Thursday, June 25, 2009

Health Update!

So here it is...
We had our appointment today at Children's Hospital (wonderful by the way.) We met with Bel's endocrinologist today and actually were given answers to her "episodes." I never imagined that this would go so smoothly so I pray that we have found an answer & treatment to what is going on.


Bel has been diagnosed as a Ketotic Hypoglycemic... what does that mean in normal people language. Well a normal functioning liver is able to convert our foods into starches and stores them and slowly releases them into our bodies to carry us through the periods of time in which we are not eating. Bel's liver does not do this, more specifically it doesn't do this at night, which is the reason for her "episodes" to be happening early in the morning. Her liver runs into an actual empty stage at night because of the long stretch of time without eating (dinner- breakfast). This means she is lacking the "fuel" to function normally in the morning. Her blood glucose level was measured at a 48 back in January when she was in the hospital, and had we measured two weeks ago it would have been close to that with how she was acting.

So from here we have a couple of modifications to our normal life. Shockingly they are really simple! She will need a protein rich snack before she heads to bed so that her body will slowly break down the food and the liver will be able to retain the converted starches. Then the same thing in the morning with a glass of milk or other protein rich food to get her day started. Her Dr. says this should take care of the "problem" and will help her body to maintain a normal blood glucose level (which is different for everyone).

IF we have any other "episodes" we have a blood glucose monitor (like type I diabetes) to check her levels as the episode is going on. If they drop we will take the next step at Children's Hospital. We are hopeful that we will not go this direction and most children outgrow the problem by age 5 so I will leave this very long update at that.

On a much different note the Swing set is here! And she is in love with it!

Monday, June 22, 2009

Summer... Sweet Summer!

Silly Blue Eyed Girl
(Painting "Anie Erin" and "Uncle Jusin's" nails)
1st boat ride of the year
Other Cabin Favorites

Well it is finally summer here and thank goodness! Bel and I are ready for our summer fun even though I still have two more weeks with summer classes and training scattered throughout. The update is mostly pictures, but I also felt the need to update you all on Bel's "episode's" yup... plural. The same incident that happened in January happened again just a little over a week ago. So... what does all of this mean? Well we are not sure exactly outside of the fact that Dr. Mark feels that it is blood sugar related, so our good Dr. has begun the next steps for us and we will be headed to meet with an Endocrinologist at Children's in July to explore what is going on a little more. Please pray that these wonderful Dr.'s are able to help us in this journey. We promise to keep you all updated once we know more.

Sunday, June 14, 2009

A Fun Day at The Park



While I was off at a short day of school Bel and DM headed down to visit with Uncle Doug and Auntie Stacey. They had a wonderful day at the park... Bel as always had a blast!

Monday, June 8, 2009

Memorial Weekend Past Due

I thought I had lost our camera after the Memorial weekend holiday, but in a last ditch effort to see the pictures of that weekend I found it in my school bag! Enjoy!



Friday, June 5, 2009

This past weekend we attended our nieces first dance recital. She did an amazing job and looked beautiful in her outfit. We are so proud of her! Way to go Pooky!!!