Tummy Trouble 2

As it turns out.... God's answer to our little girl's prayer for healing on the way home from the ER was a reprieve of sorts. He gave us time to recover from the visit to the Wrong ER, so that we would arrive at the Right ER. A week later, the pain was back and it was accompanied by vomiting and lots of it. This time there were no detours on the way to the Children's Hospital.

I have since learned that abdominal adhesions after abdominal surgery are an extremely common complication... in fact they occur in most cases. They just usually don't do any harm. In the worst case, they can cause a complete obstruction of the small bowel. This is what our little girl was experiencing! It took a little while to diagnose, as the adhesions (scar tissue sticking things together that aren't supposed to be stuck together) are not visible in an x-ray or a cat scan. On the CT Scan it was apparent that she had a complete blockage of her small intestine and because the pain is excruciating and the result can be deadly, she underwent invasive exploratory abdominal surgery to find the cause. The culprit was the scar tissue. It had wrapped around and kinked the intestine so that a portion of it was gray and lifeless. Thankfully, upon removal of the scar tissue, the intestine pinked back up! God got us there just in time!

We stayed in the hospital 6 days. Surrounded by nurses and aides that sometimes could have been mistaken for ministering angels. At our previous ER visit to the Nearby Hospital, we encountered only one person in our 4 hour stay who really treated us with kindness and compassion. At this subsequent visit to the Children's hospital we stayed in the ER for about 10 hours and the hospital for 6 days and only met one person who who even rubbed us the wrong way.

This was a hard thing to go through. For me, the hardest thing was helplessly watching my child suffer so incredibly, and then while being beyond exhaustion, trying to grasp what was happening! Hard as it was, we were greatly blessed through it. We got to see our prayers answered, our daughter rescued from her agony. We got to experience the love of God through the body of Christ in action. We were so well cared for! All five of us! They swooped down, cared for the little brothers, fed my family, ran errands, visited us in the hospital, cleaned my house (hallelujah) and prayed without ceasing!

A few things I learned through this experience:

1. After Abdominal Surgery-- watch out for Abdominial Adhesions!

2. I don't always understand what God is doing, but I choose to trust Him anyway.

3. If my child is ever again in too much pain to continue the drive to the Children's Hospital, I will pull over and call an ambulance! Don't take your child the nearest hospital just because it is close. If you have a Children's Hospital available, go there! All hospitals are not well equipped to treat, or deal with kids. If one is not available, a teaching hospital would be my next choice. They offer lots of sets of eyes to look at your situation/ct scans/test results. Magnet awards get old and dusty, I would only weigh that if it were fresh!

1 Chronicles 29:13 (New International Version, ©2011)

13 Now, our God, we give you thanks,
and praise your glorious name.


Isaiah 55:8-9 (New International Version, ©2011)

8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,”
declares the LORD.
9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.