Sunday, November 8, 2009

Andrea's story Part 2

    Let see where did we leave off. Oh yes my mom passing away. Well I went home to make arrangements for my mom. I then rode in the back of my Uncle's semi truck to the Toledo,Ohio because Bill couldn't stay with me the whole time. He had to come home and go back to work. I remember my Uncle dropping Mike and I off at a truck stop to meet Bill. From there we went to the hospital to pick up Andrea. I remember being so tired from the ride , then going to the hospital and loading up the car with the things that Andrea had accumulated during her 13 week stay.  

We get this beautiful little thing home. All 4 pounds 5 ounces of her. We start to settle in and she has this horrible bout with colic. It so terrible! The only person  she would fall asleep for was Bill. For some reason as soon as she laid on his chest she would be out like a light.

 At this time we were seeing a pulmonologist for Andrea because of her lung disease at birth. Andrea was always so tiny but had a huge head. When I say huge I don't mean like an achon head. Her head was very long. She had a sever frontal bossing. Her tissue was extremely soft and from being positioned side to side on her head caused it to shape like that. This is one of the side effects from being so premature.

   At our 13 month pulmonology appointment  they notice that Andrea isn't quite growing like she should. Her hand are extremely tiny. The pulmonoligist suggests that we take Andrea to see a geneticist. So, I get Andrea in to see this doctor which took me forever. That is when the doctor brings up Andrea has a form of dwarfsim. He was thinking that she had either Achondroplasia or Hypochondrasplasia.. He then suggested that Andrea have a genetic blood test to check for both.  Andrea had the test done and she tested negative for both kinds of dwarfism. They did say that the gene in the blood test only showed up 70% of the time and that it was still a possibility that she could have Hypo. So, we then have a full skeletal x-ray done and had it sent to Cedars Sini to be read by the dwarfism clinic there. It took  a very long time for them to get back to us and when we did receive the report there was nothing in the report. They couldn't tell what she kind of short stature she had.
 In the meantime due to our job situation we had to make a move to a different location.

 Now it was time to find a whole new set of doctors...........