Third time's a charm.....

I finally managed to get Ben's GH shot right last night-third attempt. The first time was a complete failure. The second time, I ditched the needle guard and did much better, but I don't think I depressed the plunger properly and nothing got injected. Last night, everything worked well. Unfortunately, Ben has joined the ranks of children that say the Nutropin formulation stings. Apparently, it's the preservative they use and so it doesn't get any better. Once again, we have to ask ourselves why on earth we had to change medication. We had the same problem with Daniel's ADHD medication when the insurance changed the formulary and we switched from Metadate to Concerta. Even though in theory they should be the same and have the same effects, there are subtle changes that make a huge difference to a child. Of course, the medical insurance companies don't care about any of that. Still, our statement from last year shows that the insurance company paid $18,000 for Ben's GH shots & he only started in June, so we can't complain too much.....

WGHS Basketball game

Last night was Elementary School night at the Webster Groves High School basketball game. The elementary school kids got in free with an adult. There were a lot of kids from Hudson there and they got to see the Principal win the throw competition at half time. This was the first basketball game that I have ever been to-anohter American fist for me that took almost 20 years to achieve!!!! Webster has a pretty good team, they have only lost 3 games this season & won last night, so everyone had a lot of fun. It held the kids attention for the first half and then most of them were more interested in going back and forth to the concession stand until the game ended.

Growth hormone nightmare

After 6 months on Norditropin and doing fine, we finally ran out of supplies and last night was the first go at using the Nutropin pen. Ben had already built up the change into being a disaster and was convinced it was going to hurt more than the Norditropin. Well, in a way he was right. It was horrendous. The new pen is not easy to use, it was completely different to what I was used to and as a consequence, I did everything wrong. Suffice to say, I think I hurt Ben and he didn't get any of the solution injected into himself. He cried for about 10 minutes and needed me to hold him for even longer. I think his life flashed in front of his eyes again. At one point, he even said he was prepared to stay small just so he didn't have to do the shots. I managed to persuade him to try again and hopefully it will get better. He's turned into a hater of the medical insurance system at the tender age of 7 and it won't get any better!!!!!

Visit to the magic house

Webster Groves had a Parents as Teachers night at the Magic House last night. We don't go there very often and hadn't been there since they opened the new extension. Ben was talking about it all day, but I have no idea how he knew about it. I was really surprised when we got there as the new part is huge and makes the place look at least twice the size. The big attraction for Ben was that they now have a court room and he got to sit in the judge's seat and pass sentence on us lesser mortals. They have a room full of settings for various classic children's stories and Ben & Maggie got to make shoes at the Elves & the Shoemaker section. After a while, they gravitated to the old stand-bys. Maggie spent the rest of her time fishing and watching her fish travel down the stream and Ben waited on customers in the store

Refusing to be outdone.....

After we had snow in St. Louis, Loughborough did the same.....

England has had the biggest snowfall in many years and Dad sent me pictures of the snow in their garden. Looks all nice and fluffy. Good snowman-making fodder.....

The gloves are off.....

We got the information about the Science Fair in the Wednesday envelope this week. It's very late this year because the project is due at the end of February. It doesn't give us a lot of time. This year, I decided that Ben could choose what he wanted to do again. Last year, he had a brilliant project that he came up with all on his own. He was beaten out of winning, primarily because he has such a hard time with writing & didn't write much in his journal. I also refused to write everything for him.

I suggested that he did a survey on kids using growth hormone this year, but he wanted to do something with me at work. I decided we could kill two birds with one stone & he could do an experiment that I was doing. So, now he is looking at the killing effect of cigarette smoke extract on lung endothelial cells!!!!! He made up the solution and added it to the cells today. I could have picked something out of a book like other parents do, but this was what Ben wanted. I can guarantee that it's too much science for him to win anything at an Elementary level, but it's his & that's all that matters.....

Is there no end to his imagination?

Because the weather was so much nicer today, Ben decided that he and Maggie needed to go on a scavenger hunt for things in nature that you can find in the Winter. He got a couple of brown bags, put their names on them and off they went into the garden. Later, I had to drive them up to the school so that they could get sweet gum balls. We also found a few pieces of broken boxwood when we went to work. Ben declared the hunt a success.