A season of joy

As Eloise’s medical procedures have start to space out, our frequency of posting blogs has also reduced. Lots has happened since Eloise’s last MRI in October, so we thought we would share a short update of how Eloise is getting on.

Eloise is doing well. She is doing wonderfully well.

After a long season of difficult news, poor odds and complex challenges (of which there are still quite a few) – it feels like we have entered a season of hope and joy. 

School: Eloise continues to love her fabulous school, Rydes Hill, who we will be eternally grateful for the love, attention, and care they pour into Eloise every day. Eloise is broadly meeting her age-appropriate milestones and tracking progress with her peers with the help of her 1:1. This is huge and a testament to Eloise’s personal drive, the excellent input and teaching at school and prayer.

And to be candid, also a little bit of surprise – a wonderful surprise. And we count it all joy.
Going to a parent’s evening and hearing that Eloise is doing well, hearing Eloise read or memorise her lines for the School play. It’s all wonderful joy.

Unfortunately due to some unplanned schooling changes (closure of the older part of their school) Anna will be going to a different school in September and means the girls will no longer be together. Whilst this has been very disappointing and upsetting news we are incredibly grateful the girls got to spend a period of their schooling together.  Thankfully Eloise’s part of the school is continuing, including all the amazing support she has around her. 

Friends: Eloise is an extrovert and has a wonderful talent for making friends easily, whether at the park, the beach, a new church kids group, or just standing in a line. She is well-liked and loved at school and always has a story to tell (and usually told with a lot of sass and humour). This is one of Eloise’s superpowers.

Interests: Her favourite things are still swimming and horse riding. Swimming – she can now float, swim short lengths and pick up objects from the bottom of the pool. Horse riding – Eloise can now confidently do rising trot on the lead rein and recently took part in a dressage competition, run by the wonderful RDA.  

Health: Eloise continues to have regular check-ups with a range of medical specialists, including eyes, infectious diseases, oncology, brain surgery, heart, epilepsy, physio, speech and language and radiology follow-ups.

Eloise continues to be one of the smallest in her class at school (despite being ‘held back’ a year) and so we may need to revisit our endocrinology plans (i.e. think about giving her growth hormone injections soon). Prayers for wisdom, timing and for Eloises body to respond would be appreciated. 

All things being relative – Eloise is doing ‘OK’ on most other medical areas. What a wonderful line to write! With medication, Eloise has managed winter with relatively few infections and has (to the best of our knowledge) not had any seizures for a long time! Hooray.

Family: As Eloise grows and gains strength the things we can do progressively widens, including swimming as a family, walking a little further, travelling a little further and more adventurous family activities. The girls are happiest when the four of us are together.  In many ways the last few years has made us particularly close as a family unit.

Anna continues to be her favourite person in the world (closely followed by Kobe) and the girls have been richly blessed by an increasing number of cousins (14) to play with. 

Anna is doing really well, continues to love horse riding and thankfully has a lovely friendship group, many of whom are also making the transition to the new school.

For those that pray:

• Thanks – give thanks that Eloise is doing so well. For all the answered prayers. For Eloise’s thirst for life, her outgoing personality, her friends, for all things she looks forward to and enjoys in life.
  
  As we write this, we pause to remember some of the darker days and places we’ve been.
  And then we consider where we are today.
  
  What a joy and what a privilege – to see Eloise doing so well, to experience the closeness of God in distress, to be surrounded by community and prayer, to know healing and experience miracles and see Eloise, Anna (and us!) be formed through it all. 
  
• Wisdom – as we navigate endocrinology challenges, schooling changes and the inevitable logistics of two school runs etc.
  
• Protection – for us as a family as we continue with medical check ups, work out how to bring the best out of each other, encourage one another and serve together.  

For those in the Guildford area and are interested or perhaps intrigued by God, prayer or some of the reflections that Eloise’s story may have raised, our Church is running a course to explore the meaning of life and the Christian faith. For more info, see here.

Also, always feel free to ask us any questions – we like being candid and enjoy being real with how we see and experience life.