Help support Milas Liver Translpant

Mila was born with a liver disease called Biliary Atresia. (Billy-airy Uh-tree-zee-uh)  It is a rare disease of the liver about 1 in 15,000 infants have this disease. And doctors aren't exactly sure what causes this disease.
The liver produces a liquid called bile. Bile helps to digest fat. It also carries waste products from the liver to the intestines. When the bile ducts/gallbladder are working the way it should, it lets the bile drain from the liver into the intestines. In Mila's case hers are not working, so the bile flow from the liver to the gallbladder is blocked. Mila's gallbladder never developed correctly and caused the bile to be trapped inside the liver causing damage and scarring of the her liver. Also causes Mila to be jaundice.

When Mila was 2 months old she had a surgery in Las Vegas to try to correct this problem called the Kasai Procedure (cuh-sigh) which means they removed her partially developed gallbladder and connected her small intestine to her liver hoping that there wasn't too much damage done already to her liver and bile ducts so that her liver and start to drain.

Life with this disease is hard. It's hard to gain weight and grow. It also causes Mila to not be able to absorb the nutrients she needs, so she's on multiple medications daily to help with that. Anytime Mila gets a fever, vomits, has bloody stool (which isn't normal for anyone) or has diarrhea we have to go to Renown Children’s ER because that could mean she's going into liver failure or she has an infection of the liver called cholangitis. Which means she's in the hospital for days or weeks at a time depending on how bad the infection is.  Thank God Mila has only been hospitalized twice since her first surgery. Mila is generally a happy baby, just looking at her makes your day. But when she's in the hospital it's one of the hardest things because she goes through a lot from being poked daily because of blood draws and shes can't do the things she likes to do because she's hooked up to machines.

Mila is 10 months old now and her Kasai is starting to fail slowly but surely. Her liver is getting more and more inflamed and damaged hence her cute Buddha belly. Eventually she is going to go into liver failure and be transfered to Lucille Packard Childrens Hospital in Stanford California for transplant. Justin and I are blood matches and are still in the process of getting tested to see who is going to be an ideal match to be a donor for Mila. A healthy liver can regenerate so that's why we are able to donate a partial liver to Mila. She is also on a waiting list just in case she goes into liver failure before the process is done or if we're not good matches for whatever reason.

With Mila's condition she's not able to go to daycare which put me out of a good paying job. Meaning Justin is the only person working. But that's just not enough with worrying about visits to the transplant center for check ups and evaluations for me and Justin and eventually transplant.
On top of already being behind in bills from me not working and Justin being the only one trying to get us by the stress and worry is really starting to build up. Once transplant does come Mila is going to have to stay in California for about 2 months post transplant to make sure her transplant took and if Justin's the match for Mila that puts him out of work to recover. And if I am match then Justin will still be out of work not as long as his recovery, but long enough to make sure Mila and I are recovering well before he returns which is something we cant really afford. So that's also just more expenses we need to cover on top of our everyday life.

 Asking for help is hard especially for us but it's a serious situation and we're not sure how much longer we can keep going without it and live without so much stress on us and worrying about Mila and transplant. After transplant there is always going to be doctor visits, blood test, medication etc. to make sure she stays in good health.  Anything helps and is much appreciated. Thank you for taking the time to read about Mila's story and if you aren't able to donate please share. #prayformila #bilibaby #ba #f***bililaryatresia