Update now - Pictures later

So it's July 24... wow, time really flew by! I think about 2 posts ago, I was talking about how Bria was sick, and how we had about a thousand things to do in May and June. Well, Bria had other plans for us. We got back from DisneyWorld, thinking that the next big thing for us was to move out of the rental home (we rented a home to get out of our house to push us to keep going with the house renovations... we figured if we stayed at the home, we would give up with this long long long long process. we took a short lease, and now are moved in with mark's parents until it's all done. should be 8 months more... it'll fly by, like these last 8 months). Anyways, as we try to pack up the house, Bria gets sick again. Same as before. This time, I go to the MD on Day 1 of the fever. She doesn't see any signs of infection, but since fever really high, and pending urine lab, she gave an antibiotic anyways. That was on a Friday, so I went to work. Saturday morning, I get home and Mark drops the urine sample we collected to the Quest, and while I was alone with the kids, Bria does her chilling (I might have a seizure thingy), so I freak out as usual and start cooling her off with water and pray Mark comes home fast. As soon as he gets home, I call the MD, and she says since this is the second episode of unexplained fever she was just going to admit us for observation and lab tests. Since it was Saturday, the only way to be admitted was to go through the ER. We get to the ER, and they do their thing. The resident takes a history, and before even looking at Bria (didn't look at her throat, didn't look at her ears, didn't even look at her), he tells me it's a virus. He tells the nurse to give her Motrin/Tylenol and just wait a little. Fever stayed at 102ish the whole time we were there. I told the resident the our MD wanted to admit us for observation and wanted lab tests down on her. He looks at me at says, "Admit into the hospital!?! And what kind of lab tests did she want?". Thinking to myself, "you idiot, first take a look at my child before saying it's viral, and aren't there basic labs... CBC, etc...?" My dad was coming back in town from Miami, and since it was clear the resident didn't want to help us, I frantically called him and my MD to let her know we were at the ER. Thank god Dad arrived at the airport just then, so I told him to go to the ER right away. Before he arrived, it looked like my MD ended up ording the lab tests, chest x-ray, cathether, etc. So those were done, my dad arrived, and we just waited and waited and waited. Then they said, yup it's viral and we were going home. Bria was getting an IV due to dehydration, so they had me sign the discharge papers, they removed her IV, and they said we could leave. Bria still felt warm (which her temp never went down), and I asked the nurse to take her temp before we left since we had a long car ride home, I wanted to know where it was at. What was going through my mind at this time... we were here to be admitted, and they were not, the tylenol/motrin was not controlling her temps, and I was surprised that they would send someone home with a 102-103 fever. When the nurse took the last temp, sure enough 104... ever since my dad got there, the resident became off our case (Thank YOU), and the MD in charge said they wanted to admit her for observation (DUH!). So after like 7-8 hours sitting in a tiny room in the ER, after telling them I was there to admit Bria, they finally said they were going to admit. OMG!!!

Bria gets admitted to the Pediatric wing... as the only patient in the wing! The neonatologist was the admitting MD. Now here comes the REALLY SUCKY PART... they have to put in another IV into Bria since the great ER discharged us and removed it. He couldn't do it, the nurse couldn't do it, so they call a nurse from the neonatal wing who was awesome and did it on the first shot! Bria was really dehydrated which made it really hard.

So we were there Saturday to Tuesday. Didn't expect to stay that long. Each day when they told me we had to stay another day, etc. I was suprised. Considering all I was hearing was it's viral, viral, viral... then why do we have to stay here? At least now everyone was believing me on her chills and really high late night fevers. I began to think nobody was believing me on her high fevers and the bluish skintones when she chilled. But now the nurses were my witnesses. We had such great nurses. She did end up having some unusal lab results, that at first was so high, that nobody believed the result and didn't tell us until they redid that lab. It came back as the same high value. On Sunday morning, we had one resident tells us she had no clue what was going on, kind of a mystery. On Monday morning, we had another resident assure us that this was definitely a virus.

Monday night we brought in the infectious disease pediatric specialist (who was my Pediatrician), and she ordered an MRI for Tuesday. We debated transfering her to Children's, but didn't want to start over with admission. We thought she would do better with the sedation for MRI there, than at St. Joe's, but Bria was an MRI pro. She stayed so still, the technician was so impressed. What was supposed to take 2 oral sedations and about 3 hours, Bria did in 1 oral sedation dose and in 45 minutes since she was super still. Mark and I watched her get loaded into the machine, arms tied down by her sides, and when they removed her, she somehow got her thumb in her mouth. MRI ruled out our worst case scenario, which now leading them to think maybe JRA... and that's a BIG maybe. I felt bad for the resident that assured us that it was viral. She looked really sad when Bria was going into the MRI, and I asked her if she was ok, and she said she really felt bad for us. She said that she didn't have those labs in question when she told us it was viral. I really liked her honesty.

Still don't know what's going on. The rheumatologist didn't think it's JRA, but she wanted to see us if it happened again. Wait and see approach.

We debated about going to Cancun, but all the MDs gave us the "why wouldn't you go?" We figured if it was JRA, then if she gets sick again, she was going to get sick. And we had 3 doctors traveling with us. So we went to Cancun, will post on this AMAZING trip later! Definitely the break we needed.

But before we could go to Cancun, we had to move out of our house. With Bria in the hospital, and all the follow up visits, plus a trip to Children's to see the Rheumatology speciailist, we were running out of time. But with the help of family, it was done! I have to say that Mark's mom is a packing machine, and as we all know, Mark's dad is a cleaning machine! Without their help, we would not have finished. Unfortunately, with all that work, we thought we the house was in great condition, but our Dr. Jung Moon, our landlord, thought differently and took a chunk out of our deposit (not including a receipt of what they took out for). When we asked them, all of the things they took off for would not add up to what they took . They even took off for a broken refrigerator we had asked them to fix before that. I really liked living in that house, but when something went wrong, they took FOREVER to fix it. We even had bees inSIDE our house (threatening our lives) and the Moon took weeks to fix. The exterminator found 8 beehives surrounding the house. Ok, needed to vent. The Moons were really nice people, but really shady about not giving us an itemized list of what they took off. Really unprofessional.

Anyways, we get back from Cancun, and Bria a week in a half later, Bria is sick again. Same thing, same labs, but this time a UTI. So we just finished treating her, and waiting for follow up labs to be taken.

From when this all started in May until now, Bria has thankfully gotten stronger, very playful, and very naughty. She's a daredevil. Unfortunately, she used to be very independent, only wanting to sleep by herself, but she is now really needy only wanting to sleep with us, and always having to be in contact with us. It's our fault, she got used to sleeping with us since Mark and I were too scared to leave her alone when she was in danger of seizing.
So that's our update for now.

Disney World 2009

PICTURES from Disney World!

Spent 8 days at Orlando's Disney World last week! Bria's 1st trip and we had a fantabulous time! Although, really really really raining (monsoonish rain), it was still fun and I will always remember walking around in 2 inches of water, while hiding under a poncho and an umbrello. Good thing we just bought the BEST stroller for 2 kids, the Joovy UltraLight Caboose. TOTALLY RECOMMEND!!! We got the rain cover with it, and the kids were super dry the whole trip!
Anyways, we arrived on a Saturday and had dinner at Rain Forest Cafe. The next day we were off to the Magic Kingdom. Bella's favorite ride there was the racecars (Speedway), It's a Small World, and the carousel. The next day was Kayley's birthday, so she did the Bibbidi Boppity Boutique at Downtown Disney. That place is so cute, I wish Bella would do that stuff, but she's scared of nailpolish and makeup. Maybe Bria next time. After that, we were back to Magic Kingdom to try and finish the park up. Unfortunately, this rain was against our mission, but we saw a good amount of it.
The next day we went to Hollywood Studios. I don't think I've been there since it was MGM. We ate dinner with the Playhouse Disney charachters. Bella was a little scared, more of Goliath from Jojo's Circus, but she eventually got used to being in the same room with them. Bria had a blast and especially loved Goliath! Then we were off back into the rain to watch some shows. Bella's favorite was the Playhouse Disney show, which she probably remembered from our trip to Disneyland last summer. My favorite was the Toy Story Ride. That was awesome!!!
The next day, Mark and I snuck out without the kids to ride Soarin at Epcot. This would be our 4th attempt at riding this ride because previous tries the lines were over 2 hours long or the fast passes run out. That was an awesome ride, that a couple days later we rode 2 more times. I think Ashley rode it like 6 or 7 times. When we got back, we ventured back to Magic Kingdom where we got poured on in the rain. Mark and I got separated during that rainstorm, and he carried my wallet and phone. I had Bella and an umbrella, almost stood in the middle of the park and cried, but luckily we found eachother. We left the park to meet the family at the Grand Floridian for Kayley's belated birthday dinner with Cinderella. Even though they weren't in mask like costumes, Bella was still scared and Bria had a blast!
Animal Kingdom was our next day adventure. The best day weatherwise. Not to hot, and it rained in the evening after we left the park. My favorite here was the Lion King show, which surprised me because I'm not a fan. Nemo show was good too, but the Lion King music was so energetic.
Our last park day was at Epcot, where we just hung out at the Land all day at Soarin. We took pictures with the characters, Bella didn't cry... which is an accomplishment for her, and Bria had a blast. We didn't make it around the whole park, but we got to eat at Mexico, which I was craving.
The day we left, we just hung out at Downtown Disney until we left. We were pooped!

My favorite memories of this trip:
Mommy Lu saying in tagalog that Bella was such a weird child.
Ashley buying the lighted sword... um, how old are we?
Losing my slipper in the rain as I try to run to catch the bus.
Bella standing uncontrollably as she excitedly watched the Playhouse Disney Show.
Everyone always complementing Bria, as if they've never seen a baby before. She's such a sip-sip.
Having such a wonderful, understanding husband. Mark took Bella to the potty, due to my severe fear of public washrooms. (unfortunately she had diarrhea and was in the potty ALL the time. She did end up wearing a pull up just in case for the diarrhea, but when's Mark's mom tried to put it on her the first time, she said, "No mama, I don't want a diaper. I won't poo. See, I'm not pooing." I thought that was so cute. At least we know she's definitely potty trained even in crazy line situations that Disney World has)

Anyways, enjoy the pictures! Have lots to do before we leave for our next trip to Cancun next month! Packing, moving, parties, work, etc....

Update on Brianna

I think I'll be writing here more often starting now. It's really the best way for me to remember all the going-ons in my daughters lives, facebook was just too easy to post pictures.

Anyways, it's May now. Time just flew by. Bria turned one already, and we had a big party for her at Little Quiapo filipino restaurant. There was a buffet, a bubbleologist, we made a year in review video presentation, Maxine entertained us with her singing (which was so nice that she sang our family's special song, Somewhere Out There), we had a pretty cake (vegan cake), and gave away M&Ms with Bria's face on them.
On her actual birthday, we had taken them to the allergist to get their eczema checked out. Bella was getting tested for food and environmental allergies. She got 40 pricks, and so far we know she's allergic to cats. Bria got tested also, because what we had thought was eczema was actually an allergic reaction to eggs. So she got 8 pricks, and is allergic to eggs, peanuts, and fish. To what degree she is allergic to each, we don't know. We'll find out when she's older.

Bria does walk now, a little wobbly, starting on her 13 month bday. She still does all her tricks, beautiful eyes, flying kiss, close open. She sleeps by herself and sucks her thumb. And she's small, in the 10th percentile... which is really cute. She eats alot though. We did have to bring her back to basic foods to weed out any other allergies. So she's still a little limited on what we give her, but she eats alot of what we do give her.

Anyways, this week was a nightmare. Not sure what it was about my kids and the 13th month. As you can recall, Bella was hospitalized at Makati Med in the Philippines with respiratory problems in 2007, which I thought was a nightmare then.

Last Friday, was a regular Friday. I came home from work, and Mark went to work. The night before, Bria felt a little warm, so without taking her temperature we just gave her tylenol. Not knowing that Bria was still sick in the morning (apparently Mark took her temp - 100 and gave her more tylenol), I did more morning routine of trying to sleep. Thankfully I had taped some shows the night before, so I decided to watch that instead of sleep right away. Bria was awake already, so she just played. When Bella woke up, we were all just chilling on the couch. All of a sudden Bria started to shiver. I thought she was cold, so I went upstairs with her to get socks and a sweatshirt. We went back down and I watched her a little bit, but her teether were chattering, she was shivering more. I called Mark, who decided to call our doctor. As we waited for her response, I called my brother and told him about the chills. The first thing he thought of, the last thing I thought of, was is she having seizures. This was definitely not seizures. I ended up swaddling her in a blanket, and we sat and waited. I thought maybe she was hungry, thirsty. Then I thought, maybe she had a fever? So I gave her milk and applesauce and tylenol. Still shivering, and Bella now telling me she wanted to go upstairs to take a nap, I brought the group upstairs. Bria still swaddled, we laid in bed for a second when suddenly she sounded like she was choking, gagging (hard to describe it), then she started to convulse. Thank goodness my brother put seizures in my mind, because I don't think in my panic I would have even thought that. I try to call 911 on my cell phone (which has a password to get in cuz Bella plays with it), but as I hold Bria in one arm and try to dial with my shaky hand, I couldn't figure out how to get passed my password (didn't even think to use the emergency dial feature). Bria still convulsing and making a weird gurgling sound, I run downstairs to get our landline and call 911. She sounded like she was choking on her tongue, so I put my finger in her mouth and she clamped down on my finger with all 4 teeth. (FYI: do not put your hand inside a seizing person's mouth). The guy on the phone calms me down, while Bria seizure slows down. When it was over, she was out of it. Eyes wide open, I directed them to look at me, but she didn't seem like she was there. She was very still, but breathing. Almost like a shock. Then she got very sleepy. The paramedics came and while they took her vital signs, I got Bella ready and all our things to go to the hospital. Got in the ambulance (which Bella calls the firetruck... which she really enjoyed going in), and off to Condell.
At Condell, we took lab test, etc. Everything checked out as fine, with the exception of WBC on the border, my doctor gave her iv cephalosporin, and we were discharge a few hours later. A little troubling at the hospital is that they didn't give my daughter a name wristband, and when they administered the medicine, there was now name check to iv bag. tsk tsk tsk.... quality assurance problems. From the hospital, I called work to get off that night, but nope, I had to go to work... whatever.
So we get home. Mark rushed out of work to get to the hospital, but once he brought us home, he rushed back to work. I figured everything would be ok. The kids were playing and I was lying down on the couch, then I fell asleep... oops! Woke up, I could here Bella, but not Bria. As I groggily got up, I asked Bella, where's Bria? She yells, "UPSTAIRS!" I bolted up and looked at the stairs and there's Bria hanging out on our middle landing. I grab the crazy dare devil and we just hang out in the family room. All of sudden she starts to chill again. I give her motrin, try to cool her off, but the shaking feeling was too familiar. I call Mark and just tell to get home now, and I call the ER to let them what was going on. But they just say the same thing, alternate that tylenol and motrin and put her in a tepid bath. I get off the phone, start wiping her down, and she starts to convulse again. This time I knew what to do. Lay her on her side, which this time she did foam at the mouth, and just wait it out. When it was all done, I called our MD, and I also tried to call the APN at the hospital, but they wouldn't let me talk to her that time. Mark came home, and we were getting ready to go back to the hospital, when our MD called back and said just to stay home and keep the temp down by alternating the meds. The problems is that the temp is down, it spikes up during the chilling - seizure episodes and remains after.
I call my dad to sleepover in case there's a problem. Then I go to work. After midnight, I call home to see what's going on, and she had another seizure. 3 in one day.... totally sucks. Apparently Mark really stepped up during that 3rd seizure. My dad (the doctor) was holding her when she started to seize, then he looks at Mark (the business guy) and asks if they should go to the ER. Mark takes Bria and just starts cooling her off until the seizures stops and fever goes down. When I heard that, I was so proud of Mark. He can remain cool, calm, and collect during high pressure times, especially since I'm totally a wreck. Plus I'm sure for my dad to see his granddaughter going through that is pretty scary.
So many things have happened this weak. We are now at day 7 and she still has a fever. We almost had 2 seizures we were able to stop. She had the chilling thing with lips and fingers turning blue. We've been to her MD, dad called a friend of his for a second opinion (and he was able to actually look at her original labs), and after her last chill episode, I got fed up and just brought her to St. Joe's ER. We've switched her antibiotics once already. Her last chest x-ray may have shown the presence of pneumonia, but her labs were all clear. It seems like she's a pretty health normal baby... with fever spikes out of the blue which may lead to febrile seizures. Mark and I have been on our toes ever since Friday. She goes from absolutely no fever all day to a couple fever spikes at night. We still give her tylenol and motrin q 3 hours, with or without a fever. If we are a late an hour, her fever goes up. Looks like this is all viral, which fevers can present 10-12 days... if she had a low-grade fever for 10-12 days, I would be ok with that. But we are talking, random fever spikes cuzing urgent attention to sponge bathe her down, or she has a higher possibility for febrile seizures.
All I can say is I can't wait until this nightmare is over. I want my baby to be happy again, and selfishly want Mark and I and the rest of the family that we wake up in the middle of the night with phone calls to get some sleep.

Time to catch up!

No pictures this time, but going to try and recall everything we've been up to...

Bria is now on the verge of walking. So since the last time we were on this blog, she started sitting up on her own around Thanksgiving, and then get in crawling position and think she's moving around December, and then the first week of January she just started crawling fast and pulling herself up into standing position, and within that week she was walking from furniture to furniture. Before she stood, she used to pull her crib bumper down so she could peek and see what we were up too, and then when she started to stand, she just stares at us while we try and sleep (her crib is in our bedroom). This makes it harder, because our general rule for Bria is that she can't see us while she's trying to sleep, or she won't sleep. Yesterday we started her at the Little Gym. Little Tom had his bday party there a couple years back, so we thought it would be good for her to socialize there with other kids her age. She was so CUTE!!! She played with the other kids, chasing them down the mats, and she even played with all the parents.

Bella is doing great! She just turned 3 and we had her bday party at an indoor water resort called Keylime Cove. She had a blast! We have decreased her days at school to 2 days a week, and will actually be pulling her out of school soon so she can spend more time with mommy and Bria before starting school next year. She is signed up for her 3 yo program at mommy's old school! We are so excited!!! Bella's new hobby is playing on the desktop computer. She's on nickjr.com, pbskids.org, or disney websites, plus she has a lot of games too. She can actually sit in front of the computer for hours! Mark taught her how to print, so now she selects the picture she wants, maximizes the screen, selects print, selects the printer to print on, and prints away! These kids are too tech savy!!! Other new things for Bella is that we signed her up for little gym, ice skating, and ballet. So she'll be a busy bee, just like Ate Max. Maybe she'll be a triple threat just like Ate Max!!!

Other than that, we've been busy with work, school, holidays, vacations. We had a quiet Thanksgiving since I had to work that night, and everyone was pretty much in the Philippines. We had lunch/dinner at our house. Oh, and we're at a new house too! Finally fixing up the old house, we rented near my work to lessen my commute. Anyways, after Thanksgiving we went to Vegas for the weekend. Then it was time to prepare for x-mas. Shopping and wrapping and unfortunately I worked X-mas too! BOO!!! On x-mas eve, we ate dinner at Uncle Gil's house and did a gift exchange. Then I went to work. In the morning, the grandpeople came over to watch the girls open their presents from Santa! Then we were off to Mark's aunts/uncles parties. We did a gift exchange at one, which our present was pretty funny. We took a silly picture of Mark and iron-on it to a pillow case. Will definitely post pictures of this later. Anyways, after x-mas, Tom and family came in for over a week! We did EVERYTHING!!! Navy Pier winter wonderland, American Girl, and all their usual filipino store errands.... etc. We all went to Keylime to ring in the New Year which was so much fun! Then the next day we celebrated Bella's bday, just so Tom and fam wouldn't have to drive up at a later date. After all that... phew... I'm tired! Bella's actual bday was at home. It was SO COLD that night, we just ordered in. She blew out her candles this year!!! Yeah!!! She had 2 Dora cakes, and Dora cupcakes from Ate Joy!

Anyways, now things are quieting down. Just working on the house, getting into more a routine with the girls and their activities, and my goal this year is to catch up with all my albums and stuff. So I think I covered a quick review of the big things we were doing. Lots to look forward to this year... but most importantly Mark and I are working at getting healthier this year since I'm pregnant-free.

Will post pictures soon...