This blog is for my sister, Kimberly Allred, who is struggling in her fight against Chron's Disease. She was diagnosed with this horrible mean disease over 10 years ago. For the most part she has fought this disease amazingly well. Unfortunately, for the past two years her fight has become increasingly hard. Let's just say, she is going through pure hell.
Soooo, my sweet 13yr old niece Malaina decided she needed to step in to help her mom. This is how HOPE FOR KIM started. Attached you will find Malaina's letter asking for help for her mom. It is very a touching story. I hope you will take a few minutes of your time to read it.
To whom it may concern,
This letter might be long, but a lot has happened to my mom. I would like to tell her whole story. Plus, it is a good thing that I am writing this letter instead of speaking, because it makes me cry when I talk to people about my mom and her health. I have watched my mom struggle for many, many years. I often speak to my mom about her disease. I discovered that my mom was diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease in May of 2000; I was 2 ½ year old. Her G.I. doctor prescribed something called Prednisone, which caused her to gain 30 pounds in 30 days, and covered her face in acne. My mom’s wedding photos, to my new dad, showed the acne all over her face. When I look at my mom’s wedding pictures, I tell her that she was a beautiful bride. My mom does not really like looking at her wedding photos because what the medication did to her.
My mom’s always tells me that she is a blessed Crohn’s patient; I tell her that she really isn’t. She insists that she is, because she told me that she has not been in and out to the hospital like other Crohn’s patients, until this year that is. July of 2003 my mom had her first surgery because of her disease. She was in the hospital for 8 days and then was home again, but she could not get out of bed for another 2 to 3 weeks; my uncle moved in with us and helped take care of her and us kids because my dad had to work. My mom also had a urine bag; I am not sure what the medical term is. She said that her intestine flared-up so much that it blocked something in her kidneys, so that her kidneys would not work anymore.
I remember last year my mom starting to become quite ill and she was in pain every day, but she still continued to be a Cubmaster for Cub Scouts, a Webelos leader for one of my brothers, she was coaching my older sister and I in accelerated softball, she was home schooling five of the six of us kids, plus driving my older sister to the local middle school for seminary every school day. She took us on field trips, and where ever we kids needed to go. Plus, she was and still is in school herself trying to earn her Bachelor’s Degree. I had to ask my mom when she became sick, and she said, “The beginning of February 2009.” My mom also said that a flare-up was causing her to be sick and in pain. I guess a fare-up is when my mom’s intestines become huge and inflamed on the outside and the opening becomes smaller on the inside. My mom says that it is very painful. My mom would try to hide her pain because she does not like the attention, but we could tell, because she would hold her stomach, and most of the time she would be hunched over. Plus, she cried often due to the pain. I hate seeing my mom cry in pain, because I cannot do anything to help the pain go away.
As the days, weeks, and months went by my mom just kept getting sicker and sicker and her pain became higher. My mom took a semester off from school, hoping that she would get better, but she didn’t, she just kept getting worse. She decided that she could not put her schooling off any longer, waiting for her health to become better. She did start school again, and the week before her class ended, she ended up in the hospital for 8 days. My mom looked like she was 5 or 6 months pregnant for a few weeks before she was hospitalized. My dad finally took my mom to the ER at about 4 in the morning on the 31st of March this year. My mom could not stop throwing up. The ER doctors told her that she had a bowel obstruction. My mom was very sad that she had to spend Easter in the hospital, and was not able to watch the six of us hunt for Easter eggs. We all took our Easter baskets to the hospital to show my mom.
My mom was put on a full liquid diet, because every time she ate her stomach became huge again, and then she would throw up, even though she no longer had a bowel obstruction. She was on a liquid diet from her first hospital stay, until her second surgery for her disease, but first surgery for the year. My mom’s surgeon told her that she cha to have surgery, because her intestine was basically closed due to all of the inflammation. I could actually see my mom’s intestines on the outside of her stomach; it was really scary, and very gross.
My mom lost quite a bit of weight. She weighed 104 pounds on the day of her surgery. My mom was beginning to feel good again, when two days after her surgery she started screaming and crying in massive pain. The surgery did not take, and her intestines leaked a lot. Her health just went downhill from there. She ended up having emergency surgery really late at night. Several days later, she told me that her doctor had to use 5 gallons of Saline to clean her up. My dad told me that my mom almost died that night. She spent the next day in the ICU. She just kept having complications. She had to have something called a central line, and then a pick line, a blood transfusion, many CT scans and X-rays, lots of tests. She was hooked up wires that monitored her heart. A few times she had a tube in her nose that went to her stomach, and she was on oxygen. Due to her emergency surgery, she now has her intestine poking out of her stomach, and her stool is goes in there. Most of the time my siblings and I were not allowed to see my mom because of how sick she was, I remember seeing her with lots of tubes and wires; it made me scared and sad. She was in the hospital for about a month.
My mom has been admitted into the hospital four times this year. She still says that even though she has gone through all of this that she is still very blessed. My dad told me that the medical people loved my mom, because of how sweet, friendly, and positive she was during her stays.
My mom had her third surgery two weeks ago. She became allergic to the stitches and had to have them removed. My mom laughs about how she had discovered this year, that she is now allergic to Benadryl. My mom is still very positive and happy, even though she just cannot seem to feel better. She does school work with us kids while she is in bed. She also does her own schoolwork in her bed. She will take me and my younger sister to art class twice a week, and will sit through my older sister’s softball tournaments in pain. My mom still does everything for us. I hate asking her for things because she is still very sick. My mom puts everyone before her. She looks for opportunities to help service others , she says that servicing others will not only bring her closer to God, but the people that she serves, and it makes her happy , as well it keeps her mind off of her illness and pain.
My mom’s friend has been quite ill as well. She has helped her a lot. My mom’s friend’s daughter helped her mom by doing a fundraiser for her to raise money for her medical bills. I have always wanted to let my mom know how much I love her and how much she means to me, I just did not know what to do. I am only 12 years old. When I heard about the fundraiser, I had decided that I was going to do that for my mom. My mom’s medical bills are extremely high. My dad is the only one that brings in money for the family. My mom works hard, but unfortunately she does not make money. She says that caring for children is more rewarding than money.
She has another surgery scheduled on the 30th of November to reconnect her intestines. I hope it works because she can be done with the bag, and begin o be healthy again. My mom told me that she is on a last resort medication called Remicade. Every 8 weeks she has to go into the cancer center to have an IV treatment done; it takes about 3 or 4 hours. (I was not supposed to know, but I saw a couple medical bills, her Remicade is about $3,500 each time. Plus, the hospital room is about $800 a day. One of the hospital bills that I saw was over $150,000.)
I would be forever grateful for you could donate for my fundraiser. I know that my mom would be grateful as well. I am trying to keep this a secret from her as long as I can. It would be wonderful to see my mom cry from joy than from pain. (I am proud to say that my mom only has 5 more classes and then she graduates from college.)
Thank you or listening.
Sincerely,
Malaina Allred (age 12)
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