For almost two months, Avery has had trouble breathing through her nose. She started getting extremely stuffy noses but wasn't showing any signs of having a cold (thankfully, as we checked religiously for any sounds of lung congestion). It was awful at first, her sleep was ruined because she couldn't breathe through her mouth well yet, and not being able to use a humidifier due to the risk of spreading bacteria, she had a bloody nose regularly (multiple times a day). It was sad for her and her parents, that's for sure.
But after several weeks, nothing seemed to be getting much better, and at an appointment with our CF Clinic, the respiratory therapist tried to put a little catheter type thing down her nostrils to suck some of the deep-down snot out. She got plenty out of the left nostril, but when she tried the right, it didn't seem to go down. We asked our pediatrician to check the following week during her four month checkup, and he also noticed a narrowing of some kind in the right nostril... so together, he and our CF doc recommended we see an ENT.
The following week we took yet another trip over to Children's to meet with Dr. Prager, a pediatric ENT. He decided to scope Avery's nose (not fun for the poor girl!!) and sure enough found some kind of mass in her right nostril. :( Not the best news, but at least we know what's been causing her breathing trouble.
So today we are heading back to Children's for a CT and an MRI of her nose/brain to see if we can figure out what the mass is and/or where it's coming from. (We had to be done feeding her at 7:30am this morning and I don't think she'll be able to eat until around 5pm. This poor girl!) There's a chance it could be brain tissue of some kind that got pinched off in development, so apparently there's a chance we may have to meet with a neurologist soon as well. Either way, we hope to know tonight or early tomorrow, and at that point she'll likely have to have it surgically removed. Again, not the best news, but if it helps her breathe, we'll be happy in the end. It's just this stuff in the middle that really sucks to be honest. We are hoping as 2014 draws to a close, that with it her need for so much medical attention comes to an "end". Trust me, I've learned a lot from this sweet girl already, and one of those things is that a mama's heart is very fragile! I just want her to feel better and to grow healthily, and every bump in the road weighs my heart down just a little bit more.
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