Annie's Story
I don't think I've ever chronicled Annie's history of developing Addison's Disease on this blog. As many of you already know, Addison's is a disease of the adrenal glands that is life-threatening. Adrenal gland produce glucocorticoids that keep your blood sugar Look on the right sidebar under "What is Addison's Disease?" for a detailed explanation of the disease. It's important to know that adrenal insufficiency can be caused by many different things--not just
Annie was our 7th child, 2nd daughter, and our celebration gift after Bill was healed from Progressive Supranuclear Palsy. She was born on April 7, 2003, and started life out as a typically-developing, spoiled kiddo. I often think now about her little Annie-isms--things she used to say and do. She would play Candy Land with whomever she could corral--using her own set of rules. If you picked up the card she wanted, she'd yell, "I wanted to be Queen Fros-tEEN!!"
She always slept with her favorite blanket pulled up over her head, and when she'd get up each day from the bunkbed she shared with Olivia, she'd come down the hall and announce, "It's morning-time! What's for breff-kiss?" She loved marshmallow cereal--nothing but healthy food at the Sullivan house--and would pick out the marshmallows to eat and leave the cereal in the bowl. She also liked goldfish crackers, pizza, and french fries. Olivia said she remembered Annie licking the salt off the french fries. She also liked to eat pepperoni right out of the bag. Salty foods were definitely her preference.
Annie developed a golden tone to her skin, and the creases on her toes were very dark. People would comment on it, and we just thought that she must have taken after Bill's dad's side of the family--his dad has a more olive skin tone than Bill. But as you can see from these pictures, her skin was markedly different than the rest of my kids'.
When she was about 2 1/2, she came down with a flu-like bug and over the course of a couple of days became increasingly weak from nausea and vomiting. We were so worried about her that we decided to take her to the local hospital's emergency room. When we got there, the nurse couldn't get an IV into her after repeatedly trying, and when they checked her blood glucose, it was so low that the doctor yelled out, "If we don't get sugar into her, she's going to seize!" Then they put honey into the sides of her mouth in an effort to get her blood sugar up. Annie was completely unresponsive. A nurse who we knew was working there that morning, and was pacing outside Annie's room, praying for her. The decision was made to transfer her to Children's Hospital, where they placed an I.O. into her leg bone, and began resuscitating her. She was admitted and was diagnosed with rotavirus. She was there for three days, and then was discharged.
Throughout the next year, I took her to the doctor for severe stomach pain, which I thought might be appendicitis, (it wasn't), and also for chronic constipation.