Recovery & More Words

This past week and a half the boys have been very sick and it turns out my hunch was right, they probably had/have the dreaded RSV. Thankfully they don't seem to have caught a bad case, and while I did hear significant wheezing in each boy, it was only at night or early morning and during the increased reflux attacks caused by the post-nasal drip. It's really just a wicked horrible cold, but RSV is a tricky bastard that within a matter of just a few hours can mean a trip to the hospital. Only Cameron really struggled with it enough at the doctor's office, we couldn't get his pulsox over 95% no matter what we tried. So he needed Abuterol steroid inhalant nebulizer treatments (which he HATES) and some oral steroids. It's not surprising that Cameron did a good bit worse than Evan considering the trouble he had learning to breathe, and we had been warned by the pulmonologist that this would probably happen, and my in fact get worse as he gets older and comes in contact with worse variations of this virus. Poor Evan was the one who got sick first and while he was miserable he recovered after only four days. Both boys will still have a wicked cough for at least another week I think.

During our doctor's visit the boys got hysterical when we stripped them down and weighed them and took their temperatures. You'd think we were stabbing them. But the poor things have been through this way too many times to not always assume that something painful is about to happen, so I don't blame them for being upset. But in his new fashion, Evan told both the nurse and then the doctor several times "Bye-Bye!" and gave them a very dismissive wave of the hand. It was very clear that he wanted this to be over and done and the nurse and doctor to be gone.

NEW WORDS
Cameron is now repeating much more of what we say so it is getting trickier to know if he is really using the word or just imitating, but every day he uses everything in his repertoire that he can. This morning when he woke up he screamed "Oc-pus!" for his toy octopus, then screamed even louder for "Mommy, Daddy, Eban (Evan)". Some of Cameron's other new words:

Beads
Water
Car
Cup
Chair
Hot (But this is used in the context of do not touch)
Open
Close
Ah-choo
Feet
Elbow
Hair
Chin
Mouth (pronounce Mowf)
Teeth (pronounce Tee)
Glasses (pronounced Gahss)
Hug (more specifically he says "A hug.")
Night-night (pronounced Nigh-nigh)
Bells
Owl
Shoe
Sock (pronounced Sah!)
Tunnel
Knock-knock (pronounce Nah-nah)
Me
Mine (but he doesn't know how to use it to say that "something is Mine")
Cameron (Pronounced Cah-mon, but he does not yet understand the question "what is your name?")
Banana (pronounced Nana)
Hot Dog

One other adorable but odd thing that he is doing is carrying around one yellow rubber boot. He totes it around the playroom, refusing to put it on his foot but knows exactly that that is where it goes.

Evan
He's babbling non-stop now. He's trying to say stuff but he's so busy doing the talking that he's not really saying a whole lot of words very clearly as they get mashed up in all the babble, but they are there if you listen carefully.

Water (pronounced Wha-wa)
Up
Down (pronounced Dow)
Open
Closed (pronounced Opeh)
Nose
Eye
No
Elmo
Dog (pronounced Dohg)
Knock-knock (pronounced Nah-nah)
Mommy
Daddy

We have a new bed time routine that really makes us laugh. We've been reading the book "Cornelius P. Mud, Are You Ready For Bed?" by Barney Saltzberg. We often add in our own questions to the boys about what they need to do to get ready for bed. Each question is answered by Cameron with a resounding No or Yes as appropriate, while Evan gives big goofy grins and rolling his eyes as his response. At the end of all the questions we ask "What else do you need?" and Cameron's response is always "A hug." and then we all hug. At this point Cameron points to the door and says "Nigh-nigh" and we all march upstairs and put the boys to bed with no more tears, no vomiting, no anxiety, no arching of backs, etc. It's a beautiful thing.