THE SHADDOX BOYS

Jacob and Elijah Shaddox are brothers. Jacob is 21 years old and just moved into an apartment with his girlfriend. He graduated from a technical college with an Associate's degree in Computer Maintenance. He works for a school district as a computer technician. Elijah is almost 18 years old. He is hearing impaired, has Tourette Syndrome, OCD and ADHD. He is a junior in high school. Elijah lives with his mom Mary and her wife, his stepmom. Mary has a bachelor's in deaf education and a masters in special education, and is an educational diagnostician. Life is always changing and this blog has chronicled many of these changes and will continue to do so!






Saturday, March 18, 2017

Life Has Been Busy

I am trying to be better about posting, but it hasn't happened yet. Life has been busy for us and not always in a good way. Back in November of last year, my wife had to take me to the ER for some serious pain on my right side. Everyone thought it was my gall bladder, but the ultrasound showed it was fine. I visited my gynecologist and saw a gastroenterologist. The blood work showed I was in early menopause, but nothing else was found, so we decided to wait and see what happened.

January was busy for me with work. Elijah was and still is doing well in school. Life was moving on. Right around February 1st the extreme pain returned for two nights. I was up and awake and dealing with it, and then it would go away. However, on Feb. 6th my wife took me once again to the ER and they thought I had kidney stones. Two days later and four more ER visits (two in the course of about 8 hours) and a LONG special scan and it was determined that my gall bladder was not functioning as it should be. I went to the last ER in an ambulance. There is a lot more to the story, but it is all too complicated. I spent from Thursday night to Saturday afternoon in the hospital. My surgery was early on Friday evening.

My poor wife was as worn out as I was from all of these visits. My mom was a great help and let her go home to get some rest. She had to take care of the boys, although Jacob is pretty self sufficient, Elijah isn't. He is not a toddler, but he needed someone at home at night and to get him up and off to school.

I spent one week home after surgery and then returned to work. It took another two weeks before I started feeling like my old self. The pain that I experienced was the worst pain I have ever had. It wore me out and I was worried we would never find out what was causing it.

Jacob is studying for a certification test for computers that will hopefully lead to a better job. He had his wisdom teeth pulled this past week and did really well with it all. We are both glad that it is done! Elijah will be 17 next month. That is really hard to believe. My wife and I will celebrate our first wedding anniversary in June. Hopefully, I will post again before June!