Her Story. . .

Hi! My name is Sarah and I wanted to share my daughter Elisha's story. She is truly a miracle from God. I hope you can find encouragement also!

Elisha was born on June 14, 2006. She is my third child and her delivery though unique because every child is different was routine in the eyes of medical professionals. She was beautiful!!! She cried almost immediately. The first cry of a newborn baby is one of the most special sounds I have ever been blessed to hear. We took her home the next day with no complications. I was told to bring her back to the pediatrician in one week. At her one week checkup the doctor noted that she was not gaining weight as she should, so they wanted me to come back and have her checked again the next week to make sure she started gaining weight. She was very slow to gain weight, so the doctor continued weight checks and made sure I was feeding her every 2 hours. When she was about 3 weeks old My husband, Scott, and I noticed that her coloring was turning yellow. She had some newborn jaundice but that had gone away and now she was turning yellow again. The next day we took her to the doctor and She said we had to stop breastfeeding and start bottle feeding to see if that helped and if she were still yellow on Wednesday (this was Monday) then we would do some lab work. Well, we followed doctors orders, but Wednesday came and instead of being less yellow she had turned almost orange. They admitted her into the local pediatric floor after finding her bilirubin level was very high. She was placed under bili lights (looks like a tanning bed light) to try to get rid of the jaundice. To say the least it did not work. By Friday we were getting very worried. They were having a hard time with her labs because they couldn't get her to stop bleeding. They did some liver function lab tests finally on her Friday night. The numbers were ridiculous. They were so high. The nurse called the on call doctor but He said we would keep her as she is and increase IV fluids and start checking her blood sugar. Well, I became frantic. I was pacing the room. I just had a horrible feeling that something was really wrong with my perfect little baby. Instead of her color getting any better it was much worse, now she looked like she had been in a tanning bed entirely too long. Her breathing was starting to look shallow and I felt like she was in trouble. After arguing with the nurse through the night, we told them that she was going to be transferred to a bigger hospital. That Saturday morning they took her by ambulance to a hospital in Morgantown WV. They admitted us on the regular pediatric floor because basically all the information they had received was that she was jaundiced and her mom was being difficult. The doctors at Ruby Memorial were wonderful. The nurses were wonderful. Everyone listened to me and were very supportive. Then the lab results came back.
I will never, ever forget that moment. My family was all there. My parents and Scott's parents and some of our brothers and sisters were there. As I was standing there looking at my sweet baby they told me the news that something WAS very wrong with her. Her clotting levels were not at all where they should be and they were consulting a liver specialist to see her. It brings tears to my eyes still. I am transported back to that moment when my whole world fell apart around me. They were saying that we shouldn't touch her because they are afraid of hemorrhaging. They said I could hold her one more time, carefully, before they transferred her to the PICU. She was crying so hard just laying there and I will never forget the moment when I picked her up and laid her against my chest. She stopped crying and was so peaceful. All I could think was that this would be the last time I ever held my sweet baby. Scott got to hold her and then they took her away. The best way to describe the rest of that day and night was frantic fear and helplessness. They decided that she had to be transferred again to a different hospital. That night we drove to Pittsburgh, PA. First they were going to drive her because of weather, then she started having trouble breathing and they life flighted her after they intubated her. We did not see her again until the next morning very early maybe 5 am.
When they brought us into the PICU at Pittsburgh Childrens Hospital Elisha looked like a different baby. She had tubes coming out of her everywhere. She was also sedated. The doctors were caring for her immediate needs while trying to determine what was causing her liver problems. Between that Sunday and Wednesday the doctors determined that she was in acute liver failure and they never have found a cause for it. She remained in the ICU getting the care that she needed to stay alive while they tried to find the cause behind it so they could treat it. On Tuesday night they told us that they would be also putting her on the list to receive a donor liver if need be. On Wednesday we asked if we could be tested for a living donor. They only wanted to test one of us and Scott asked if he could be the one. He was a match for her. On Wednesday evening they did a liver biopsy on Scott and Elisha to determine finally if Scott's liver could be used and if Elisha's liver had to be transplanted. Scott was a match. The doctor came out and told me that Elisha's liver was 98% necrotic, dead. So, they moved the transplant up to Thursday instead of Friday when they were going to do it. I can tell you that on Thursday I felt my whole existence hanging in the balance. My husband across a walkway in one hospital getting part of his liver removed and my infant daughter down the hall waiting for her new liver getting her dead liver taken out. It is hard for me to look back on that week, from Sunday to Thursday and realize that it was only 5 or 6 days. It felt like that was all I had known. The inside of the ICU. Going to Elisha and caressing her face or touching her fingers. I cant imagine going through what she endured. The doctors tell me that as they were finishing up the surgery, Elisha getting part of her daddy's liver that they could see the jaundice draining out of her. It was TRUE! The next morning, Friday morning, I saw her and couldn't believe my eyes. She was pink!!!!!! It would still be a long haul for her but at least healing was starting. They had to go in for another surgery maybe on Sunday or Monday to fix a vessel that was bleeding. Then she had another surgery later on that closed the skin of her abdomen over the liver. She was doing well. The next very exciting change was when they finally decided to remove the breathing tube! I was crying when I heard her cry for the first time. It was a new voice. It was so quiet. But it was a sweet sound to me. We spent about 2 weeks on the transplant floor after they moved us out of the PICU. Elisha and I were able to spend some quality time with each other. I would just hold her for hours. It was a wonderful feeling. We were able to leave Pittsburgh to go back home in September. Her surgery was on July 20th of 2006 when she was only 5 weeks old. It is now over a year later and she is doing well, very well. There have been problems to overcome but Elisha is strong. Over all the doctors are happy and we are happy with her. God saved her. I have no doubt about that. She is our miracle and our blessing. `