The Overfed Sick Child Grows Up

As I continue to scan photos into my computer, I am getting way back into the pictures of my childhood....ok, make that my babyhood.

I started out in life on a precarious footing.
Soon after I was  born the folks found out I had food allergies.
This caused much concern for my survival back in the Days of early 1960's medicine.
It was not fashionable in that era to breastfeed your child.  And my parents were nothing if not social climbing fashionable wannabees.
All the hip people in 1960 were using modern technology and conveniences to make their lives easier and better.
Frozen tv dinners were the bomb.
Automatic washing machines gave the housewife more free time.
Breastfeeding a baby was so "your mother's generation" and time consuming.....why not buy this nifty new baby formula for your kid?  Just open the can, add water and slap that stuff in a bottle and feed your darling offspring.  No more having to wear special bras, dealing with engorged and leaky teats(and the added laundry they caused)and being tied to your baby 24/7.
A giant step forward for mankind, right?

The problem was that I had the bad fortune to be allergic to baby formula-which was based on cow's milk.
I'd drink a bottle and bring most of it right back up again.  Then they'd feed me all over again and hope that more would stay down.  Feeding me was almost a constant process in those early weeks.....forget having to clean a house, take care of 2 older boys, shop and cook dinner for a family.  The sick baby had to be fed continuously.

What stayed down wreaked havoc in my digestive system and came out the other end in much the same liquid state as it had gone in, but nastier.lol
It also caused me pain during the journey so I was a wailing, screaming child for much of the time I was awake during those first few weeks.
I also started not breathing well.  At 10 days old my mother came to get me up from a nap and I was turning blue and not breathing, which bought me a ticket to an ambulance ride to the hospital.

So the medical geniuses decided that the not breathing/not eating stuff was all tied together and they put me on straight goat's milk which was hardly available or affordable for my parents tiny income.  But if it kept their newborn alive, they scraped together the money and rejoiced that I would live on.

Then the story goes that I developed an allergy to goat's milk after a few months or so.
This is bad in the days before specialized baby formulas because everything was based on animal products.

The last resort was to put me on some newfangled thing called soy milk.  Soy milk was "new" back then to mainstream southern suburban American, hard to find and even more expensive than the goat milk.
But if it worked, they'd buy it, even if my grandmother had to work extra hours at her job to kick in money to pay for it.

It seemed to do the trick and everyone breathed a sigh of relief that the sick baby was going to be ok now.
The family doctor had more tests done on me to test for other allergies.
And my tests came back with blinking lights and warning signs flashing aplenty!
Not only was I allergic to lots of other foods but environmental stimuli too.  Luckily though no medicines set me off.   I came away with a diagnosis of severe allergies as well as asthma.

Still, my mother had concerns about me thriving to adulthood.
She had so much concern that my mother shoved as much food into me as she could get down into my tiny stomach.  She put me on solid foods way too soon(now it's basic knowledge that you wait LONGER to introduce solids to a child that has allergies), and as long as it wasn't one of the foods I was allergic too, I was given the green light to eat it, whenever and whatever.

It didn't take long for me to pork up.
This is me at my 1st Easter.  I was a normal sized baby at birth.   I wasn't even 2 months old in this photo.....

And by August, I was about 7 months old and sporting the Jabba the Hutt look.  And this is one of my more svelte looking photo shoots....

I guess they figured that if I had another health scare, having a few extra rolls of fat on me would help me survive another episode of not being able to keep food down.

Here's a photo of me at about 9 months with a ginormous lollipop(it's blow pop sized!)crammed into my mouth.....

There are lots of photos of me either being fed or eating something myself all within my 1st year of life.
Back in the day a Fat Baby was a Cute Baby, so I must have been a real Looker!lol

As an aside.....do you notice how I don't look happy in any of these photos?  Ok, so I look bewildered in the first one, but I can find very few photos of me growing up where I am smiling or happy.....well, except for those pictures where I am hamming it up for the camera, putting on my actress face.

After I lived through that first year, my parents switched gears and began restricting my food intake.
As far back as I can remember, how much I ate was watched, limited and (the worst)was commented on.
Seconds were never offered.
Yet if a food was not "liked" I still had to "clean my plate".....because there were starving children in the world who'd have loved to eat those peas, or liver, or spaghetti, or mashed potatoes, etc.

And since my parents became the Food Police, I became the Food Sneak.  Well, as much of a sneak as I could manage living in that household with an older brother who would snitch on me in a heartbeat.lol
I usually would just wait until we went to a picnic or party with other people where the food was not policed and binge to my heart's content while my parents were off socialized and drinking.  Let's just say that we went to A LOT of parties.....

If they had just let me alone to eat until I was full and not enforced the "clean plate" manifesto and not made comments(like I'd never get a boyfriend if I wasn't skinny....and that was said to me when I was 6 years old), I might have grown out of being food obsessed.

But no.
I've spent the last 52 years dealing with an unhealthy relationship with food.
I bet there are lots of folks out there who can relate to this.....well, I am hoping so!

Enough of my little Pity Party.
Therapy session over for today.

Sluggy

The Week That Flew By/Dragged On

The one where I fill y'all in on what's been going on around Chez Sluggy lately.....

On the evening of May 10th, #1 Son and his Girlfriend arrived, after driving the full length +  of Pennsyltucky from college.  Finals were over and it was good to see them.
The next morning the 3 of us piled into my minivan to drive 200+ miles back across Pennsyltucky to retrieve my Daughter from her school.

I sat in the car while the 3 of them piled stuff into carts and bags and hauled it down to me so I could strategically pack the van.

Notice Daughter taking her sweet time sashaying back to the dorm to help below.....

And look who got the job of pushing the cart full of her crap up the hill(her brother) and who got the job of carrying 6 garbage bags at once like a pack mule(her brother's girlfriend), while Daughter just carried her guitar.

They informed me later that Daughter just stood around and "directed" up in the room while they bagged(she hadn't even prepared anything beforehand to move it!)and carted her belongings.  They ended up making 2 trips filling that cart!

It's a good thing they came because if she had pulled this on me alone, she'd still be sitting her ass in that dorm today!
And never did a "thank you" escape her lips.....

We wedged in all the crap because what we brought last Fall had fit in the same van with PLENTY of room to spare, had expanded and had had babies while in the dorm.  And she now possessed a "few" "vital" things she had bought while living at school....like dishware and silverware.....and a mattress pad.......and a blow up naked afro american girl doll(don't ask!)......just important stuff like that.
And then she had taken back to school in January when her father drove her back a floor lamp and 2 chairs.
And I was suppose to fit all that into my van along with 4 people?!?

So we get home Friday evening and yes, we made HER unpack it all!
And my house is once again bursting at the seams with her junk.....

And while this was all going on, Hubs was off in Washington DC having a grand old time at a work conference.  He's staying in a Hilton, eating hoity toity restaurant food and I'm refereeing the 3 kids + girlfriend, none of whom want to be here and dealing with the others.

Hubs gets back Saturday morning, sleep deprived so he sleeps through most of that day.

Sunday was Mother's Day.  I got some flowers....

 And among the cards I received was this one, from the Daughter.....

This is a FAMILY JOKE.
So now, I get one of this kind of card every year.....or a Giant Novelty Card.

Monday afternoon Daughter went out to find a job since she is going to live here next year while she
attends the community college.
She came home a couple hours later with a job in hand, landed at the first place she applied!
I find it interesting that my nephew(who graduates from high school next month)claims to have been applying for lots and lots of jobs over the past few months and has had no callbacks or offers.
Hmmmmm......

Wednesday evening of last week #2 Son had his French National Honor Society ceremony.  This is his second year making it.
You need 6 consecutive quarters with an A average in French to qualify, so you can't even be considered until your 2nd year taking high school level French.  This is his 3rd year in the subject though he is only a Sophomore.  There is an accelerated language program in this school district in which certain middle school students can take either math or language high school level courses 1 year early with permission.  (This can only be done because the middle school and high school are in the same building so there is no additional cost to transport them from one location to another for the classes.)

So #2 Son lit the candle and got his 2nd year pin while his siblings and the girlfriend were forced to watch.  Payback for all those times he was forced to watch them at ceremonies, in concerts or on teams.lol

#1 Son and the Girlfriend stayed until Thursday morning, May 17th.  Mostly #1 was dealing with appointments and getting business things done and seeing some friends and taking Girlfriend out, along with doing some clothes shopping.  He needed to be back on the other side of the state to start his summer job the following week(this week).
He is getting an apartment this coming school year so we talked about how much money he has left in his college fund, the apartment he wants to apply for, the lease(since we have to cosign it), etc.

#1 Son turns 21 in July.  He has already invited me to come over and stay at his apartment and come drinking with him anytime I feel like getting away from the dogs, his dad and his siblings.
I might just have to take him up on that...... ;-)

We also had some really nice weather last week!
The Rhododendron bloomed.....

Of course, that also meant all the weeds in my flower and garden beds and around the trees and next to the front porch were growing like.....well.....WEEDS!lol

And hardly anyone here, between back backs, other medical issues and allergies, was in any condition to tame the mess in the yard.  So it's coming up on Memorial Day Weekend, and my flower/garden beds are laying fallow, with no hope of things changing in sight.  So many yard projects to do and nobody to help.  I can't even get #2 Son interested in doing anything for money.  bleh.

I bought this recently on eBay.......

 I had hopes of watching it with my history major #1 Son last week.  But there are 2 things his girlfriend doesn't like evidently-politics and history documentaries-so this was a no go.
So I'll rewatch it in August when #1 comes home again without the girlfriend.

We are big history buffs and we enjoy a good political discussion in this family.  I hope the girlfriend knows what she is in for......lol

Last week I did something to my shoulder AGAIN to make the bursitis flare up.
Ugh.  So I started taking Percocet to ease the pain.  It helped the pain but it depressed my breathing so that I couldn't catch my breath if I walked around.  And I couldn't sleep at night because my breathing was so shallow it woke me up if I dozed off.
So it was be pain-free and sleep deprived and panicky or feeling the hurt but breathing and trying to sleep through the pain.
I chose to breathe......yah, I am crazy that way.....

To add to my joy the hot weather arrived like gangbusters!  And between all this other health stuff the humidity made my legs and my one foot start swelling.  It got so bad I thought my breathing and legs indicated I had thrown a blood clot into my lung.  Luckily it hadn't but that was one scary thought! 8-(

Between dinners out, lunch out with #1 Son and Girlfriend, making large and more expensive meals at home, taking #1 Son shopping for some apartment needs, and sending others to the grocery store when I couldn't, and paying for gas and meals for 2 trips across the state, it's been an expensive week+ around here.
 
So that dear readers is the short version of what I've been up to  and why I haven't been blogging much.

I can't believe that this coming weekend starts Memorial Day stuff and #2 Son finishes school 16 days from now and leaves for camp a week after that!

Maybe I'll just go hide under the bed covers for awhile....

Sluggy