The Flood of 2011

Wow. Check out the pics of our flooding. This has happened 5 or 6 times in the last 2 weeks, each time is a little worse because the ground is so saturated and the rivers so swollen. We just noticed a little water in our basement. Others have had it much worse. We've lived here 19 years and I have NEVER, EVER seen anything like it.

I'll have to get pics from up above our house. The pond is overflowing with all the streams coming through. Andrew and I counted 6 new independent streams coming down the hill. Yikes! To top everything off, we had a full-fledge tornado WARNING tonight. We didn't have any trouble here. I guess I'll have to check to see what was reported in the wider area.




Here's Jeffrey checking out the drainage pipe that goes from west to east. You can see the spray of brown dirt toward the bottom of the pic . . .sorry it's so blurry!

This is our neighbor's overworked drainage pipe!

Under 11 hours!!

It's a new record! It was just over 10 1/2 hours door to door today AND, yes, Sumana did have surgery! She didn't go in til 11:10, was out by 1:30 and on the road home by 4:30!

Her lungs sounded pretty good at 9:30, but they wanted her to have another nebulizer treatment before surgery. Dr. Sanders looked at her x-rays again and he found a way to eek out another 2-3 cm on her current rods, so he changed his plan to a simple expansion, instead of the more involved rod replacement.

Everything went well and aside from the usual pain, Sumana seems to be doing well and is very happy to be home!

Surgery?

Sumana saw her primary doctor Thursday and received pretty good news. Her lungs sounded clearer than they had a week earlier. We're still a little unsure about surgery on Monday. We are supposed to arrive at the hospital at 8:30. The anesthesiologist will have the final say whether the surgery will happen or not.

In the meantime we have Sumana taking regular albuterol nebulizer treatments and playing Wii Fit or treadmill to try to clear her lungs. Please pray that she is all clear on Monday. I'd love to see her in new rods . . . she's growing so fast!!

I'll keep you posted!!

Pneumonia . . . .:-(

So sad. Sumana went from a cold on Wednesday (we did see the doctor and got her started on a steriod) to bronchitis (took her to the ER for shortness of breath) to bacterial pneumonia today (back to her doctor's office). Her O2 sats were around 93 yesterday and today. If they get below 89 they would admit her to keep her on oxygen. Those numbers are too close for my comfort!! The poor kid! She is acting okay, but the coughing really hurts her chest and ears.

The doctor doesn't think that she'll be able to go ahead with her April 18th surgery. I'm afraid she's right, but I don't even want to consider what that might mean. Dr. Sanders was booking into July a month ago, so unless he can squeeze her in somewhere, we'll be looking at August at the earliest. As much as I'd like to get the new rods in her back, I really don't want to take a chance with her weakened lungs. The whole ventilator experience is a once-in-a-life-time thing as far as I'm concerned. Been there, done that . . .don't wanna do it again!

So, please pray for healing and wisdom for us. I'll contact Dr. Sanders office next week and see what they say.

Here's a quick, funny story: After her doctor appointment we went out for lunch. She sneezed so hard and unexpectedly, that she knocked over her glass of ice water. It dumped across the table and into my lap!!! Where is the video camera when you need it? She was sooooo startled (me, too!). It was sooooooo funny! Wish you could have witnessed it!

Improvement!

I must say I'm pretty close to speechless . . . and that doesn't happen very often! Sumana saw the developmental eye doctor yesterday. I looked back at older posts and she has tested as poorly as 20/70 in her right eye. Yesterday she 'almost' made it to 20/50. I think I've mentioned how much she has resisted patching her right eye. She was supposed to be patching her eye 2-3 HOURS a day. In reality she has been doing it about 30 minutes a day. . . if that. When we went to the doctor yesterday I didn't expect to see any improvement, in fact I expected to have to accept the fact that she was nearly blind in one eye.

I can't even begin to express how stunned I was to hear that there had actually been improvement in her right eye. The doctor is not even close to being ready to talk about corrective lenses or visually adapted reading materials. He wants to see her get to 20/30 and THEN he'll have her start vision therapy (more exercises!!) and THEN maybe talk about corrective lenses.

Because Sumana has been so resistant to patching, the doctor explained WHY she needs to do this. He explained that to drive, you need to have a certain level of vision. He told her that it is only for 10 weeks and if she is faithful, he won't have to prescribe eye drops (which she hates). Once her right eye is strong enough, he told her that he can help her train her eyes to work together as a team. (They probably have never done that before). When they are working together correctly, she won't have the blurriness and double vision (that's from the left, dominant eye taking over for the right eye). I think the doctor got through to her. She only has to patch her eye two hours a day and it can be for 20 minute intervals throughout the day.

I am so relieved! I have been making plans to buy a Nook and subscribing to a large public library to try to get reading materials for Sumana that have a larger font. I've been concerned about all of her school subjects and the small size of the font that is used as the kids advance. The doctor told me how to make a typoscope for Sumana. This will help isolate one or two lines of reading material, and he says that's all the assistance she needs at this point. He showed me the type size that she can read and it is the size of most of her books or even smaller. Her problem is with crowding and with the typoscope, that will help eliminate that problem. How cool is that??

Anyway, please be in prayer for our girl. Sumana picked up a really bad cold this week and it's gone to her chest. She doesn't have a fever yet, but the albuterol and cough assist aren't helping. We'll be off to the doctor's today or tomorrow. Sigh . . . She's pretty concerned because she is anxiously awaiting her surgery April 18th and doesn't want anything to get in the way of that! (What a trooper!!)

NC was a GREAT break!!

Sumana, Andrew and I had a FANTASTIC time visiting Papa and Nana in North Carolina. It was a fun, relaxing time and just what the doctor ordered! The weather was fantastic . . . no rain, lots of sun and it even hit 80 at the beach one day. Woo-hoo!

When we got back (after driving through snow . . . ugh!), Sumana had her pre-op appointment. She's all set for surgery April 18th. I still need to verify that Dr. Sanders is swapping out her rods for new ones. He was not at the pre-op appointment. Last time we saw him he planned to give her longer rods. The way she's growing, she needs them!!