tmi & an angel named Doris

I learned too late in my life that T.M.I. stands for "too much information", and as you now know, in my world there apparently is no such thing.

Honestly though, since our meltdown, life has been seriously lovely. There were the bubbles, of course, and working in our garden, digging in the rich earth and marvelling at the brilliance of everylivingthing out my window. I'm actually really looking forward to this week with spring break. We've been snuggling a lot, reading books and talking about everything from the upcoming wedding to math problems to Joe-Henry's Halloween Costume. He's going to be Dwight Shrute.

We also got him fitted for a custom compression stocking. I can't tell you how frustrating it's been since our move to try to find ANYONE who is willing to learn about Joe-Henry's syndrome. His pediatrician is very hand's off, but mostly I think it's just the way his office works and not necessarily him. Everything seems to take longer than it should, and be more complicated and people have just been kind of, well, not helpful. But I finally found the fount of knowledge for all things vascular and lymphatic, and it was in a little dress shop that specializes in mastectomy wear and compression garments. I found them through another local kt mom. I've never met her, but we've exchanged lots of emails. She directed me to this store, where we were met by Doris. Doris is now, officially, our angel.

She's probably in her 60's, she's very tan with dark curly hair, and she has a very exact speech pattern. On the phone I pictured her to be completely humorless and librarian like, and I couldn't have been more wrong. She was a riot, a great listener (Joe-Henry had LOTS of stories to tell - more on that in a moment), and an absolute expert in all things compression: lymph flow, vascularity, types of materials, different styles of stockings, etc. She had more information and more compassion than anyone else I've met here. And if all goes as planned, Joe-Henry will have his bright orange compression stocking in about 10 days.

Anyway, she had Joe-Henry take off his pants so she could measure him, and he immediately said he had to go to the bathroom. So I told him we should probably put his pants back on so we wouldn't shock the ladies, and he said, "Yeah, I don't want to be like Daddy that one time when he forgot his robe, running naked through the house grabbing his penis yelling 'Nudiedaddynudiedaddynudiedaddy'!"

Um. No. Probably not.

I guess the whole "oversharing" thing runs in the family.