Audrey’s Story

Biliary Atresia

Nearly 1 year ago, we were blessed with our beautiful warrior Audrey Grey. She is so happy, blabby and full of laughs and smiles. At birth, she had jaundice and used a phototherapy blanket for about 24 hours. At her 2 month well-child check, she was referred to a GI specialist in Milwaukee as she still showed yellowing of her skin. After a few sets of labs, Audrey was immediately admitted to Children’s Hospital for further evaluation. Audrey was brave through many needle pokes, an ultrasound, and finally a liver biopsy. I’ll never forget the look on the resident’s face on April 16, 2021 when she entered our hospital room with the attending physician. At that moment we were informed our perfect baby had Biliary Atresia. Audrey hasn’t been doing well these past few weeks. It’s typical for her to be in the hospital for about 3 days every other week for lab values, but lately her mood/behavior and jaundice are very off. Ultimately, Audrey’s liver is declining very quickly. She is now very jaundiced and is malnourished as well. Since being in the hospital, the team is working to manage her ascites while also keeping her hydrated. Audrey just got a PICC placed for supplemental nutrition from now on. She also got a CT to check on her liver and to see if she could accommodate a bigger liver to hopefully increase the pool of live liver donors. She is getting a lot of swabs and tests to try to narrow down what’s going on and why she took a turn. Audrey is just not her happy self, and it’s tearing us apart. We get moments of smiles, content, and cuddles.. we hold onto those moments with all of our hearts. We love her so much, it kills us to see everything she has to go through. She remains very brave and so much stronger than she should have to be.