We knew it would have to happen at some point in time but I don't think a parent is ever prepared for what we just went through. Brace yourselves, this will be a long post. Annabelle has had rotten luck with her kidneys for about a year now. She had her first UTI when she was 5 months old and has had more UTIs than I can count now. (At least 8 that I can think of.) Her signs are always the same. High fever, lethargic and wants to be held constantly. I always know when she gets a fever she will have a UTI. On Sunday August 14 I noticed that Annabelle had a low grade fever. I figured she was getting some teeth and didn't really think about it. She had been pretty whiney lately but I just chalked it up to being a youngest child and almost 2. Each day I noticed her fever was getting a little higher but it didn't really concern me that much. Once it reached 102 i figured we better go to get the urine sample. Went to the dr and they didn't want to do the catheter. We put the bad on and waited....and waited....and waited. 2 1/2 hours later they were getting ready to leave and still Annabelle wouldn't pee in the bag. They sent us to Primary's and I decided there was no way I was going to go there at 9:30 at night. I decided to go to Kids Care who will do a cath. So on we went. Her intial urine came back postive for UTI so we got the antibiotic and went on our merry way. Next day rolls around and still Annabelle is not feeling good. By this point in time her fever is varying between 102-104 and she is needing to be held 24/7 no exaggeration. Thursday comes and goes and still no sign of improvement. We go back to the dr. on Friday who looked at her urine culture and sees that no growth is happening with the culture. By this point in time her fever is hovering around 105. She is a sick little girl. She had stopped eating or drinking and was terribly upset all the time. Nothing would soothe her and she was just miserable. The dr looked at her and said, "I can run a whole bunch of tests here but if I find anything unusual I will have to send her to primarys and they will run the same tests all over again. Lets save some time and tears and send you up now." So on we went to the ER. The resident who came in to see us was a joke. First she thought that it was "just a virus". Fever for 5 days now and just a virus. Then she looked in her mouth and said, "Oh it looks like she is cutting teeth, I think we have found the source of the fever." Um really? 105 fever with teething? Finally they do a CBC which shows her white blood cell count to be over 20000. (Extremely high for a small child) They do a CT scan of her neck and find swollen lymph nodes. The resident comes back and says oh it looks like she has tonsilitis. Switches antibiotics and sends us home after 8 hours. Says to follow up with our dr the next day. So we do. Even after the switch of anti biotics she is still worse. (i know hard to believe) By this point in time she is really no more than a bump on a log. She is hardly moving and sleeping pretty much non stop. Fever is 105 and just generally she is miserable. Not eating or drinking at all. The dr looks at her and questions why the ER didn't admit her. He tells us that this is the kind of thing he sends kids to the hospital for...not the other way around! He sends us back up, hoping they will admit us this time.
Fortunately for us they do. They do some more blood work hook her to some iv fluids and anti biotics and start asking us questions. They originally thought she had something called Kawasaki Disease. In a nutshell it causes heart disease in young children if not caught in time. It felt like we were in a rush against the clock. After some more blood work and lots of prayers we found out that she did not have all the markers necissary for the diagnosis. By this point in time she was starting to respond to the antibiotics. Her fever had broken and she was starting to act a little better. She was still not eating or drinking but was starting to smile (we hadn't seen that for over a week.) and be awake for longer periods of time. By day 5 in the hospital they decided that she wasn't going to eat or drink normally at the hospital. The threat of a feeding tube loomed over us but fortunately the drs took pity on her and let her come home. We still don't know what made our baby girl so sick but we are grateful for antibiotics and the availablility we have to them. Thank heavens it was only a nasty infection that caused all this drama and not something more life threatening. We are glad to have our sweet Annabelle back. She is still a little tired but no more fevers and she is back (almost) to her normal self.

I couldn't bring myself to bring up my camera until after she was responding to the anti biotics. She was hooked up to too many machines and ivs and I didn't want to remember her that way!

This picture is on the day we left. She still has her iv in (but not hooked up) but other than that she was free to run around. She loved the play room and by this day she didn't want to stay in her room. If we even came close to the door she would start to freak out. She knew drs and nurses would poke her and mess with her in there!