Aviana Joy goes to the hospital

well. This isn’t exactly what I expected. My poor baby is hooked up to several monitors, a second IV and this morning has to have another tube up her nose and down to her belly, and another rectal tube. She has had 8 Xrays and a CT scan. The team of doctors assigned to her care are still not exactly sure what is wrong.

What happened was just this: We went in to see her regular on call pediatrician and he wanted her admitted to the hospital. She had several tests and interventions; with a tentative diagnosis of either appendicitis or a twisted or blocked bowel. Both of these would require surgery, and no surgeon in our area (even though we live in an area of 1/2 million people) would feel comfortable doing surgery on someone so small. We got transferred to the University of Iowa hospitals. We got here last night around 7. Around midnight, we had our final consult with the doctor who said that Little Miss A doesn’t fit into any of the textbook cases of anything.

After a restless night, we are a little closer to an answer. They are leaning toward gastrointisis which is a fancy name I’m sure I spelled wrong, for a horrible stomach flu. I am positive she wouldn’t have gotten over this on her own, as she was steadily worsening. She already is improving a little, just from the hydration through the IV. In fact, she initiated two different sentences this morning “I need some covers. ” “Go get Gigi and Opa.”, and she has been much more responsive than she has for 36 hours. Yesterday when I would ask her a question, she would only stare vacantly, but this morning she is answering some questions.

She’s sleeping peacefully right now, so I snuck into the family lounge to write a quick update.

How can you pray?

Pray for wisdom for the doctors to be able to know what do. Pray she’ll heal. Pray this won’t make her susceptible to every virus from here on out. Pray for us to see how God is working in this, what good is coming out of it. Pray that Brielle won’t be too adversely affected from spending so much time away from me, and not nursing. Pray all the people we are in contact with will be able to see God in us. Pray for peace of mind.

Thank you.

And thank you Jesus, for loving us, and for being present in the easy and in the hard times.