Time For Practice!

It's that time of year again for spring sports to start and this year the kids have switched their sport.  Lauren is playing softball and Curtis is playing soccer.  We are still waiting to hear from Curtis' coach to find out when their practices will be, but Lauren had her first practice today.  She has a really awesome coach that has been coaching for 17 years.  The girls seem eager to learn, so I think it will be a good team.  The team name is Crush and their uniforms are orange with black and white on the sides.  The shirts are sleeveless and they will be wearing shorts.  I can't wait to see them in their uniforms.  They start pre-season games on the 21st.  So without further ado, here are some pictures from Lauren's practice today.

Learning the fundamentals of baseball. 

 

Learning how to manuver the glove. 

 

 Fielding the ball

 

Running the bases 

 

Learning how to throw underhand and overhand 

 

Learning how to run along the base line 

 

Making sure to touch the base 

 

Go team Crush!



Another Long Day

Today we spent all morning at Children's Hospital St. Paul doing more testing and following up with the gastroenterologist. I was very nervous about today. I wanted to find out what is causing the bleeding and prolapse, but also scared to find out and this time it was just Lauren and I since Curtis is back in school. I did cry a little on the way there, but once we arrived, it was game time. Lauren had her sweat test first and she did very well. She cried a little because the charges going through the electrodes hurt towards the end.

Here are the electrodes that she had on both arms.

This is the bracelet that measured the sweat. She had to wear these for 30 minutes.

Here are both arms with the bracelets bandaged up so that she wouldn't pull them off. Thankfully, she was able to play in the waiting room for the half hour that they were on her arms.

Giving Snoopy a hug after getting the bracelets off.

Here she is going through the kid door at Dr. Goldman's office. I love the little door and Lauren thought it was the coolest! Dr. Goldman told us that her bloodwork is normal, so no deficiencies. Since Lauren hasn't had any bleeding and prolapse in three weeks, Dr. Goldman told us that she doesn't need to come back unless she has more bleeding. If she does have bleeding, we need to call the office right away and they will order the scope to check for polyps. We also had another xray done to see if the stone has been flushed out of her appendix. Dr. Goldman will call us with the results of the xray and the sweat test. I did ask her what the next step would be if the stone was still in Lauren's appendix and she said that there isn't anything that they can do because she is too little to have her appendix removed. She said that we will have to be vigilant because she is going to be more prone to appendicitis. She also said that they can do surgery through her belly button, but we will get there when we get there. So we still don't know what is causing her bleeding, so we just watch and wait for now. Thank you all for praying for our sweet little girl.

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.

Happy Birthday Lauren!!

So today our Lauren turns three. Time is just going by way too fast! I made her a Strawberry Shortcake cake and we brought it to church and everyone sang Happy Birthday to her. We will be taking Curtis and Lauren to Chuck E. Cheese next weekend to celebrate their birthday's. In honor of Lauren's birthday, I will be writing her birth story...We decided to induce a week early because the doctor was saying that Lauren was going to be bigger than Curtis and after what happened with Curtis we were trying to avoid a c-section. So on Tuesday, August 14th, when I had gone in for my doctor's appointment we decided to induce the next day since I was already 4 cm dilated. Now let me just say that Lauren was my best and easiest pregnancy. I didn't have any morning sickness and had a lot of energy. In hindsight, we shouldn't have induced because it didn't work and Lauren was our smallest baby. Oh me of little faith! Anyway, we got to the hospital at 7:30 a.m. so that they could start the Pitocin at 8 a.m. When they checked my cervix, I was 5 cm so we thought things would go rather quickly. Wrong!! At 10 a.m. when the doctor came in to see how I was doing, I still hadn't progressed any. They were going to give me until noon since he had to do a couple c-sections and if I hadn't progressed then they would break my water. So noon rolls around and I'm now 6 cm, so he breaks my water to a pop and a big gush. That was a very weird feeling. So we just wait. About 1:20 p.m. the doctor comes back in to see how I am doing and it's progressed a little, so he leaves and asks them to page him if anything changes. Not long after that I started to feel a lot of pressure and felt like I needed to push so we called the nurse and she came in to check me and sure enough the head was crowning and I was told not to push until the doctor got there. That's a lot easier said than done! So the nurses pages the doctor and he doesn't answer the page so she tries again and he still doesn't answer. She calls his office and he's not there, so she comes in to me to make sure I'm not pushing and let me know that they can't find the doctor. Are you kidding me!! This baby is coming with or without him. After about 5 minutes they finally found him and told him to get to my room asap. He shows up about 5 minutes later to my relief and we get things going. After two pushes, Lauren slid right out and we were in love. Our little peanut was 7 lbs. 7 oz. and 18 1/2 inches long. So Happy 3rd Birthday Lauren, we love you!!