Monthly Archives: March 2009

More News

So… the pulmonologist called back with some news. Concrete news!
So, we learned on Wednesday that Kirra definitely has the reflux going on. They also did a regular chest x-ray which showed a tiny little collapse in her right upper lobe of her lung, which indicates some aspiration. Which means that sometimes when she has the reflux, it goes into her lungs.
I guess anytime you get anything into your lungs your lungs really don’t like it, so you can cough and cough and cough, plus to protect your lungs they make mucus, which in turn makes you cough more…. So all of that totally makes sense. It can cause an asthmatic reaction in your body which is why sometimes the inhaler works for her.
So we’re going to double her dosage of the prevacid, and also continue to give her the daily steroid inhaler to try to rebuild her lungs, and keep them strong so that if she aspirates they’ll be able to take it.

We’re supposed to call the doctor back in 2 weeks and give her an update.

Does have reflux.

Today was the Barium swallow study, and structurally Kirra doesn’t have any problems. Everything is hooked up right. We did find out she has reflux for sure. Now we just wait for the pulmonologist to call us back for the next step, whatever that may be. I think I am going to do some research on reflux.

NOT Allergies

The pediatrician/pulmonologist called yesterday and let us know that Kirra’s mold and milk allergies came back with a 0/5. And her all encompassing allergy test came back a 4/64. So she has no allergies.

Today is the swallow study so hopefully we will know more once that is complete. Kirra coughed from about midnight until 5:30am, when we finally woke her up and gave her the albuterol. she promptly stopped coughing after that. Maybe it is asthma? I was reading that there are other things besides allergies that can cause an asthmatic reaction such as virus’, weather, etc. I wish she was big enough to do the test for it.

Hopeful for tomorrow…


Well tomorrow we’re going back to the U of M for more tests. Kirra is done taking the Prednisone, and didn’t turn into “too much” of a monster. No actually she was just fine. We can’t tell if the Prednisone even worked or not since Kirra has a cold on top of everything else. She is still coughing, but it seems to be less… and Tally hasn’t had to give her the rescue inhaler lately, and neither have we. So I suppose it helped whatever the inflammation in her lungs was… I just hope she gets over this cold soon!


Tomorrow she has the Barium Swallow study on x-ray to see the structure of her airways, and her upper digestive system. I think this will also reveal if she does have reflux, but I’m not sure.

We’re also supposed to get the allergy tests back tomorrow as well. My friend told me about how her daughter has enlarged adneoids and that’s why she’s been coughing for 5 months straight, so if we don’t learn anything new tomorrow, I think that will be our next step. Our appointment is at 1:00pm, so I will post more information tomorrow night.

I hope you like the new blog…..

Kirra has been so fun lately, trying new things, and loves to help me in the kitchen.

She’s also got a few friends from our mom’s group. Above is a picture of Kirra and Aiden.

More Doctor Stuff

Well, today we went back to the U of M for Kirra’s cough to see Dr. Laguna. We decided our next steps are to take another chest x-ray, draw blood for a complete blood count, and allergies to mold, milk, and an allergy detective antigen (so if she is allergic to anything this will come back positive) and a Barium Swallow Upper GI x-ray (study).

So, today we did the chest x-ray and the blood draw. The lab tech got her vain, but had to fish around a little bit. She had a helper with a bunch of toys for Kirra to distract her. At one point we turned on this disco ball that light up and spun around on a wand and we shut off all the lights, Kirra probably thought we were on a space ship or something!

The x-ray was really easy to do, and Kirra did great on that! Our Barium swallow is for next Wednesday afternoon.

Dr. Laguna called us back about 2pm and told us the blood work for the Complete Blood Count came back and was just fine. The x-ray didn’t show any illness but did show inflammation in her lower lungs. SO Dr. Laguna did want us to go on Prednisone for 5 days. Its liquid by mouth twice a day. Hopefully it doesn’t turn our angel into a monster or disrupt her too much. Dr. Laguna didn’t think it would since she’s not going to be on it for very long, but did assure us that it does a very good job of getting rid of ANY inflammation in the body. Basically she’ll definitely stop coughing. (if her coughing is a result of inflammation). Which… would kind of point signs towards asthma….

We’ve been giving Kirra lots of Albuterol (ProAir) lately and that seems to be helping her out. Since we’re going on the Prednisone we don’t have to take the Flovent steroid anymore. We are supposed to stay on Prevacid though.

I guess we’ll know more after Wednesday.

More Snow


Well Monday I called the pulminologist back regarding Kirra’s cough, and she put us back on the inhaler. She thinks Kirra still has reflux and possible asthma, and she likely caught an additional cold. All these problems! Generally though Kirra is in fantastic health, and enjoying every minute of life!


The snow is back today, its very pretty to look at and I am glad I got home before the worst of it came. We had subway for dinner tonight, and Kirra had her own mini sub of Turkey, Spinach leaves, tomato, onion and black olives. She loved her whole sandwich very much!

Jason got half the day off, and possibly tomorrow because of the snow storm, but he’s started college classes now to become a certified housing inspector. He’s taking correspondence classes because of his work schedule, but its from a very accredited school Penn Foster.

Fun Weekend

We had a pretty fun weekend! Saturday morning Kirra and I went walking at the mall with a friend, came home, I went grocery shopping while Kirra napped, and then Jason and I watched a little TV. Later in the afternoon, Jason, Theo, Kirra and I went downtown Minneapolis to the Home and Garden show. On the way we got to stop by Jason’s work which was pretty cool to finally see.

Later that evening after Jason and I put Kirra to bed, we watched some Harry Potter.

Today Jason and I watched a bunch of Harry Potter again, cleaned the house, and I had a friend come over. This should be a pretty good week at work as well.

Kirra’s back to coughing again, so I am going to call the pulmonologist to find out what’s up! And what she suggests…

Car Back

Well I got my car back today and its running well. There is a bit of a delay and its possible there might be something up with the cylanoids, but I am supposed to get a “check up” next week. I’m happy to be driving my car again, although it’s really weird because I think i need to shift, or press in the clutch. I’ll get used to an automatic soon enough again!


Kirra has been really talkative lately, and is explaning her vocabulary. She knows where eyes are and gently touches your eyes and saying eyyyeee really quiet. Its so cute. Today we went over to a friends house where they have a little girl about Kirras age as well. They had a bunch of fun together, but we couldn’t stay late because Kirra hadn’t eaten dinner, and Tyler hadn’t gone out to potty yet.

We might go to the home and garden show this weekend, because Jason gets free passes thru work. Then we can dream of ideas for the yard. Kirra’s been coughing again, but we feel like it’s just post nasal drip down her throat at this point. If she’s still coughing by Monday I will call the lung doctor Dr. Laguna back.

Happy March

Well our daycare provider called me yesterday (Sunday) to inform me that she has strep throat and that her son (Kirra’s age) has the chicken pox! So I took today (Monday) off. I met up with me and Kirra’s friends Stefanie and Anna (Kirra’s age) and we went walking at the Northtown mall for about an hour and a half. Well it was time to be getting home, so we took off and went home via Hwy 65. Well right after we passed under the bridge of CR-14 my car went vrrrrooooommmm. And I lost all capabilities for acceleration!!!! What the heck. I threw my car into Tiptronic (manual transmission) and nothing there either. I was stuck in the turning lane right off 65.


Luckily my neighbors were home, so Michael came over and pushed me and Kirra home with his car. What a godsend. Jason came home shortly thereafter so we could figure out what was wrong with my car. We had a toe truck come and bring it up to Frank’s shop in Forest Lake where it was confirmed I will need a new transmission or to get mine rebuilt! Uhhhhhh…..

So, now we’re trying to decide if we should fix the car, or scrap it for parts, and buy a new one. We wanted to buy a new car, however this will be so bittersweet. I love my car. I really really do… but if we spend all this money (which it’s not cheap to fix a trany) then 6 months later something else goes belly up… my car right now has nearly $150,000 miles on it. She’s not dying young by any means. So what a headache to deal with.

On the bright side (if there is one) I called the Lung doctor today, and she says we can stop the inhaler! Kirra will be so happy! We’re to continue the prevacid and soy milk for another month. If she remains cough free we call Dr. Laguna back in a month, and maybe take her off the Prevacid. I’m so happy everything seems to be working out!

I’m off to the dentist tomorrow (oooh fun… not). Hopefully they are nice to me. Its a new dentist. It’s just a teeth cleaning and x-rays, but I’m not a huge fan. Hopefully Tuesday will prove to be better, and hopefully we can get a good deal on a new car, otherwise it looks like we’ll be fixing the Sebring.