Monday-Wednesday update on Abby...

Monday, from Brent:

Abby is doing very poorly. She’ll be in hospital several more days, minimum. She can’t eat. Her fever isn’t going down. She is swelling up with an allergic reaction to the antibiotics. She is in constant pain that is requiring a morphine drip just to keep her from constantly crying.

Please pray for Michelle as she cares for her at the hospital.

Tuesday, from Brent:

Abby is still pretty rock bottom. High fever, mouth/stomach/intestine sores from the toxic chemo… very painful. She is on a constant morphine drip, can hardly talk and is completely devoid of any body strength. She has constant tremors, is throwing up, and now has a urinal tract infection that is pretty serious and requiring additional, stronger antibiotics.

Michelle is stretched pretty thin. She is stuck in the hospital room and cannot leave Abby’s side while I shuffle back and forth to take care of the rest of the family. Please pray for Michelle. This is really hard on her to have to watch Abby suffer hour after hour.

Many thanks for all the kind prayers, and for the continued meals from our dear Christian brothers and sisters.

Wednesday, from Brent:

Abby is improving little, if any, at this point. I’ve got a severe migraine today (too many days with little sleep catches up to me this way), and an appt tomorrow for what appears to be a staph infection under my chin. We are both extremely tired, but God is good and we rejoice in the greater opportunity to see Him work, and take care of us.

My heart aches most for Michelle being stuck up at the hospital 24 hours a day, and for little Abby suffering so. I miss them both terribly.

Thank you for your kindness and prayers. You are a blessing and we are blessed to have such kind brethren.

Wednesday, from Michelle:

This has been without a doubt the hardest seven days for me, (Michelle) since this whole thing began. As all the parents know, it is very hard to see our children in pain and suffering. Abby has been in so much pain. Even though her doctors and nurses are trying to control it with hourly IV morphine, she has been having break though pain that needs to be treated with extra morphine and even that is not working well today. She has been crying both when she is awake and in her sleep.

There is so much going on with Abby right now that it is difficult to know where to begin. As most of you know, Abby was admitted to the hospital last Thursday because of a high fever. She is still in the hospital and will be here for a while longer. She has an elevated temperature and is on IV antibiotics. They identified pseudomonas in her bladder. This can be a dangerous and hard to treat microorganism.

Sunday, she developed mucositis. Her immune system is so low that the "good" bacteria that is supposed to live on your skin to project you is attacking the lining of her whole digestive tract. She has "canker" sores all inside her mouth, down her esophagus, in her intestines, and on her bottom. I knew that she was miserable, I just didn't know why until I learned how many sores she has. This is so hard for a little girl to handle.

Her doctors said that the only things that will heal the sores is for her WBC to build back up, so that they can heal her. She won't be able to do chemo until she is better. All they can do now is give her IV fluids, and pain medicine. They are giving her Morphine via a PCA pump. It gives her a dose of morphine every hour and then she can press a button to get an additional dose every 15 minutes. I didn't know how quickly she would understand the instructions, but she got it in under 3 seconds. She is holding on the the PCA button like it is her best friend.

Since Abby's immune system is suppressed because of the chemo, she is running a fever, and has all of those sores, we may be here a while this time. It is my understanding that her white blood cell counts have to return to a normal level, before she will begin to heal from this. They are working to keep her comfortable until then.

We would appreciate your prayers. Your prayers, comments and emails mean so much to us.