Hope & optimism

My dear friend does research on factors that protect people from suicide utilizing positive psychology constructs. Some of her recent work looks at hope and optimism as protective factors. I will admit that I had never really thought about these as two distinct (though related) constructs and I sometimes still struggle to know when to use each one correctly. I know this seems like a bit of a diversion from my typical blog post; I guess I was just thinking about my thoughts (metacognition is my favorite) on A's health today. We've had a lot of time to consider it over the past few weeks (/months/year). I should note, of course, that while what we've been experiencing has been stressful (especially in combination with the last few months of both of our lives professionally), we know how fortunate we are to have a reasonably healthy little girl. Of course we are always so very grateful for that.

So last week A had a fairly short-lived stomach virus. She was fever-free by Saturday afternoon but on Monday her return to school also included a return of her fever. Throughout the week she maintained about a 100-degree fever. We took her to the doctor (not her regular pediatrician) on Wednesday because her cough had worsened significantly, her congestion and runny nose were terrible, her ear was draining and on and on. Her teacher and a friend in her class had recently been diagnosed with an upper respiratory infection so, even though we had a pediatric pulmonology appointment scheduled for today, we thought it best to take her in. I won't say this was a wasted trip entirely but we certainly didn't get many answers. The physician suggested that her left ear seemed infected and she could not see the tube. Her right ear tube also could not be seen but she noted that there was a white ball that she could not decipher. She suggested it might be an odd ball of wax, a foreign object, or a cholesteatoma. So, we are going to the ENT this upcoming Tuesday morning. How lucky--3 physician visits in 7 days. I will admit that by Wednesday night I was feeling neither hopeful nor optimistic about my life or my career (after rushing to teach directly after the doctor's appointment, I got a call from Chad that I needed to come home because he had come down with the stomach virus! seriously! this is our life right now). The doctor didn't really have an answer for the cough worsening but thought it could be "her usual junk" (that seriously was a quote) or a cold. She also had lost a pound since December. This isn't necessarily cause for concern; it's just worth noting. We were given a 3-day course of antibiotics (mostly for the EI). Unfortunately, nothing has really changed since then in terms of her symptoms.

This morning we had her pulmonology appointment. This trip started (and ended) like most trips to Tulsa--not being able to get off the exit we needed to due to construction and then being completely turned around. Fortunately, the doctor's office was extremely helpful and seemed understanding of our (& our GPS!) apparent incompetence. I have to say--absolutely every person we interacted with at St. Francis/Tulsa Children's Hospital was absolutely amazing. After a pretty extensive clinical interview, Dr. Droemer indicated that he felt like A's case sounded like "classic asthma". Her lungs were fairly clear and her oxygen level was within normal limits but he thought that the continued problems breathing needed to be addressed further. His plan included increasing her daily dose of Zyrtec, replacing Qvar with Flovent, removing the Singulair since it hasn't seemed to help and has caused a lot of sleep disturbance in the last 5 weeks, and continuing the Albuterol as needed. We discussed the use of inhalers vs. nebulizers and he felt very confident that an inhaler (w/spacer) was appropriate for our current use and that we should not switch. He ordered a chest x-ray and also requested we get blood work to test for allergies. We discussed the possibility of false positives (the test might indicate that A could have/has the propensity for an allergy though she isn't actually allergic to it at this time) and I was glad to hear false negatives weren't really a concern. The blood work will test for the 15 most common food allergies and 15 most common environmental allergies. It isn't quite as accurate or extensive as the skin test but we agree that we would prefer to wait until she is significantly older to have that testing completed. I will say it again--he was absolutely fantastic. We are so happy to have interactions with such great medical professionals. We will be going back in 4 weeks (the day after my birthday!) and hopefully things will be going well.

She absolutely hated the chest x-ray last May so I was feeling a bit of trepidation about how she would do today. The radiology department was outstanding, though. They were so gentle and patient and explained what they were doing and validated that it was scary for her. She did cry but she pulled it together pretty quickly once she was finished (it was also so much faster than when we had the x-ray done last year). She wasn't completely won over by the sticker (Tinkerbell) but the bubbles with a princess ballerina on top made her smile once she calmed down.

Unfortunately we had to go from radiology down to the lab for blood work. While she greatly enjoyed the waiting room (complete with a Cozy Coupe, train table, tons of animals and toys), she knew what was up once we got into the lab room. They explained that they would first do a Lidocaine jet injection (J-tip) which "shouldn't hurt" but made a scary noise (it is aptly named!) to numb the area. Poor thing was pretty afraid even before the J-Tip but she really lost it when it made the pop/hiss sound. Unfortunately, once they inserted the needle, they discovered that the J-Tip had blown the vein. This meant re-prep which gave us a chance to pick her back up and try to console her but she really was too far gone. We felt awful laying her back on the table for them to try again on her other arm. They had some trouble getting blood at first (she may have my tiny, deep, rolling veins...) but fortunately it worked the second time. Chad and I both have been surprised at how well we do with vaccines. Neither of us has ever cried when she got a shot. However, it was all I could do to keep it together today. I am not sure I'll ever forget the look on her face. I made myself maintain eye contact with her as I tried to support her and explain what was happening. Sometimes being a parent is just so hard. I know most parents go through this at one time or another but man. It stinks. It also really made us think about those kids with severe illnesses who are having blood drawn frequently. My heart truly goes out to them and their parents.

The good news is that once we got in the car, she immediately fell asleep (even before we left the parking garage). We were able to go pick up aunt Amber (yay!) from the airport and get all turned around and lost on the way to the Irish restaurant where we had lunch (and our driving around allowed her to get a slightly longer nap so that was a perk of Tulsa construction confusion).

So, to follow back to the original thought/title of this blog--I have some hope that this new plan will work and am generally optimistic that things will get better. It definitely is a process though. When we were leaving the office we felt pretty good. Once getting home, though, we realized what we already truly knew--a different inhaler and more allergy medicine may not work. But we will try to remain optimistic. In the meantime, we are also making plans/thinking about what we would need in order to pull up our carpet and put down hardwood floor to decrease environmental allergens. I am guessing that will be awhile from now but fortunately we have a couple of people who have volunteered to help install it once we purchase it. Chad's allergies have been much worse since moving to Oklahoma (mine have stayed comparably yucky across multiple state lines) so he wonders if this is part of her issues (Stillwater is situated between OKC and Tulsa, two of the worst cities for allergies and asthma). Silly Oklahoma.