Yesterday was Jonalyn’s 10th birthday. She wasn’t up for much of a celebration and frankly, I didn’t want to confuse her by celebrating again. I’m just glad yesterday wasn’t as bad as Tuesday.

Tuesday, she couldn’t keep anything in her stomach. That included her pain meds. She was miserable, poor kid. She whimpered most of the day. Needless to say, I did my fair share of laundry and floor washing and my febreeze bottle got a work out.

Much as I hate to admit it, I tried Doug’s solution to the problem yesterday and it worked. Don’t you hate it when husbands are right?? After giving her plain Tylenol first thing in the morning and not achieving any pain relief, I gave her a rice cake. She ate that, so I mixed her pain med in her apple juice. She didn’t chug it, just sipped it down over about 15 minutes. Then I gave her applesauce. Success! The change in her was amazing. She started talking and laughing and playing again. That’s our new system now. I made her favorite – chicken and rice – for dinner, and she ate quite a bit.

And how sweet to know that her caregiver in the Philippines celebrated her birthday with pancit, juice and bread and they said a mass for her. She is the sweet girl she is today because of their love during the first five years of her life.