Finally I remembered to take a new pic of her skin! her redness has gone down quite a bit since we've stopped wrapping her entire body. her neck is raw from a yeast infection that is just now healing over. But as you can see, she's looking great :) her legs are still the worst area, but even those are looking a ton better. :)

I'm proud of my little girl.

So I was looking back at some of the first posts I wrote, where I included pictures of Genevieve's skin at that time. I knew that she looked a lot better now, but I didnt realize to what extent until just now. To remind you....


That picture was taken March 14th. and here we are today, with only the arches of her feet wrapped. We were (before) wrapping her ankles and feet (and often a little up her leg) every time, but over the weekend we decided to try something new. I knew her legs needed to breathe, and the skin to dry out to help it heal. So we started to just put a tshirt on her at night and just letting her sleep in that and a diaper, instead of a sleeper. We left her legs unwrapped, and only wrapped her feet if they had actual sores on them. Before we were wrapping her feet no matter what because the skin was so thick and looked painful. So far, it's made a huge difference. No sores on her ankles or legs still. Her feet are wrapped today just where the arches would be, she had some tiny blisters show up last night at the base of her toes. She seems to be a lot more comfortable now as well. Every night I say that I want to take a new updated picture of her skin and I always forget. Tonight it's just me and Genevieve for her bath, so I will do my best to try to remember to take one and put it up.

I should really try to get some cleaning done around here while she's asleep. check back later tonight and hopefully I'll have a new pic of her skin up.

(Jenny... you posted a comment to my last entry. I replied to it, but in case you don't see it... feel free to email me at aschmaedeka@yahoo.com i would love to talk to you some more!)

Well, my little girl is up to 10 pounds exactly and 22 inches long. she looks a whole hell of a lot longer lol. She did well with her shots, only fussed for 2 seconds. She's a tough girl. She came home and slept for a good 5 hours or so and now she is super clingy, and fussy. She falls asleep for (literally) 2 minutes then wakes up whining. I gave her some tylenol and it's only helping her to stay asleep for about 5-10 minutes at a time. her skin is looking really good, i'll try to take a new picture tonight of it. I'm exhausted today for some reason, so i'm keeping this short.


Oh and I must throw in that I am extremely proud of myself. Last night I knew Andy was super stressed out while at work because he had a lot to get done and would be there late... and he knew he had to help with her bath and do her bandages when he got home (which takes anywhere from a hour to a hour and a half)... so I figured I would help out. I did a bath with her by myself and even did her bandages (first time for me, andy always does them). The bath was a challenge to do without sitting in the tub with her. Simply because leaning over the tub, holding her body under water was a challenge. She looked at me quite confused, probably because she's used to me being the one to comfort her through it all. But I did it! :)

such a beautiful smile

I finally caught a picture of her smiling! She has been smiling for about a week now, but it's totally obvious that she's still learning that she can smile. Each one is very few and far between and most of the time she only smiles when she is by herself. Like when she is laying by herself on the couch and no one is paying attention to her and she's "talking" to herself... she will smile. We happen to catch them out of the corner of our eye. We can show her different things, make different noises, and silly faces and she just stares at us like "what the hell are you doing" and wont budge for a smile... so I'm very happy I finally caught one for a picture! :)

me and andy.

oh how i love photobuckets editing software. haha

Her dermatologist visit today went GREAT! She was very impressed with how great Viv's skin is looking. She told us to keep doing exactly what we've been doing. We were told however that Genevieve has 3 yeast infections and the start of a 4th one. The worst one is in her neck roll... when she opened up that roll, man I thought i was going to throw up it smelled so bad. We had been cleaning in there, but apparently not well enough =/ she also has a yeast infection behind her ears, one side is worse than the other.. the ear she favors when sleeping is worse. one down in between her "goods" and her thighs. and then the start of one in her armpits. rather embarassing that she has so many at once, but the derm reassured us that it is perfecting normal considering the fact that we have to keep her moist right now for her skin not to hurt her. she prescribed a cream for us to use on these areas and that they should clear up. She also told us to keep doing the soaks every night, and to use a capful of bleach in the bath water at least once a week, that it will help kill the bacteria in/on her skin.

We are definately going to keep visiting with her instead of Genevieve's original dermatologist. She took the time to listen to our concerns and answer our questions, no matter how outrageous some were.... unlike the other derm. She didnt treat Genevieve like she was a "prize"... didnt try to show her case off to other doctors in the clinic... like her original derm did. She also made another appointment with us for in May. When Genevieve was seen by her original dermatologist he brought in 4 other doctors without asking us, and pretty much just "showed off" his rare case that he had. Didnt answer any questions of ours. He offered skin care advice that only made her worse. When we left, he didnt even have us schedule another appointment for her to be seen. And when we've tried to make an appt with him, he's been booked for months. Plus the new dermatologist is in the same building as her pediatrician, so we dont have to worry about anything not being transferred over to her pediatrician or vice versa... I guess the u of m medical center (where her original derm is) never sent over a copy of the skin biopsy results to park nicollet (where her pediatrician and new derm is) so as of right now they dont have actual paperwork/results at park nicollet that it is EHK. So tomorrow I get to call and get that taken care of. I also have to remember to call the manufacturer of Aquaphor and see what her dermatologist or pediatrician need to fax them for us to get on the program to get Aquaphor for free. And also call the medical supply place and get her doctors switched over to her new ones. To me it sounds like so much to do, but that's just because I hate dealing with her medical things over the phone... that's why Andy takes care of most of it for me. haha.

She was a super crab apple today, and it literally took me all day to realize why. She woke up at about 11am to eat and enjoy some mommy and me time with me... and was awake until about 7:30pm tonight. With little naps throughout the day that only lasted maybe 5 minutes each. We had her derm appt and then I took her with me to visit my cousin who is in the hospital (she has a blood clot throughout her right leg, and then clots in both lungs =/), so we were on the go most of the day. Normally she will fall asleep in the car, but since it's been so nice out, ive uncovered her while in the car, and she loves looking out the window. So she wasnt falling asleep. And like mother like daughter, when she's exhausted but still around people she fights falling asleep, hardcore. She gets really heavy eyelids, and the second she starts to fall asleep she pops her eyes wide open and then starts to fight it again. She's afraid to miss out on something. Silly little girl.

She has her next appointment next week on the 9th. Her standard 2 month check up and vaccinations. I am so nervous about her shots, hell, I teared up when I took my dog to get his shots! I will definately remember to give her tylenol before we go, and Andy will be holding her while she gets the shots and I will be looking the other way! haha. I'm super excited to see how much she weighs and how long she is now. None of her clothes are fitting her these days... she's too long for them! she is wearing 3-6 months in sleepers because she needs the length.

Well it's almost 1:30am and I should get some sleep. Here's more pictures that I took the other day of her.... I'll write again after her appointment next week :)



I decided to play with the photo editing software on photobucket...