Qatar Adventures with the O's

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Update on Avery

As most of you know, Avery has been having bowel and bladder problems over the past 10 months. She initially contracted a parasite last Christmas break which seemed to be resolved by the end of spring. Unfortunately, during that time, she began to have some problems staying dry. The problem as become progressively worse since arriving here in Doha.

We found an American trained doctor here who I really like. She ran another stool test which thank goodness came back clean and free of parasites. We have tested for a urinary tract infection (also negative). Avery then had an ultrasound of her bladder, kidneys, colon, etc. We have found that she isn't able to empty her bladder when she pees. She has 50% of her urine left in the bladder after she goes. Therefore, 5 min later she needs to go again. We aren't sure why this has happened and further testing is needed. I spoke with our Florida pediatrician and we will get some testing and a visit with a pediatric urologist while we are they for Christmas.

The ultrasound also showed that she is a bit constipated even though she goes every day so we are working on that now.

To further complicate things, she also is having bladder spasms in which her bladder contracts at times when Avery isn't trying to urinate causing her to scissor her legs and try to prevent the urine from leaking out. She isn't able to because it is like squeezing a water balloon while trying to pinch the end where the water comes out. If you squeeze very hard, water will leak through where you are pinching. She is going through 8-10 pairs of underwear per day because of this leaking. The treatment for this is contraindicated if you also have the bladder emptying problem. We will find out more when we see the specialist in December.

I feel so bad for her because for so long we thought she just wasn't taking the time out from playing to go and we now find out that she has no control over the problems she is having at all.

Despite all this, she is happy and having fun here in Doha. She loves school and is doing pretty well staying dry there if they take her to the bathroom every 30 minutes. (Usually only needs to change once while at school). Love this girl!!!

Saturday, November 3, 2012

Doha Skyline

Bobby had some of the Crom guys over for a meeting at the house this weekend so the kids and I decided to head out for a couple of hours. We went with the twin boys (Leon and Jordy) that Chase and Natalie have been playing this week with and their mom and dad on a boat ride along the Corniche. The boat took us really close to some of the coolest looking buildings in Doha so I wanted to share them with you. I think the architecture here is so different than anything I have ever seen in the US. At night, many of these building light up with crazy, changing lighting patterns.

Crazy fun architecture here

Here is Natalie getting ready to get on the boat

Chase "meditating"

Natalie "meditating" and cracking up at the same time

Not sure why they thought this meditating was so funny but they did.....

After the kids were finished being silly with the meditating, the caption started playing some music and everyone danced along and had a great time.

Coer (pronounced Kor), Jordy, and Avery dancing in a train (Ingrid in the background)

Natalie and Avery dancing

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Picnics, Parks, Souq, Kittens, and Goodbye Mia

Now that the weather is finally becoming bearable (only getting into the 90s during the day and down in the 80s at night), we have begun to venture out to the local parks. One morning last week we went to one of the parks at the Corniche. The Corniche is the long sidewalk area that runs all the way down the waterfront on the edge of Doha. There are many parks, a huge, wide sidewalk, and even some restaurants along here. At night, the place is packed with people picnicing, exercising, and just walking around and playing on the playgrounds. At that time it is mostly local Qatari people. We only spent about 1.5 hours playing soccer, baseball, volleyball, and playing on the playground before the kids were too hot to stay out any longer. Natalie was with us during all these events but she is anti posing for pictures these days so I didn't manage to sneak any in on these

Bobby playing soccer

Keep your eye on the ball Avery

Chase playing soccer

Chase and Bobby

Today we took the kids to another cool park that had 3 huge playground structures in various parts of the park plus a huge skate park area. It was more than a half pipe and had some parts that even Avery could ride her little bike on. The kids had a blast here and we will definitely be coming back often.

Leon and Chase

Souq Waqif -- We took Mia to the Souq Waquif where she could see the camels, locals, and a really cool marketplace where you can find anything from gold, to pearls, to textiles, to handmade goods, custom tailored clothing, etc....

We got to watch a man take tiny gold pellets and melt them into jewelry

Our friends, Ken and Esther, have been back in England for this break so we have been kitten sitting for them. They have a kitten that is so tiny and cute and the kids are loving helping take care of him. Here are a few pics of the cutie pie.

Avery and Biscuit

Chase and Biscuit

Before taking Mia to the airport, we took her to the Hilton restaurant for dinner. We sat outside and got to see a perfect view of a man in traditional dress drinking beers, and then his buddy come over and together they were having shots and beers. Even they break the rules sometimes I guess. :)

In this one, the first guy is laying down taking a nap I guess

Mia is at the airport now waiting to head home to Florida. We had a great time spending time with her and showing her around Doha. Unfortunately, she got sick 3 days into her trip and felt awful for most of it, but she still had fun and we were so glad she was here and got to spend time with us. We love you MIA!

Happy Halloween!

Well, Halloween has come and gone and it sure wasn't the same as in Town of Tioga..... I saw that Tioga was as busy as ever this year! So sad to have missed all the chaos! We did have a great time here in Doha though!

We spent the day putting up some decorations in the front yard so trick or treaters would know to stop at our villa. Then we headed to the pool with a friend of Chase's from school and his brother, sister, and mom since their compound wasn't doing anything for Halloween. They are a very sweet family and all the kids had fun playing with them. They are from England and have only lived here about 8 months.

The compound had all the kids meet up at the front office to head out to trick or treat and I was really surprised how many kids turned up! There must have been at least 100 or more kids there! And this was right in the middle of a week off of school, so most of the kids we have met here were out of town! Lots of houses had candy and a few even were really decorated pretty well (although nothing like Tioga). One house had the coolest thing that I want to get for our house next year. It was a bubble fogger (which is like a bubble machine but when the bubbles pop they turn into smoke.) It was sooo cool to see and the kids loved it! The family said they got it in Canada so I bet I can find it on Amazon. Here are some pictures of the night:

Butterfly Fairy and Rainbow Fairy (aka Tillie and Avery)

Jester(Ingrid -- twin's mom), Skeleton Zombie (Jack), Werewolf (Chase's friend Charlie), Ghost one (Jordy), Ghost 2 (Leon), Wizard (Chase), Genie (Natalie) The Ghosts are the twins who live in our compound that we met this week. Charlie is in Chase's class at school and Jack is his older brother. Tillie in the first pic with Avery is Charlie's little sister.