sweet Mike let me sleep from 8 PM to 11 PM. I couldn’t go back to sleep, so the four of us (after Heidi woke up from a very late nap) watched Star Trek: The Next Generation until 1 AM. Tru conked out quite easily. This morning, I had to wake her at 5 AM and keep her awake until her 9 AM appointment, so we were quite tired by the end of the test.

Tru films Heidi before the test.

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Tru preparing for the test. The nurse took her to the test room and explained the procedure while I was in the bathroom. The chair Tru is sitting in is for the mother to hold the child if the child is too distraught to lay in bed. We did not have to use it.

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During the test.

The nurse scrubbed Tru’s scalp with a q-tip and put leads all over it with a gunky, conductive substance. Tru did not like being dirty one bit. The nurse then wrapped her head so that the leads would stay put, and Tru didn’t like this either. I thought she would have fun laughing at how silly the test was, but she was just too tired and cranky to enjoy it.

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First, the nurse measured her brain activity with Tru lying quietly on the bed. Then she asked Tru to close her eyes for a minute. Next, Tru had to blow a pinwheel for 4 minutes. I demonstrated to get her started and intermittently to keep her going, and I was totally out of breathe. I don’t know how Tru managed to do it for so long! The nurse said that 4 minutes is usually a pipe dream in a child as young as Tru, but she did blow most of that time. Next, she measured Tru’s brain activity while flashing her open and closed eyes with a strobe light with the light strobing at different intervals. Finally, Tru rested with the lights off for about 30 minutes. The hope was that she would fall asleep, but she never did go completely to sleep.

When we were finished, Tru’s hair was very dirty and gunky! She was not a happy camper, but Chicken McNuggets and Sprite cures anything. We immediately went to McDonald’s for lunch and home for a nap. Now that we’re awake, all of us are feeling much better! We should get the results of the EEG in about a week and a half. Cross your fingers!

Happy belated St. Patrick’s Day! We spent yesterday sick, and not one of us wore green! However, Tru received this card from Missa and Papa and wanted to respond.

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I took this video of Heidi crawling this morning, and Tru wanted to be on video, too. She is feeling much better after her 2-day stomach bug.

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First things first!  New pictures of Heidi on page 2 of the Tru and Heidi 2009 album.

Poor Tru is sick. We spent all night Sunday night and Monday morning consoling her each time she threw up and cleaning her off. She took three baths and I changed the sheets 6 times that night.  Monday morning, we got some Zofran (anti-nausea) into her and she did fine all day. She had to stick to a strict  BRAT diet–bananas, rice, applesauce, and toast, in addition to Gatorade and juice.  She was fine all night last nigt, but first thing this morning she chugged a cup of juice and promptly threw up again. Zofran and the BRAT diet again today!

Mike was sick yesterday, too, and stayed home from work.  Heidi has a stuffed-up nose, and I had to take Seiko to the vet yesterday for an eye infection. Everybody in the family was sick except me!

Heidi has done quite a few new things lately. She started crawling backward at 8 months old, and within the past week, she’s learned to crawl forward.  She can say Mama, Dada, and Nana, but I’m sure she doesn’t understand what she’s saying.  She’s started eating more solid food, as evidenced by the pictures linked to above.  She loves mashed potatoes and carrots, as well as bready things like pancakes.  She’s got two teeth and may be working on one more.  She can pull herself up with a little support, and she can stand and cruise a little, too.  She’ll be 10 months old on Friday!

Tru got her EKG today. It went well, but we don’t have any results yet.  Here are pictures of her at the doctor’s office yesterday and getting her EKG today.

Strange thing happened at the doctor’s office. Dr. Zbell, Tru’s regular doctor who could not see us today, said, upon hearing that we’d left the ER early last night, “I know Dr. Bryant really wanted you to stay last night.”  Funny, Dr. Bryant told me on the phone last night that it would be fine if I left and I could just come into the office in the morning.  She never told me that we should stay, even when I told her I was calling to make sure I wasn’t making a dumb decision by considering leaving early.  Apparently after that, she talked to the other doctors and lamented that we left.  Oh, well. So nice of her to give me bad advice and then condemn the choice I made based on her advice. </sarcasm> The doctors are going to run some tests assuming that it could have been either a fainting spell or a seizure. She’s going to have an EKG tomorrow to look for heart arrhythmias, and later this week she’ll have a CT scan and an EEG to measure brain activity. They took blood today to look for an infection and possible anemia, but all her blood tests came back normal. We’ll keep updating as we find things out.

We had a scary night last night. We’d almost finished dinner when Tru looked at Mike and very confusedly said, “Daddy?” She just shut down and started leaning over. She fell out of her chair, and Mike had to catch her. She was shaking or twitching or something, and when she came to, she was very confused and unresponsive. We didn’t know whether it was a seizure or she had just passed out. She was looking all over the place and shaking, and she wouldn’t answer our questions. It took about 5 minutes before she was back to normal. We called 911, and the paramedics checked her blood pressure and oxygen levels, which were fine, when they got here. They stuck around asking questions for about ten minutes while we calmed down. Tru had been fine the whole time, so we drove to the ER ourselves. We got there about 9 and by 10:15, we still hadn’t even been triaged. By that time, we’d talked to Mike’s stepbrother who is a doctor. He assured us that it probably wasn’t a seizure, and Tru’s pediatrician told us we could take her home and come in to the doctor’s office the next morning. She’s got an appointment for 2:15.

She spiked a fever of 102 F 2 days ago, and she got a pretty good bump on the head with the car door about a week ago. I’m going to ask if either one of those events could have sparked this episode. I’m fairly certain it wasn’t food-related, though, because she ate and drank normally all day yesterday. I’ll update after the appointment.