Greetings to Ariella's Family, Fans and Followers
As you may be aware last week our family went away to the Lake George area for a much needed vacation. Even now we smile when think about the fact that we were able to take our amazing daughter, who has surpassed so many expectations, on a week-long vacation. It is a testament to God's grace and mercy and our baby's unrelenting desire to keep fighting. Though it took significant planning on our part, as the parents, to check, double check and triple check our packing list to ensure we did not forget any of her medical equipment; it was certainly worth the effort. We packed-up the car last Saturday morning and left for upstate New York around noon. More than half of the trunk space was taken up by Ella's medical equipment, and as it turns out we needed every piece of it.
We arrived at The Glenn Falls Inn, the bed and breakfast where were staying, a little after 3 pm and were thrilled to see that our accommodations provided us more than enough space to set-up all of Ella's equipment and leave plenty of room for everyone else to sleep and move about the loft-style apartment comfortably. I won't go into exhaustive detail about every aspect of the vacation, however, I will absolutely share some highlights.The vacation featured several trips to Six Flags Great Escape, where Ella got to swim and ride several rides and believe me when I tell you she loved every minute of it. She loved the water park and got to ride several of the non-water rides with her mom and baba (brother). However, Ariella was not the only one to enjoy our vacation.
Grandmabeula was fascinated with the decor at The Glenn Falls Inn, as we all were, but Grandma really enjoyed the accommodations. Big brother baba, got to do a lot of rides and even swam in Lake George with his dad. Mom and Dad were able to get on some rides and most importantly enjoy watching their children have a good time. The entire family enjoyed a scenic boat cruise around Lake George. Yet, in spite of all the good times and great memories the vacation was not without its challenges.
Mom and Dad successfully learned to give the baby her respiratory treatments on the go. We learned that we could put the baby on her ventilator in her stroller and continue to enjoy the amusment park or the lake or the outlets or whatever it was we were doing, without having to run back to the room in order to give the baby her treatments. In spite of our diligence in keeping up with the baby's treatments we did, however, have a set back. First big brother Charles spent most of the vacation battling some sort of weird cold/allergies hybrid attack that didn't cripple him, but certainly slowed him down. Momma Rachel was also fighting off a cold the second half of our week away and in spite of our best efforts Ariella also got sick. She started to spike a fever the last couple of days of our vacation. We returned home we scheduled an appointment with her pediatrician who ordered x-rays for her at Children's Hospital. The x-rays revealed, that Ella had fluid in her lungs, as a result she was diagnosed with clinical pneumonia. The good news is she has been on antibiotics for almost three days and has shown significant signs of getting better. Additionally, the doctors don't think she needs to be hospitalized so she continues to receive her care at home from our home care nursing team.
All told our vacation was a huge success. We certainly would have preferred that no one get sick, but considering that there was a point in time when Rachel and I were not sure we could ever take a vacation with our baby I have to say I am very proud of what were able to accomplish last week. Rachel is an amazing mother and wife. I am very blessed to have this incredible woman by my side.
Go Team Botts!
