ELLA

This morning brought more answers to Ella's breathing problems after a trip to see Idaho's only pulmonologist, Dr Tipits.  Before we actually got to meet Dr Tipits, his assistant prepared Ella by getting a reading on Ella's current oxygen levels, and charting her height and weight. But while we were waiting for the oxymeter to read the oxygen levels, Ella got a bit antsy, and in order for the monitor to pick up accurate numbers, the patient has to be completely motionless.  For those of you who know Ella personally, you understand what an oxy-moron it is to even use the two words "Ella" and "motionless" in the same sentence.  So, I had to come up with a way to keep Ella occupied and for the most-part, still.  I decided that maybe if she started reciting Bible verses, it might take her mind off of the sensor on her pointer finger and allow it to properly pick up her oxygen level.  So, I started by suggesting a Bible reference of one of the verses that Ell...

Spring Break is officially over with Calvin's start back to work and Ari's return to school.  For Ella though, the end came on Saturday morning when she realized that she was in her bed at home instead of in the car-seat she fell asleep in the night before, and came running into our bedroom whining, "I don't wanna be home, I don't wanna be home!"  I guess that means she enjoyed our vacation.  From the photo on my last post, you probably gathered that we spent our week away at the Oregon Coast.  It was an incredible time of play as a family.  We haven't had a family vacation since September of 2009, before we left for Peru to work in missions for a year.  And we have never had a family vacation with just the four of us.  So we were very ready for some time as a family to rejuvenate after our busy year (2011) with Ella as she underwent 3 hip surgeries, 8 times going under anesthesia, 5 full-body casts, 2 wheelchairs, 1 scope (camera down the throat), ...

Sorry for my delinquence in keeping up this blog for the past few days, but we are on vacation right now having the time of our lives!  Updates to come next week...

Waiting to go back for the study... Ella had an emergency (last minute) swallow study done today. They sat her in a special chair and video x-rayed as she ate different foods and drank several drinks of different consistencies. Their concern is that Ella has been aspiratin g and causing her this wheezing and these breathing problems she's experienced for the past several months. Turns out, Ella aspirated on several of the thin liquids during the study. She even took fluid into her lungs with the thickened liquids. And more fluid went in with the double-thickened liquid. It wasn't until the fluid was thickened 3 x that she did not aspirate. What's more concerning is that every time she aspirated (or took fluid into her airways) she NEVER once coughed. When I asked the therapist if that was because she was so used to aspirating, she said that I had hit the nail on the head. So it appears that Ella has been taking fluid into her lungs for qu...

Last night I had the incredible opportunity of being involved in the Lifeline Pregnancy Banquet, here in Nampa, Idaho.  I had not anticipated the blessing that would come from listening to the testimonies and from the way I felt the Spirit move in my own heart as I had the chance to share part of my story with Ella!  But I think the best part was mingling afterward with new friends that I had instant bonds with just because of our common relationship with Jesus Christ. I am constantly amazed at the way God works.  I first, bumped into a woman that told me that she had to leave the banquet room because she was caring for her baby, but felt as if the Lord wanted her to hear what I had to say, so after the banquet was over, she approached me just to tell me that she had stood outside the banquet hall with her ear to the door just to take in every word!  She came away with this message: I SERVE A MIGHTY GOD!  You know, it's just interesting to see how God brings H...

Beth in Peru Today, my heart is overflowing with emotion.  It is heavy with the weight of the evil that has absolutely infiltrated our world and is drowning those who have not yet met Christ, but my heart is soaring with the amazing, crazy, super-natural power of Jesus, Who is ready at any moment (at their surrender to His love)to swoop in and pull those dying lives to safety and complete healing!  I just read a blog post from one of the young women that is still serving in Arequipa, Peru, our old "post" when we were in South America serving as missionaries.  This young woman, Beth Beers, was on our team and has just experienced something that most of us will never even be able to comprehend in all of our lives.  Please read this blog post and consider what the power of God can do!  Because we know that our God is GREATER, our God is STRONGER, our God is HIGHER than any other!  Our God is HEALER, AWESOME in POWER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Please lift t...

For the past several days, the only things I've been posting are health updates on Ella. Well, hopefully today is the last one. :) Ella slept all night for the second night in a row! And today has only coughed one noticeable time! I haven't given her any steroids OR puffs from her inhaler either! What a blessing from Jesus that we are seeing such a noticeable recovery!  We never, ever take Ella's health for granted. And this new recovery is no exception.  Every night when we are saying prayers with the girls, if Ella is healthy at the moment, we praise Jesus! It has been amazing to watch as He continually cares for and protects our sweet little babe. Thank you so much for your prayers! The great, I Am, has heard them and He has answered mightily! This is Ella playing one of her ABC games while she was sick.  She was pretty pale and pasty while her breathing problems persisted. This was taken just a few moments ago and her coloring is ba...

Update on Ella: Ella has continued to wheeze mildly for the past day and a half since being on her inhaler and steroids, but her cough has loosened up significantly. She did, however wake up this morning with a runny eye and endless nose-bleed, but those have both since stopped "running". We saw Ella's pediatrician again today and she said that she still hears some wheezing, but that Ella seems to be improving. We'll keep her on her oral steroid for a few more days to make sure she is processing sufficient oxygen and then once that's out, we'll go to a daily inhaler. The doctor also wants to move forward on trying to schedule a swallow study to make sure that Ella is not taking fluid into her lungs when she's drinking. There is a slight chance that we may have to have the study done in Salt Lake because her Ear Nose and Throat doc is there, but we'll see. All in all, Ella is doing much better and we are so thankful that she's br...

This evening we went in to see Ella's pediatrician. I thought we were going to get a good report because Ella had started to play today and cough a bit less frequently. Her cough was even starting to loosen a bit, but when we went in and they tested her oxygen levels, she was 90% saturated (which is fine, it's just not 100% which she normally is), which told us t hat she was either tired from all of the hard work (breathing and coughing) she'd done over the past few days, or she was trying to breathe through all the yucky stuff in her chest because she was also wheezing. The doctor said that it sounded like she was wheezing and that her right lung may be a bit deflated. After giving Ella a breathing treatment and listening to her again, she thought that it sounded a tiny bit better, but she wanted to get her on steroids to open everything up so that she could breathe easy tonight. Well, in theory, that's great, but since we were the last case of the...

Please keep our Ella Belle in your prayers. She's been taking short, quick breaths for two days now and coughing so frequently and violently. Yesterday, her coughs were so intense that she threw up. We took her to Quick Care yesterday and the Physician's assistant urged us to go straight to the E.R. because of Ella's breathing, cough, slight fever (but she was on preventative antibiotics for her incision, so it was odd for her to be running a fever), and aches and pains in her tummy. She wanted blood tests and x-rays done to rule out infections and/or pneumonia, RSV, collapsed lung, etc... Feeling frustrated that we had just gone and spent $ at Quick Care and received no answers, we went home and called Ella's pediatrician's after-hours number and talked to the on-call nurse. She also urged us to go straight to the E.R., so we went. When we arrived and after we saw the doctor, he was so busy with a patient that was having heart troubles, that i...