Prayers Needed for Gabi

On Friday, Gabi was diagnosed with Kawasaki Disease by her pediatrician in Sheridan. We spent Friday afternoon through Sunday in the hospital as she underwent treatment and had recovery time. She is doing much better now, but is still very tired and grumpy. We will not know the long-term effects on her heart until tomorrow when we go see a pediatric cardiologist in Billings for an echocardiogram. We are hopeful that we caught it early enough to prevent any damage to her coronary arteries and heart.

It was very scary for all of us. Gabi doesn't get sick very often and so it was quite stressful, especially when everything happened so quickly from the diagnosis to treatment at the hospital. She was a little trooper and won the hearts of many nurses during her stay. She hated the blood draws and IV, but loved the popsicles, stickers, ice cream and all of the attention. :) Watching your little girl lay in a hospital bed hooked up to an IV is heartbreaking. I hope I never have to see that again.

Here are some pictures of her as we were getting ready to leave. She is looking so much better in these pictures than she did on Friday (but taking pictures then was the last thing on my mind!) Gabi really missed Maya while she was in the hospital and was pretty happy when she came in to visit Sunday morning. We are thankful that we live close to family now and for all of their help watching Maya. Her diagnosis is a long story and one that gets me pretty angry. She came down with a rash all over her body last Saturday (4/2) and a low-grade fever. I called her doctor's office in Golden and they said to watch it and go in to the doctor if the fever didn't go away in 4-5 days. So, Tuesday morning (4/5), I took her to the urgent care clinic in Sheridan because she still had a 100-101 fever and red eyes. She was very irritable. Dr. Finley (don't EVER go to him!) spent less than 1 minute with us, looked in her mouth and ears, didn't listen to anything I told him about the history, and diagnosed her with a sinus infection and pink eye. I knew it was an incorrect diagnosis and feel bad for not standing up to him, but I guess I trusted him for some reason because he was a "doctor". We waited for the antibiotics and eye drops to work over the next couple of days and when they didn't, I called a pediatrician in Sheridan and got her in Friday morning. They took one look at her and knew something major was up! After blood tests, a chest x-ray, lots of examining, phone calls to Children's Hospital in Denver and the pediatric cardiologist in Billings, and 5 hours later, they diagnosed her with Kawasaki Disease. They immediately admitted her to Sheridan hospital to start the treatment of IVIG (gamma globulin) and aspirin. She looked so much better the next morning and has continued to improve (except for her energy level and she has thrown up a couple of times...probably from the aspirin.)

Please keep Gabi in your prayers. We are praying that she returns to her normal, energetic self soon and that her immune system and cardiovascular systems did not suffer any damage. She is such a sweet girl that shouldn't have to go through this! We will update this after our trip to the pediatric cardiologist in Billings tomorrow.

Lots of love, Tara