During these trying times, I need to remember my happy song – and the lyrics have never been more fitting…

<a href=”http://www.youtube.com/v/90KyZ1GbJGI&rel=0″ target=”_blank”>http://www.youtube.com/v/90KyZ1GbJGI&rel=0</a>

Life, it’s ever so strange
It’s so full of change
You think that you’ve worked it out
Then BANG
Right out of the blue
Something happens to you
To throw you off course
And then you

Breakdown
Yeah you breakdown
Well don’t you breakdown
Listen to me
Because

It’s just a ride, it’s just a ride
No need to run, no need to hide
It’ll take you round and round
Sometimes you’re up
Sometimes you’re down
It’s just a ride, it’s just a ride
Don’t be scared
Don’t hide your eyes
It may feel so real inside
But don’t forget it’s just a ride

Truth, we don’t wanna hear
It’s too much to take
Don’t like to feel out of control
So we make our plans
Ten times a day
And when they don’t go
Our way we

Breakdown
Yeah we breakdown
Well don’t you breakdown
Listen to me
Because

It’s just a ride, it’s just a ride
No need to run, no need to hide
It’ll take you round and round
Sometimes you’re up
Sometimes you’re down
It’s just a ride, it’s just a ride
Don’t be scared
Don’t hide your eyes
It may feel so real inside
But don’t forget it’s just a ride

Slowly, oh so very slowly
Accept that
There’s no getting off
So live it, just gotta go with it
Coz this ride’s, never gonna stop

Breakdown
Don’t you breakdown
No need to breakdown
No need at all
Because

It’s just a ride, it’s just a ride
No need to run, no need to hide
It’ll take you all around
Sometimes you’re up
Sometimes you’re down
It’s just a ride, it’s just a ride
Don’t be scared now
Dry your eyes
It may feel so real inside
But don’t forget enjoy the ride

thehealthymom is a wreck. For dad, the ERCP tomorrow is a no go. Possible cancer. Options went from surgery to hospice care. I’m not handling this well.10:38 PM
May 20th from TweetDeck

Late Wednesday night they said they wouldn’t be able to do the procedure because he had a fever and he was so very weak.

We spent most of the day on Thursday thinking he would be gone soon. I visited him around lunch time on Thursday and brought some get well cards that the boys had made for him. I read them to him, and gave him some ice chips, and then let him rest. He was very, very weak and looked so unhealthy.

After I left, I met Doug at Buena Vista for Zander’s kindergarten transition/graduation ceremony.

thehealthymom’s father in law needs to have a procedure he may not survive, but he most certainly won’t without it. Heading back to the hospital now.
2:21 PM May 21st from TweetDeck

Then suddenly on Thursday afternoon, Georgiana called and said that the doctors wanted to go ahead with the ERCP procedure. They said that he may not survive the procedure, but that he could not live longer without doing it.

So I called my dad, he came over to watch the boys, and Doug and I picked up his mom and took her to the hospital. We met with Georgiana there and Greg and his daughter Jessica were on their way down from Ft Collins. Normally, he is only allowed 2 visitors in the ICU. But since this was a “special occasion” (ie, he might die) they let us all come in to his room to be with him before the procedure.

THANKFULLY, it was a very short procedure. 20 minutes for the actual ERCP and then another 30 minutes in recovery before we could see him. They cleared out the blockage in his bile duct and it’s kept open with a stent. OMG – he must have been suffering for a long time. They said his duct was COMPLETELY blocked. They released 300 cc of bile that had been built up due to the blockage. They intubated him for the procedure, and decided to keep him intubated afterwards while his lungs cleared. They took tissue from several places for a biopsy. A likely diagnosis would be that the blockage was caused by a malignant tumor.

thehealthymom is relieved that dad’s procedure went well. We’ll get biopsy results in the morning
6:46 PM May 21st from vlingo

We spoke with both the anesthesiologist and the surgeon who performed the procedure. They both said that dad did well. And although he is still very, very, very sick, he will be more comfortable now.

We all went out to dinner together at Appleby’s. Even mom had a margarita.

Friday morning, we got an update from Georgiana. She said that Dad was still intubated, but his color was good and he was more alert.

thehealthymomgot to talk with dad in the ICU – he’s off the ventilator + looks more like himself. No biopsy results today.
5:05 PM May 21st from vlingo

On Friday afternoon, Doug and I visited dad together. We were pleasantly surprised to find that the breathing tube was removed. And even happier to hear dad talking with us, seeming much more like himself. What a relief.

I’m so relieved that he might actually get the chance to go home (with hospice care) and the boys might be able to see him more normally and get a chance to say some form of good-bye to him.

I’m still really struggling with what losing him will affect the boys. No matter what, it’s going to be hard on them, but I just don’t want it to be any more difficult than it has to be.

At this point, our best hope is that he will be well enough to come home with hospice care, so he doesn’t have to be in the hospital.

Please continue to keep him – and the family – in your thoughts/prayers.

So, it’s been quite a day today. Last night, my mother-in-law, Gaynell, called to say that my father-in-law, George, had been admitted to the hospital. Late the night before, his pain level was quite high, and they went to his doctor in the morning. The doctor told him to go to the emergency room.

After he was admitted, Mom said that they were going to do surgery the next morning, and that it was gall bladder and kidney related.

Doug and I went to the hospital today to visit Dad, thinking it was going to be some routine procedure and that Dad would be better soon.

When we got there, it turned out Dad’s blood pressure had been dropping since 1 AM. His systolic pressure had gotten as low as 62 (normal is about 115) and was currently at 83. They were pushing fluids and took him off morphine to get his blood pressure up and stabilized.

The surgery that Mom mentioned was actually a procedure called ERCP, which involves dad swallowing an endoscope which would give the doctors a view to see any blockages near the liver/gall bladder/pancreas. In all likelihood, his pain was being caused by gallstones, among other possibilities.

But they can’t do the procedure until his blood pressure is closer to normal and stabilized. They told us that he would likely be in the ICU that afternoon.

We also found out that Dad signed a DNR – and with his blood pressure so low, it was very possible that he could get into a resuscitation situation. I spoke with my sister-in-law, Georgiana, to see if there was any way we could talk him out of it. But he’s adamantly sticking to it.

This news was a blow to me. I could understand it if he was diagnosed as terminally ill, but right now, he isn’t.

Around 3 PM, we found out that his systolic pressure was slightly higher, now 87, and that they would schedule the ERCP for the morning.

Around 6 PM, we were told that he wouldn’t have to go to the ICU, but to critical care.

At 7:30 PM, we found out he was actually moved to the ICU. And that he weighed a shocking 88 lbs.

This day has been so emotionally draining for me, but I can’t even begin to imagine what it’s like for my mother in law. They truly are like another set of parents to me.

My mom, who is an RN at Penrose, where my FIL is now, went on her day off to the hospital to support my in-laws. She rocks!

The boys know that grandpa is sick and in the hospital, but that is the extent of it. They usually spend Wed/Fri afternoons at grandma & grandpa’s house. Today I was able to distract them with a playdate at the park and a preview event at the zoo. But I did have to tell them that they would probably not go to their grandparents’ house on Friday.

“You mean we don’t get to go there at all this whole week?!” Zevan complained.

The boys made him get well cards, and Zander’s said “Get well soon grandpa because we want to come over.”

My heart is just aching. I’m not ready for this. I’m going to keep believing that he will stabilize and that the ERCP will help alleviate the pain and get us to a course of treatment to help him get better. I will work on preparing for other outcomes, but I want to stay hopeful that he will be back on his feet.

I’m so emotionally overwhelmed at this point. I just wasn’t expecting it.

Doug’s trying to comfort me because I keep randomly bursting into tears, and I’m feeling guilty about that because I’m supposed to be comforting him!

Please send positive thoughts/energies/prayers for his health. I think it really does help.

So, I am a total Wordpress girl now. Every site I create now starts with Wordpress. And I’m in the process of converting a good number of current clients, whose pages have been handcoded HTML until now, to Wordpress.

And for shopping carts, I’m all about Mal’s shopping cart. It’s free, it has great features, and it has its own secure server.

Now I’m trying to find a way to get these two services together.

I did find a Wordpress/Mals Shopping Cart plug-in in progress, which looks like it can do the trick when you are starting from scratch and can enter each product individually.

But, I do have one client whose inventory changes every 6 weeks. And it’s hundreds of products each time.

Currently, I am using a heavily customized Photoshop Web Photo Gallery that generates the Mals’ code from the file name. My client puts the prices on the images themselves, so I only have to change the product description when I generate the Add to Cart button code. The rest (the user id, qty, etc stays the same).

It seems like it would be simple enough to generate that code as you would a caption. So I’ve been researching all morning, trying to find the best plug in to try my hand at customzing to make this work.

Right now I’m looking at AWSOM PixGallery Version 4.5.7. Or possibly NextGen Gallery.

I haven’t done any actual coding this morning, just research. And my brain hurts. Time to break for a late lunch at Wild Ginger and cleanse my mind with a funny mystery book….

Yesterday was Free Comic Book Day.

For those who don’t know, Doug and I own Bargain Comics, a comic book store in downtown Colorado Springs.

We gave away comics at the store and at 3 local libraries:

• Bargain Comics, 19 East Bijou St, 10:30 – 5:00
• East Branch Library, 5550 North Union Blvd, 11:00 – 3:00
• Briargate Branch Library, 9475 Briar Village Point, 1:00 – 3:00
• Woodland Park Library, 218 E. Midland Avenue, 12:00 – 3:00

In the morning, I took Zander and Zevan to Zander’s soccer game at 9 AM at the YMCA. We were late, but Zander played the 2nd quarter as goalie and did a great job. He made some great saves and never let a goal in.

Afterwards we went to the car, and headed over to Washington to see the new site for the Montessori program next year. It happens to be right behind a Dunkin Donuts. Since we had a few minutes, we stopped there. The line was longer than we’re used to, but we made it to the school shortly after 10 AM. After the principal showed us the proposed room assignments, we took the tour. The building definitely has a more institutional look – low ceilings, cinderblock walls and not many windows. But the media center and computer room were both more clean and modern. Overall, it’s fine. We could have done much worse. You could see how much the current students put into the school, and it was sad for them to lose their school.

After the tour, we headed to the comic shop. The 501st Garrison were there in full force. They set up a tent out in front. They were really great. EVERYONE was so excited to see them.

They had started about 20 minutes before we got there, and despite cold, drizzly weather, there was still a line outside the door. We saw our friends Michelle, Jonathan & Jonathan in line as we wormed our way through the crowd to the back of the store. I put the boys in the back of the store, Zevan set up near the storage closet with his donut, and Zander on the back wall, reading comic books.

Barb, our manager’s daughter was there in a Captain America costume, complete with shield. We had a friend dressed as Flash manning the prize table until he was called to the East library branch, and I took over.

It was CRAZY busy nearly the whole day. The store was packed. Many people who came to shop or even just browse were surprised to find out we were giving away comic books.

Around noon, Grandpa picked up the ZBoys. We stayed busy all day, and saw a lot of friends, many of whom saw my event listing on Facebook.

A KOAA reporter came for the event. He was psyched because the Garrison was there, and he is a huge Star Wars fan. He filmed a lot at the shop, and we even were able to squeeze in a quick interview. My talking head appeared on the 10 o’clock news last night! The coverage was good.

KOAA will be doing a feature on the 501st Garrison next month – so the publicity was good for everyone involved.

I took a break around 2:00 PM when Candy & Misha came by. We ran over to Old Chicago’s for a quick lunch. I got back to the store and helped out for a while longer. The last friends I saw were Kristi & her girls. They were VERY excited to get comic books. Kaitlyn was so cute with her two year old voice saying, “Teen Titans!”

I left the store around 4:15 and headed home.

Whew! What a day!

My boys have made their first blog posts!

Check it out: www.zander-scott.com and www.zevanscott.com

I’m so proud.

Overheard at breakfast this morning.

Zander: If I become President of the United States when I grow up…

No, wait. What’s the 6th month?

Dad: June.

Zander: It will be the first of June. There are no holidays in June.

So, as I look into creating website for the ZBoys – at their request , I started perusing some Wordpress Themes.

My favorite site for Wordpress themes by far is WP Zoom. Particularly the theme sets, like 50+ Free Themes for Personal Blogs and Best Free WordPress Themes in 2008.

Right now, for this site, I’m playing with the Notepad Chaos theme – it’s one I’ve been eyeing for a while, and will likely be the one that I use as a starting point to modify and come up with a custom version of it for myself.

I’ve set up the websites for the boys – and used some related themes and added a few custom touches so far.

For Zander’s site – I’m using the Wordpress Fun theme. As you can see, I changed the logo and the color of the boy’s hair. I removed the featured area and replaced it with his links and categories. Of course, that will change again

For Zevan’s site, I’m using Desk Space which has the same cartoon guy. I’ve customized the header with his name and photos and note from mom and dad

These will be a work in progress. The boys haven’t even seen these pages yet, and I’m sure they will have strong opinions about their sites.