#972 - Jehovah Rapha

Jehovah Rapha

The Lord our Healer

Last weekend I attended the Created for Care Retreat in Buford, GA (another post for another time). On Saturday morning my mother-in-law called and asked if Ella had ever shown any type of food allergies. I told her no and asked why. She said she woke up with puffy eyes and swelling around her mouth and chin. She wasn't having any trouble breathing, so I asked her to just watch her closely and keep me updated. Around lunch time she sent me a picture of her face, and it worried me so I said she should probably take Ella in to the doctor (they're open on Saturdays). Long story short, the clinic was closing soon after they got there, so they were sent over to the E.R. to receive some benadryl. By this time, Daddy made it to the E.R. (he had been about 2 hours away at a mission team training) and they all went back home.

That night she reacted crazily to the benadryl, and neither Ella nor Daddy got much sleep. In the meantime, I'm 12 hours away and don't know all of the details of what's going on. Sunday morning, my m-i-l sent me another picture and Ella looked worse. Plus she was now running fever. The E.R. told them the day before it was most likely not an allergic reaction, but a virus. So, I continued to stay updated via phone as my friend and I began our journey from North GA to Mississippi where I was planning on spending the night. As we were driving, I debated whether or not I should go ahead and finish the trip that day or wait until Monday to head home. I talked to Daniel about it early in the afternoon, and he said he did not want me driving 12 hours straight and that I should wait until Monday.

However, a couple of hours later, she continued to get worse, so Mama Bear instincts came out and I said that I was coming home even if it meant getting there after midnight. By this time, Daniel and I decided she needed to go back to the E.R. (a different one than Saturday night) so some more testing could be done. At 6 pm Sunday night, Daniel headed to the E.R. and I left MS headed west to see my baby girl.

I arrived at the hospital at 12:30 (shouldn't have taken that long, but there were complications as to whether this hospital would end up treating her because her doctor didn't have rights there...blah, blah, blah...so I sat in a parking lot for about 30 minutes waiting to find out where to go.) and saw this...

My puffy baby girl would only sit in this position. If we tried to move her for any reason she would scream to high heaven. And let's just say, she was not near as excited to see me as I thought she might be. In fact, I think she was pretty mad at me for not being there throughout this whole ordeal. It took her a good while to warm up to me. I'll admit, that was hard to accept.

By 2:00 a.m. they decided it was indeed a virus (couldn't tell us which one, though), and there wasn't a reason to keep her overnight. So, we headed home and Ella slept on my chest for the remainder of the night. To keep her comfortable and her fever down, we were given instructions to alternate between tylenol and motrin. At 8:00 a.m. Monday morning I called Ella's doctor and made an appointment to see him at 9:00 a.m. By this point, Ella was D.O.N.E. with doctor's and hospitals, so that visit was not too fun. But, we made it through, and she and her daddy came home and took a long nap together.

The rash and swelling that began on her face quickly moved to her entire body. She was so pitiful!

She still tried to find time Monday to play with her dolls and stuffed animals.

 

Sweet girl hated taking her medicine, but loved holding it while rocking with Mama. Here she is sound asleep while holding the tylenol bottle.

By Tuesday her fever had broken and some of the swelling was starting to go down. She was still pretty rash-y, though. Thankfully, her appetite was coming back.

 Her doctor asked us to check in with him every day, so when I called Wednesday I told the nurse that she'd had diarrhea since Tuesday and her rash/swelling didn't seem to be going away. The doctor suggested we bring her in for some more blood work just to be sure they hadn't missed anything the first time around on Sunday night. So, back to the hospital we went Wednesday afternoon. I took her by myself, and she was such a trooper! Yes, she screamed the whole time the nurse was taking blood, but she didn't try to squirm or pull the needle out. She just sat very still and screamed. :) The sweet nurse hummed "Jesus Loves Me" the entire time...sometimes I really do love living in the Bible belt.

We decided that if anything came back abnormal on the blood work, then we were heading to Children's hospital in Dallas. So, Wednesday night we were on pins and needles waiting to hear the results. He called about 8:30 p.m. and said that everything looked great. Thank you, Lord! 

So, we continued to wait.

 And then the peeling began...

And we're actually still in the peeling stages. It's as if she got a really bad sunburn all over her body. Her ears are even peeling (inside!).

But, we are definitely over the worst of this nasty virus. The weather has been gorgeous this week, so once she felt like it, we spent a lot of time outside. Swinging is one of her favorites, so we've done it a lot!

Lord, thank you for being Ella's healer. Even when the doctor's didn't know what was going on, you did. Thank you for giving Daniel and me wisdom as to how best care for our daughter that you've entrusted to us. Thank you for being our peace and comfort. Thank you that our daughter is on the mend, and that throughout this entire week we've seen Your hand at work.