- Good morning, everyone.
This is our first video back from vlogmas.
And if you are subscribed to us,
thank you for subscribing and watching.
And if you have been watching for a while,
you know that we took some time off,
and we needed to take that time off.
And so I thank you for your patience.
And I wanted to explain kind of what
I have been going through in the past couple months,
because I've had a little bit of a medical issue.
We had a great Christmas, and a really,
really good vlogmas season,
and it was really happy and fun.
But I've been dealing with this other thing,
and I wanted to take just a moment and talk about it.
It's nothing serious.
It's just been something that's been happening.
And I wanted to talk about it.
Since October of last year,
I have been having these unexplainable hives.
They usually flare up at night and in the mornings,
but they persist throughout the day,
and they are all along my sides,
like the trunk of my body, down my arms,
recently, they've been coming down,
I don't know if you can see them right now.
This isn't a bad breakout for me, this is like normal.
This kind of like average,
but they've been kinda coming down my arms,
and down my legs, and it's been spreading more and more.
I thought they would go away.
That's why I haven't mentioned it at all.
But it has been something that's kind of under the surface,
been like bugging me, and they itch.
Like I can feel them through my shirt,
and they've just been bothering me,
and making me a little bit more irritable
I than I typically am.
So, since October, I have been going to an allergist
to try and figure out what is going on.
I've taken a bunch of blood tests.
I am on a bunch of medication,
which I'll talk about in a second.
And I, I changed out,
I changed my diet, I changed my,
the sheets, and pillowcase,
to a hypoallergenic pillowcase and sheets.
I changed out the air filter in our heater.
I changed, I put an air purifier in my bedroom.
I changed my shampoo.
I've gone through everything,
to try and figure out what these hives are.
And I also did the blood tests and everything came back
I'm very healthy, apparently.
Which is really good to hear,
aside from these hives that my body has decided
that they're going to produce.
Hives aren't a new thing for me,
I had them a little bit when I was younger.
They sort of run in my family,
Bailey's dealt with it before,
Jacob's dealt with it before, I'm dealing with it now.
And typically, they just kind of go away.
These ones have been persistent,
and mysterious.
No idea where they're coming from.
My doctor has put me on a bunch of anti-histamines.
I went through a round of like a steroid as well.
It sort of lessens it a little bit.
The outbreaks aren't as severe,
and like super itchy and big, but they're still there.
And the medication makes me super tired.
And tomorrow, I am actually going to the allergist
to get my first injection of something called
Xolair, I think.
it's a monthly injection for hives,
if they can't find the cause for them,
and they aren't going away with regular anti-histamines.
So that's where I'm at, medically.
One of the ways that hives can get more severe
is through stress.
People get stress and deal with stress in different ways.
And for me, my go-to is to
have a project to work on something.
So vlogmas I thought was gonna be the thing.
Like I was going to work really hard on vlogmas,
I had take my mind off it, work on something.
So we tried that for that month.
And I did a pretty good job in terms of like,
putting a video out every day.
I think we missed maybe like two days,
which is good for us for, for vlogmas.
And I was having fun doing it, I really enjoy it.
Those are like really happy memories for me,
to see those later and reading comments,
and things like that.
Like it really, it was very encouraging and fun.
And I thought that maybe
the hives would go away from me doing that.
Or like my stress level would reduce,
that didn't work.
Jessica suggested that I take time off,
which is not my go-to.
That's not like me as a person.
I'm usually like, no, I gotta be doing something.
I gotta build a guitar or, you know, start a new project.
But she told me to take, take time off,
which is what we've been doing since vlogmas.
That didn't seem to make a difference with the hives.
So yeah, now we're kind of going,
gonna go somewhere in between.
And we'll be posting videos,
but not at an aggressive pace,
just, you know, normal stuff.
And I've been trying to figure out
ways of like making my work load different,
not, not necessarily less,
but just adjusting workload to balance
family and work and feel like fulfilled with what I do,
cause I love what I do,
but also be able to be more present
and be more, I don't know, just sort of shift things,
and see what happens with that.
And so for that, we are currently looking for an editor.
In the past we've had like babysitters,
we haven't been looking for a babysitter,
because COVID is spiking.
And having someone from the outside
get put into the mix just didn't seem to work
for what we're doing right now.
So, we haven't been looking for a babysitter,
but an editor is an interesting idea.
I really enjoy editing, like it is a fun activity for me.
I like making the videos, but I think I
am at a point where I would like to try
working with somebody to make the videos happen.
And so we're on the lookout for
somebody to do some editing for us,
which you may or may not notice a difference.
Hopefully, if you do, it's a good difference, on the vlogs.
Right now, I'm just trying to find a balance,
because we've got the new baby, we've got a puppy,
we've got six kids.
And this month has been super cool.
I'm really enjoying the extra time that I've had
with Teddy, because he's,
he's just sort of coming to this age
where he's figuring out that he has hands,
and that they can do things.
And that's a really fun like baby time.
He's also teething, so that's like,
got its own little challenges.
Luke has been going through his different therapies,
making some breakthroughs, doing some really cool stuff
with speech and with physical therapy,
and it's just been really fun
working with him during this last month.
Bailey's gonna go to a public high school next year.
And so it's nice to have the extra time with her.
And then of course like, Dunkin is such a sweetheart.
Parker's just got so much fun energy,
and Jacob is doing such cool things with his art,
and with Blender, learning this new program,
that is just beyond me.
It's really cool to hear what he has to talk about,
and his like ideas for things.
So this past month, like, I haven't been posting anything,
I've been really trying to take it easy,
but I've been really, like,
enjoying the extra time that I've gotten with
my kids and with Jessica as well.
And I just wanna say, that I haven't been
trying to hide the fact that I
have been having these allergic reactions.
It's just that I've been so busy with,
with doing vlogmas, and being a dad of six kids,
and having a new dog, and being married,
and all of those things that I,
I haven't had a chance to really sit down and talk about it.
Plus I thought they would just go away over time.
They haven't.
And that's why I'm starting up the round of injections,
which hopefully will take care of them.
It doesn't with all cases,
I've been doing a ton of research on this,
but hopefully, hopefully it'll, it'll help out.
And vlogmas this year, in the background,
it was a super happy, wonderful time.
But in the background,
I have been dealing with this,
and I have been on this medication,
and it has made me super sleepy.
Like if I sit down and don't do anything for a little while,
I'll probably fall asleep,
like my eyes just automatically close,
and I'm kinda just done.
So it has been a kind of a challenge there.
And this year, Jessica's done
even more than she usually does.
Like she's always working on
the back end of the videos,
and she makes all of our thumbnails,
and she takes care of the kids.
And she's feeding Teddy constantly,
all through the night and all that stuff.
But she's also done a whole bunch of stuff this year.
I had to let go of some of the stuff that I love to do
for Christmas time.
Like I love wrapping the presents,
Jessica wrapped most of the presents this year.
And the thing, just little things like that, that like,
I recognize that I need to like, let go,
and like take care of myself a little bit.
And Jessica totally was like, I got this, I got this,
I'll do this and that.
And I also want to say that I was really touched by
a lot of the comments,
both on YouTube and Twitter and Instagram,
that we were getting about how
we have become a part of people's Christmas,
or holiday traditions.
That I can't not express.
I can't even like wrap my head around
how cool that is.
Like, it is so neat that we've become a part
of people's traditions, watching our videos,
and seeing us open up the advent and stuff,
like our traditions have become your traditions,
which in turn, become our traditions.
And I wanna say, thank you so much for
letting us be a part of your lives.
And also thank you for the comments,
letting us know what we mean to you
is what helped me kinda keep going.
And, I don't know how to express how grateful I am
for you guys, as well.
Like, honestly, your, your words
and your encouragement, your kindness,
it means so much to me and to my whole family.
So thank you very much for that.
This year, Christmas was a lot of fun.
All the lead up to it was a lot of fun,
and we were having a really good time.
And I just wanna point out, that you can be
having something hard happen at the same time
that you're having a good time,
and that it's okay to be happy and to enjoy things,
even when something challenging is happening.
So this was like a minor thing.
It was just making me a little irritable,
I was a little itchy.
I didn't like the mystery of
not knowing why it was happening.
And I still don't really like that,
but that doesn't mean that I wasn't like,
having fun, and enjoying life,
and enjoying the Christmas time along with you guys.
And I think that's it.
I think you are now up to date and, and we can move on.
So, I might give you more updates
depending on how the new medication works,
and just cause you guys are curious, I might,
I might post more about this in the future,
but I did wanna kind of explain our long absence,
and just kinda get you up to date,
before we jump right back into our regular family vlogs.
So, thank you so much for listening,
and for watching and we will see you next time.
(calm music)