Prayer Request for Brailie update

From Brooke's facebook today.


Brailie's MRI results were all normal...no sign of stroke, tumor, blood clot or anything that would have caused this. So, the doctors decided that it was Bell's Palsy. She is the youngest anyone has ever heard of getting it even at Children's in Denver and Children's in Florida. They think Brailie got Bell's from either the hand and foot virus (coxsackie) or fever blister virus (herpes simplex). She had a fever blister outbreak all on her lips and in her mouth back in December but nothing since. The doctors said that it is in your system forever after you get it and you can still get an "outbreak" without the blisters. The way Bell's works (from what the docs explained) is that the virus or your antibodies that are busy from fighting the virus attack the facial nerve for some reason and cause the paralysis. Luckily it isn't permanent, usually only lasting less than 6 weeks. They put Brailie on a corticosteroid and an antiviral. They said we should start to see a tiny bit of improvement by Friday night or Saturday morning!

The only problem is that I have to give her the steroid four times a day and the antiviral twice a day. They are pills so I am going to have to try to sneak the crushed pills into her food. So far she has found them in everything I have tried and then refused to eat it. Guess I will just have to get creative! I don't want to have to force anything else down her after the horrible experiences she had having the MRI drugs forced down and then aspirating some of it. We will figure something out!

Brailie is acting ok. The only real trouble she is having is that her left eye only closes about half way when she blinks. The doctors said that she can develop some eye conditions if it isn't lubricated enough. So we have to manually close her eye and tape it shut when she is sleeping if it isn't closed. It is impossible getting eye drops in it so we are getting pretty good at blinking it for her. Other than that, she is doing fine. She is eating, sleeping, and playing like normal. It is just hard to see only half of her face working. Thank you so much for all the calls, emails, and especially the prayers!!! I will keep everyone updated with her progress.