Playing Catch-up!
WOW! The last two weeks have been crazy around here. Things have been really up and down.
We are trying to go through things, throw out what we don't need, pack what we don't need right now, and finish up small little things to put our house up for sale. While we are getting rid of a TON of stuff, everything is torn out right now. Our house almost looks worse than when we started!
The last 5 days have been particularly rough - especially in the Down syndrom and Heart kid community. In the last 5 days, we have lost two friends:
First, there is Carly. She was 8 years old and died last Friday. This was totally unexpected and it has sent shock waves through the DS community. So many of us have never met IRL (in real life), but are still close through our blogging and facebook communities. If you would, please say a little prayer for Carly's Mom, Dad (who had to do CPR until the ambulance arrived), and her older brother and sister. If you are so inclined, please stop by Michelle's blog. She has put up a button to donate. On behalf of the DS community, a fund has been established to pay for a wonderful artist named Michael Johnson, who also has DS, to commission a painting of Carly for her family. Any money over and above will be donated to Mott's Children's Heart Center per Carly's family's wishes in her obituary.
Our next friend is a local heart buddy. I have asked for prayers for Ashton before. Sometime on Sunday night or Monday morning, Ashton had a major stroke. He was still on a bypass machine, but was being weaned. He was going to be listed for transplant. Sadly, his family had to take him off of life support on Monday afternoon. He had such a following! I was never able to personally meet Ashton, but I have talked with his Grandmother and Dad. They are both wonderful people. Ashton was a first degree black belt in TaeKwonDo, and attended the same studio as my nephew. He will surely be missed, but we are happy that he is now able to run, and spar, and do all of the things little boys should. A memorial is set for this Saturday, May 1 at Bismark school.
The next person is my friend, Phred from Alaska. We have known each other for years via the internet, but never got to meet. Phred was crazy as a bedbug! If you look up Mountain Man or Hillbilly in the dictionary , it is a sure bet the picture would be Phred. We may not have always seen eye to eye on things, but he was one of those rare birds who knew who he was. He had no trouble expressing his oppinions - wanted or conventional, or not - but he had no trouble with others doing the same, whether you agreed with him or not. Many of those ideas where greatly challenged this past fall when he became a Grandfather. His Grandson was born with both Trisomy 18 and Trisomy 14, plus a translocation. This was a defect that the doctors never thought the baby would survive - even through the pregnancy. So far, he is doing amazingly well! It looks like he is the only recorded person in the U.S. with this particular genetic disorder. On March 25, Phred went to sleep and never fully woke up. He had a massive stroke. His family took him home from the hospital to make him comfortable and he passed away on March 29, 2010. We noticed that he had been missing from our forum and somebody contacted his wife. She forgot to notify his on-line friends. We will miss you Phred!
So now that we are all thouroughly depressed, the results from all of our recent appointments....
Monday, the 19th, we went to the Cardiologist in Peoria. Christopher* had an ECHO. The results were GREAT! Tricuspid regurgitation (or leakage) was minimal. Mitral valve regurge was downgraded from moderate/severe to mild/moderate. No sign of pulmonary hypertension returning, and mild thickening of the septum that was repaired. (His septum is competely patch material - now is growing scar tissue and thickening making it less flexible. For obvious reasons, this is watched VERY carefully). We don't have to return for a year!
Tuesday, the 20th, we went to Wheelchair Clinic at LaRabida in Chicago. We are required to go every 6 months, or it voids the warrenty on the wheelchair. Unfortunately, we don't use his wheelchair that often. He does not sit in it all day, he is not transported in it to school or anywhere else, and it is HEAVY! It takes two of us to lift it into the back of our van. Since my Dad has had colon cancer surgery and hernia surgeries, hecan't isn't supposed to lift over 10 lbs. So, Christopher will have this chair for a L-O-N-G time. They had to order a new back for the chair (I think everything is custom made) since he just keeps getting longer instead of gaining weight. We drove to Chicago, went to clinic, and was back home by 12:30 that day! Remember, this hospital is a good 3 hours away, depending on traffic. We didn't mess around that day. Something fired us up because we ended up going to get curtains for 4 rooms in the new house, paint for 5 rooms, rugs for 2 rooms, completely changing the plan for one room in the process, and stopping by a couple furniture stores to look for a few things we need! While at Menards, (after Mommy used Cavi-Wipes to sanitize them) we put Chistopher in a swing that is set up there. We have the same one for him at home, but aren't putting up the set this year because as sure as we do, the house will sell! He really seemed to like it. Here are a few pics.
Friday, the 23rd, we went BACK to Peoria to see the GI doc and the Endocrinologist. Even though the scales indicated that Christopher had lost a pound since his visit to the Cardiologist that Monday, the GI doctor was happy with his overall weight gain of 1 1/2 lbs since October. He added some calorie booster to the formula cocktail and a return visit for 6 months. The Endo doc was underwhelming. I am not sure I am too comfortable with her. I had some questions that I asked her several times and she ended up never answering one of them. Christopher's TSH levels supposedly went up 3 points in 3 weeks, and she sisn't wasnt to repeat the test to make sure what was going on. We have such trouble with Peds. Endo. docs. They just don't seem to want to do much unless your child has diabetes - not something we want to visit thank you.
Well this post in long enough. I will update our trip BACK to Chicago yesterday for tag team therapy services and a trip to the zoo - complete with picutes!
Hugs!
Steph
*OK. So I originally was only going to use "Lil' Man" on the blog as a pseudo security measure. It is too much work and most of you who come here already know who Christopher is anyway! LOL! So, I am going back to using his real name. :)
We are trying to go through things, throw out what we don't need, pack what we don't need right now, and finish up small little things to put our house up for sale. While we are getting rid of a TON of stuff, everything is torn out right now. Our house almost looks worse than when we started!
The last 5 days have been particularly rough - especially in the Down syndrom and Heart kid community. In the last 5 days, we have lost two friends:
First, there is Carly. She was 8 years old and died last Friday. This was totally unexpected and it has sent shock waves through the DS community. So many of us have never met IRL (in real life), but are still close through our blogging and facebook communities. If you would, please say a little prayer for Carly's Mom, Dad (who had to do CPR until the ambulance arrived), and her older brother and sister. If you are so inclined, please stop by Michelle's blog. She has put up a button to donate. On behalf of the DS community, a fund has been established to pay for a wonderful artist named Michael Johnson, who also has DS, to commission a painting of Carly for her family. Any money over and above will be donated to Mott's Children's Heart Center per Carly's family's wishes in her obituary.
Our next friend is a local heart buddy. I have asked for prayers for Ashton before. Sometime on Sunday night or Monday morning, Ashton had a major stroke. He was still on a bypass machine, but was being weaned. He was going to be listed for transplant. Sadly, his family had to take him off of life support on Monday afternoon. He had such a following! I was never able to personally meet Ashton, but I have talked with his Grandmother and Dad. They are both wonderful people. Ashton was a first degree black belt in TaeKwonDo, and attended the same studio as my nephew. He will surely be missed, but we are happy that he is now able to run, and spar, and do all of the things little boys should. A memorial is set for this Saturday, May 1 at Bismark school.
The next person is my friend, Phred from Alaska. We have known each other for years via the internet, but never got to meet. Phred was crazy as a bedbug! If you look up Mountain Man or Hillbilly in the dictionary , it is a sure bet the picture would be Phred. We may not have always seen eye to eye on things, but he was one of those rare birds who knew who he was. He had no trouble expressing his oppinions - wanted or conventional, or not - but he had no trouble with others doing the same, whether you agreed with him or not. Many of those ideas where greatly challenged this past fall when he became a Grandfather. His Grandson was born with both Trisomy 18 and Trisomy 14, plus a translocation. This was a defect that the doctors never thought the baby would survive - even through the pregnancy. So far, he is doing amazingly well! It looks like he is the only recorded person in the U.S. with this particular genetic disorder. On March 25, Phred went to sleep and never fully woke up. He had a massive stroke. His family took him home from the hospital to make him comfortable and he passed away on March 29, 2010. We noticed that he had been missing from our forum and somebody contacted his wife. She forgot to notify his on-line friends. We will miss you Phred!
So now that we are all thouroughly depressed, the results from all of our recent appointments....
Monday, the 19th, we went to the Cardiologist in Peoria. Christopher* had an ECHO. The results were GREAT! Tricuspid regurgitation (or leakage) was minimal. Mitral valve regurge was downgraded from moderate/severe to mild/moderate. No sign of pulmonary hypertension returning, and mild thickening of the septum that was repaired. (His septum is competely patch material - now is growing scar tissue and thickening making it less flexible. For obvious reasons, this is watched VERY carefully). We don't have to return for a year!
Tuesday, the 20th, we went to Wheelchair Clinic at LaRabida in Chicago. We are required to go every 6 months, or it voids the warrenty on the wheelchair. Unfortunately, we don't use his wheelchair that often. He does not sit in it all day, he is not transported in it to school or anywhere else, and it is HEAVY! It takes two of us to lift it into the back of our van. Since my Dad has had colon cancer surgery and hernia surgeries, he
Well this post in long enough. I will update our trip BACK to Chicago yesterday for tag team therapy services and a trip to the zoo - complete with picutes!
Hugs!
Steph
*OK. So I originally was only going to use "Lil' Man" on the blog as a pseudo security measure. It is too much work and most of you who come here already know who Christopher is anyway! LOL! So, I am going back to using his real name. :)
Labels: appointments, Cardiac, Chicago, doctors, Prayers, wheelchair
posted by Stephanie at
1:44 AM
3 Comments:
Praying for all of these families. This is the worst part of our loving medical mom community. Losing kidos! I hope you get moved in and settled soon!
So hard the last few weeks and for me,since our walk with leukemia began 18 months ago,well,suffice it to say,my heart has been broken over and over and over again.
Sending you and CHRISTOPHER lots of love!
so sorry for all of the losses! i did now know about phred or ashton, just little carly, and all of these families have suffered too great of a loss!!!!
glad the heart appt went well for christopher :)
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