How it all began...

Since the first week of August, Hannah's been battling her first urinary tract infection. It began with her complaining of her head hurting and a fever and later vomiting. Our kids don't get fevers very often, so when they do, we know something must be going on. When her fever went up to 103.7 it was time to call her Doctor.

Abby and Caleb had gone over the mountain to spend a few days with Grandma & Grandpa. Joel was up at Timothy Lake, camping with Elijah, leaving Hannah and I to play together for a night. Her and I played in the backyard swimming pool for a little while, then went to the craft store, on a coffee date and to McDonald's for dinner. We even stopped at Salvation Army and found a Tinkerbell Doll for a buck! Later, we came home and painted our nails. It was a perfect girl time.

The next day though, she came down with a fever. Some friends had invited us out on the Columbia River on their boat for the evening. She was a trooper and went along with it. About halfway through the evening, her fever was around 101 and she just wanted to be cuddled and held. The next couple days were more of the same and even finding her sleeping randomly throughout the house!

On August 6th, I took her in and Dr. Eki suggested a urine culture to rule out a urinary tract infection, saying they were common for girls her age but I didn't really expect that to be what was happening. It was though, so we started her on a 10-day antibiotic. She improved and we thought she was over it. The office ordered a renal ultrasound over at Mt. Hood Legacy Hospital and during the few day wait for the results her fever returned and we felt like we were back to square 1.

We started round 2 of a different antibiotic and at the end of those 10 days it was September 18 and I could tell by now that we were still dealing with the infection. She was scheduled to have another urine culture done, but I was certain there would be a round 3. It was a Saturday, so we had to take the culture to Mt. Hood Hospital again since the Doctor's office was closed. Tuesday, I still hadn't heard any results but knew we were still dealing with the infection so I called the office and left a voicemail letting them know my concerns, asking if they had results, wondering what the next step was since by this time, it just wasn't feeling right.

Dr. Emmerich called back after a couple hours (5:30pm) saying that he'd been on and off the phone with an "Infectious Disease Control team" at Randall Children's Hospital and they'd been discussing Hannah's case and were considering admitting her to take the next step of antibiotics which would be administered by IV. By the time I received the call being told to pack and bag and bring Hannah to the hospital, it was 7:45 at night. It was pretty alarming and difficult to hear past the title, "Infection Disease Control team" to believe that Hannah would be ok.

We didn't know how many days we would be at the hospital, just that most likely, we would be doing a "course" of IV antibiotics, so we packed several days worth of clothes and things we would need. Joel prayed for us which calmed my worried heart. He prayed the verses that have been a theme for our family this fall; Joshua 1:9 "Be strong & courageous, do not be terrified, do not be discouraged for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go!" It was encouraging for my Mama's heart to hear those words and to be able to walk into this new situation knowing that the Lord is with us, leading and guiding us every step of the way.

More to come...