Evelyn had a Paeds appointment this afternoon.
I just stopped and thought about that. That particular line has been the starting line of more blog posts than I care to imagine. You’d think with my super powers that I’d be able to think of new and exciting ways to let you know that Evie saw her doctor, but apparently, you’d be wrong.
In any case, she saw the Paediatrician today and he is stumped, but! not really. but! kind of. but! these things should not be related, but might be, but probably aren’t.
Evelyn appears to have contracted cytomegalovirus at some point, probably while she was in utero. I don’t know much about it and at this stage I’m a bit loathe to google too much, but I do know that it can cause seizures …
[Digression: If we go through all of this, this EVERYTHING, only to be told that she’s not having seizures, but now she has something that seemingly can cause seizures, I will be VERY ANNOYED if they decide that she IS actually seizing. Because it sure as hell looks like seizures still to me and “twitchy episodes” or “non-epileptic myoclonic episodes” as they’re technically being called does not have the same ring to it when I’m watching my daughters eyes roll into the back of her head while her face twitches.]
… because of calcification in the brain. Now, when Evie had her MRI at the grand old age of five and a half weeks, or around 10 days corrected, it didn’t show any calcification and common sense would tell you that there needs to be calcification first to cause the symptoms she is having. But common sense would also tell you that if she had had cytomegalovirus, then there would be both IgG and IgM antibodies in her blood and urine – whereas she only had IgG antibodies (inherited from me, because I’ve had it an am immune). BUT, trumping everything, they found DNA PCR in her urine (that’s what they told me, anyway), which is apparently a better diagnosis than just antibodies?
All of that is to say, I’m not sure how much of the IgG and IgM and PCR stuff you understand, goodness knows I’m barely wrapping my head around any of it.
End result: Evie has had cytomegalovirus and it might be the cause of some of her issues and it might not. She might be terribly broken, or she might be entirely asymptomatic. We just don’t know. She’s been referred off to have another hearing test and a brain ultrasound in any case, so we’ll see what those show.
Unrelated: She’s also having her adrenal function tested, because her skin continues to darken, making her look rather like she’s trying to hide a solarium habit from me. As a child of completely Caucasian parents, her nipples should be the darkest part of her torso, not the lightest. Again, it could be nothing, but darkening skin is an adrenal thing and we’re checking it.
I think she’s also having another liver test, among other things*
Also unrelated: Her development continues to suck. I mean that in the very nicest way of course. She’s just barely hitting some of her 6 week milestones now (at almost 16 weeks), and so I’ve got a handy dandy developmental chart to fill out before our next appointment in a month.
*I say tested, but we didn’t do the bloods today because it was all too much, and PACU was very busy taking blood from a poor screaming toddler. We’ll get the bloods done when she has her ultrasound next week.
