My Joy

One of the reasons why I haven't been posting nearly as much as I'd like is that my sweet toddler has Juvenile Arthritis and its been a real roller coaster ride the last six months since we found out. She'd sprained her ankle in Oct 2015 and gradually stopped walking over the holidays, alarming us and {after an insurance issue}, sent us to the urgent care to see what was wrong. They bounced us around a little and two exhausting weeks later we learned she has Arthritis. Since then we've been doing everything we can to ease her pain, lower her inflammation and get her back on her feet. She's several doctors {some good, some not} her diet has changed and she's improving.

We've placed her on a Weston Price/anti-inflammatory diet with no gluten, soy, dairy, corn oil, processed foods and reduced sugar {all of which is hard to communicate to a two year old with a roving appetite}. We discovered she's allergic to soy and citrus so we immediately removed those from her diet and began to see immediate improvement in that area. She's seeing a nutritionist and a physical therapist regularly, and I'm happy to say that she has been walking independently for some months now and is in the process of trying to run. She still has a few kinks to work out though. We just started her on immune suppressant therapy which should help. We're hoping and praying that that combined with everything else we're doing will have her in remission sooner rather than later and she can go about her life in a happy pain-free toddler way once more.

And just in time too since she'll be dealing with a whole new challenge of having a baby sister here very very soon. Another reason for my lack of posts. Anyway, the reason I'm writing about all this now is partly because I just can't remember if I posted about it previously or not, and partly because I need your help. Some of you may have seen this lovely post over at In The Bookcase; my blogger buddy Tarissa kindly wrote it up for me and it says so clearly what we need; we need, help, we need funds, but most importantly, we need prayers and to get the word out about this sweet little girl who is going through so much at such a young age. Please hop over to her blog and check out the post, and then click Share. Also, please please share the GoFundMe page made just for my Joy. Anything and everything you can do to help is greatly appreciated. It's at difficult times like this that God tests us and shows us His grace. Please keep us in your prayers. Thank you.