The faces I love...

These are the precious faces I love...faces of my babies when they are WELL!

We have had our far share of sickness this last month. And below are the faces of nephrotic syndrome and RSV! Blehhhh!

Maggie got a mild cold back in early January. The cold triggered another relapse with her nephrotic syndrome. She had massive proteins back in her urine and gained close to 4 pounds of extra fluid. You can see in this picture how swollen her eyes, cheeks and nose get when she retains that extra fluid (not to mention fluid in her belly and chest too).

It took about 3 weeks this time (after her full dose of steroids and lasix) to get her turned back around...meaning trace proteins in her urine and loosing her extra fluid. She had a renal sonogram and some lab work to evaluate her kidney & liver function two weeks ago, and we will see her kidney specialist this Thursday for a follow up after those tests.

Every time Mag has had a mild viral cold, she has experienced a relapse (we have had 4 relapses total) with her kidneys. We are 7 months into treatment and have not been able to come off of the steroids yet. This is our immediate goal...stay well, then wean on her steroids...hopefully to wean off over the next few weeks. We are also looking into some homeopathic alternatives to strengthen her kidneys, liver and immune system.

We praise God that through all of this, Maggie has been relatively pain free and mostly herself. She still has some pretty bad sleep disruptions from the steroids, and has had to have some mild diet and fluid restrictions when she is swollen...but overall, you might not ever even notice she was sick. She has gotten very brave and mature about seeing doctors, having test and labs drawn. I am very proud of her "roll with the punches" attitude. She is the light of our life and keeps us smiling every day!

As if dealing with Maggie's poor kidneys, wasn't enough. We had to see our little Sadie-bug get sick this last week too. She was diagnosed with RSV(a bad respiratory virus) last Wednesday. She has had a fever, a ton of drainage and a wicked cough. She had wheezes and some increase in her work of breathing. We have been doing breathing treatments every 4-6 hours with a home nebulizer since Wednesday, and she is finally doing a lot better. She too handled her sickness like a doll and has been mostly happy during the entire sickness. In fact, her pediatrician nicknamed her a "happy-wheezer". She had a decrease in appetite, and some sleep disruptions too (but hey... I was already up and awake with Mag...so whats one more awake child at 2 o'clock in the morning, right?).

The Lord is good, and is always asking us to rely on Him more. I know in the book of James scripture says we are to count it JOY when he asks us to endure a trial. For me having sick kiddos IS a trial. I always worry so much when they are sick. My worry is a sin, and I am constantly working on repenting of this sin and turning away from it!!! Anyone else out there in the blog-o-spere struggle with this sin?

His mercies are new each day, indeed! I have learned so much about prayer for my children and have had some very sweet time of prayer with God talking about my babies.

So for now...we are in full-on "Operation-keep-everyone-well" mode! We are hibernating at home until March when all of the flu/rsv/cold crud is done. We have pulled Mag out of preschool, she is skipping church for a while, no more trips to Wal-mart and we are doing our best to keep clean hands! Any other suggestions?

Love to all,

Leah