Well, here we are a year after my last post on this blog! I was kind of surprised it was still out there and I still remembered the password. It has been quite a year for the Toler family to say the least. Many of my facebook friends have been asking about our daughter Elyse, so I thought I would write out the story here instead of using up space on Facebook.
Last November, we noticed a swollen lymph node in Elyse's neck. We took her to the doctor and they said it was probably just an infection and it would go away. Unfortunately, it didn't and after many, many tests, the doctors decided it needed to come out. In January, she had surgery to remove the lymph node. They thought it was something called an atypical mycobacterial infection which is rare, but her symptoms matched up with it. Unfortunatley, because of a mix-up in the lab, we were not able to get a culture of this first lymph node. However, surgery should have taken care of the infection.
Over the next two months, we took care of her incision, but noticed that she was developing new swollen lymph nodes on the same side of her neck. We met with an Infectious Disease Specialist who agreed with the mycobacterial diagnosis and suggested surgery again. It is very unusual for this infection to spread or affect other nodes, but her symptoms still seemed to match. On April 7th, Elyse had another node removed along with a mass of scar tissue. We are now in the healing process from that surgery. The wound has to heal from the inside out, so the incision was left open (with packing inside), and we go back to the doctor every 2 days to get more packing taken out. The newest incision is much deeper and wider than her first one, so it has taken a toll on our sweet girl. She is one tough cookie! So far, the tests done have not been able to confirm the mycobacterial infection, so we are back to the drawing board on the cause of her swollen lymph nodes. Right now we are praying for healing for the incision (Elyse is currently fighting a staph infection on the surface) and healing for whatever has caused these swollen nodes.
We greatly appreciate all the prayers, calls, and meals from our dear friends and family. Elyse is truly blessed to be loved by so many people!
O LORD my God, I called to your for help and you healed me. Psalm 30:2
1 comment:
Oh Susan, I am so glad to see you are blogging again. Sometimes I feel like it is a lot easier to talk about stuff on my blog than on Facebook because there are so many distractions. I knew a little about the latest surgery situation with Elise, but since we had nursery last week I guess we missed the update in Sunday School. She is such a little trooped. I guess it is the not knowing what is causing all of this that is the toughest part of it all. Our comfort comes from knowing that God already knows, and He will take care of your sweet family through all of this. During the school year I feel like I run a marathon most weekdays just to keep up, but I would be more than happy to help you out in ways that I can. I will be praying for all of you!
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