Eliana Update, August 29, 2026

Prayer Requests:

Platelets / HUS:

Eliana’s platelet count dropped today after roughly seven days of trending upward. Obviously, that is disconcerting for us. We are talking with the doctors to understand what it means. Is one day simply an outlier in an otherwise positive trend, or is it indicative of something else? We don’t know yet.

Her hemoglobin also remains low, and she will be getting another blood transfusion.

Pray that HUS has not reversed course. Pray that the platelet drop is not evidence of renewed disease activity or another complication, and that her platelets and hemoglobin begin moving in the right direction again.

Kidneys / dialysis / feeds:

Some really good news: she peed a couple more times overnight.

Keep praying for urine and for her kidneys to wake up.

She will also continue with eight hours off continuous dialysis, which is good.

She has been able to take more feeds, but they are still bothering her belly and she has thrown up a couple times. Tolerating more nutrition, particularly the more concentrated feeds needed for her renal diet, is critical. Less fluid burden helps make intermittent dialysis possible, and intermittent dialysis remains one of the major catalysts for eventually getting her out of the ICU.

Right now, we don’t have line of sight to when any of that happens.

Pray that she tolerates the feeds, her belly settles down, and she can continue progressing toward intermittent dialysis.

Voice:

Her voice still has not returned. We are now seven days out from extubation, so the fact that it has not come back is atypical.

We will be meeting with ENT very soon so they can look at what is happening. Is there structural damage from the breathing tube? Is there something else preventing her vocal cords from working correctly? We simply don’t know yet.

Please pray hard for this one. Pray there is no permanent structural damage, that whatever is preventing her from speaking can be treated, and that we hear our girl’s voice again.

Rest:

She was still restless through the middle of the night, but the latter half was much better and she finally got some good sleep.

Pray that continues. Her body needs restorative sleep while it heals.

Quick update:

That’s kind of where we are this morning.

There is good news. She peed a couple more times. She got some real sleep. She continues tolerating eight hours off continuous dialysis. She is taking more feeds.

And then there is the not great news. Her platelets dropped after seven days of moving in the direction we wanted them to move. Her hemoglobin remains low enough that she needs another transfusion. Her voice still hasn’t returned, and now we need ENT to help us understand why.

Given how fragile this situation remains, it is hard not to be disconcerted when something that had been consistently trending in the right direction suddenly moves the other way.

So we don’t know what today’s platelet count means yet. We don’t know what ENT will find. We don’t know when she will tolerate enough feeds to move to intermittent dialysis or when we will have line of sight out of the ICU.

Some good news coupled with some not great news.

That’s where we are right now.

Keep praying.