Willow is a sweet, adventurous and happy 5 year old from Alexander County, NC. Willow got sick with what was thought to be a simple stomach bug, running a fever for one day and experiencing diarrhea. She became sicker and weaker during those first couple of days and entered Iredell Memorial’s ER on Friday, May 16th at 11:30 pm. They quickly diagnosed that E.coli (the worst kind, STEC) was present in her diarrhea and blood. She was sent by ambulance to Brenner’s Children’s Hospital in Winston. They alerted the family that this type of E.coli often leads to HUS (hemolytic uremic syndrome) which causes kidney damage. Her diarrhea worsened and turned into pure blood. The toxins produced by the E.coli break down the red blood cells, destroying them. Willow was moved to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit immediately. She had to have surgery to place lines in both sides of her neck for the treatments she desperately needed. She has treatments of plasma exchange to try to rid her body of the toxins. This is done with donor plasma so she was given allergy preventatives. She had CRT which is a continuous dialysis for a few days to clean her blood and remove fluids. Willow had become very swollen over her whole body looking to be 2 to 3 times her normal size. She was then moved to HRT which is a dialysis of 2-3 hours every day. During the first one, she had a neuro episode that looked like a seizure but the doctors were afraid it was a stroke, as she could not move her right side. They ordered an MRI and she continued seizure type brain activity. Thankfully, the MRI determined no stroke! Willow was then connected to an EEG to measure the electrical activity in the brain. She had to be given extra medicines for seizure activity, high blood pressure, and tachycardia (fast heart rate). Willow spent 13 days in the PICU before doctors determined she could move to a regular floor. That was a roller coaster and due to low respiration and other factors she was quickly sent back to PICU and continued getting dialysis daily for about 3 hours. She has now been moved to the intermediate unit, which is right beside the PICU, so she can still be closely monitored. On June 3rd, Willow had to have surgery to remove the catheters from both sides of her neck and replace them with a permacath in her chest and an IV in one hand and another in her foot. She has had dialysis once through the new port. It was very scary for her as she has finally become more alert and aware. In recent days her lab numbers have shown improvement and she has been able to talk and eat some. She can sit up with assistance and even took a couple steps! She has had a difficult time understanding all that has happened and is happening and with growing awareness, she is frightened. She screams each time medical personnel walk in the room…simply afraid of all she is experiencing. Willow has now been in the hospital a total of 23 days and has a long road of recovery ahead. Our sweet, courageous girl has had more shots, meds, and tests than we can count. Prayerfully, she will not need dialysis long term. She is still very weak but works with PT and OT to increase her stamina. Her Mimi and Pop (legal guardians) have stayed at the hospital with her the whole time. Doctors have advised that she may need to go to a rehab in Charlotte as our journey continues and of course we don’t want to hear more hospitals, but we are trusting in Jesus for complete healing.
This road has already been long and we would like to help them with any expenses that have come and will still come in the future. If you feel led to donate, we are in deep appreciation and if that is not a possibility at this time, please pray for Willow to have complete Earthly healing. Either way God will bless you! He so loves the prayers of His people and so many have been praying along with us, asking about Willow every single day and celebrating the small steps forward! We cannot begin to explain how much our family appreciates your prayers during this time. We will keep you updated and again, thank you all so very much.
