Blessings for Bijou

See this beautiful little girl? 

Her name is Bijou, and she's six years old. 

 She's good friends with Josiah and Ava.  

Like "I love you SO much" good friends. 

She has a sense of humor and she's smart as a whip.  

She loves life and knows how to have fun. 

I mean, laugh out loud, "let's go on an adventure" kind of fun.

She was Josiah's first friend when we first moved to Hong Kong almost two years ago.  On the first day of staff training at ICS where Shannon works, we saw another family with young kids like ours.  They had two beautiful little girls, Bijou and Ami.  And it just so happened that we got to be next door neighbors our first year in Hong Kong when we lived in staff housing at the school.  Our kids quickly became friends, which meant we (the parents) became good friends, and we lived out the whole "su casa es mi casa" line pretty darn well.

This is their beautiful family, now a family of five.  Bijou's parents are John and Cara, and Bijou is older sister to Ami (3) and Dax (1).  

And even though we aren't neighbors anymore, we're still GOOD friends. 

  

Silliness on the train, Josiah's 5th birthday

It's a beautiful story of friendship, right?  Well, this wonderful little girl also happens to have an awful autoimmune disease called systemic onset juvenile idiopathic arthritis.  It's a rare, life threatening disease that affects Bijou's joints and organs.  It's put Bijou into the Pediatric ICU fighting for her life since she's come to Hong Kong. Twice.  During her first stay in the PICU at the end of February this year, the doctors discovered that Bijou's lungs were heavily damaged and that she would need a lung transplant sometime in the future.  In addition, Bijou also had macrophage activation syndrome, a complication of JIA.  Basically that means that although macrophage cells are supposed to destroy only foreign cells, her cells think that every cell is a bad cell.

This past Thursday, Bijou was taken to the emergency room because she had an unexpected seizure.  On the way to the hospital she had another one, and since then doctors have been trying to stabilize Bijou's body.  They still do not know exactly the cause of the seizures Bijou had, but Bijou is starting to recover.  She remains in the PICU and this week they will do some invasive tests to try and figure out more information regarding the seizures.  Despite all the stuff going on inside Bijou's body, her personality is the same.  She is happy, talkative, and wants to go home and be with her whole family.

Here in Hong Kong the doctors have been great, but they are limited in expertise for her very rare disease and they are unable to do a lung transplant here.  The family is trying to raise funds to be able to take Bijou to Cincinnati Children's Hospital in Ohio, because it is a leading hospital for children with Bijou's condition and the doctors in Hong Kong have specifically urged them to go there.  Due to Bijou's present fragile condition, she will need a medical escort for the flight back home.  The medical transport alone is expected to cost around $35,000US dollars.  

As their good friends, this whole experience has been heartbreaking.  I don't know how to express how I feel but to say that it hurts.  It hurts to watch a six year old suffer from a terrible disease.  It hurts to watch her parents have to go through so much pain and suffering.  And I realize that the only thing I can really do is to be there and love them as their friend and sister, and to pray huge miracles for their sweet little B.

I want to get to get mad and cry (and oh, I HAVE) and there have been times my heart has been so discouraged, but then I remember of how Jesus wept.  I remember that his love for the Legers is much deeper, much wider, much longer, and much higher than my love for them could ever be. (Eph 3:18)  And I pray that our God, who is "able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us" (Eph 3:20), would use this body of people that love Him to do immeasurably more.  

If you've taken the time to read this blog entry, thank you SO much.  Would you stand alongside them as well and pray on behalf of their daughter that she would be healed?  Would you please pray for their family, especially John and Cara?  If you would like to keep up to date with Bijou's progress so you know how to pray for Bijou, you can do so here.  You will need to make an account but it's free and updates are sent out regularly.  If you would like to help the family raise funds so they can provide expert care for Bijou as soon as possible, please click here.   Thank you so much for loving, supporting, and helping our dear friends.

Ava, Josiah, Ami, and Bijou