I tried explaining on my Facebook page, but Facebook is better for short updates and a lot harder for longer explanations (especially trying to type everything out on my iPhone). So here is what's going on with Lauren's blood, as the way I heard it from the doctor. So I don't know how accurate it really is, a lot of times after the doctors leave we'll discuss what they had just said and we've heard two different things. While Hilary always thinks she is right, she has won enough Starbuck bets to prove it, of course, it comes out of our joint account anyways, but every once in awhile I'm right. So here we go…

Problem #1. Lauren caught some type of infection. In response to the infection her body produced a cold antibodies to fight off the infection. However, the antibodies were attacking her red blood cells (hemoglobin's), hence she became anemic. Because she was anemic, they gave her a blood transfusion on Tuesday. However, in order to preserve blood they keep it refrigerated. Once out of the refrigerator, the blood is only good for about 4 hours. They administer the blood via IV over 3.5 hours, apparently they can't pump it in her too fast.

Problem #2. In response to this cold blood, which Lauren has gotten before many times, her body produced a warm antibody, which began to attack the cold blood cells. Aiya!! So that is why when she peed, her urine was red. Her body was getting rid of the dead red blood cells.

Problem #3: So how do we treat this condition? As many of you know, Lauren's body is a steroid addict. For the last year, we have been trying to wean her off her Decadron (steroid). In April of '08, CHOC started her on 12 mg per day. When we stopped, her body crashed. So they had to give her a boost of extra steroids and then we began to slowly reduce the amount every three days. We had gotten to a point where we were only giving her 1 mg a day. The doctor said the amount was so small that we could stop, but again she started to crash (slurred speech, hard time walking, shaky hands, no energy). So once again we had to give her a boost of extra steroids and start the process over. After many, many months, we have now gotten to the lowest level ever of .13 mg a day. In fact, every doctor or medical person that doesn't know her history thinks we're crazy and that amount is doing nothing for her, but sorry, we know better.

By now you probably know where I'm going. The way to treat her dual antibody problem is with Decadron. 3 mg twice a day for 6 weeks! That's 46.15x the amount of her current daily dosage. We are going to discuss with the doctors one more time if there is any other alternatives other than Decadron. While of course we'll do what's best for Lauren, you have to understand the last time she was on this much steroid, she gained over 10-lbs in less than two weeks. While some people can gain that much after a solid meal, for Lauren that's a 33% increase to her total body weight. It was heartbreaking having to explain to her why her stomach and face looked so different, why she couldn't fit in her pants, why she wore a size 6 even though she was only 4 years old. I could have said it's might having something to do with those two bowls of cereal, a bagel, Top Ramen and spaghetti that you had for breakfast, but I wouldn't want to trigger one of her exorcist 'roid rages episodes that were so scary it would raise the hair on the back of my neck (which is something else we have to look forward too again).

We were so close to having our little girl back. Shallow, maybe for also to have hoped for, but physiologically, to us, it was important.