Doctor Doctor, Gimme the News

Between my pregnancy, the kids, and Jami - we have seen a LOT of doctors in the past few months.  In fact, one week we had 8 appointments in 3 days!  We've been fortunate to meet with many specialists for Jami while she's been in town.  Lots of driving to Ann Arbor.

The other day I got a babysitter for the girls while Jami and I met with a specialist.  We were leaving the house and Scarlett saw us:
Scarlett: Aunt Jami where are you going?
Jami: The doctor.
Scarlett: Ugh! It seems like all you do is go to doctors! Is that what you do in Utah too?!

Whenever my girls get hurt Jake goes all Mr. Miyagi (from Karate Kid) on their owies.  Here's a reminder:

Here are my girls taking care of my fake owies Miyagi-style:

The twirls are still battling with Molluscum.  I'm so darn sick of this virus!  I can't tell you how many times we've been to the dermatologist (mostly cause I don't remember, but it's a lot!)  Here we are waiting to try a new treatment for the girls: freezing them off.  Not a lot of fun (lots of crying) but works really well on their bumps.

Poor girls.  Jaide had a bunch on her face and Siena has some on her bum.  After they were frozen, Siena cried when we would change her diaper.  The doctor gave us medicine to put on them and Siena would cry "no medicine" each time.  Sad.  Why can't we shake these?!

Jami overheard Scarlett telling this to Kaylie: "Flashing lights can give Aunt Jami seizures, that's an illness that can last a really long time."  Scarlett even took away all of the flashing light toys and put them in a box so that they won't hurt Aunt Jami.  Sweet!

Scarlett was cavity free!  And here's another photo when her tummy was sick.

Jami tried some Eastern medical treatments while she was here, including acupuncture.  We went there like six or seven times.  She really felt like it helped her overall pain, especially while the needles were in and then it tapered off for 3 days.

The girls are pretty well behaved in the waiting rooms.  I would tell them "we are going to the doctor today" And Siena often would say "Siggy tummy hurt" (Siggy is their name for Jami - no idea why - my dad thinks it's really "sicky" haha!).

One day Scarlett asked where we were going and I told her we were going to a massage place.  After I said that Scarlett went: "Oh good, I could use a good rub."  bwahaha!!!  She was so disappointed when it was for Jami (really Jami was trying Cranial Sacral Therapy - which she really liked).

Sometimes Scarlett gets random illnesses that sound a lot like what the adults are going through, for example "My bladder hurts" (Jami) or "my back is too tight" (Jake) or "my feet are really hurting" (mom).  haha!  We have to be careful what we say - she's always listening!

One of the doctors that Jami has been seeing is one of the top experts in the US for her bladder disease: interstitial cystitis.  Part of the treatment includes bladder installations that she has to keep in for a few hours - the nurse calls it "marinating" and it always grosses me out!  Anyways, we drive to the U of M for those every week and since it's a fast nurse visit the girls and I just hang out in the car.  This last time we kept busy playing with Scarlett's new microphone.

Jaide particularly loves singing (I just love her fake growly laugh):

They really like sitting in the front seats while we wait:

On the way home.  Jami was way too happy at that early hour.  

We've also seen a nephrologist several times.  While Jami's been here she's passed 3 big kidney stones - all at my house.  She's so dang tough!  She even caught one so they were able to analyze the contents and were able to discover that the reason she has so many stones is due to her seizure medication.  Ugh.  So she's going to have to talk with her neurologist about possibly changing meds.  Ugh again.  

Jami got another kidney infection and we went to see the nephrologist about it.  He saw what bad shape she was in and sent her to the emergency room to get fluids and more cortisol (since she has adrenal insufficiency and it is dangerous when you're really sick).  I found a babysitter for the girls til Jake got home, and I took Jami over to the ER.  We went to the U of M ER cause all her doctors are in their network and her nephrologist put a few orders in the system of tests he wanted while she was there.  They have 116 beds in their ER (which is big) and they were all full.  Poor Jami, we had to wait 3 hours to get back into a room!  Luckily the doctors were great which made a big difference.  One of the nurses put the order for her CAT scan in the system wrong.  So they made Jami drink this awful contrast even though she was puking and so sick.  But the nurse kept telling her she had to finish it to get the test.  It took Jami 3 hours and lots of anti-nausea medication to finish it.  Then they took her back to get the scan and the radiologist was soooo livid that they made her drink that nasty stuff - the lady even called Jami's ER doctor and complained in her behalf.  But besides that (and the looooong hours) everything went well.  Jami looked much better once she wasn't so dehydrated.  We went home 12 hours later.  Thank goodness they had complimentary valet parking so neither of us had to walk to the car.  My huge prego body really hurt the next two days after sitting in a hard chair for 12 hours.  But the next morning was Scarlett's birthday and I'm so glad we went to the ER the night before or Jami would have been too behind on her cortisol to join in the bday festivities.

Poor Jami, her doctors always tell her she's a "complicated case".  I'm just grateful that she's alive - 2 years ago we weren't sure what the outcome would be.  She's a tough one and she keeps moving forward, one step at a time.  Team Jami!!!!!!!!!!