WARNING: some of these images may be considered graphic or disturbing to some people.
Well....where to begin? A ton has happened in these last two months.
Aila is doing great. She has gotten at least three more teeth since the last blog entry bringing her current total to 11. She's working on her second incisor now. She had her 15 month check up a few weeks ago and is in the 95th percentile for height and weight, and ironically is almost exactly the same stats as Ashlan was at that age, but Aila is actually a couple ounces heavier. Aila is 32.5 inches for height and 27 lbs 3.3 oz for weight.
Ashlan is doing awesome too. We pulled her out of school for July and August but she took a month of swim lessons four days a week. Her instructor said she has never seen a four-year-old do so well at strokes. We are so proud! Of course she's not perfect at it, but she's doing very well. Those lessons ended a week ago, which I am actually very happy about because four days a week was a lot, for Aila too! We just started Ashlan in karate and so far she loves it. She stopped dance at the end of February because she told us she didn't like it anymore. We never put her in anything else until swim lessons in June bc of traveling to PA and Disney and then having visitors. We'll see how long karate lasts, lol.
Now for Dan. Long story... He was admitted to the hospital on July 3. We just thought he had a bowel obstruction again, since he had been having pain issues and multiple hospital admissions since his surgery in March 2012. Well, turns out he had a myriad of problems and no one can figure out how it began. His first issue was that he had a small bowel obstruction. Unfortunately, that has become somewhat normal for him, considering all his hospitalizations in the past three years, no matter what "diet" we try him on. We actually thought this was no big deal...we thought it was just another "routine" bowel obstruction for him. Boy, were we wrong. This leads to the second, and most major, issue- that he became septic. He presented with chills, uncontrollable shaking, vomiting, a high fever, and his BP was 60/19. The scary part was that they could not bring up his BP even with IV fluids. He must have been pretty bad off, because on early Friday evening I was told to "make some calls" to family members. He had emergency surgery only a few hours later, where they removed his gallbladder and the small bowel obstruction (some intestines). They also biopsied some lymph nodes, which were normal, thankfully. So now he has no spleen, appendix, and gallbladder. In addition to the septic shock, he somehow got streptococcus pneumonia not only in his lungs, but also in his digestive tract, which the infectious diseases doctor said was extremely rare. He spent four days in ICU and four days in the regular hospital. He saw five individual doctors during this time- the attending dr, infectious diseases dr, GI specialist, a renal dr, and the surgeon. The surgeon was the only one who speculated that the pancreas started all of this. Dan's pancreatic enzyme levels were elevated in the hospital, and continue to be, but they are going down. We're hoping this was just an acute pancreatitis attack and not chronic pancreatitis, because that could, and will, change our lives forever if that's the case. Chronic pancreatitis usually has two major flare factors- fat and alcohol. Those who know Dan, know he's a pretty healthy eater. As it is, he didn't really have a lot of fats in his diet or alcohol. Usually this is a disease for alcoholics or people that eat very unhealthy, and Dan is the complete opposite of that. However, chronic pancreatitis can also be caused by trauma to the abdomen. As best as we can guess, he may have had trauma to his pancreas from his previous surgeries but no one really knows. He has been getting bloodwork weekly since this happened and his enzyme levels are going down, though they are still elevated from the normal range. We are hopeful that this is just an acute pancreatitis attack, and though he would be prone to other attacks and would have to really watch everything he eats, life could somewhat return to "normal". If it really is chronic pancreatitis, then we have to keep these permanent lifestyle changes, which is mainly food but what he can have would be very, very limited. He has an appt with his GI dr in August, so hopefully they'll do an ultrasound of his pancreas then to find out more. One thing we know is that Dan is a fighter and has such willpower. He goes back to work in a little less than a week, and except for a few days here and there, has been feeling pretty good since the surgery. He has some good days and bad days though, but that's probably to be expected seeing what he went through. His attending dr said it best to me, "Your husband is like a puzzle. We are still finding the pieces to it, though we might never have them all". We have been enjoying his time off from work though, at least this past week. He had a PICC line in when he came home and for a week had a nurse come visit to administer medication to him through that, so we didn't really want to leave the house for that week. We made up for it this past week though. We had some friends over for swimming and dinner, went to the zoo, went to the park, went to the community pool for the slides/kiddie area to meet friends, etc. It's nice to kinda feel normal! Hopefully it will continue and we can put this bad nightmare of his hospitalization behind us!
**Special thanks to my parents and Dan's mom for helping us out the week Dan was in the hospital. I don't know what we would have done without them. (And a very special thanks to my extended FL family for babysitting the girls overnight so I could be with Dan at the hospital the night of his surgery). I am so blessed to have such a great support system that drives 1500 miles through the night to get here ASAP!! We could never begin to repay all of our family!
Well....where to begin? A ton has happened in these last two months.
Aila is doing great. She has gotten at least three more teeth since the last blog entry bringing her current total to 11. She's working on her second incisor now. She had her 15 month check up a few weeks ago and is in the 95th percentile for height and weight, and ironically is almost exactly the same stats as Ashlan was at that age, but Aila is actually a couple ounces heavier. Aila is 32.5 inches for height and 27 lbs 3.3 oz for weight.
Ashlan is doing awesome too. We pulled her out of school for July and August but she took a month of swim lessons four days a week. Her instructor said she has never seen a four-year-old do so well at strokes. We are so proud! Of course she's not perfect at it, but she's doing very well. Those lessons ended a week ago, which I am actually very happy about because four days a week was a lot, for Aila too! We just started Ashlan in karate and so far she loves it. She stopped dance at the end of February because she told us she didn't like it anymore. We never put her in anything else until swim lessons in June bc of traveling to PA and Disney and then having visitors. We'll see how long karate lasts, lol.
Now for Dan. Long story... He was admitted to the hospital on July 3. We just thought he had a bowel obstruction again, since he had been having pain issues and multiple hospital admissions since his surgery in March 2012. Well, turns out he had a myriad of problems and no one can figure out how it began. His first issue was that he had a small bowel obstruction. Unfortunately, that has become somewhat normal for him, considering all his hospitalizations in the past three years, no matter what "diet" we try him on. We actually thought this was no big deal...we thought it was just another "routine" bowel obstruction for him. Boy, were we wrong. This leads to the second, and most major, issue- that he became septic. He presented with chills, uncontrollable shaking, vomiting, a high fever, and his BP was 60/19. The scary part was that they could not bring up his BP even with IV fluids. He must have been pretty bad off, because on early Friday evening I was told to "make some calls" to family members. He had emergency surgery only a few hours later, where they removed his gallbladder and the small bowel obstruction (some intestines). They also biopsied some lymph nodes, which were normal, thankfully. So now he has no spleen, appendix, and gallbladder. In addition to the septic shock, he somehow got streptococcus pneumonia not only in his lungs, but also in his digestive tract, which the infectious diseases doctor said was extremely rare. He spent four days in ICU and four days in the regular hospital. He saw five individual doctors during this time- the attending dr, infectious diseases dr, GI specialist, a renal dr, and the surgeon. The surgeon was the only one who speculated that the pancreas started all of this. Dan's pancreatic enzyme levels were elevated in the hospital, and continue to be, but they are going down. We're hoping this was just an acute pancreatitis attack and not chronic pancreatitis, because that could, and will, change our lives forever if that's the case. Chronic pancreatitis usually has two major flare factors- fat and alcohol. Those who know Dan, know he's a pretty healthy eater. As it is, he didn't really have a lot of fats in his diet or alcohol. Usually this is a disease for alcoholics or people that eat very unhealthy, and Dan is the complete opposite of that. However, chronic pancreatitis can also be caused by trauma to the abdomen. As best as we can guess, he may have had trauma to his pancreas from his previous surgeries but no one really knows. He has been getting bloodwork weekly since this happened and his enzyme levels are going down, though they are still elevated from the normal range. We are hopeful that this is just an acute pancreatitis attack, and though he would be prone to other attacks and would have to really watch everything he eats, life could somewhat return to "normal". If it really is chronic pancreatitis, then we have to keep these permanent lifestyle changes, which is mainly food but what he can have would be very, very limited. He has an appt with his GI dr in August, so hopefully they'll do an ultrasound of his pancreas then to find out more. One thing we know is that Dan is a fighter and has such willpower. He goes back to work in a little less than a week, and except for a few days here and there, has been feeling pretty good since the surgery. He has some good days and bad days though, but that's probably to be expected seeing what he went through. His attending dr said it best to me, "Your husband is like a puzzle. We are still finding the pieces to it, though we might never have them all". We have been enjoying his time off from work though, at least this past week. He had a PICC line in when he came home and for a week had a nurse come visit to administer medication to him through that, so we didn't really want to leave the house for that week. We made up for it this past week though. We had some friends over for swimming and dinner, went to the zoo, went to the park, went to the community pool for the slides/kiddie area to meet friends, etc. It's nice to kinda feel normal! Hopefully it will continue and we can put this bad nightmare of his hospitalization behind us!
**Special thanks to my parents and Dan's mom for helping us out the week Dan was in the hospital. I don't know what we would have done without them. (And a very special thanks to my extended FL family for babysitting the girls overnight so I could be with Dan at the hospital the night of his surgery). I am so blessed to have such a great support system that drives 1500 miles through the night to get here ASAP!! We could never begin to repay all of our family!
My beautiful girls.
Ashlan and her friend, Charlotte.
Look at this chubby butt!! So cute!
Kisses for sissy.
Ashlan playing with the pool toys that I bought for our Fourth of July party that we never had, lol.
Aila had to get in on the toys too, of course.
My poor Dan.
Morning after his surgery.
Up and about almost 48 hours after surgery. Still in ICU here. Slow, but at least moving!
The surgeon did an awesome job. Although it was a bigger incision, it was right over his old scar and pretty straight!
Ring around the Rosie.
Bathtime fun!
Little Miss Attitude! This is how she greeted me in the morning. Guess she needed more sleep, lol.
Someone ran into the door jam with her forehead while chasing her sister.
Ouch! It has healed nicely though.
Poor baby- teething problems.
Little snuggler, especially when her teeth hurt. :(
Pool fun with friends.
Aila prefers the stairs to slide, lol.
Chasing her friend Oliver around the house. They were doing laps, lol.
Love!!!
Action shot at the park.
Family time.
So proud of herself!
Ashlan's swim badges that she earned.
Aila's first trip to the zoo.
Beautiful day!
"Oh look!" So excited she was squealing, lol.
Checking it out.
At the zoo's splash pad.
These two have too much fun together!
Getting soaked!
