GO AWAY MRSA!!!!!

We have a little battle going on in our house. A little battle that is becoming more problematic all the time. About six weeks ago Eric changed deodorants and became irritated. He got a bump. The bump grew, and grew, and grew. It grew into a huge abscess about 5 inches long and 2 inches tall. It caused a fever. Eric visited the emergency room where they cut him open, drained what they could, and sent him home with packing we had to remove each day for a week. We also used vancomycin antibiotic in his dialysis bag for two weeks. It was MRSA--antibiotic resistant staph infection.

A few weeks after that, Eric went to the hospital for the kidney transplant that didn't happen. Everybody who came in and out of his room had to put on protective clothing because they could be contaminated by the MRSA that Eric had on his body. We learned that even though his MRSA infection was gone, he likely still had lots of MRSA "on board" in his body.

Saturday Eric woke up with a little bump on his face. By Sunday afternoon it looked like a huge pimple. By Monday morning his whole cheek was triple it's normal size--he looked like a chipmunk on one side!! Off to the doctor we went. He's pretty sure it's another case of MRSA infection. The cultures aren't back yet, but (little did we know) once you have one infection you are prone to have multiple infections over your lifetime. Umm...has anybody else heard of how diabetics usually lose their feet? INFECTIONS. We are NOT happy about this. This is likely going to be an ongoing issue for poor Eric, especially as long as he is immune-compromised (which will be pretty much forever).

I asked the doctor how this might affect Kendi, since she's coming home in under 2 weeks and we don't know what her current HIV numbers are like. "Oh!" he says, "If the labs come back positive for MRSA Eric probably should not touch her." GREAT! It will be really easy to bond with daddy if he can't touch her, right? Ugh. MRSA is dangerous for HIV positive people.

I'm not sure what we can do to try to eradicate the MRSA from Eric's body. As long as he has it, he can give it to her. Then she could be dealing with it on an ongoing basis. And as long as she has it, she can give it back to him. It's completely unrealistic for them just not to touch each other!

So we would appreciate your prayers that the MRSA would be absolutely and completely wiped out of Eric's body. He doesn't need ongoing battles with infection, and neither does Kendi. We need a healing. This is a little thing now, but each time another infection happens we have a new battle on our hands--and MRSA can be deadly in the right circumstances. Please pray with us for healing, so that this little thing never becomes a big thing for our family.

Thanks!
Anita