Lauren

I know it's been awhile since I last posted, and I will talk about my Mom's visit out here on another day. I am going to talk about Lauren's health issues and it's going to get graphic, so if you have a weak stomach do not read. As most of you know, Lauren has had rectal bleeding since she was 15 months old. When the bleeding first started, we took her off dairy and gave her soy to see if she was allergic to dairy...still bleeding. We flushed out her system and still bleeding, then she had a bought of prolapse that scared me to death. For those of you that don't know what rectal prolapse is, it's when the rectum turns inside out and comes out of the anus. Here I am changing her diaper and there is this bulbus purple thing sticking out of her bottom. I had to muster every ounce of my being so that I wouldn't scream and scare the kids. When I lifted up her legs to remove the dirty diaper, it was gone. That was what led to our visit with the gastroenterologist at CHOC. No testing was done and we were told to put her on Miralax to keep her stools the consistency of soft serve ice cream...still bleeding, but not as frequently. At first she went for a month without bleeding, then two months, then three months, then when we moved out here she went for five months without bleeding and we actually thought that it was finally over, boy were we wrong! She had three bouts of bleeding in one day, then nothing for a month, then more bleeding. Her bleeding was becoming more frequent until Thanksgiving when she had a bowel movement and started screaming because of the pain. She wouldn't let Kevin touch her so I had to check her out. She told me that there was blood and when she got off the toilet, blood was dripping onto her leg. I grabbed the toilet paper and starting wiping it up. I asked her to bend over so that I could check her tooshie and there it was staring at me, but this time I had to push it back in. Not fun people, not fun at all. The next day more bleeding and prolapse. I also have to say that whenever she had bleeding in the past, it was just a little bit and it was more pink than red, but since Thanksgiving, it's been bright red and a lot of it. The Monday after Thanksgiving, I called her pediatrician and let him know what was going on and he gave us the name and number of a doctor to call and schedule with right away. Well, when I looked up the doctor online, I discovered that it was a surgeon. That totally freaked me out! So last week, we got her in with the surgeon and he examined her. The doctor had to put his finger in her anus to check how things felt in there and I must say Lauren did so well. She did everything that he asked her to do and she didn't make a peep. We were so proud of her! So the surgeon tells us that everything feels nice and tight and where it should be and he didn't think that she would need surgery. He did agree that since the bleeding has been going on for so long to have a scope done, so he said that he would talk with his colleagues and they would call us to schedule. The next day we got a call saying that Lauren would need an xray and would be seeing the gastroenterologist after. Now that brings us to today. We took her in for the xray and she did wonderful! We got to the doctors office and the fun began. The doctor said that Lauren has some calcification in her appendix and has a lot of stool in her bowels. So tomorrow, we flush out her system with a whole bottle of Miralax and a liquid diet. The doctor was very upset that no testing has been done on her, so we had to take her to the lab for lots of bloodwork. I went in with her and when she saw the needle, she just started shaking and saying, "No shots, Mommy. Please no shots!" Then she started crying... I so wanted to cry with her, but I had to be strong for her. They took out a lot of blood...poor thing :( Lauren needs to come back on January 4th to have a sweat test done to check for Cystic Fibrosis. This test will take an hour and she will have electrodes on her and some kind of device to collect her sweat. That is not going to be fun. She will see the doctor afterwards to go over the lab results and to discuss the colonoscopy in detail. She may also get another xray to see if the stone is gone. We are so thankful that testing is finally being done, but it is so hard to watch her go through this. I would love to just take this from her and bear the burden myself. Today was a little overwhelming and I'm still trying to process it all. Prayers would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.