Thanks to everyone for all the prayers and sweet comments. We feel lucky to have so many people interested in our baby girl. Landree had her appointment with the lung specialist yesterday. It was quite a busy day. Rick couldn’t get off work
so it was just mommy and Landree. First she had to go get a chest x-ray. When they put her up on that hard table she just stared at the x-ray machine and looked the nurses up and down. She was taking it all in. They couldn’t believe she didn’t
cry at all.
After she had the chest x-ray we went up to see the specialist. I think there were six pages of questions about her symptoms and different things in her environment. There were so many things I thought I knew, but didn’t. For example,
what brand of vitamins she’s taking and how much I give her. I don’t remember. I just remembered that I fill the dropper up to the line and squirt them in her mouth before she realizes what I’m doing!
All of the nurses that worked
with us were great. They all made a fuss over Landree and were really sweet. The specialist was nice too. He was very gentle with her and talked to her a lot. She was so funny in the doctor’s office. She’s usually so quiet but from the time we
got in the exam room she started making a loud growling sound and smacking her lips. A couple of times the nurse mimicked the sounds she was making. Landree was not amused at all. She stopped what she was doing and stared her down. Then she would
give her a long blink like us girls give each other when we’re really annoyed. She was a mess!
The doctor said her pediatrician wanted to rule out the possibility of Landree having loud breathing. I had never heard of that before, but it’s
caused by something developing incorrectly and obstructing the airway. He listened to her chest and did not hear anything that made him suspect any structural problems. He explained that she most likely just keeps getting infections. The bad news
is that it’s possible there’s nothing we can do about it but wait out the cold and flu season. Another possibility is that Landree could have Reactive Airway Disease (RAD). Judging from what the doctor says and what I’ve read it sounds
much worse than it is. From what I understood it really just means that Landree’s airway overreacts to things which makes it harder for her to get over infections in her airway. I guess she might get the overreacting part from her mother. LOL. The
doctor did point out that Reactive Airway Disease is not related to Landree having Down Syndrome. In order to determine if Landree has this, he prescribed her a steroid. If the symptoms are gone after taking five days of the steroid then it will confirm
his suspicion that Landree has Reactive Airway Disease. I was relieved to hear that if the symptoms (cough) stayed gone then we wouldn’t have to do anything else. If the symptoms go away after five days but start up again after a week or so then we will
need to start some preventative medicine. If her cough doesn’t get any better after taking the steroid then he will know that she doesn’t have Reactive Airway Disease. We would just have to keep battling the cough until cold
season is over. Any of those outcomes are good with us. We’re just so thankful it’s nothing major. Thanks again for the prayers! I’ll let you know how the five days go!