WTOL 11 first brought you the heartwarming story of a Perrysburg father donating his kidney to his own daughter back in 2015.
Four years later, Cassie Paige is headed back to the hospital for a possible kidney rejection.
The Paige family said a recent visit to the doctor left them praying a little harder this holiday season after learning she would need further testing to see if she's able to keep her donated kidney.
Cassie's mother, Stacey Paige, said the results came back inconclusive and her levels had started to spike.
"Just recently we received the call that they had spiked once more and we knew leaving her last clinical, if it did spike again, they were gonna have to admit her to do a kidney biopsy there at Mott," said Stacey.
It's not the news Cassie wanted to hear, especially now during the holidays
"At first I was kinda upset because knowing the whole process that I did have to go through back then kinda just flooded through me because I don't like seeing my mom cry cause that makes me cry. But I know that everything is going to be okay now because I know that if I were to go either way, I would still leave something behind for everybody else to learn about me, in a way," said Cassie.
The biopsy means doctors will remove a piece of the kidney and then determine what exactly is happening to cause the numbers to fluctuate.
"It could be a resurfacing of her auto immune disease. It could be an infection in the kidney. And then lastly, which we obviously hope isn't the case, it would be as she get older, her body just like everybody's develop antibodies. And so sometimes as you get older those antibodies can then turn around and try to fight off the transplanted kidney," said Stacey.
Cassie will be admitted to the University of Michigan Mott Children's Hospital on January 8.
Until then, she's not allowing it to stop her from working or attending Penta Career Center to become a dialysis technician.
"As myself, still being alive is brave enough to anybody. Even if you're going through something. There's always a brighter side. And that even though sometimes you feel like there's nothing in the world to help, there always is cause there's always people to reach out to," said Cassie.
Cassie and her parents say they can only pray and wait on what the future holds.
"Best case scenario is you know that it isn't rejecting. That it's you know one of those not say easy fixes but it is easier than finding out that it is rejecting and turning around and do you know back to dialysis and looking for another donor, which I mean if need be that's what we do," said Stacey.
Until the January biopsy date gets here, Cassie said she's not going to let it ruin her holidays
"I'm gonna go into that day with a big smile on my face because I know everything will be alright as long as I keep praying, listen to my mom and dad. Take my medicine on time. Drink lots of water and do what I'm suppose to do," said Stacey.
The costly doctor visits have been hard on the family during the holidays.
You can donate to Cassie and her family, by visiting the Cassie Strong Facebook page here.