Tender Mercies on Top of Everything Else

It's been one of those month's I tell ya. 


One long crazy month...........


and it's only January eleventh.


Below is a copy of my facebook status tonight:

"just got home from the Dr with Ally this time. She has pneumonia and a partially collapsed lung. Her lower lobe on the left side looks to be either collapsed or "congealed" because of the pneumonia. Thank goodness for tender mercies."

Now below is a reply from Gabby:

"i don't get it, how is that a tender mercy?"

Ahhh, the question for the ages.  To the naked eye the above statement does look to be a little lacking in the department of tender mercies but that's because you only have half the story.

Let me fill you in.

I don't know why, but for whatever reason, we have spent many winters inside the sterile walls of a doctor's office.  From the time she was two years old Gabby had chronic sinusitis and everytime she caught a cold, she got a sinus infection.  Round after round of anti-biotic's were administered, and they worked, but with a new cold came a new infection.  That started our frequent trips to the Doctor in the winter.  Gabby was also highly suseptible to strep throat and her sister illnesses, scarlet fever and scarletina.  Since then, with only one exception that I can think of, we have spent wintertime batteling strep throat, viral pneumonia, and the many ills that come with winter.

This winter has been no exception.  Gabby has missed ten days of school, Courtney fifteen.  But Ally was doing pretty well.  No cough or cold or anything else.  Until two days before Christmas she complained of a sore throat.  Knowing our family history I took her to the doctor right away.  Turns out of course that she had the first strep throat of the season.

Ten days of amoxicillian and she was all better, well, mostly.  A few days after she finished her medicine Ally developed cold like symptoms.  Coughing, runny nose,  and this was the weird part, she started taking a nap every day after school.  I wasn't worried, I knew she was coming down with a cold and she could use the extra rest.  In the meantime, Gabby had been having the same cold like symptoms, I even teased her about spreading it to the rest of us.  On Sunday Gabby started complaining about a horrible sore throat and pain in her ears.  Larry took her in to the clinic and turns out she has strep throat and a double ear infection......ahhh, the joys of being a mother. 

Along with Gabby and Ally, Courtney has been having those same cold like symptoms.  But with Courtney's symptoms have come the sore throat.  So Sunday night I determined that I would take the girls to the Dr on the morrow.  I told everyone they were staying home from school on Monday, surprisingly I didn't get any complaints.

If you haven't noticed yet we go to the Doctor ALOT.  Even with insurance the co-pays really add up.  We can spend up to two or three hundred dollars a month in the winter on DR visits and prescriptions.  So with this in mind I thought I would only schedule one dr visit and let the dr check ears and throat of the other patient out of the kindness of his heart.  For some reason I really felt like I needed to make that appointment for Ally, even though Courtney had the more extreme symptoms.  Technically there was no reason for me to take Ally to the Dr today.  She felt fine, she looked fine, she acted fine.  When I called in to schedule the appt, the receptionist asked me what her symptoms were, I told her "sore throat, fever, vomitting", true, she had had a low grade fever the night before and her excessive coughing caused her to "spit up" a little bit but these alone would not have prompted a visit for her under normal circumstances.  But for strange and unknown reasons to me at the time, I felt like she needed to be seen. 

Ally even argued with me on the way to the Dr.,  "Mom, I don't know why I have to go to the doctor, I feel fine."

When we got to the office and the nurse was interviewing Ally about her symptoms, imagine how silly I felt when the nurse said to Ally "so you have a sore throat.?" and Ally says "ummm, no"  and when the nurse asked me why she was being seen I told her, "I just wanted to make sure her strep throat didn't come back......?"  It was true in a way.  I was there at the doctor with Ally and I didn't know why.  The feeling that she needed to be there wasn't overpowering, it was just there.

The doctor came in and did his doctor thing.  He looked at her throat, it was fine.  He checked her ears, they were fine.  He listened to her cough, listened to her lungs, listened and listened some more, and said "something's not right".   He ordered a chest x-ray and found what he was looking for.  The picture of Ally's chest show a beautifully shaped lung on the right hand side.  Clear as day.  On the left there appears to be only half a lung.  He pointed out that the cloudy white portion on the bottom of the left lung was infection or a possible collapse.  He was a little puzzled however because Ally wasn't showing any signs of pneumonia, other than a cough. 

I don't know when we would have discovered this pneumonia if it hadn't been today.  Would I have sent Ally to school tomorrow, feeling fine as she did, only to have this develop into something far worse than it is?  The feeling that she needed to be seen today was definitley a tender mercy.  It reminded me again that Someone bigger than me knows all and is leading me carefully by the hand.