A long week...

In November I had surgery to help relieve my Crohn's symptoms, which had gotten increasingly worse over the past few years. I had a small bowel resection and they removed just over a foot of my small intestine. Needless to say, I was off work while I was recovering. Thankfully, I am feeling better than I have in years!

This past Monday was my first day back at work and I was nervous about balancing home and school life. Crohn's gets worse with stress, so I have been trying to take things slower -- which is not normally a strength of mine! I went to bed Sunday night feeling happy that I was organized and ready to start a new work week.

Unfortunately, our little miss had other plans for me. I woke up to her crying at 1 am and when I went into her room, I immediately knew that she had a fever. Maelyn and fevers scare the crap out of me. I gave her Advil and snuggled into bed with her -- although she didn't sleep another wink for the rest of the night.

I knew that there wasn't any way I could possibly miss the first day of school after being away for so long, so Paul stayed home with our little miss and promised with fingers and toes crossed that he would keep a diligent eye on her temperature.

After a doctor's visit to make sure the fever wasn't due to an ear or bladder infection, we have spent the rest of the week trying to make Maelyn as comfortable as possible as she fights this nasty cold. How one little kid could produce that amount of boogers mucous is beyond me.

I haven't slept in four nights, but our little miss has a typical cold -- and for that I am grateful. I know that life will return to normal shortly (if there really is such a thing as normal), and I find that because we have been through worse, I am not stressing as much about the small stuff. Who knew that the stress of this past Fall would teach me such an important lesson?

Here is hoping that 2012 is a happy and healthy year!