What a Poopy Day! (Literally!)

What a dark, sleepy, rainy morning to have to go to the hospital!!! Savannah did not want to rise and shine - and she didn't even know what we were up to today!

We got up early and headed downtown to the Children's Hospital where Savannah was a real trooper for testing. When we walked in she got a funny look and said "Ewww. Boo-boo." She remembered having blood drawn there the other day. We have talked about how we have to go see the doctor for testing on her "boo-boo belly." The lab tech (also a fabulous guy - we've been blessed with wonderful professionals!) came over and explained the whole procedure and then we got started. They prepped her skin with a gel to induce sweating and then placed four electrodes on her arms. The mild electrical current had to run through each arm for five minutes, and during that time, Savannah had to sit completely still. She did great! After that part was over, they removed the electrodes and placed a special patch on each arm to collect sweat. The patch also dyed the sweat blue so that we could see how much we collected. Then she could do whatever she wanted. For a while she just wanted to sit and snuggle with her Mama. She was still a little afraid they were going to poke her again. But she eventually warmed up and they even had her dancing in the hall and playing tag (remember - the goal was to work up a sweat!). But wouldn't you know... princesses don't sweat! :) They checked her after 15 minutes and she had only sweated about one drop on each arm. So they put another shirt on her and wrapped her up in a blanket and waited a little longer - still barely any sweat! The goal was to fill the vial on each arm and run two tests - and average the two. However, we only got enough sweat for maybe one test, and we're not even sure about that. The time was up though, and we had to take the patches off to prevent blistering.



However, Savannah knew that the other day she got a sticker when she left there, and she was NOT about to leave without another one. :) She looked right at the lab tech and said "boo-boo sticker?" Haha. :) So he gave her a BUNCH of stickers. :)

So now we just wait on a bunch of results! She is, however, having big tummy troubles again. They usually subside for a few days and then come back... and they're back. In fact, we stopped for breakfast on the way home from the hospital and she had a massive blow out. Well, we needed samples to run the tests on, so I had to take her to the bathroom and get the samples in containers they had given me. You should have seen the looks I got! I mean what kinda mom is standing over a kid covered in poop scraping it off with a plastic spoon and putting it in little vials?! If I was witty I should have thought of something funny to say to all of the older women looking at me weird... but I'm not. Instead I just grinned. :)

The poor girl has had six episodes since 3pm yesterday. The good news is that we managed to get all of the samples we needed for the labs. I decided today that when she is a sassy teenager and thinks her mom is good for nothing - I'm going to remind her of today when I had to dig through her diaper with a plastic spoon to get lab samples! :)

A big thanks to Mimi for going with me today to the tests and helping out when Savannah had a major blowout. :) And thanks to Mimi and Grandad for being the "poop courier" and taking the samples back to the hospital to keep me from having to drive there a third time this week. :)

And thanks to all of our friends and family who have been such an encouragement - it really helps to know of all of your prayers during this crazy and uncertain time. :) I knew I had great friends and good blog readers - but you guys have really blown me away this time. Love you all! Keep us in your prayers as we now do the really hard part - wait! :)