My son's doctor told us that they don't worry about numbers of imaging scans until they are into the dozens for MRIs and the hundreds for X-rays.

Did you read the whole article? The person was trans, according to both the legal definition in the state it occurred and the generally proposed standard by trans activists. Having abused the rights accorded based on that status does not change whether the standard was met.

His blood tests came back okay. The liver-related tests look the same as last month, so not normal, but not bad enough to need to make a change at this time, and not worsening. They added some more metabolic-related things to his tests, which didn't turn up anything. Glucose levels were fine. The only thing in his tests that came out worse than last month were his white blood cell counts, but that shouldn't have anything to do with his scent. At this point they are saying it is likely that the smell is an unknown side-effect of the study drug he is on, as it builds up gradually in his system over time, so could very well have just taken this long to build enough to cause this effect.

I don't love any child more or less than another. I think they are all such interesting, amazing, different people. That does not mean, however, that I enjoy each child equally all the time. As they go through different phases, sometimes one or another can be a huge pain for a time, but that's just part of growing up. However, issues with the kids' perceptions of unequal care have become more difficult this past year. The requirements of medical care for my youngest mean that he gets way more one-on-one time than the others going to and from appointments, while they stay at home. They've spent a lot of time with babysitters. They've had to take on more responsibility with being more independent with schoolwork, and we had to drop most of their extracurriculars (those that weren't already cancelled for covid). And while we actively resist the urge to spoil ds7, he is often worn out by his medications and PT work and is incapable of doing as much as we expected of the others at his age. They have mostly been really understanding of it all, but they are just kids, and it is a hard thing to deal with.

No. Old person body scent that you faintly smell when giving them a hug, that's a little more--I don't know--sour? warm? frail? yellowish?--than a younger person's scent. I don't really think we have the vocabulary necessary to describe it.

His blood sugar could be affected, and will be tested on Wednesday. It has been fine previously. He's only seven, so I'd be surprised if it were body chemistry changes. No sinus issues.

Yes, but it is not the traditional chemo. He's in a clinical study for an oral MEK Inhibitor. It's supposed to not cause that nearly as much, but they have got me using gloves if I absolutely have to be the one taking care of that stuff or dh doing it if at all possible.

That may be it. His blood tests related to liver function were a little off last month, so it might be that getting worse.

I'm sure I'm more sensitive to it because of the pregnancy, but the change in my perception of smells happened almost five months ago, and this is a distinct difference just in the last few weeks. It's possible, but I don't think it is just me.

The only thing I can think of that it is at all similar to is old person smell. Not actually like my grandparents, but like dh's grandparents when they were in the nursing home. But not quite like that.

My son smells wrong. This is my little guy with cancer. I have always been more keyed in to smells than most people. Lately ds7's scent is different, off somehow, and while there's some variation from day to day, it seems to be getting more and more so. He has also generally been very fatigued lately, but the smell is not necessarily stronger on the days when his fatigue is worse. It's not the medication on his breath or anything like that, though I do smell it more strongly from his breath than from the rest of him. It is not a bad smell, really, but something about it creeps me out. Every time I hold him, that smell has me going "Something's wrong! Something's wrong!" on the inside. We'll be seeing his oncologist and doing all his monthly tests on Wednesday, so if it is something that will show up on a blood test, we'll know soon.

I agree that this definitely doesn't change anything about the recommendations for previously infected people to still go get vaccinated, as that gives the best possible protection against future infection. What it might change, though, if future peer-review and studies back up this info, is the calculation on vaccinating healthy children. How low would a kid's chances of having a severe outcome from covid contracted in childhood need to be to actually make it safer for them to first catch covid as a kid, and then be vaccinated afterwards so as to have that superior protection of natural immunity+vaccination, vs. if they were to be vaccinated earlier and have a higher likelihood of contracting covid for the first time as a breakthrough case when they are older? Right now we are all hoping for a vaccine for younger kids soon, but if it turned out that getting vaccinated younger increased the chances of catching it at an age when a worse outcome is more likely? I hope we get more information on this soon.

Really? I thought the new studies coming out of Israel were showing the opposite? https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.08.24.21262415v1

All of my kids want kids of their own, though my oldest is not big on the idea of going through pregnancy and childbirth, and she goes back and forth between wanting to adopt or have kids naturally. My youngest may or may not be able to father children after his spinal surgery last November, but he is too young to determine whether those functions were damaged or not. The chemo may also affect that. But if he wants to be a father someday and can’t naturally, there are always other options to parenthood.

If you don't want to have problems with the backs, bolt the shelves to the wall when installing them. No issues then. The backs are too flimsy to hold up over time, otherwise.

Various extra expenses this month. After doing the dishes by hand for months, we coughed up $320 for the dishwasher repair. He had to order a part, so that will be completed next week. Dh got a dental appliance to help with his sleep apnea. Dd12 hit a special life milestone and we took her out for a nice (fancy) dinner, for the first time ever. Dd10 needed new glasses because she lost the old ones, and the kid size didn't fit very well anymore, but neither did the adult ones. Got her adult petite ones but the price came in at almost $200 more than our insurance would pay. The hospital invited us to participate in a cancer charity event that we are going to. Our expenses there are covered, but we needed to put some extra in the fuel budget to cover the travel cost. Some car oil and filter changes and tire rotation things. We completed our mortgage refinance and paid back the part of the fee for that that we took out of our emergency fund. I was pleased that after all the extras, we still managed to sock some more towards our goal of filling the IRAs for the year. We can make it if we stay on track.

I married a month after turning 20, and it was absolutely the right decision for me. If a young adult is mature and ready for the real work of establishing and maintaining a solid long-term relationship, and they happen to find the right person early, why wait? But I did have some misgivings about my 19-year-old niece's marriage this summer. She never struck me as particularly mature for her age and was so recently still in that changeable adolescent phase that I worry whether she is ready yet.

It was a very different experience at grad school. I was surprised when a professor at dh's law school wouldn't allow any accommodation whatsoever for dh missing 2 classes when I was giving birth (his policy was that if you miss two consecutive classes, you get dropped from the course), and their school medical insurance didn't cover maternity costs. My own dad was pulled out of finals at BYU law school to go to my sister's birth and was allowed to complete his finals the next week.

It's interesting to me how many people on here have the experience of the divide in circles they know being between early marriage and education, especially for girls. Being lds, and especially having attended a church university, my personal experience is very different. I guess my religion must be unusual for so often opting for both early marriage/family and higher education. If you ever get a chance to walk around BYU campus, you will spot plenty of young, pregnant female students and babies. There was a dad in my Hebrew linguistics classes who's son came with him to class every day, and then he and his wife would swap in the hall before their next classes (so that neither had him with in their lab sciences). The baby was crawling and then walking around the classroom, and our professor would hold him and play with him during timed quizzes so that dad wouldn't be distracted.

Yeah. I have wished that all my kids, but especially ds9, could have a teacher like you for their math instead of me. I have learned a ton about math education and done well by them, but it still surprises me that between two very “languagey” parents we managed to get four “mathy” kids. At least we have AOPS for when they surpass me, which my dd12 is only about a year away from doing.

For my son, slowing him down served a dual purpose of not crushing his sister by passing her and also giving him more time to mature before getting into too difficult of work. Because even if he could answer most of the questions right a year or two ago, doing the work in his head often faster than I could, if he got that twentieth question wrong he’d be rolling around on the floor crying that the computer was lying, or that it was just trying to trick him to make him look stupid. So we took lots of forays into math games and challenging word problems to slow his progress through his main curriculum while we worked on that.

I think this is a is a good idea.

I am hoping we can get past this before he finishes BA, and then I am confident he will be ready for AOPS Prealgebra. I have slowed his math progress at times with various side tracks to avoid him passing his big sister, and the work he’s doing is not very challenging for him once I get him to use paper. Where is your son taking his physics and his chemistry classes?

My ds9 has about half of BA5 left, and is finally hitting the point where he can no longer consistently get all the answers right in his head. We have been trying to work on this kid’s perfectionism for years, with some progress, but not enough. (His mantra that we regularly make him repeat is “Human beings make mistakes. I am a human being. I make mistakes.”) We are having a lot of drama with math now, with ds frequently in tears. Once I place the pencil in his hand and force him to write down his work, he doesn’t have any trouble, but I think he sees it as a failure to need to use anything. I guess I am glad we are working through this now before he gets to Prealgebra, but man, am I tired of it. I am so ready to be done with this daily drama and back to him being my easiest student. I wish I knew how long this is going to take.

At what math level would you consider a young student ready to attempt the AMC 8? I have a kid who I think would love to get into serious math competitions, but I had it in my mind that it was only for middle schoolers. How do you tell when a young one is ready?