Clairey Clairey, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?
With wood and a drill...
And holes to fill...
And Andy's watering can keepin' the flow :)
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Chugging Along
In our case, no news is good news :) Claire has responded well to her daily apple-flavored antibiotics (based on how willingly she sucks it down, I think she considers it her dessert :) and we haven't seen any more signs of infection. As for her FPIES, three months after the last episode and diagnosis, my worries for another episode reside in the back of my head. Perhaps the daily precautionary measures are becoming routine and family-and-Clairey-friendly meal planning is a welcome (tasty!) challenge, or maybe we've just discovered that FPIES isn't going to change the game, but kick it up to the next level.
Claire has handled eleven foods brilliantly and so far number twelve seems to be falling in line with all the rest. She eats three meals a day at the table with us. I feed her varying portion sizes of her new food in the morning for breakfast and creative combos of her "Hooray! Foods" for lunch and dinner. I suppose it's my own paranoia, but I don't want her to go without eating any given food for more than a couple of days at a time. After our experience with rice cereal (handling it just fine and then having an episode after taking a break for a couple of weeks), I don't want her body to "forget" the foods we've painstakingly introduced with success :)
As she continues to hit her developmental milestones, staying one step ahead of her (literally!) make for additional considerations. Aside from the conventional baby-proofing, we have to make sure that there aren't any crumbs laying around that could find their way into her mouth... She's a bit of a slithering vacuum cleaner (her crawl is more of a slither :). Fortunately, at two-and-a-half, I think Andy understands as well as a two-and-a-half-year-old could, that food will make Clairey sick, unless it's given to her by mommy and daddy. I've already caught him telling her, "No Claiwey, that food makes you sick". It does my heart good to know that he's looking out for her, too :)
Claire has handled eleven foods brilliantly and so far number twelve seems to be falling in line with all the rest. She eats three meals a day at the table with us. I feed her varying portion sizes of her new food in the morning for breakfast and creative combos of her "Hooray! Foods" for lunch and dinner. I suppose it's my own paranoia, but I don't want her to go without eating any given food for more than a couple of days at a time. After our experience with rice cereal (handling it just fine and then having an episode after taking a break for a couple of weeks), I don't want her body to "forget" the foods we've painstakingly introduced with success :)
As she continues to hit her developmental milestones, staying one step ahead of her (literally!) make for additional considerations. Aside from the conventional baby-proofing, we have to make sure that there aren't any crumbs laying around that could find their way into her mouth... She's a bit of a slithering vacuum cleaner (her crawl is more of a slither :). Fortunately, at two-and-a-half, I think Andy understands as well as a two-and-a-half-year-old could, that food will make Clairey sick, unless it's given to her by mommy and daddy. I've already caught him telling her, "No Claiwey, that food makes you sick". It does my heart good to know that he's looking out for her, too :)
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Radiology Follow Up
I got a phone call from our pediatrician today. He went over the results of the ultrasound and VCUG in terms that my brain could grasp. Seems as though Clairey has grade two vesicoureteral reflux and grade one hydronephrosis in her left kidney. That means the urine back flows up to the left kidney and results in mild swelling. Her right kidney, thankfully, is perfectly fine.
Our pediatrician referred us to a pediatric urologist. We are scheduled to see him on May 28th (a birthday present to me), which I took as a sign that Clairey's needs aren't severe enough to require immediate attention. In addition, we've been prescribed daily low doses of antibiotics to protect her against further UTIs and kidney infections. At this point, the treatment plan is for "spontaneous resolution", which is a fancy way of saying "let's wait and see if she outgrows it". I bet Claire is going to feel like a brand spankin' new ladybug in a few years when she's finished outgrowing all the things she needs to outgrow.
P.S. I got an encouraging answer to my question about screening Andy for reflux. Apparently reflux is far more common in girls and therefore Andy is most likely just fine. Phew. :)
Our pediatrician referred us to a pediatric urologist. We are scheduled to see him on May 28th (a birthday present to me), which I took as a sign that Clairey's needs aren't severe enough to require immediate attention. In addition, we've been prescribed daily low doses of antibiotics to protect her against further UTIs and kidney infections. At this point, the treatment plan is for "spontaneous resolution", which is a fancy way of saying "let's wait and see if she outgrows it". I bet Claire is going to feel like a brand spankin' new ladybug in a few years when she's finished outgrowing all the things she needs to outgrow.
P.S. I got an encouraging answer to my question about screening Andy for reflux. Apparently reflux is far more common in girls and therefore Andy is most likely just fine. Phew. :)
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Claire's Radiology Appointment
Clairey and I were at the hospital this morning at 8:30 and were seen by the ultrasound tech right away. Claire has developed an aversion to anyone in scrubs and she made that perfectly clear to everyone on the first floor of the hospital. She was awfully upset about the ultrasound...and that was the easy part.
Afterwards, we went straight into Radiology for her VCUG. They inserted a catheter, collected a urine sample, and filled her bladder with dye. Claire was in hysterics the entire time. I was able to hold Clairey's hands and watch the image of her bladder on the X-Ray screen. The radiologist explained everything I was looking at. Apparently Clairey has a huge bladder! We didn't see any of the dye leaking from her bladder until she started to urinate (the wait felt like an eternity).
The doctor told me that Claire has 2nd grade (4th grade being the worst) reflux on her left side. This means the dye left her bladder and traveled all the way up to her kidney. We couldn't see, definitively, if their was leakage on her right side, but if there was, it would only be 1st grade, as it didn't make it to her kidney.
The reason Claire's UTI resulted in a fever and shaking was because the infected urine traveled from her bladder into her kidneys and caused infection there. Over time, this can cause scarring on the kidneys and prevent further kidney growth. Bad news. The good news is we have our information now and we can start moving forward in our treatment. It will be up to our pediatrician to decide whether we see a urologist next or not. The radiologist believes, based on Claire's level of severity (and her own daughter's reflux), we're probably looking at giving her low doses of antibiotics everyday to keep her urine sterile (to prevent any more kidney infections). After about a year, they will probably do another ultrasound and VCUG to see if the reflux has cleared up on it's own. If not, we may be looking at other treatment options, including surgery (I was assured that there are some minimally invasive procedures).
Something interesting... Vesicoureteral Reflux is hereditary. All my life I've been told about the time I was hospitalized for a bladder infection at four months of age. That was the beginning and end of the story. They didn't perform the same investigative procedures then, as they do now. My mother struggled with significant kidney infections as a child and as our pediatrician noted, a person can live just fine without ever knowing their kidneys are damaged... Until they learn the hard way. Andy is also at risk for reflux. The results of Claire's tests today will no doubt raise questions with each of our own doctors in the future. Clairey may very well be leading us towards discovering our own medical histories.
Our sweet baby girl continues to take one for every team. I feel indebted to her in so many ways.
Afterwards, we went straight into Radiology for her VCUG. They inserted a catheter, collected a urine sample, and filled her bladder with dye. Claire was in hysterics the entire time. I was able to hold Clairey's hands and watch the image of her bladder on the X-Ray screen. The radiologist explained everything I was looking at. Apparently Clairey has a huge bladder! We didn't see any of the dye leaking from her bladder until she started to urinate (the wait felt like an eternity).
The doctor told me that Claire has 2nd grade (4th grade being the worst) reflux on her left side. This means the dye left her bladder and traveled all the way up to her kidney. We couldn't see, definitively, if their was leakage on her right side, but if there was, it would only be 1st grade, as it didn't make it to her kidney.
The reason Claire's UTI resulted in a fever and shaking was because the infected urine traveled from her bladder into her kidneys and caused infection there. Over time, this can cause scarring on the kidneys and prevent further kidney growth. Bad news. The good news is we have our information now and we can start moving forward in our treatment. It will be up to our pediatrician to decide whether we see a urologist next or not. The radiologist believes, based on Claire's level of severity (and her own daughter's reflux), we're probably looking at giving her low doses of antibiotics everyday to keep her urine sterile (to prevent any more kidney infections). After about a year, they will probably do another ultrasound and VCUG to see if the reflux has cleared up on it's own. If not, we may be looking at other treatment options, including surgery (I was assured that there are some minimally invasive procedures).
Something interesting... Vesicoureteral Reflux is hereditary. All my life I've been told about the time I was hospitalized for a bladder infection at four months of age. That was the beginning and end of the story. They didn't perform the same investigative procedures then, as they do now. My mother struggled with significant kidney infections as a child and as our pediatrician noted, a person can live just fine without ever knowing their kidneys are damaged... Until they learn the hard way. Andy is also at risk for reflux. The results of Claire's tests today will no doubt raise questions with each of our own doctors in the future. Clairey may very well be leading us towards discovering our own medical histories.
Our sweet baby girl continues to take one for every team. I feel indebted to her in so many ways.
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