An unexpected all day trip to Children's

It was both cute to see him in a little gown, but sad at the same time.

A little back story: Mason has been throwing up a lot more lately...much like he did when he was younger...almost entire bottles. He also has been coughing...a wet cough. On top of that at night he will start to dry heave and gasp for air. There have been conversations back and forth to the CF clinic. There were thoughts that this might be a CF cough, meaning there is build up of the mucus. That was hard to hear. There were thoughts that his GERD is more severe. The last call we he had was that he might have an intestinal blockage/obstruction somewhere. Depending on the size we would either have to give him Mira-lax or go into surgery. That was hard to hear too. I was mentally punching CF in the face. This call was at 3:30pm on Tuesday and we were told all arrangements had been made for us to arrive at Children's Hospital on Wed. morning at 8:30am.

he's got some junk in his trunk :)

Here is what it boils down to. I left a panic message on the CF clinics coordinator voice mail at 6am because Mason was dry heaving, gasping for breathe at times, and just not sounding right. He had his eyes closed for the whole 45 min. I assume he was sleeping. She met us at radiology to assure us it was good timing we came in. We spent from 8:30am to 2pm in radiology getting x-rays every 30 min. He did not sleep much. He had to drink TWO barium bottles because one just wasn't doing the trick. They flavor it orange for children as a side note. It also makes their farts smell like orange too! :) We had TWO CF clinic visits, ONE quick trip to the GI clinic, and ONE trip to the outpatient lab for THREE vials of blood drawn. We left and arrived home at 5pm. We were exhausted.

This was the first x-ray room...we were in 4 different rooms and had what seemed like every radiology tech in the place.

my hesitation smile while Mason shows the true feeling in the room...we got used to the lead vests.

Round one of Barium

not everyone can pull off the hospital gown look :)

The results: he has grown 3/4 of an inch since May 16th but he has lost 2 ounces...but, NO obstruction! Thank the good Lord for that. However, his small intestines look " chronically irritated." So that is a sign of a probable milk PROTEIN allergy. We have to wait about 1-2 weeks to find out if this the case. The blood was drawn to complete a RAST test to verify it is a milk allergy and we have to send in two stool samples back to Children's so they can look for blood in the stool. All three components will give us the answer. If it is not a milk allergy, we head to the GI doctor. The funny part of it is the x-ray is usually the last thing they do when diagnosing an allergy.

in our secluded little area since there was a lot of coughing and someone with pneumonia in the waiting room.

He needed something to wash down the barium...

He makes it hard to stay worried all the time

Now, the Milk Protein allergy is a a double edge sword. I have mixed emotions about it. On one side it will be nice to know what the issue has been and we can deal with it and move on. On the other side, it adds a little more stress in the CF mix. Dairy has a lot of FAT and SALT, two of the three things Mason needs A LOT of. You would be amazed at all milk and milk products are in. The nice thing is...they say he would grow out of it by age 4. I told the dietitian that I would need to start learning to cook quick!

A doctor walked past us while both our eyes were closed and stated "they look like they are having a long day." SO TRUE!

So we will keep you updated in the final results. I am so happy that he will not remember this day. It was a traumatic one with lots of tears and not just from him. Besides the tears, Mason was such a brave and happy little boy all day. He is going to teach me a lot about inner strength on this journey. We will head back to the CF clinic on June 27th, ahead of our July 18th appointment so that we can talk to the Doctor about everything and hopefully he will have put back on the 2 ounces and more!