Thankful ~ Day 20

This morning Kyndal woke up with a very stiff back and upper chest area and was having trouble breathing regularly. I convinced her that she had probably just strained her back and should go ahead and go to school. She texted me later in the morning and told me that she thought that maybe she had bronchitis or something and should go to the doctor. I thought she should wait it out, but she insisted that she needed to go.

This afternoon she and I went to her doctor's appointment. Her lungs sounded fairly clear, but the doctor decided to take an x-ray just in case. He was puzzled why she was having so much trouble taking a deep breath, and having pain when she tried, if her lungs sounded so clear. After the x-ray he determined that she might have a touch of pneumonia so put her on an antibiotic and an inhaler.

When we were walking out of the pharmacy, the doctor's office called. The radiologist had reviewed her x-rays and found that she had a partial collapsed lung. As it was not caused by injury or illness, so they called it a spontaneous pneumothorax. We decided that since it was just in a small part of her lung that she should just spend the evening resting and hope that the lung will absorb the excess air between her lung and chest wall and that the lung with re-inflate on its own. She has another x-ray tomorrow afternoon. If it doesn't get any better on its own, she will have to be admitted into the hospital to have a chest tube put in to drain the excess air and inflate the lung. We are certainly praying that it is not necessary.

Why is this a thankful post? I am thankful that she listened to her body and followed her instincts that she should go to the doctor. Had we waited, it could have been much, much worse.