She sells sea shells in the emergency room?

What a week!  Headed to Myrtle Beach last week to visit some dear old friends, The Johnson's, who now live in Florida. It was a great half way point, and their relatives own a cottage, and allowed us to stay for free, so minus the gas to get there, it was a cheap vacation!  We brought food and ate in, and just vegged out for four days, on the beach and around the cottage.  The kids had all sorts of adventures especially when we went back to the beach at night with flashlights, they searched for sharks teeth, sea shells, and hermit crabs.  Here and there they would come across a bonus find, like a squid, and a baby shark.  We had a lot of fun!  My youngest came back with a tub of sea shells.   We arrived home after our looong trip (around Washington) around 6 pm on Monday the 6th.  We were not home an hour and we got the call that a dear aunt died, one whom I was planning on visiting next week.  I headed to bed mourning the loss and regretting not getting up there sooner to visit.  I was exhausted from not getting any sleep the night before we left Myrtle Beach.   Little did I know I was in for a very long 72 hours ahead.  At around 3:30 am on the 7th, my youngest started with severe right flank back pain.  I sent her back to bed with some Tylenol and suggested it was due to all the stooping down hunting for sea shells, or perhaps the waves from the ocean.  Unfortunately, the pain did not go away, and before I knew it I was calling the doctors office to try to get her an appointment.  By this time it was already 8 am and the appointment was not until 10:30, it only took a few minutes after I hung up with them, to realize that she was not going to make it that long.  I called back and suggested that I go to the ER and they asked me to bring her right in.  That was were I made my first mistake, we headed over and waited, soon we were in the room and she was being examined, it did not take them long either to realize this was some serious pain.  They sent us right over to the ER....duh, I should have just taken her straight there.   It turned into a long morning and until they were able to get a CAT scan they were not sure if it was appendicitis or a kidney stone.  A KIDNEY STONE!  WHAT?!  She is only nine years old! What are you thinking?  Plus, her dad was just here a little over two weeks ago with a kidney stone, that would be too weird.   Much to our surprise, within the next hour after them suggesting that, it was confirmed.  My nine year old daughter had a kidney stone.  Crazy!!  They decided to admit her and try to pump lots of fluids in her to see if they could flush it out, however, that did not work.  They took another CAT scan the next day and discovered that it was lodged in a very difficult spot and did not feel that it would pass on its own.  They suggested that we consider having it removed.  What in the world!  We were just at the beach!  Is this really happening?   It was, and we were faced with a big decision.  Let it alone and hope it never bothers her again, or have it removed, which meant that she go under.  It was so hard to know what to do.  Our final decision came down to the fact that if we left it, and she in fact started with pain again, we would have to start this whole process over again.  Meaning the ER visit, the IV port, the CAT scan, the explaining it over and over....that seemed equally scary.   So we decided to  trust the Lord with this and allow them to take the stone out, and hope for no major complications.   Again, it was all too hard to believe that just a couple of days ago she was shelling for sea shells.   She came through well, however, they had to put a stint in to keep the tube running from the kidney to the bladder open, as there was a lot of swelling from the irritation of the stone. That stint will need to come out in a week, but in order to prevent her from being put under they attached a string to it and will literately just use that to pull out the stint.  Amazing!  She was a good sport and even though she found it hard to deal with the pain, and the fact that this string is taped up onto her belly, she understood it was the best thing for her.  This was her first hospital stay besides at birth, and she rather liked the whole idea of having a room to herself.  She said it was like her own apartment and we both joked that the nurses and doctors were like her servants.  She got lots of attention. So she felt a bit sad as she was wheeled down to the lobby in her chariot,  she would miss her servants, they were so kind to her and took time to ask her about her recent trip to Myrtle Beach and how she got so many stick-on tattoos (story for another time) and they learned all about her adventures on the beach and of the great many sea shells she found.  I'm thinking she could have sold them some...they loved on her that much!