Free Fun CF Treatment

Today was a first for us.  We went to the beach TWICE!  I took Eleanor to walk around 30A and the lake where the beach house is located.  It is a 1.5 mile loop during which Eleanor chit chats about the birds and flowers and anything she sees or think she sees like pigs!  What an imagination...anyways, we are done with our walk today and I decide let us go see if she will like the sand and beach because last year she didn't really get into the sand. 

I carry her down to the water and take off her shoes.  The first time her feet get wet she looks like hmmm...so I tell her she is such a big girl that the water feels good...well she starts laughing.  With one hand firmly gripping my index finger we walk up the beach so the water can "get" Eleanor's toes.  She tries to sit down in it but we are not in proper attire.  So we leave...not without a fit, but with a promise to come back.

At 5:30 pm today we go back to the beach dressed in our new Elmo Tankini.  First funny thing is she is upset that her belly is not covered by the bathing suit but gets over it quickly.  She also doesn't appreciate the sunscreen spray but decides it to is okay especially when mommy does it as well.  On the way to the beach I hear, "Going to the Water!  Does it feel good to your feet!?! Want to Splash!"  We get there and, as it always is in the evening it is breezy as Eleanor calls it.  We get to the water and Eleanor is chattering because she is cold but she doesn't want to leave because she wants the water to get her toes.  We go from a death grip on my finger and splashing water with one hand to sitting on the shore a few feet from where the waves break splash and throwing sand.  Every time a wave would get her she would say want more...and of course another wave would come and she would splash and say it's bathtime!!  She had the best time and did not want to leave but we did not have any fits this time.  We also took about half the sand with us in her diaper and swimsuit.  It was home to take a bath right away.  She also went to sleep faster tonight...she was a tired little girl.

I guess I should address the title of my blog this time.  A study done on surfers in Australia showed that their lung functions were higher than those CFers who didn't surf.  So they now have vials of Hypertonic Saline (basically sterile salt water) for people to inhale to help with their CF.  Here is the link if you would like to read a story about it: http://research.unc.edu/endeavors/spr2006/salt_cf.php  The salt in the water helps the disconnect that the gene causes and really helps people with CF cough the junk that is in their lungs out and up and lowers infections.  So everytime we go to the beach it is a free fun treatment that Eleanor doesn't even know she is getting. 

The second time we went when she was sitting in the sea spray she coughed a lot and one time she coughed twice really loud and hard she looked at me and said,"OH excuse me!"  It was precious.  She was a precious sight.

Thank you Lord for your beautiful creation that we miss so much and do not enjoy because "we have to get things done."  Thank you for Eleanor and her precious disposition.  She makes me proud to be a mommy and proud that she can enjoy what You have given us and is in our back yard.

Coleen