Infection and Lots of Standing

One of Brynlee's oncologists called after her scans last week to inform us that Brynlee possibly had a bladder infection. Brynlee's urine has had an odor to it off and on for awhile now, and I am embarrassed to say exactly how long. The problem was that the urinalysis was done on a sample of urine that was not a clean catch, so the doctor wanted us to go to our pediatrician and see if they would cath her to get a clean catch and see if she did have a urinary tract infection. I finally got her in yesterday and thankfully her doctor agreed to do a straight cath as the medical assistant put a bag on her, which those bags are the dumbest invention ever. We have never had luck with the bag method of collecting urine, hence the reason her first urine sample was not a clean catch. Anyway, so we found out that Brynlee does indeed have a UTI, probably a bladder infection, and she has been put back on antibiotics. Interestingly enough, she is back on the antibiotic Septra that she was taking as a preventative against pneumonia while she was on chemo treatment. It was probably keeping away the UTIs too. So she will be on the Septra until we have her bladder study and renal ultrasound right before Christmas.

 

Otherwise, we have been working hard on our therapy at home. This first picture is of Brynlee standing in the pony walker that we have turned into a makeshift stander for her. It isn't perfect, but it hopefully helps with something. She has been tolerating standing in it more and more lately.

 

This next picture is Brynlee in her new toy - parallel bars. Our handyman built Brynlee her own set of parallel bars after seeing the ones down at the Now I Can place. They still need to be finished, but Brynlee loved trying to walk in her new toy. 

I think it is time to get Brynlee some leg braces, but I kind of struck out with the physical therapist today. She was less than helpful and told me I would have to go to an orthotist, which is fine, but how am I supposed to know what kind of leg braces she needs or could get. I know that her old rehab doctor would have some answers for me, but I don't know if her new rehab doctor will even write a prescription for some. We might wait until after our visit to Shriner's to see what help they might be able to offer us with getting her into braces. Until then, we will improvise. Today's PT was less than ideal. I almost felt like the therapist didn't know what to do with Brynlee, or maybe she just didn't feel like actually doing some work with Brynlee. Since we are going to Now I Can after Thanksgiving, we won't be going back to regular PT until January, and even that is still debatable at this time.