Baby doll and her kidneys

Our baby doll became sick as we prepared to head home from vacation earlier this month. She was just not herself - so cranky, uncomfortable and almost fidgety. We were concerned it might be an ear infection because she has been prone to these in the past. She'd go from happy and playing to just miserable rather quickly - and back again. By Saturday she didn't want to be in her car seat for the five hour drive nor sit still on the airplane portion of the trip home. She kept pulling at her diaper and saying, "Owwee". Now to know Anna is to realize that she doesn't like being confined much at all. So we simply assumed she had just had it with being cooped up in the car and airplane and we toughed it out until we got home on Saturday evening, doing all we could to keep her comfortable while we were on the road. Then her symptoms changed.

At 2am on Saturday night she woke up with a 102 fever and was crying. I got her started on meds to bring the fever down and it would break, only to have it spike back up again a few hours later. Again, her mood would go from somewhat normal and happy to plain miserable and lethargic. I got her into the Mercy after hours clinic on Sunday around dinnertime to see if this was another ear infection or teething or what. None of those things. Her ears and everything checked out as normal. We were told by the doctor (or possible a PA who was very visibly not a "kid" person) she had a virus and it would just need to work through her system but to keep her on the Tylenol or Advil to control the fever.

She was due for her two-year well child checkup with her regular pediatrician on Tuesday and by that morning her fever had diminished and stayed away until 4pm that afternoon when it came back full-force. Again, we controlled it with Tylenol and waited it out since we thought it was a virus. By Thursday morning at 2am she was just so miserable and my gut told me something else was going on. I remember so clearly sitting out on the couch in the living room after getting her settled back into bed, running through each day since we returned home and evaluating how she was acting to gather any other possible symptoms. And that is when it hit me like a ton of bricks. As I sat there in the dark with my laptop open I punched in various symptoms on WebMD and a UTI came up. What?? I never even knew a toddler, baby or even a young girl could get a UTI. I had always associated that with teens or adults.

I remembered her pulling at her diaper once it became wet and saying, "Owee" or "Tee-Tee ouch" randomly throughout the previous days. Coincidentally, Anna was at the very same time starting to become curious about the potty. She loves to sit up there, wipe, toss it in the potty and flush but has never had a productive potty trip to date. She had no rash or any visible reason for being uncomfortable and as soon as I changed her diaper she'd go about playing. I then assumed she just didn't like having a wet diaper touch her skin now that she was more aware of using the potty. I also remembered a few of her night diapers having a funky odor over the past few days. It's amazing the clarity your mind can reach when you're sitting in the darkness of a completely quiet room at 2am. All of those symptoms clearly pointed to a UTI. My heart broke thinking our baby doll had been uncomfortable for so many days simply because we weren't getting the clues she was attempting to give us. I just cried.

The next morning I called and got her in to see her pediatrician first thing in the morning. When we arrived her temperature had spiked again and their thermometer read 104 degrees. The doc immediately ordered a urine analysis based on her symptoms and the fever that simply would not go away. It had been five days of off/on fevers so the doc was concerned the infection had entered her kidneys or this was early signs there was trouble with her kidneys (operation or development of). The analysis was conclusive that this was indeed a UTI that had developed into a kidney infection, and she had blood in her urine (not visible without microscope). She was started on an antibiotic that day and continued for ten days. After being on the antibiotic for two days her fever went away and thankfully did not return. Her mood and overall comfort level appeared to go back to normal. Four days after the antibiotic cycle we were brought back in for another analysis and it showed the infection was gone. Praise God. But we aren't done yet, unfortunately.

On August 10th Anna will undergo two procedures, back-to-back, at a local hospital that specializes in treating children - a renal ultrasound and VCUG (Voiding cystourethrogram). The renal ultrasound is not at all invasive. It 'shows details of the anatomy of the kidneys and bladder. It can rule out or diagnose obstructions, developmental abnormalities, tumors, and stones in the kidneys and urinary tract.'

The VCUG is the procedure I am absolutely dreading but I know it is necessary. To get a "clean" urine specimin and diagnose the UTI, Anna had to be catheterized and I don't know who cried more - her or me - during that. And the VCUG will require another catheter. VCUG is 'commonly used to evaluate the bladder and the ureters. This procedure involves putting a dye into the bladder to see whether there's an obstruction, or reflux of urine from the bladder back up to the kidneys when the child urinates.' This procedure involves a catheter, small amounts of radiation via the x-ray, and possibly mild sedation to keep the child calm/still during the procedure. All of these give me uncertainty but I am determined to do a lot of research, prepare questions for my pediatrician and any radiology staff I can reach at the hospital. I want us and Anna to be as prepared as possible because I know this is going to be a very difficult day.

To put it simply, Anna does NOT like doctors' offices or anything medically related. She will cry from the moment we pull in to the parking lot to the moment we leave for any doc visit. And because she has endured so many visits here lately, she is even more sensitive to medical environments. Poor girl, last week she got to the point where she would just repeat, "No doctor. No doctor," over and over if we got into the car. I had to reassure her that we were not going to the doctor that day. So to realize how scared she is going to be in August makes me cry inside for her.

So between now and August 10th, we will be doing a lot of praying that the procedures will go well, that Anna will cooperate so the tests can give clear, accurate results, and of course that the tests show no damage or irregularities within her bladder, kidneys or anywhere else. We're praying she is as healthy on the inside as she appears to us on the outside and the UTI was just an isolated event. I'll post more as time progresses and we learn more about the procedures.


* Medical information provided by KidsHealth.org and WebMD.com