Pulled Pork

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Pulled Pork cradlerockingmama.com

We’ve had a rough couple of days.

Most of it is non-FPIES related, so I won’t bore you with the details, but let’s just say I’ve been feeling very shaky.

Even if I’d been feeling great, though, yesterday would have brought me down.

Yesterday, Zac reacted to the pork.

It’s been a fairly mild reaction in a lot of ways; no vomiting, no lethargy, nothing at all scary or frightening.

But starting two days ago, he began eating less and less of the pork that was served to him at each meal. Yesterday, he only ate a bite or two at breakfast, and flat refused all pork I served him the rest of the day.

After breakfast, the diapers started.

Nearly four years into the mothering gig and I have to tell you, I’ve never experienced the dreaded “blow out” diaper before. Just lucky, I guess.

Until yesterday morning, when Zac presented me with two such diapers – one so bad I had to hose him down from neck to toe in the bathtub. He stood there screaming, and actually physically shook while I rinsed him off.

Everywhere the poop had been, the skin underneath was bright red. The red faded quickly, for which I was grateful, but it was there.

By the third diarrhea diaper, he had a diaper rash.

I HATE changing my sweet boys diapers and having him squirm to get away from being wiped. HATE IT.

I didn’t see any blood, but his stool color had changed and it could have blended in somehow. I didn’t test the diapers, either. So I don’t know if he had any blood in his poop. It hardly matters; the other symptoms he had are enough to know the truth.

He seemed to lose his appetite for quinoa, too, for most of the day; by dinner time, he was hungry again and ate a ton of quinoa.

He comfort nursed all day long. Forty and fifty minutes at almost every nursing session.

The worst part is, while the food was making his insides a wreck, the NUTRITION from the food was making him blossom!

He is absolutely a different child than the boy he was last Friday.

He’s doing things he has NEVER done before, using his tongue to make noises and sounds, trying to say words, and energetic in a way that makes me think that IF we could get him enough nutrition, his energy levels would make Jed seem like a low-key child (when he is anything but a low-key child!).

It kills me. It absolutely kills me that Zac can’t eat pork any more.

The worst part is, I don’t know if it is the pork itself, something the pigs ate (barley is in their diet, and barley is a common FPIES trigger), or something in the processing.

Christina is A-MA-ZING! She works SO hard to raise healthy, GMO-free animals, and she truly cares about her animals and her customers. So much so, that she spent a day this week at her processors observing their methods and asking questions so she could confidently answer questions from severely allergic people like us about how the meat is handled.

Turns out, her processors, in order to appease USDA standards, spray the carcass of the animal with citric acid.

That’s corn, y’all.

They clean their equipment with chemicals that have bleach and chlorine, and use an isopropyl alcohol mist at one point.

That’s maybe (probably?) corn, too.

She said they cut the outside (the part sprayed with citric acid) off and don’t put that part in with the cuts that are packaged, but I have to wonder if that is enough for a child as sensitive as Zac.

Darrel and I are now debating whether we should buy a whole pig from her and somehow get it to a safe butcher so we can see if it is the pork or the processing that Zac reacted to.

It would be expensive and maybe a tad extreme, but it could answer a lot of questions about Zac’s sensitivity levels and what he can and cannot tolerate.

In the meantime, we ordered the expensive chicken feed for my parents and they started feeding their chickens a corn and soy-free diet, so in the near future we can trial eggs for Zac. This is nerve-wracking, because eggs are a tricky FPIES food.

I also ordered some raw sunflower seeds from a place that seems to have the least potential cross-contamination possible and plan to do whatever you have to do to turn that into sunbutter to trial for Zac. If he’s okay with sunbutter (even if I have to make it from total scratch), that would be wonderful; Jed eats sunbutter all the time, so then the boys could have the same food on occasion!

Also, it would potentially give us a safe “fat” in the form of sunflower oil.

I’m also planning to sprout quinoa to see if Zac will eat the sprouts for a more nutritious form of quinoa. At least it’s SOMETHING green.

And as soon as possible my mom and I are planning to grow spinach and beets, so they’ll be available to trial.

I’m feeling a bit defeated lately.

Some days you just can’t win for trying.

I hate FPIES.

How Living With FPIES is like Living With Domestic Violence

 
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How Living With FPIES is like Living With Domestic Violence cradlerockingmama

Please click over and read THIS before you continue to read this post. It will help clarify a lot of what I say in the following analogy. Thank you.

If you are or have been the victim of domestic abuse and violence, this post may upset you.

If you are currently in a domestic violence situation, GET OUT. There are links for help at the bottom of this post. You do NOT have to live like that. Start to believe this: people do care about you!

__________

Last week during a conversation about FPIES and food trials with a friend, I commented that “FPIES is like an abusive husband”.

Later on I thought a bit more about it and realized: I may have hit on something with that analogy.

Now, of course living with FPIES is not the same as living with domestic violence, not at all; but the psychological similarities were shocking to me when I thought about it. For me, the similarities served as a way to convey the emotional stress of living with FPIES to family and friends in a way they might understand. 

Here is a list of four general characteristics of battered woman syndrome:

  1. The woman believes that the violence was or is her fault.

  2. The woman has an inability to place responsibility for the violence elsewhere.

  3. The woman fears for her life and/or her children’s lives.

  4. The woman has an irrational belief that the abuser is omnipresent and omniscient.

Further, a battered woman is described as a woman who has been through two “battering cycles”. A battering cycle has three phases and is defined by the law as:

  1. tension building phase

  2. explosive battering incident

  3. honeymoon phase

How is FPIES like this?

On a daily basis for FPIES families, FPIES is everywhere (point 4). FPIES parents rearrange their lives to accommodate the often bizarre demands of FPIES. We change our habits, our diets, our routines, our “rituals”, our parenting styles.

We avoid play dates, social activities, interactions with people and places that were once meaningful because they are too risky with FPIES.

If we do go out in public, we’re on high alert at all times, knowing that the smallest thing could trigger FPIES (phase 1).

No matter where you go or what you do, FPIES is lurking…just waiting for you to let down your guard and “mess up”, triggering a physical attack on your child (phase 2).

And you do, indeed, fear for your child’s life (point 3). While there are no documented cases of FPIES children dying from the disease (that I know of, anyway), FPIES parents know this disease and understand that an FPIES reaction – left untreated – could potentially lead to death.

I’ve heard many FPIES Mama’s wonder how many cases of SIDS are actually undiagnosed FPIES babies who didn’t vomit and instead went straight to shock in their crib.

Even though FPIES parents know that FPIES is the reason our children are sick, we are the ones who feed our children.

So when we feed them a food that triggers FPIES, we feel guilty. It was OUR fault…WE did that to our child…I made my child sick (point 1).

We know , intellectually, that FPIES is the reason; because we are the parents, though, the people who are supposed to protect our children from everything and anything that could hurt them, we take the blame on ourselves. We internalize the blame and guilt and make ourselves feel worse.

Even more, there’s the nagging wonder many FPIES parents have that they, in fact, gave their child FPIES.

Some wonder if it was their genetics. Others wonder if it was what they ate during pregnancy, or some necessary medicine they took while carrying their child.

FPIES parents will feel guilty for triggering a reaction in their child even if they were following doctors orders! If the doctor insists on a food challenge, or tells the parent to push through symptoms or trial a new food, and that advice leads to an FPIES reaction in the child…well, we may  be upset or even angry at the doctor (especially if they didn’t listen to us) but in the end, we will be most likely to blame ourselves  for making our child sick (point 2).

After all, we’re the ones that put the food on their tray table. 

During food trials, FPIES even operates on a cycle that is strangely similar to the phases of domestic violence: 

  1. Tension building – first ingestion of the food, wait 2 hours (or longer) on pins and needles, watch every tiny action or sign from your child with your stomach in knots until the food trial persists long enough through that tension to prove the food safe OR…
  2. Explosive Incident – profuse vomiting, shock, diarrhea, dehydration, and possible hospitalization, followed by…
  3. Honeymoon period – once recovered from the FPIES reaction, your child will behave perfectly normal and happy and you’ll feel a weight lifted from your shoulders and a lightness in your belly…

…until the next food trial begins.

Women (and men) who suffer from domestic violence are often later diagnosed with PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). 

PTSD shows up in many different symptoms, generally grouped into three categories:

1. Re-experiencing symptoms:

  • Flashbacks
  • Bad dreams
  • Frightening thoughts

2. Avoidance symptoms:

  • Staying away from places, things or events that are reminders of the experience
  • Feeling emotionally numb
  • Feeling strong guilt, depression, or worry
  • Losing interest in activities that were enjoyable in the past
  • Having trouble remembering the dangerous event

3. Hyperarousal symptoms:

  • Being easily startled
  • Feeling tense or “on edge”
  • Having difficulty sleeping, and/or having angry outbursts

I wonder how many FPIES parents would or will be diagnosed with PTSD as time goes on? 

I may be completely wrong about all of this.

These are just some analogies I recognized and was startled enough by that I wanted to share, in case someone else might find this to be a way to explain to any family or friends who downplay your stress levels what life as an FPIES parent sometimes resembles. It might show them that you are, in fact, dealing with a highly stressful situation.

After all, after thinking this through a bit, I’m of the opinion that if we could somehow create a physical, human form of FPIES…we’d be able to have it arrested for abuse.

Or at least get a restraining order against it. 
__________

If you found this post because you are in an abusive relationship, I give you my sincere empathy and love. This post is meant in no way to diminish what you are experiencing or have experienced. This was written purely to express my thoughts about the seriousness of the disease my child (and many of my readers children) live with every day. Comparing FPIES to Domestic Violence is a striking analogy to convey the seriousness of FPIES; we all know how deadly and dangerous Domestic Violence is for its victims.

If you are in an abusive relationship, PLEASE GET OUT. Get help.

In the US: call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 (SAFE).

UK: call Women’s Aid at 0808 2000 247.

Australia: call 1800RESPECT at 1800 737 732.

Worldwide: visit International Directory of Domestic Violence Agencies for a global list of helplines, shelters, and crisis centers.

My Kitchen Sees A LOT of Action

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My Kitchen Sees A Lot of Action cradlerockingmama

After I shared our “Day in the Life of FPIES“, I got a lot of comments about how much time I spend in the kitchen and how focused we must be on food all the time. So I thought it would be fun to document everything we cooked for a week just to see if an FPIES/Fructmal Mama/family really does spend more time in the kitchen than most people.

Here is everything we cooked last week from Sunday to Saturday. Let me know if you think this is a lot of cooking or if I whine more than I should about how much time in the kitchen we spend!

Sunday:

  • One loaf of bread
  • Double batch hamburger hash
  • One serving of hash browns
  • One package of pork sausage
  • Two trays of quinoa tortilla bread
  • Pitcher of quinoa milk
  • One steak
  • Heated up one serving of quinoa for me
  • Heated up a bowl of quinoa for Zac
  • Heated up two 1 oz. servings of pork for Zac
  • One batch of candy bars without chocolate
  • Chicken, carrot and bell pepper stir fry w/ leftover mac ‘n cheese
  • Strained off pork broth that had cooked overnight
  • French fries for a snack
  • Ran the dishwasher twice

Monday:

  • Double tray of quinoa tortilla bread
  • More quinoa milk
  • Heated up leftover sausages
  • Heated up 1 oz. serving of pork for Zac
  • Made a triple batch of hamburger hash
  • Hash browns with chopped up leftover sausage
  • 2 hamburgers for Jed
  • Heated up dinner leftovers from Sunday night
  • Made a mix of Quinoa and ground beef stir fried in olive oil
  • Ran the dishwasher twice

Tuesday:

  • Made a double batch of hamburger hash
  • Made a pan of bacon (in the oven of course)
  • Three hamburgers
  • Cooked a steak
  • Made millet flour brown gravy w/fresh sliced mushrooms
  • Fresh green beans w/red bell pepper and mushrooms
  • Tray of quinoa biscuits
  • Quinoa/hamburger stir-fry mix for me
  • Bowl of rice cereal for Jed
  • Ran the dishwasher once

Wednesday:

  • Bowl of rice cereal for Jed
  • Steak and hash browns for my breakfast
  • Turkey sandwich w/ potato chips
  • Cut and served a bunch of candy bars
  • Heated up leftovers from last nights dinner
  • Ground beef/quinoa stir-fry mix for me
  • French fries for a snack

Being worn out from the reaction caught up to me today; I didn’t feel well and was very tired so went for leftovers as much as possible.

Thursday:

  • Rinsed and cooked a pot of quinoa (3 cups)
  • Piece of toast with sunbutter
  • Turkey sandwich w/ chips
  • Quinoa stuffed peppers
  • T-bone steaks
  • Big pot of mashed potatos
  • Homemade lemon-lime soda
  • More Quinoa/ground beef stir-fry mix
  • Ran dishwasher twice

Jed ate two bananas, too!

Friday:

  • Bowl of rice cereal w/ banana
  • Double hamburger hash
  • Sirloin steak
  • Leftover mashed potatos
  • Cooked another package of sausages
  • Ran dishwasher once

Another wiped out day; Jed ate lots of quick foods (leftovers, bananas, candy bars).

Saturday:

  • 10 pieces french toast
  • Heated up leftover sausages
  • Sliced bananas
  • Heated up 1 oz. of pork and quinoa for Zac
  • Steak and Hash browns
  • Pot of quinoa (4 cups)
  • Spaghetti squash
  • Pork chops
  • Green beans
  • Steak for me
  • Heated up more pork and quinoa for Zac
  • French fries as a snack
  • Cleaned out our deep fryer
  • Ran dishwasher twice

And of course, several times every day, I fed Zac bowls of quinoa. I only mention this because I may or may not have documented it each time, since all that involves is scooping quinoa from the big pot in the fridge into a smaller bowl for him! It doesn’t really feel like food preparation because it’s so easy!

So what do you think? Is that a lot of cooking or pretty normal for you, and are you an FPIES family or not?

I feel like it’s pretty normal; maybe even a little lightweight. I didn’t cook up any bones for beef broth this week, or dehydrate the broth. I also didn’t make any beef jerky or potato chips from scratch this week. And I couldn’t claim credit for the pork roast because I cooked that right before my “document the week” began!

Also, we had a bit of a rough week and a few days I just didn’t get much sleep, so, I was tired and went for our version of convenience food for a couple days there.

I should also point out that I am not the only person who did all this cooking. Some of these items were cooked entirely by Darrel on days that he was home. This was just to show what is cooked in our house in a week – not necessarily who cooked it! (Thank you, honey!)

__________

Have you ever written down everything you’ve cooked in a week? What did it tell you about your lifestyle?

False Positive?

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False Positive cradlerockingmama

Saturday Zac ate another ounce of pork at breakfast. Then he ate another ounce at dinner.

Throughout the day he was happy, pleasant, playful, and perfect.

He pooped a bit more than normal, and had hiccups for a few minutes in the afternoon, but that was it for anything remotely “not normal”.

Jed, being the precious, adorable child that he is, decided he didn’t want Zac to take a nap that day and devoted his energies (with great success) to preventing Zac from a reasonably timed nap.

Poor Zac finally fell asleep at 2:30pm, which is about half an hour after  he normally wakes up from his nap.

Thanks, Jed.

Jed then proceeded to fall asleep face down on the living room floor while his brother napped and I cleaned the kitchen.

That is a tired boy!

That is a tired boy!

Both boys woke up just about dinner time, which meant bedtime became the stuff of fairy tales; fun to think about, and based in no way on reality!

Sure enough, they didn’t go down for bed until after 11pm.

Sunday dawned bright and early, and Zac ate another ounce of pork.

Then he had a poopy diaper, and, even though it looked fine, I tested it for blood. (What can I say? I’m a little paranoid about food trials right now.)

I thought I was going to vomit when I watched the test change to blue.

Blue means blood is present, you see.

When I told Darrel, he literally just sat down on the floor and hung his head.

We stayed like that, Darrel on the floor, me standing motionless at the counter, for what seemed like forever (but was probably only a minute).

Time felt like it stopped.

Then Darrel looked up and wondered something aloud that I had started thinking at the same time: what if the test was wrong?

At that moment, Zac was sitting in his high chair, screaming for more pork.

He’d been FINE.

Better than fine! Since we’d restarted the pork the day before, he’d been climbing, running, jumping, smiling, making faces, interacting and trying to talk more than normal.

It felt like some big part of his personality, his soul, was finally being allowed to shine. 

I took this video about an hour after he ate breakfast. Does this look like an FPIES child having a reaction?

No, it does not. Especially after seeing last weeks video!

HOW could he have an FPIES reaction that causes blood in his stool when there were absolutely NO other signs? Last week, there was no doubt. The test showing positive for blood, the unbelievable behavior and screaming in pain…it was very, very clear he’d reacted to something.

But this? This time around, he’s not screaming in pain for no reason, he’s showing NO symptoms – except for the test saying his poop has blood.

So…could the test be wrong?

Suddenly energized by the desperate purpose of finding any way that these tests could be giving us a false positive, I grabbed the test kit and re-read the instruction manual. Then I hit the internet hard.

For anyone else who uses the at home fecal occult testing kits, here’s what I learned that might be useful to know:

Our tests do not actually test for BLOOD. They test for an element that can be present in blood.

That’s an important distinction! Basically, the paper of the test is made or treated with an acid that can be oxidized by hydrogen peroxide to turn blue. The reaction can be increased by adding peroxidase-like compounds.

The hemoglobin in blood is capable of exerting peroxidase-like activity, and thus makes the tests “do their thing”.

HOWEVER. They also advise us (in our testing kit, anyway) to NOT consume certain foods for two days prior to using this test on a sample. Foods such as rare and lightly cooked meats (especially red meats), cauliflower, turnips or broccoli, horseradish, radishes, cantaloupe, and iron rich supplements and foods high in iron.

Pork is said to be safe for these tests, but surely they’re talking about the horrible pork from the grocery store. The pork Zac is eating is a Heritage breed; as I’ve commented, the meat is RED in color.

A little more reading about Berkshire pigs and I learned that they are often called “the other red meat” by producers.

Perhaps…just perhaps…THIS pork is “red meat” enough to confuse the test!

Then I contacted some friends I knew would have particular expertise in this arena, and based on the conversations we had, Darrel and I came to a conclusion: we’re shelving the stool testing kits and pushing through. 

The little bit of mucous in his diapers and one incidence of hiccups would not be enough to make us worry about a reaction had we not tested his stool. So we’re going to stop testing the stool and simply observe his behavior.

Barring any obvious fail signs (like visible blood in his diapers, vomiting, or other symptoms), later this week I will contact our doctors and ask them to order a stool test via a lab that actually detects blood (not elements that are present when there is blood) to see if his diapers are clear after a full week.

Since we trialed pork for 3 days, took 4 days off, and will then have re-trialed it for a week, we may be brave enough to call it a safe food this Friday! (We may be cautious, and give it another week just to be sure, though!)

Sunday night, we gave him another ounce at dinner. He begged  for more.

Today, he will get an ounce at all three mealtimes. Tomorrow, if things are still going well, he can eat as much pork as he likes at each meal.

And God willing, things WILL go well, and we WILL discover pork loves Zac as much as Zac loves pork!

__________

As for Mr. Jed, well, I’m a little concerned about him. Falling asleep on the living room floor isn’t exactly normal for him. And if you notice, in the photograph he’s wearing clothes. My little streaker normally hates wearing clothes in the house, but the last few days he’s been saying he’s cold.

He’s not running a fever (I’ve checked), but he has told me a couple of times that his body hurts. He can never point to where his body hurts with any more specificity than that, though.

We’re speculating now…growth spurt, maybe? I don’t know, but we’re keeping an eye on him.

__________

So how was your weekend?

Frugal Friday – Make a Plan

 
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Make A Plan cradlerockingmama

We’re back to cleaning up our finances!

Today, we’re making a plan.

We’ve figured out how much money we have and where it is going, and we’ve figured out who we owe and how much. That last one was probably a little painful, right?

Have no fear! The next part is the liberating part of financial management: make a plan to dig yourself out of the hole (if necessary) and build yourself a solid rock of money to set your family down upon!

Let’s start with our fictional family from the last post. If you remember, they were coming up with a small amount of leftover money at the end of the month after expenses were tallied.

EXPENSES
Mortgage

1000.00
Car Notes

308.00
Phones

125.00
Electric

200.00
Water

40.00
Annuals

453.00
Groceries/Gas/Misc. Living

1457.00
Student Loan

152.00
Credit Cards

575.00
TOTAL

$4,310.00
 

 
INCOME

 
Job #1

2900.00
Job #2

1600.00
TOTAL

$4,500.00
Difference

$190.00

But they did have some debt, and they would be doing a WHOLE lot better if they didn’t have that debt hanging over their heads!

EXPENSES
Phones

125.00
Electric

200.00
Water

40.00
Annuals

453.00
Groceries/Gas/Misc. Living

1457.00
TOTAL

$2,275.00
 

 
INCOME

 
Job #1

2900.00
Job #2

1600.00
TOTAL

$4,500.00
Difference

$2,225.00

The first step on their road to recovery is: save some money.

Sounds ridiculous, right? How can we pay off debt if we’re saving our excess money?

Well, we can’t, technically. But what we can  do is start off by making sure we don’t accrue MORE debt as we journey through our plan.

If we’ve got at least $1,000 in liquid savings, then when we suddenly need new tires, or the ER copay of $250 hits, we’re not digging out a credit card to pay for the unexpected (and making our financial hole deeper)!

Step One of Paying off Debt: Save at least $1,000 in a liquid savings account.

Once we’ve achieved that goal (which for our fictional family will take a little over 5 months), then we can start paying off our actual debts.

There are a lot of thoughts and theories about this part. Financial people can sit down and tell you the exact method of paying off debt that will cost us the least amount of money, based on interest rates and payment amounts. I’ll make it simple for you, though.

The two ways to pay off debt are:

  • base your payoff schedule on the interest rate of the debt, OR
  • base your payoff schedule on the amount owed on the debt

If you go the “interest rate” method, you sit down and order your debts from highest interest rate charged to lowest interest rate charged. For our fictional family, it would look like this:

DEBT

TTL Owed

APR

Monthly
Credit Card

22,000.00

22.99%

500.00
Credit Card

4,000.00

12.99%

75.00
Car Loan

16,000.00

6.25%

308.00
Mortgage

118,000.00

4.75%

1000.00
Student Loan

48,000.00

2.75%

152.00
TOTAL

$208,000.00

$2,035.00

If you go the “amount owed” method, you sit down and order your debts similarly, but in reverse: lowest debt to highest debt. Our fictional family would have this list:

DEBT

TTL Owed

APR

Monthly
Credit Card

4,000.00

12.99%

75.00
Car Loan

16,000.00

6.25%

308.00
Credit Card

22,000.00

22.99%

500.00
Student Loan

48,000.00

2.75%

152.00
Mortgage

118,000.00

4.75%

1000.00
TOTAL

$208,000.00

$2,035.00

The “interest rate” method would have you start paying off your debt by first throwing every spare dime you have at the highest interest rate debt until that is completely paid off.

Our fictional family has $190 leftover after paying all their expenses. So their debt payment would change to look like this:

DEBT

TTL Owed

APR

Monthly
Credit Card

22,000.00

22.99%

690.00
Credit Card

4,000.00

12.99%

75.00
Car Loan

16,000.00

6.25%

308.00
Mortgage

118,000.00

4.75%

1000.00
Student Loan

48,000.00

2.75%

152.00
TOTAL

$208,000.00

$2,225.00

On that repayment schedule, it will take our fictional family over 2.5 years to pay off that first debt! (I’m keeping things very simple, and dividing the amount owed by the amount paid per month to come up with the number of months before zero balance. Interest paid over that amount of time will, of course, increase the number of months it takes to achieve zero balance.)

After they achieve that goal, they would then take the entire $690 they’d been putting towards paying that single credit card and apply it to the next debt on their list. Our fictional family now has a debt listing that looks like this:

DEBT

TTL Owed

APR

Monthly
Credit Card

1,600.00

12.99%

765.00
Car Loan

6,144.00

6.25%

308.00
Mortgage

102,000.00

4.75%

1000.00
Student Loan

43,136.00

2.75%

152.00
TOTAL

$152,880.00

$2,225.00

The good news is, 2.5 years in to this plan, they’d have paid off the second debt enough with their regular $75 a month payment that it will be paid off in just 2.5 MONTHS.

And then they’d repeat the process for the next debt:

DEBT

TTL Owed

APR

Monthly
Car Loan

5,528.00

6.25%

1073.00
Mortgage

101,000.00

4.75%

1000.00
Student Loan

42,832.00

2.75%

152.00
TOTAL

$149,360.00

$2,225.00

About 6 months of that, and the car is paid off! Then they’d tackle the mortgage, then the student loan, and 5.5 years later they would owe no money to anyone for anything!

TOTAL TIME TO FREEDOM: Just under nine years.

Hey – no one said financial freedom was cheap, easy or quick! Few things in life worth having are actually any of those things.

Besides, this fictional family can pay things off faster by throwing any extra money they come across (via income tax refunds, work bonuses, gift money, or pay raises) at their debt. So it’s possible they could shave a couple years off this path to financial freedom.

Now, I’ve just gone into great detail about how to use the “interest rate” method of debt repayment, but I have a confession: I hate that method of repaying debt! 

I never, ever use it. 

It takes far too long to see tangible evidence of the hard work that debt repayment requires, and I’m far too impatient to wait that long for the fruits of my labor.

For me, every time I pay off a debt and no longer have to make a monthly payment, I feel a surge of accomplishment and feel encouraged to “keep up the good work” and “stay the course”.

So I use the “amount owed” method of repayment.

Fortunately, it works the exact same way! Only you start with the debt you owe the LEAST on and work your way up. For our fictional family, I’ll show you the charts for how their repayment would go.

First debt:

DEBT

TTL Owed

APR

Monthly
Credit Card

4,000.00

12.99%

265.00
Car Loan

16,000.00

6.25%

308.00
Credit Card

22,000.00

22.99%

500.00
Student Loan

48,000.00

2.75%

152.00
Mortgage

118,000.00

4.75%

1000.00
TOTAL

$208,000.00

$2,225.00

A little over 15 months later:

DEBT

TTL Owed

APR

Monthly
Car Loan

11,380.00

6.25%

573.00
Credit Card

14,500.00

22.99%

500.00
Student Loan

45,720.00

2.75%

152.00
Mortgage

110,500.00

4.75%

1000.00
TOTAL

$182,100.00

$2,225.00

About 20 months later:

DEBT

TTL Owed

APR

Monthly
Credit Card

4,500.00

22.99%

1073.00
Student Loan

42,680.00

2.75%

152.00
Mortgage

100,500.00

4.75%

1000.00
TOTAL

$147,680.00

$2,225.00

FIVE MONTHS after that:

DEBT

TTL Owed

APR

Monthly
Student Loan

41,920.00

2.75%

1,225.00
Mortgage

98,000.00

4.75%

1000.00
TOTAL

$147,680.00

$2,225.00

Three years later that student loan debt is gone, and three years after that, the house is paid off, too.

TOTAL TIME TO FREEDOM: almost exactly 9 years. 

It might take a tad bit longer to achieve the same end results, but along the way it sure feels like you’re accomplishing more, and more quickly!

That’s enough to keep me sticking to the plan, but in the end, you have to decide which method works best for you.

Step Two of Paying Off Debt: Pick a Method and Start the Work

Again, along the way as we pay off our debt, we have to remember to throw any extra money that comes our way at it as often as we can, while keeping our $1,000 emergency fund fully funded.

But…what if we hate the idea that it will take NINE YEARS to pay off our debt?

Or worse, what if we aren’t as lucky as this fictional family and our expenses exceed our income?

Read the rest of the series:
Part One: Where Are You Standing Financially?
Part Two: Organize Your Debt
Part Four: Focus on the Details
Part Five: Design Your Dream Life

So which method do you like best? How many years will it take you to get out of debt?

Don’t forget to subscribe!

Rolling Hills Traeger Ranch

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Rolling Hills Traeger Ranch - Lorraine with a Rainbow - cradlerockingmama

When it came time to consider another meat trial for Zac, I admit to being at a bit of a loss.

My awesome lamb guy only raises lambs.

We’re pretty confident chicken (so probably turkey and other poultry) is a trigger, so we didn’t want to go there.

Game meats are supposedly good, but as sensitive as Zac is we were unsure of animals who may have eaten anything – including corn – while they wandered the woods.

What’s left?

Then one of my friends shared how her son, another sensitive reactor like Zac, had been doing really well on pork.

So of course, I asked for the contact information to her pork source!

My friend shared with me, and now I’m sharing with you…because whether or not pork proves safe for Zac, this lady is awesome and deserves some pats on the back (and business) for her efforts!

Christina Traeger runs Rolling Hills Traeger Ranch in Minnesota. She raises chickens, beef, duck, turkey, goose, and pork; all free-ranged as much as possible, fed soy and corn free feeds when necessary, antibiotic and hormone free, and sustainably raised.

That’s what I’m talking about! Animals raised the most humane way possible, and the most healthy way possible! Gotta love this lady!

I’ve now chatted with Christina by phone several times and exchanged many messages online, and she is the real deal. She is concerned about the food supply the way it is these days, and wants to do her part to make eating healthy and safe for everyone – especially those who are sensitive to corn and soy.

She was happy to ship meat to us, and it arrived still frozen in a styrofoam insert.

This pork roast was beautiful and unique; I told Darrel I was glad I didn’t currently have a beef roast cooked up because I was likely to mix up the meats!

Shredded, beautiful pork roast!

Shredded, beautiful pork roast!

As with heirloom vegetables, heritage breeds of animals that are not fed corn and soy have different qualities. Christina’s Berkshire hogs have meat that is red in color when raw, and cooks up more of a reddish-brown.

It certainly doesn’t look like the washed out, pale looking white meat of grocery store pork!

It smells heavenly when cooking, too. The aroma of the roast I cooked was on par for deliciousness to cooking up a pan full of bacon…and our roast was cooked with no seasonings or vegetables at all!

I wish we lived closer so we could go visit Rolling Hills and Christina. Maybe someday we can go for a visit to see her ranch in action.

Until then, though, we will order as much as we can in meats from this wonderful rancher with a conscience.

If you want to eat some delicious, humanely raised, GMO-free meat, I strongly urge you to order from Christina and Rolling Hills Traeger Ranch. You won’t be sorry!

Find her online at GrillinMeats, or at Love British Whites.

She’s on Facebook here and here.

And her contact info is directly below:

Christina Traeger
38468 210th Ave
Ogema, MN 56569
320-293-2995

Like I said, even if pork doesn’t prove to be safe for Zac, this lady is amazing and I wanted to share with everyone a fabulous source of Good Meat.

Frankly, her prices are so good that we will continue to buy as much as we can from her just for Darrel and Jed!

Happy grilling!

Pocket Change for Michael

 
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Pocket Change for Michael Gonzalez cradlerockingmama

Last year I wrote about FPIES children with no safe foods. The story that had caught my attention enough to write that post was the story of Jennifer and her son Michael.

At the time, they were just a family I had heard about and felt heartbroken for. Over the last year, though, I’ve actually gotten to know them a bit (online, since we live in different states) and I want to take time today to tell you more of their story, and ask for your help.

Jennifer and her husband, Thomas, have two little boys. Michael is now 4 years old and has been struggling his whole life.

It took them AGES to get a proper diagnosis of FPIES for him; by that point, his little insides were so wrecked from different GI treatments and food trial fails that he could only tolerate one thing to eat: Neocate Junior Unflavored.

Then, in May of 2012, Nutricia changed the label on the can. Despite their claims that the label change was the ONLY change they made to the formula, after the label change Jennifer (and hundreds of other families) were shocked to discover that their children now reacted to what was once their only safe food.

Poor Jennifer suddenly began scavenging to buy as much of the “old label” formula as she could to help keep her son safe, while conversing with Nutricia about a solution for her son. The woman has left no stone unturned on this quest; she’s driven Michael thousands of miles to consult with doctors at the Mayo Clinic, bought every can of safe formula she can find, asked questions, pushed for answers, and through it all, she was going to school to be a nurse! She’s amazing!

Finally, some good news came last fall: Michael found a safe food! Hemp! He can tolerate limited quantities of hemp with no reaction!

Then another! Sugar! He can tolerate one brand of sugar!

This is joyous news, of course, but I don’t think it takes a genius to figure out they were still in dire straights…after all, a child cannot live on hemp and sugar alone.

Still, Jennifer is a praising, optimistic woman, and this was good news for her and her child. 

Another blessing that happened in their lives last year: they had another baby! 

They hadn’t planned on having another child. They sort of weren’t sure if they were ever going to have another child. But they got pregnant anyway.

God’s ways are mysterious, and sometimes we don’t know the explanation for why things happen.

Sometimes, though, we do. 

What happened next is extraordinary: Jennifer and Thomas learned that Michael does not only have FPIES. He also suffers with something called MNGIE, which is Mitochondrial Disease. 

If we thought FPIES was rare, MNGIE takes the cake! It has only been diagnosed in 70 people. Unlike FPIES, Michael will not outgrow MNGIE, as it is an error in his DNA.

There is no treatment for MNGIE, all they can do is treat the symptoms to avoid as much pain as possible. However, there is one bright light of hope: a bone marrow transplant. 

A bone marrow transplant for Michael will, in layman’s terms, “reboot” his genetic code and give him a longer, healthier lifespan.

And Matthew is a match for a bone marrow transplant for his big brother. 

God’s ways are mysterious, but sometimes, it all makes sense!

Now it gets tricky, though. Because MNGIE is so rare, insurance deems any treatment for it as “experimental”…and will not cover the procedure.

So to get Michael the help he desperately needs, Jennifer and Thomas must somehow come up with $300,000 to pay for a bone marrow transplant for their son.

Just to get the process started, they must have $50,000.

Being an FPIES family, I already know what their finances are like. They don’t have $50,000 laying around. Most people don’t.

But they really, really need it.

This is one of those times I wish we were rich. I wish we were so financially well-to-do that I could just tell her to call the doctor and book the procedure and send all the bills to us. Oh, I wish that so very much!

But I can’t. We’re not rich. We’re in the same boat as her family. Hanging on by a thread.

Then I thought to myself, maybe there IS something I can do.

But it’s going to take your help!

It’s a little thing I’m asking for, but I think it will be a big help to Jennifer and Michael.

SAVE YOUR SPARE CHANGE FOR THE MONTH OF FEBRUARY AND SEND IT TO MICHAEL.

That’s it. When you find some spare change laying around, stick it in a jar. At the end of February, count it up, and go to Michael’s MNGIE Fundraising page to donate that amount to his desperately needed bone marrow transplant fund.

I have about 400 people who read my blog every day. If every one of us gathers spare change for a month, we’ll likely come up with about $5-10 each that we could send.

That’s not a lot of money for each of us to outlay.

But that’s $2,000-$4,000 we could send to help Michael get the life-saving treatment he needs!

(And let’s not be satisfied with just that: let’s share this request with all our friends online and see if we can’t get some outside support for this cause!)

So here’s what I’m asking for my friend:

  1. Read their story.
  2. Like their Facebook Page.
  3. Share this post asking for help EVERYWHERE you can think of!
  4. Gather your pocket change for February.
  5. Donate your pocket change to Michael.
  6. Come back here and leave a comment (or send me a a message) letting me know how much you donated so at the end of the month I can tell you how much your joint effort contributed. 

Don’t be shy, either! Ask your co-workers for their spare change after lunch. Pick up those pennies off the ground. 

I can’t ask anyone to donate large sums when I know that most of us are struggling right now.

But I think we can all scrape together some pocket change. 

Let’s turn that insignificant pocket change into something unbelievably significant in the life of a sweet, adorable little boy. 

Let’s save our pocket change for Michael.

Are you in?

Is Snow Safe for FPIES Kids to Eat? (With an FPIES Reaction Video)

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Is Snow Safe for FPIES Kids to Eat (With an FPIES Reaction Video) cradlerockingmama.com

Zac had an FPIES reaction yesterday.

The proof came, as always, with a poopy diaper. His first diaper of the day looked great, but since we are trialing a food, I tested it for blood anyway.

It was…inconclusive. It could have been blood. It might not have been. Hmm…

Half an hour later, another poopy diaper. Once again I tested it for blood. This time, it was positive for blood. (I always want to say “negative” when I report this. Being positive is not something I want to associate with bloody diapers!)

After the diapers, I put him down for a nap. He had a really hard time sleeping comfortably. He woke up once needing to be nursed back to sleep, and he sweated profusely even though he was only wearing a diaper and had no blankets on him.

As soon as he woke from his nap, Darrel carried him to the living room, where he promptly slid off the couch, ran to the wall and stood staring at it from a few inches away for several minutes. This is very weird for him.

Suddenly, with no provocation, he turned, ran behind the couch, and began screaming.

I came in to try and calm him, and this is just four minutes of what happened next:

Now, some might look at this and think this is just a child having a temper tantrum, but that’s not what is happening here.

In this video, Zac is in pain. He can’t stop screaming. He’s flailing away from me when I try to touch him.

It took almost 20 minutes to get him calmed down, and he was prone to having episodes like this the rest of the day.

This is not normal for Zac.

Last night he slept so badly, he woke me up every hour to hour and a half all night long. I’m exhausted.

So now to discern the cause. The obvious answer is pork, right?

Well, maybe not.

An hour or so before the first poopy diaper on Monday, Zac handed me a partially eaten ladybug. (While he hiccuped in my arms.)

And then, of course, there were the large amounts of snow we foolishly allowed him to eat Sunday.

“Snow?” I can hear you thinking. “Has she lost her ever-lovin’ mind? Snow is harmless!”

Au contraire, my friends.

In my desperate attempt to find any cause of the reaction that might NOT be the pork, I asked the corn-free people whether snow could be corny.

Check out what they sent me:

Eating Snow
Is Eating Snow Safe?
Why Children Shouldn’t Eat Snow

Yeah. In short, snow FORMS by attaching to a particle in the air. Doesn’t matter of the particle is a bit of pollen or pollution. Then it attaches itself to more ‘particles’ in the air as it falls.

So if the freshly fallen snow washed the atmosphere above our heads clean of some pollen or pollutant that Zac is reactive to, well, we gleefully fed him a few bowls full of it on Sunday.

Excuse me for a moment while I share my unedited thoughts: “For Christ’s sake! SNOW? Snow could be why he’s pooping blood? How in the world am I going to keep this child healthy and thriving if something as innocent as freshly fallen snow could make him sick?!”

Let’s not forget the ladybug, either. He’s reacted to tree buds and crickets, so obviously, nature is not his friend.

Further complicating things is the fact that Darrel and I went to the movies on Friday for our anniversary.

Why does that complicate things?

Well, what do YOU snack on at the movies?

Popcorn. Right.

Since popcorn is obviously not allowed on our house, Darrel seized that moment of freedom to indulge in a bag of popcorn for himself.

We were both so giddy at the thought of a break that we didn’t think it through.

Not only were we sitting in seats that were probably covered in popcorn residue, which then transferred to our clothes, hair and hands, but Darrel ate popcorn – and I kissed him before he washed his mouth!

I may have accidentally corned myself and my son on Friday!

(I feel incredibly stupid for not thinking this through ahead of time. I’m going to simply state that the idea of two hours away from the kids being a normal person was so heady and exciting that we simply lost our minds. It’s the only explanation I can come up with for not thinking the popcorn all the way through before the fact.)

So now we pull the pork (much to Zac’s dismay),’ wait for baseline, and reintroduce the pork to see what caused the reaction this time: date night popcorn, piggy, ladybugs, or snow.

(Am I in some bizarre alternate universe here? The absurdity of our situation is not lost on me. I feel like I’m being Punked every single day.)

I feel sick, y’all. Is it too much to ask for a food trial to go smoothly?

I mean, obviously it’s too much to ask for some safe foods…could I even just get a food trial that doesn’t have to be re-trialed, and re-trialed, and re-trialed??

Today, FPIES is kicking my butt. I honestly don’t know whether I want to cry, hit something, or scream. They all seem like decent options right now.

I’ll keep you posted; in the meantime, would you mind praying for the absurd? Please pray that my son got corned because I kissed my husband after he ate popcorn, or that half of a ladybug made Zac sick, or that he reacted to freshly fallen snow, because I’d really like the pork to be safe for him. Thank you!

__________

What’s the most ridiculous thing your child has ever reacted to?

This Little Piggy

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This Little Piggy cradlerockingmama

After writing about our Anniversary and saying that we wouldn’t be able to go out on a date, we got a big surprise!

My parents and I spoke early Friday morning, and Mom mentioned they were planning to go to town to run some errands.

I had a sudden brainstorm: maybe we could go to town with them. I could nurse Zac right before they dropped Darrel and me off at the movie theater, they could take the kids to run their errands, and pick us up as soon as the movie ended so I could nurse Zac again!

Mom and Dad agreed, and that’s just what we did. The kids had a great time with Grandma and PopPop buying cat food and light bulbs, and Darrel and I got to go sit in a movie theater, hold hands and cuddle a little, and watch an entire movie from start to finish without interruptions! It was glorious!

Even better, we got to sit in the back off my SUV alone for some snuggle time on the drive home. Reminded me of being a teenager! It’s been a long time since my parents drove me to and from a “date”, after all!

The only photo Darrel and I have taken together without kids in...WAY too long!

The only photo Darrel and I have taken together without kids in…WAY too long!

What a fabulous Anniversary gift!

When we got home, we saw that UPS had delivered a very special package while we were in town: Zac’s pork roasts were waiting for us!

We immediately threw a pork roast in the crockpot and let it cook low and slow overnight.

Saturday morning, the pork was cooked beautifully and we fed 1 ounce of piggy to Zac.

His first time eating pork. He liked it! Now let's hope it likes HIM.

His first time eating pork. He liked it! Now let’s hope it likes HIM.

He only ate 3/4ths of an ounce at first pass, then started crying to be let down from his high chair. He spent the next couple of hours being unhappy about every suggestion…he didn’t want quinoa, didn’t want to nurse, didn’t want to play, didn’t want ANYthing except to snuggle.

Then, suddenly, he wanted quinoa. So I fed him some quinoa in a bowl, and when I picked him up from the chair after he’d finished he indicated he wanted to go into the kitchen.

So I carried him to the kitchen, where he tried to throw himself at the bowl of pork on the counter!

I fed him the remaining 1/4 of an ounce he hadn’t eaten at breakfast, and he wolfed it down and indicated he wanted more!

Unfortunately, it was only day 1 of the trial, and that day was limited to 1 oz of pork.

An hour later, he had a horribly mucousy diaper, but no other signs.

Finally I got him to go down for a nap, but it was fitful at first. He woke up and needed to be nursed back to sleep after only 30 minutes.

Then he slept for over TWO HOURS!

The rest of the day he was fine – until a weird episode at his first middle of the night feeding.

When I went in to nurse him, he started screaming at me and actually tried to kick me! That’s never happened before. He rolled away from me, still screaming, then suddenly, about 30 seconds after it all started, he just rolled over, started nursing, and went right back to sleep.

Very odd. 

The rest of the night passed uneventfully, and Sunday he got another 1 oz. of pork at breakfast. He LOVED it! Then he ate really well the rest of the day, took a great nap, and had another 1 oz. of pork at dinner.

If the child knew how to do it, he would have literally licked the bowl clean.

He had two diapers on Sunday that had a LOT of mucous in them, but other than that he had no disturbing signs whatsoever.

In fact, he actually seemed MORE energetic on both Saturday and Sunday. He babbled a lot more than usual, played harder and more enthusiastically than typical, made new facial expressions and sounds, and really seemed to blossom over those two days. 

We are praying so hard right now that pork is safe for him; the mucous diapers could just be an adjustment symptom as his body gets used to digesting a new food. Please pray with us that it is just that, and that pork can become a part of his regular diet!

Beyond the exciting pork trial, Sunday was a fun day because we got more snow!

It wasn’t as much snow or as deep as two months ago, plus Zac is bigger and more stable on his feet – and he had a blast!

I was happy because this time, we had perfect fitting winter hats and mittens for the boys to wear, thanks to both their grandmothers Christmas gifts.

Woohoo! Snow!

Woohoo! Snow!

This kiddo thinks snow is the best thing ever.

This kiddo thinks snow is the best thing ever.

Darrel pulled the kids around in the new sled they got for Christmas, Jed (true to form) played with his trains in the snow, and Zac discovered the joys of eating snow!

Being pulled in the sled is way fun.

Being pulled in the sled is way fun.

Eating snow is good, Mama!

Eating snow is good, Mama!

In fact, the boys both liked eating snow so much we gave them both bowls of (clean, from the top) snow to eat when we got inside.

Yummy!

Yummy!

You’d have thought we’d given them gourmet ice cream, y’all!

Zac was almost beside himself: he’s never been presented with so many things to eat at once. It was a veritable feast for him!

A bowl of snow, a bowl of pork, and some quinoa snacks? Hel-lo, Mama! I'm feasting now!

A bowl of snow, a bowl of pork, and some quinoa snacks? Hel-lo, Mama! I’m feasting now!

He still wanted more snow and more pork when he’d finished eating, but overall, Zac had a great eating weekend, the boys had a fabulous time playing in the snow, and it was a good three days for the family.

It’s nice when we get a break like this. Too much stress and worry every day starts to wear you down.

Oh, and we discovered that Jed and sorghum flour are not a great combination.

Last weekend I made a loaf of bread for Jed, and over the week I noticed that about 4 hours after eating any bread, he got a lot more…irritating to be around. Argumentative and difficult, not listening to what we say, etc. Nothing severe, nothing extreme. If we weren’t the family that we are, constantly paying attention to our food, I probably wouldn’t have noticed the connection!

But it definitely happened 4 hours after every bread ingestion. So I double checked my “avoid” list on his diet and – wouldn’t you know it? Under SWEETENERS it says to avoid “sorghum”. I never noticed that before – and it isn’t listed at all under the grains/flours section! Since I only use sorghum in flour form, I’d missed that.

So Sunday, when I made my weekly loaf of bread, I changed the ratios of flours and omitted the sorghum flour. Hopefully we’ll have a slightly more agreeable week now! (And bonus: Darrel says he likes the bread better without  the sorghum flour!)

__________

How was your weekend? Did you get to play in the snow, too?

Five Years Married

 
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We got married in the aftermath of a major ice storm. Yes, I wore boots under my wedding dress. I'm practical that way.

We got married in the aftermath of a major ice storm. Yes, I wore boots under my wedding dress. I’m practical that way.

Right now I’m supposed to be sitting on a lounge chair in Antigua, eating anything I want and maybe even sipping a cocktail.

Darrel is supposed to be sitting by my side, and the kids are supposed to be happily playing and being spoiled back home by my parents.

At least, that was the plan on July 17, 2012.

On that day, as we sat at Chipotle, eating what turned out to be our last meal out as a family at a restaurant, Darrel and I discussed how hard the previous two years had been for us and how on our 5 year wedding anniversary, we were going to treat ourselves well.

We were going to travel to the islands, leave the kids at home with grandparents, and indulge in a little “couples therapy” via time alone, romance, and did I mention? NO KIDS.

On that day, the day the story of this blog began, we had just been through two years of MSPI and IgE allergies with Jed, which had forced me to spend most of those two years dairy, soy and egg free.

I’d had to re-learn how to cook without those ingredients, and we had learned there were only about 7 restaurants that we could safely eat at out of all the restaurants in the world.

We’d spent 2 years being nervous and stressed because so many people “just didn’t get it” about our sons food allergies and intolerances.

While Zac had presented us with bloody diapers two weeks prior, and was obviously sick at that moment in the restaurant, we were confident that by January of 2014, our 5 year wedding anniversary, we would have all our childrens food issues well under control (maybe we’d even have grown out of some of them) and could give ourselves a well-deserved respite from the grinding ordeal of daily living with food allergies.

What blissfully ignorant naïveté we had then.

Four hours after planning our tropical paradise escape, we were standing in an emergency room watching our son be tended to by almost a dozen ER personnel, all of whom were obviously on high alert.

And our new lives began.

New lives that do not involve tropical escapes.

New lives that don’t allow for even a short date night away from our children.

New lives that make me sick with longing for the ease of the two years prior to that night; the two years we had thought were so extremely hard to endure.

New lives that are dictated by the demands and needs of FPIES and Fructose Malabsorption.

Truly, our issues with dairy, soy and egg, once so daunting and overwhelming, barely register in our consciousness as “issues” at this stage of the game.

They’re second nature by now, and the other demands are demanding in ways we never could have foreseen on that innocent July night.

Yet time has passed, as time will do, even in our new lives, and we have reached the five year mile marker of our marriage nonetheless.

We won’t be going on a date tonight. Frankly, we’ll be lucky to get an hour to cuddle on the couch…and that’s only if the kids cooperate at bedtime.

Hand in hand cradlerockingmama

After five years married, three and a half of which have been shadowed and clouded with serious health concerns for our children, I can honestly say a few things about my husband and our marriage.

Nobody is perfect, but Darrel is still my Dream Man.

This last year has been the hardest of our married life, but our marriage is still solid.

We have had to accept that at this point in our lives, our marriage is unfortunately relegated to the bottom of the priority list most of the time, but we never forget that as soon as we have some breathing room, WE must get some attention and care.

It’s inevitable that, when facing such crazy pressures and stresses daily, you will eventually lash out at your partner at times. We both find it humorous that when we do that, we always end our “fight” with a “this sucks, I’m taking it out on you, I’m sorry, one day we’re ditching the kids and going to the islands” apology and hug.

No, it’s not all romance and flowers in our marriage right now (can you imagine how guilty we’d both feel if Zac ate one of the flowers and reacted?!), and maybe I’d like it if we could spend more time together…going to movies, going out to dinner, playing video games (yes, we were both gamers before kids), snuggling on the couch…but at no point do I ever have anything less than absolute happiness about my decision to marry Darrel and the life we lead.

In the ways that matter, in the ways that truly keep a marriage solid, we take care of our marriage.

We support one another as much as possible; him for my blogging and writing, me for his photography.

We stand united in 99% of the choices and actions regarding our kiddos health and needs.

We try to lighten each other’s load whenever we can.

We still regard each other as our best friend.

Yup. Still do!

Yup. Still do!

One day, yes, one day, our kids will be stable and healthy enough that we are SO running away from home for a couples getaway.

And when that day comes, we will not be the rosy-eyed, gooey, romantic saps we were during the first year and a half of our marriage.

But we’ll have enough of US still standing solid that we can work our way back to that lovey-dovey state.

Because Darrel is the best man, the best father, the best husband, and the best friend I’ve ever known. (And I don’t think I’m too shabby, either.)

So, five years married, Darrel, and I still adore you. Thank you for…everything. You’re the love of my life.

Next time I'm rope swinging off a boat in the Caribbean, I'll be doing it with Darrel!

Next time I’m rope swinging off a boat in the Caribbean, I’ll be doing it with Darrel!

~One day we will go on that romantic getaway.~