Mackrory Family Fun: Like a Rock

Friday, November 6, 2009

Like a Rock

Some of you may remember the frightening night we had during the summer in Wisconsin when I was miraculously awakened with Brielle's coughing and had the presence of mind to realize that she hadn't been sick and went in to check on her and found her body covered in hives and swollen. She was having a severe allegic reaction to some pecans she had eaten that evening. (I found out the next day that my parents, in their family prayer the night before, had felt impressed to specifically pray that Jared and I would have the help we needed to guide and protect Brielle and Nathan. Thank heavens for answered prayers and loving and inspired grandparents.)

Well, we finally got in to see an allergist yesterday and that little girl was like a rock. She let them poke her over and over as they tested to see what she was allergic to. The most amazing part was when they drew her blood to do further tests. Before starting they showed me how to hold her to restrict her movement and had another nurse come into steady her arm and then the phlobotomist drew the blood. Those precautions were not necessary. She watched every single part (despite my efforts to distract her)...finding the vein, inserting the needle, blood filling the tube etc. and she didn't flinch, fuss, cry or complain. NOTHING! She watched with interest and composure (I can't even do that! and didn't. I looked the other way!) The nurses said that in all the time they have worked there less than 10 children have made it through a blood draw without crying and/or losing it. Go Brielle! We are proud of you.

The outcome? No treenuts for her. She is severely allergic to pecans and walnuts.

7 comments:

Shonna said...: What an amazing little girl; way to go Brielley! With that and how interested she is in medical and dental things, she could be a nurse or Dr. or a really brave Mom when she grows up. Sorry to hear about the allergies.; November 6, 2009 at 8:30 AM
Perfectly Imperfect said...: That made me woozy to READ!!! That girl is going to be a great mom - what with not minding blood and all. I see a lot of SONS in her future! I'm sorry about the allergy. That is hard because you have to watch everything. Will she grow out of it or is it a lifelong thing? I am glad for your parents too - what an amazing story for Brielle to remember all her days. Heavenly Father was watching out for her through her grandparents and parents.; November 6, 2009 at 9:25 AM
Kristen Mackrory said...: The blood work will give us more information as to whether or not there is a chance she will grow out of the allergy, but the doctor said that usually nut allergies are for life. Poor Brielle...no pecan pie ever. So, so sad!; November 6, 2009 at 12:50 PM
Michelle said...: She's a dang cute little rock, too. Maybe she'll grow up to do something in the medical profession! That is pretty darn tough. Tell her that her Aunt Michelle is super proud of her. Sheesh. Amazing little girl.; November 6, 2009 at 4:31 PM
Blake said...: What a trooper! Not many kids can handle that kind of experience with anywhere near that ease. I had a hard enough time getting a little 3-year-old girl to open her mouth today. Go Brielle!; November 6, 2009 at 7:45 PM
KaraLynne and Andy said...: Brave Brielle! We are sad to hear she is so allegic to something. It can be so dangerous - we have a friend who is allergic to tree nuts and she has to watch even kissing her husband if he has eaten them recently. Im glad you got some answers today though.; November 7, 2009 at 2:59 PM
Kay Hinton said...: I'm so grateful for allergy tests . . . and benadryl! She sounds a lot like her Aunt Shonna who was always so interested in medical procedures and liked shots. I see nurse or Dr. in her future! PS I LOVE her hair curly.; November 8, 2009 at 5:52 AM

Quote of the Month

“’Whenever darkness fills our minds we may know that we are not possessed of the Spirit of God…When we are filled with the Spirit of God we are filled with joy, with peace, and with happiness, no matter what our circumstances maybe; for it is a spirit of cheerfulness and of happiness. The Lord has given unto us the gift of the Holy Ghost. It is our privilege to have that Holy Ghost reign within us so that from morning till night and from night till morning we shall have the joy, the light and the revelation thereof.” -President George Q. Cannon

Why you say that?

9/4/10 Nathan (looking at a picture of him and Dad fishing) in a very excited voice: "I went fishing with my Dad!!!...That made him happy."
Nathan's Prepositions:
"I'm hungry about oatmeal."
"I will share it to you."
8/26/10
Brielle: "Mom! I made some chocolate milk for you!"
Mom: "Yummm. What is in it?"
Brielle: "Grass, peanuts, dirt....um, I mean, spagetti, jelly beans and chocolate."
Brielle ("reading" Mom a story): "And then she went...long pause. Mom, do you know why I stopped reading?"
Mom: "No, why?"
Brielle: "Because I saw a word I knew! "in"!"
8/14/10 During family scripture study:
Brielle: "Who are the Lamanites again? Are they the ones who dress in army clothes and carry swords?"
Mom: "Yes, they like to fight."
Brielle: "They like to push and hit and kick and bite."
I'm okay with her thinking that that is the type of fighting they did. We are almost to the war chapters though, so her image of Book of Mormon fighting may change.
8/12/10
Background: Nathan woke up at 6:45 this morning and one of the first things he did was go to the sliding back door and open it to go out, despite the fact that there was a DOWNPOUR of rain, lightning and thunder...which is probably the reason he woke up so early. Jared jumped out of bed to stop him from going out into the storm.
Mom (later): "Nathan, why were you going outside in the rain?"
Nathan: "I was going to save the world. Dadda wouldn't let me."
8/9/10 Brielle: "Nathan, Jesus is the bestest man. He doesn't hit. He doesn't bite. He doesn't do anything that is wrong."
8/4/10 Brielle: "When I am 8 I want to get baptized on Tuesday because that is my favorite day."
Mom: "Why is that your favorite day?"
Brielle: "Because my brother was 2. Hmm. Now I am going to have to call it "threes"day."
Nathan: "I'n going to get baptized yesterday."

Nathan Updates

11/30/09
Nathan's verbal ability is improving by leaps and bounds. We got full sentences often. As I was blogging the reunion, he saw the picture of the gingerbread houses:
N: "Made ginger houses. Lisa help me a candy!"
11/23/09
During an FHE lesson about showing love to our family members from Elder Bednar's talk, Dad planned an activity where we practice showing each other that we love them. First Brielle showed Dad that she loved him by giving him a hug and a kiss and telling him that she loved him. Then Dad showed Nathan (who was seemingly completely oblivious to the lesson and the showing of love as he played with his plane in the corner). Then as Dad was trying to get Nathan to show Mom that he loved her and Nathan was completely ignoring him Brielle started to cry:
B: "Dad, you are supposed to show me that you love me!"
D: "Oh, yes, but for this activity we are going aroung in circles."
N (perking up in the corner): "CIRCLES?!?"
After a few seconds of somewhat confused silence:
B: "Okay! Let's go around in circles!!!" With that Brielle jumped up and began running around in circles in the living room (one of the kids favorite games to play is to chase each other in circles giggling the whole time).
Nathan has started calling his sister "brielley" like his Mom and Dad do. So, so cute.

Why you say that? (A common Brielle question. Here we ask her the same thing.) Archive

9/22/09 At preschool today:
Addie: "Can we have some more snack?"
Kristen: "No, because your moms will be here to pick you up any second."
Brielle: "Mom, can I have another snack because you aren't coming to pick me up. You are already here!"
8/17/09 During breakfast as we are talking about going for a walk:
Brielle: "Is it hot or cold outside today?"
Mom: "Right now it is medium. It isn't real hot and it isn't real cold."
About 15 minutes later while getting dressed:Mom, pointing to the corresponding drawers: "Here are your winter clothes and here are your summer clothes."
Brielle: "Mom, is fall medium?"
Eating frozen yogurt:
Brielle: "Is this a dairy product?" She's 3 for heavens sakes! What 3 year old cares, or even knows about, the food groups. Our budding doctor does. She is always asking if something is a grain, a fruit, a vegetable or a dairy. With almost every meal she asks if it is healthy for her body. And, being a child who has struggled with constipation, she LOVES anything with fiber. If you tell her it has fiber in it, she's in man! Blake and Shonna got her to eat a baby carrot and an orange slice after explaining fiber when they visited in WI. When I went to throw away the carrots (a vegetable that until then she has refused to even touch) as we were moving, she got very mad at me and made me take them out of the garbage because they were for her! Afterall, they have fiber AND help her see in the dark!
7/27/09 Nathan (holding mom's hand): "pocket. pocket. down."
Mom: "Okay, let's play 'Ring Around the Rosies.'"
Nathan (reaching out to Brielle with other hand): "No. Baa."
Mom: "Brielle, Nathan would like you to play with us."
Brielle: "Okay."
After playing 4 or 5 times:Brielle (looking sweetly at Nathan): "One more time okay? There is only one more 'Ring Around the Rosie' left."I wonder where she learned that one. :)7/23/09
Dad: "Brielle, sit at the table and eat your food or dad will sit on you (lightly, of course)."
Brielle: "No, those are not part of the options!"
7/16/09
Brielle's word of the day: "squeezy". Definition: adj meaning squishy or soft. For example, spagetti becomes squeezy when cooked and string cheese becomes squeezy when it has been out of the fridge for an hour or so in our picnic bag.

Brielle's accomplishment of the day: She ate the leaves off of the trees (broccoli).
7/13/09
Brielle: "I can't wait until I get big. Then I can reach the salt and pepper."

Eating a red and white sucker given to her by a friend:
Brielle: "Why did they make this sucker red and white?"
Mom: "I don't know. I guess they just wanted both colors in it."
Brielle: "Did they not have enough red?"

5/26/09
Mom: "Let's get the house all picked up. The person who cleans up the most gets a special prize."
Dad (a few minutes later in an effort to get things going a little quicker): "I'm picking up the most."
Brielle: "No, I'm picking up the most."
Dad: "I'm picking up the most, fastest."
Brielle: "No, I'm picking up the most, fastest."
Dad: "I'm picking up the most, fastest first."
Brielle: "No, I'm picking up the most, fastest first."
Dad: "I'm picking up the most, fastest first on one foot."
Brielle: "Why?"
3/24/09
Brielle is starting to think mathematically. She learned her letters so much more quickly than her numbers, but she has recently gotten her numbers through 9 down and she is putting her understanding of them to use.
For example:
Jared (holding 6 Smarties): How many do you get?
Brielle: 3
Jared: How many does Nathan get?
Brielle: 3

Mom: Go get 3 books to read
Brielle (holding her new favorite book): I already have this one. I just need to choose 2 other ones.
Mom (holding 4 M&M's; Nathan was sleeping): How many M&M's does Brielle get and how many does mom get?
Brielle (Pauses for a few seconds): I get 3.
Mom (acting a bit offended): Then how many would I get?Brielle: One...I get 3.That's just the way it is I guess.
3/3/09
Brielle: Mom, what are you doing?
Mom: Cutting onions
Brielle: I don't like onions.
Mom: Me neither. They stink!
Brielle: They stink?
Mom: Yes. They do!
Brielle: They need to go potty!
3/2/09Mom (Grabbing his hand as Nathan tries to hit her): Nathan we don't hit. Do you feel frustrated?Brielle: "Yes, he does."Mom: "Nathan, when you feel frustrated you can say 'grrrrr' and that will make you feel better."Brielle (in a consoling tone): "Good idea mommy"That was a rewarding moment for me! I try to reinforce her when she chooses good ways to solve her problems. It felt good to have her do it back to me!2/12/09Brielle: "When we sit down we have a lap. When we stand up we don't have a lap."
2/10/09 (Showing me her baby doll that she had been taking care of)Brielle: "I put these (barettes) in to keep the hair out of her face."Mom: "That is so nice of you."Brielle: "And I use the comb to get all of the nuts out. She put them in with her hands."Mom: "She put knots in her hair with her hands?"Brielle: "Yes. She put nuts in her hair with her hands during dinner."I guess I need to be more clear when, in answer to her questions, I explain what I am doing when I am combing the knots out of her hair each morning.
2/7/09 (Singing in her bedroom)Brielle: "Twinkle little star...like a dino in the sky..."
At breakfast - 1/25/09
Brielle(eating whole wheat toast) : "Please pass the bear jam (honey)."

Brielle's Personal Prayer - 1/24/09
Dad: "Please help my owie to get better." (She scraped her face badly about 30 minutes before)
Brielle repeats
Brielle (At the end of the prayer): "Dad, it's not gone. It's still there!"
Dad: "What?"
Brielle: "My owie isn't gone after the prayer."

About one week ago Brielle came to me randomly and said:
Brielle: "I have three houses."
Mom: "You do? Where are they?"
Brielle: "My Idaho house, my Utah house, and my Wisconsin house."
Yipee! If she is already thinking about her WI house, maybe this next move won't be so hard on her!

Nightly Family Prayer - Brielle's turn 1/22/09
Dad: "Please help us to sleep well now."
Brielle (kind-of) repeats: "Please help us to sleep not yet."

Brielle's pronuciations:
zebra - "eezbra"
vegetable - "jetable"
carpet - "crap it"
milkshake - "milkshade"

Looking at a book:
Brielle: "Mom, what are these?"
Mom: "Those are insects."
Brielle: "I love sex!"
Mom: "Hmmm...maybe we should call them bugs."
2/3/09S marty pants!!! Brielle's favorite library book is "Franklin Goes to the Hospital." We have checked it out 2 or 3 times. I sat down to read it to her and got part way through the sentence and stopped.
Mom: "Franklin had gone to the doctor..."
Brielle: "for regular check-ups."
Mom: "Franklin had had..."
Brielle: "colds and tummyaches."
Mom: "Franklin had gotten..."
Brielle: "cuts and bruises."
Mom: "And one time..."
Brielle: "the doctor had even come to Franklin's house."
Mom: "But until now...."
Brielle: "Franklin had never been to the hospital."
The whole book went on like that with Brielle finishing sentences about sleep medicine, x-rays, surgeries, and being brave. We had read it to her maybe 7 or 8 times with a couple of weeks since the last time we checked it out. It makes me wonder...what else is stored inside that little brain?

Nathan Updates Archives

7/23/09 New favorite words: "DO IT!!" (meaning, "I do it.")Looking at a picture of me and my sisters:
Mom: "Nathan, who is that?"
Nathan: "Shon. Mommy. Shell."
Who knew that he knew that? Not me.
7/14/09 He was playing with Baby Sara (the doll), comforting her when she cried and doing pat a cake with her feet (I do that with him when I change his diaper). Then he said "Stinky!" and began to change her diaper. He took the mock diaper of and said "whoo wee! Stinky!" while waving his hand in front of his nose. I found it humorous and I love that he is learning to pretend. He has a great role model of that in his older sister.
3/24/09 I can't keep up with all the words he is learning lately. Everyday several new ones pop out. SO FUN! He LOVES outside, trains, cars, food, and books. He also notices every little noise and tells me what makes it. Smartie pants.
3/13/09 Recent words:
"My tun" - My turn (Hmm. I wonder where he learned that one)
"Chicken"
"Nana" - banana
"Some""
Nandy" - candy
"Tick" - Stick
"Foo" - Food
"Shower"
"Owieee"
"Yummy"
"Fishy"
"Tak you" - Thank you
Nods his head a lot in answer to questions
3/3/09'He said "I love you" today! :)
3/2/09 His vocabulary is growing by leaps and bounds! Recent additions:"tissue"-he walks around saying this as his nose is running constantly. He doesn't fight me wiping it anymore."train, choo choo"- everytime he hears the train pass our house he calls this out and runs to the window."vvvrrrooooom"-whenever he sees a car"stinky" - you can guess when he uses this :)"welcome"-we recently realized that this is what he is saying instead of thank you to our "what do you say Nathan?" prompt. He has been saying it for months and we recently mused that he should be able to say "thank you" more clearly since he is talking so much better now. We then realized he is saying "welcome" because we always say "you're welcome after he responds to that verbal prompt.Morning Welcome
2/7/09 I got up this morning at 6:45 to go and play raquetball and heard Nathan calling "mama, mama". It was all I could do to not go in and give him a great big love, but I had to leave to pick up Candida to play ball. When I got home I saw Brielle coming down the stairs, so I said "HI!!" Then I hear "HHHHIIIII! HHHHHIIIIII! HHHHHIIIII!," as Nathan scoots down the stairs as fast as possible (and he is amazingly fast as many of you can attest). He came running over to me and gave me a big, heart-melting hug. Brielle plopped down on the stairs and started giving me a report on the morning as Jared and I do when one or the other of us gets home. "Nathan wake up. I say it is morning...mumble, mumble, mumble." Then Nathan was off to the kitchen making his uh-uh noise which means he wants me to follow. Then he gets in there and I hear "PEEESE. PEEESE. PEEESE. (Please)". I go in to find him standing beneath where the cookies are on the counter reaching as high as he can. "PEESE." In an effort to give him something healthy instead, I went over and opened the fridge to get him some milk. Nathan bee-lined over there, saw a sippy cup of Kool-aid and let out a squeal of glee! He did a little happy dance as he grabbed it and started drinking. How can I say "no" to that? I couldn't.
2/4/09 We went for a walk and Nathan talked up a storm:
"side" (let's go out side)
"ca - vroooom" (There is a car. Vroooom)
"do - ruff, ruff" (There is a dog. Ruff. Ruff)
"nt some" (I'm hungry. I want some)