Appointments and More Appointments

-
Image
One of the unfortunate things about cerebral palsy (CP) are the many co-occurring health issues that go along with it. Because of this, those with CP have more doctors, specialists, and other kinds of providers they see on a regular basis. While the CP itself mainly affects the muscles, other areas of the body are affected as well, which results in more medical challenges.  For instance, besides CP, some of other Faith’s health issues include: ·          Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) and other digestive issues ·          Scoliosis ·          Bowel and bladder incontinence ·          General anxiety Because of these co-occurring conditions, we have more appointments than the average person. At times, it can all be a bit overwhelming. Faith enjoying a nice fall day On September 23 rd , we ended up in the E...
Post a Comment

Saturday Outings with Faith

-
Taking Faith to church on Sunday mornings is my favorite activity of the week but something else I love are our Saturday outings. We normally go to the library and sometimes go shopping at Target (her favorite store). 

One Saturday we even went to the pet store because she wanted to look at the hamsters. She has made it known that she would like to have a hamster but since I'm not much of a rodent person I'm not too excited about it. Rob and I wondered if we could talk her into a guinea pig instead. For some reason a guinea pig seems less "rodenty"!

Faith is bundled up and ready to roll!

Yesterday, even though the temperature was only in the single digits, she wanted to go to the Big Event Carnival. It's held every year at the Bismarck Civic Center and is hosted by the area Child Evangelism Fellowship.

We have never gone before because I was never sure if Faith would be able to tolerate so many noisy, crazy kids under one roof. Also, one of the main attractions are those inflatable bouncy things that Faith can't do. But since it was a Saturday and we weren't doing much else, I decided we would check it out. A major bonus was instead of an admission charge, carnival goers were asked to bring a food donation to help those in need.

Faith and her friend D'Ette 

There were lots of booths with different games for the kids to play. After they played, the carnival workers (people from local churches and ministries) gave the kids tickets they could redeem for prizes. Everyone was very gracious and cheered for Faith when I helped her shoot a duck or toss a beanie through a hole. She wanted to get her face painted but the line was too long.

Her favorite part was visiting the Healing Room's "blessing tent." We went inside one of the little tents they had set up and pray with a few volunteers from the team. I thought it was great that as the kids exited the event, they were given a New Testament Bible and a DVD about the story of Jesus.

Faith is excited to find Lola and the Healing Rooms blessing tent!

It was fun and of course now she's asking when we can go again! Hopefully as Spring approaches, there will be many more fun things for us to partake during our Saturday outings!

Comments

Post a Comment

Most Popular Posts

Appointments and More Appointments

-
Image
One of the unfortunate things about cerebral palsy (CP) are the many co-occurring health issues that go along with it. Because of this, those with CP have more doctors, specialists, and other kinds of providers they see on a regular basis. While the CP itself mainly affects the muscles, other areas of the body are affected as well, which results in more medical challenges.  For instance, besides CP, some of other Faith’s health issues include: ·          Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) and other digestive issues ·          Scoliosis ·          Bowel and bladder incontinence ·          General anxiety Because of these co-occurring conditions, we have more appointments than the average person. At times, it can all be a bit overwhelming. Faith enjoying a nice fall day On September 23 rd , we ended up in the E...
Read more

My Tetanus Shot Ordeal: A Real Pain in the Arm

-
Image
Last Wednesday I had my yearly doctor exam and when she said I should get my tetanus shot updated, I didn't think twice about it. The nurse said my arm would be sore for a couple of days, gave me a handout and stuck the needle in my arm.  The next day my arm was sore and although I found it a little harder to pick up and carry Faith, I was glad the pain wasn't going to last long. Boy was I wrong! But not only was my arm sore, my whole body was. I felt achy and extremely tired. According to a medical site on the Internet, these were mild side effects of the Tetanus shot. If these were only mild side effects, I would really hate to have them at a moderate or severe level. My arm is still red and sore on day 2 after my tetanus shot. On Friday, two days after getting the shot I felt so tired that I took a four-hour nap after getting Faith off to school. Then on Saturday I took a three-hour nap up until 7 o'clock, but still felt tired and was able to go back to sleep around 10. ...
Read more

Faith's 73-Day NICU Stay

-
Image
September is  NICU Awareness Month . For those who don't know, NICU is an acronym for Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. According to  World Metrics  50,000 premature babies in the United States receive care each year in the NICU.  The average NICU stay for a preemie is 25 days. Honestly, that number surprises me, as I thought it would be much higher than that. Along with preemies, full-term babies born with certain health issues, such as respiratory distress, jaundice, and other kinds of infections receive care in the NICU.  Tiny Faith in her isolette at Mayo  But for Faith, whose untimely birth consisted of an emergency C-section 11 weeks early, it took 73 days before she was discharged. Those 73 days were a major emotional rollercoaster! And for many reasons, one of which was being nearly 600 miles from home as Faith was born at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. (You can read what led up to that on my post,  October 4, 2003: A Day I'll Ne...
Read more

Faith's 4th

-
Image
Every year, the one thing Faith wants to do for the 4th of July is go to the parade in Mandan. It surprises me how much she loves parades, considering the noise and crowds of people. About 20,000 people attend the annual 4th of July parade, and it's filled with very loud firetrucks, big machinery, trucks, and other kinds of loud noises. This year, there was also the concern that it would be more crowded than usual. This was due to the fact that part of the normal parade route was under construction.  Besides all that, the Parade starts at 10:00, which means Faith needs to wake up pretty early so that we can arrive in time. Neither of us had slept well the night before, so I was already concerned that she didn't get enough sleep to get through the long, busy day. I let her sleep as late as possible and prayed for us both to have enough energy to make it through the day. It helped that we could do her morning feeding enroute and also during the parade. She normally doesn'...
Read more