So thankful for Kyla

This past weekend is one of those weekend that I would rather not remember. It was definitely one of those weekends that makes you look at your precious children and thank God for their smiles, laughter, silliness, and yes...even their strong wills and arguing. Kyla is the type of kid that never seems to stop moving or talking. She talks almost non-stop all day long and tries to do handstands and gymnastics around the house most of the day.

Well, on Thursday night she woke up in the middle of the night and threw up several times. On Friday morning, simply because it was Friday, and I didn't want her to not be able to see a doctor over the weekend, I took her in to be seen. They ran a strep test and the doctor told us it was just a stomach virus. She threw up for another 48 hours, so on Sunday I called the doctor on call who told us we might want to pay a visit to the ER. Kyla was getting weaker, had not eaten in over 48 hours, and even worse, had not been able to keep down very many liquids in that amount of time. She stopped bouncing around and talking much and just wanted to lay on the couch. Sunday evening, Pete had to carry her to the ER...she couldn't walk. The doctor told us she was not dehydrated, but the doctor also didn't run any tests on her to make her statement official. No urine or blood tests were done to test for dehydration. She gave kyla a popsicle, (which she did not want to eat) and sent us on our way.

Sunday night was Kyla's 4th night of throwing up. She threw up about 5 times that night. The next morning I took one look at her and new something was seriously wrong. She was so pale, so thin...I could see almost all of her little bones. She couldn't hold her head up and wouldn't talk to us. We had to carry her everywhere. I managed to get her to eat 1 pedialyte popsicle and then eat 2 pinches of a banana which she (thankfully) kept down. We went at 10am monday morning to her doctor's office.

The doctor and nurses were surprised by our ER visit and lack of attention Kyla received there. Her doctor ran blood and urine tests that showed she was severely dehydrated. They gave her 1 liter of IV fluids, which she screamed on Peter for 1.5 hours through the 3 hour process. Then she fell into a nice deep sleep while the IV finished. I entertained Avery in the waiting room for those several hours because poor Avery was upset from hearing Kyla scream like that. The doctor told us she needed more fluids (probably another half liter) because she did not really perk up that much after the 1 liter that she received and it took her 1 full liter of fluids before she even needed to pee.

At 2:00pm after the IV was finished, the doctor told us that he wanted to admit her to the hospital, but if we were able to have her drink about a half liter of fluids before 8pm then she could stay home as long as she didn't vomit anymore. He prescribed Zofran to settle her stomach too.

We took her home, she drank and drank whatever we forced upon her...and it really did seem like forcing! She also ate 4 saltine crackers that day and little bits of banana here and there and I gave here several teaspoons of honey to keep her blood sugar up. She didn't throw up anymore on her own, and we gave her Zofran that night just in case. She woke up the next morning walking out of the bedroom with a smile on her face saying, "Mama, I feel better" and gave me a huge hug. It was so great to see her smiling and walking and talking again!

It's Thursday now, 1 week from when this all started. Kyla is back to herself eating pretty much anything. I'm having fun giving her foods to fatten her up again, as she is still really skinny. She lost almost 4lbs in 4 days. And, if you know Kyla, she doesn't really have much weight to loose!

She was trying to argue with me today about not wanting to clean up toys because she was still playing and I was honestly thankful that she was feeling good enough to try and argue :-) Today is also the first day that she had a bit of bounce back in her step and talked a lot most of the day. Sometimes, the non-stop talking gets a little tiring for me...but today I was simply thankful for who Kyla is: my sweet, and very bubbly almost 6 year old!

I was thinking through all of this how so many children in so many countries suffer from dehydration on a daily basis and how life-threatening it really is. I saw a little of this while I was in the Philippines last summer. I am so incredibly grateful that our children are healthy on a normal basis. I'm also so thankful that God healed Kyla before she had to go to the hospital!

In the pictures above, the first two are of Kyla celebrating her birthday a month early with her friends in Charlotte, NC. The last 2 pictures are about 2 days after Kyla started feeling better from her illness. In between the time...Kyla got a haircut too!