This is just my little place in the world to blog about whatever comes to mind. I plan to review books, movies, music, bands, bars food and restaurants, along with my wife, step sons, marriage past and present, anything is fair game! and AVM's
On the evening before leaving for Rochester (Sat.) I wanted to jot down a few thoughts while I’m still thinking about them.
I have an excellent wife. Proverbs 31:10 says “An excellent wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels.” The answer to the first question is: I did (by God’s Providence). The only thing I can say about the second sentence is: Yes, my wife is worth more to me than the sum total of the earth’s wealth. Thanks Karla for your faith, your strength, your beauty, your commitment to mothering, your commitment to teaching our children, and for your partnership in the Gospel ministry. I love you much!
I am very tired of talking about my brain surgery. I’m tired of thinking about my brain surgery. Talking about one’s brain is very personal. It’s not like we’re talking here about getting a few warts removed from one’s foot. Maybe it’s notreally such a good thing to publicly share such personal information. Before the techno age not many talked publicly about such things. Is nothing sacred anymore? This I think in one moment while in the next I am reminded again and again of the multi-faceted, glorious working of God in all things for His own glory and my own joy. So, I’ve decided to keep typing.
So many things to do and no way to get them all done. But, tomorrow afternoon we leave anyway and I’m sure whatever didn’t get done didn’t really need to get done anyway.
The tears flow easily these days…more often than I have ever known before. I’m not sure why really.I’m not afraid. I am a bit unnerved I suppose.But really, I am not afraid.I’ve known fear before. As a young kid I remember once being at home alone and thinking that someone had broken into the house. I hid underneath a bed until I heard the sweet voices of my parents. I see life these days as they really are: fragile.
The Bible tells it like it is. Jesus’ half brother James wrote in 4:13-14 “Come now, you who say, ‘today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit.’Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring.What is your life?For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.”
A pastor friend of mine has a 15 year old niece who has enjoyed excellent health. A couple of weeks ago she came down with what the family thought was the flu. After being sick for a couple of days they took her to the hospital, found her dehydrated and gave her two units of fluid. Her blood pressure was also way down. After being rehydrated her b.p. improved slightly. She returned home.
Five hours later her parents brough her back to the E.R. and then a children’s hospital. She now had a high temperature and her body literally began to shut down. The major organs were beginning to fail. She was dying. They put her into a drug induced coma for three days. A week ago Thursday the medical staff went to turn her over when she reached out and yanked the ventilator out of her throat…and thankfully began to breathe on her own. She was diagnosed with Toxic Shock Syndrome and is slowly recovering. Apparently this deadly bacteria can enter through any bodily orifice…as simple as rubbing one eye with one finger. Thankfully she is now doing much better.
Hundreds of you, and others who don’t even have computers have, with all sincerity, offered to do anything for us during these days. I know every offer is sincere. Here is one thing each of you can do. Instead of worrying yourselves sick over this whole drama I would ask that you turn in your Bibles to Psalm 27. Read through the 14 verses of this chapter, think about the implications. If David’s words express the truth of your own heart, then may it first be a balm for your soul. Then please pray it for us as well. That’s what I would ask for you to do for us! Oh yes, and also keep the responses coming. I see and read everyone…with joy!
I've been getting emails asking about how Jake's doing since his surgery, so here's the scoop:
His recovery has been going fairly well, he's had to deal with a lot of pain in his AVM, so he's on a somewhat regular regimen of ibuprofen. The bleeding, for a while, had been down to nothing - up until the Saturday after Christmas. Michael and the boys were goofing off, and Jake happened to move his head at just the wrong time, and Michael & Jake knocked each other pretty hard. That caused Jake's AVM to bleed pretty badly. Michael was able to get it stopped fairly quickly, and Jake was really careful the rest of the night.
We came home from Kansas City on Tuesday evening, just in time for Jake to have a major bleeding episode. The boys were playing with their new Nerf guns (gotta love Christmas presents!), and was putting on his vest for dart tag. The strap of the vest bumped his AVM again, and he instantly had blood running down his chest and his back. Jake came downstairs and let us know he was bleeding, so I went up to the kitchen with him and we did what we could to get it stopped. Normally, when he bleeds, he's able to get it stopped in a matter of a few seconds. This episode was much worse than normal. He held a dish towel on his head for almost a full minute, and soaked up close to half of the towel with blood. To be honest, it was the most scared I've been since we found out about Jake's AVM. It was a lot of blood, and it was coming fast, and not stopping. After we finally got it stopped, Michael suggested that I call the doctor first thing in the morning.
Wednesday morning, I called the doctor and talked to his nurse. She took all the information, and let me know that she'd talk to the doctor as soon as he was out of surgery. We went on about our day - going to a few stores for the boys to spend some of their Christmas money, and got a phone call around 3:00 saying that the doctor would like to see Jake, "just in case". One thing that I've been very thankful for is the fact that whenever we've had a concern, the doctor has taken it very seriously, and has not made us feel like "dumb parents". We scheduled an appointment for today at 10:30am.
We got down to Iowa City just in time this morning for his appointment. We waited for a bit in the waiting room before being called back into the exam room. We were informed that Jake's doctor had been called into an emergency surgery, but knew that Jake was coming in, and he really wanted to see Jake himself. He had his nurse take a bunch of information, and had his assistant take a quick look at Jake and report to him while he was in surgery. The process took close to an hour, and I was thankful that we had taken our video iPod and Jake's PSP with us to keep the boys occupied. After a while, the nurse came back and told us that the surgery was taking longer than he thought, and she had a pager for us so we could walk around the hospital while he finished up.
By this time, it was close to 1:00, and the boys and I were getting pretty hungry. We decided to head down to the cafeteria and grab a quick snack. We got there, picked up a couple bags of chips and a soda to share, and sat down to chat. We barely got our chips finished, and our pager went off letting us know that the doctor was out of surgery.
We made our way back up to the Neurology Clinic, and were taken back to another exam room. The doctor came in and shook Jake's hand (which made Jake feel pretty grown up), and had a look at Jake's AVM. He was very pleased with the progress the AVM has made. He said that it's much "quieter" - which meant there was a lot less blood flow! (PRAISE GOD!!!) and he said the the AVM has shrunk some too (PRAISE GOD SOME MORE!!!). Jake has a rather large sore on the AVM that has scabbed up, and the doctor said that more than likely, the bleeding was aggravated by the dry scab cracking. He said to put aloe on the sore a few times a day, and hopefully that will help to soften the area. He also gave us some gauze to use, in case it would bleed again. He said (which I didn't know) that the gauze is better to use to stop the bleeding, because the fibers in the gauze actually aid in the clotting of the blood. (I thought that was pretty interesting).
The doctor wanted to go ahead and schedule Jake's next surgery - not feeling it was an emergency, but also wanting to get it done fairly quickly. He had mentioned wanting to schedule it for February or March, with Jake's school schedule in mind. I told the doctor that Jake starts baseball on March 1st. The doctor smiled and said, "then we'll do February!"
So....Jake's next (and final) surgery is scheduled for February 12th at 7:30 am. He'll, again, spend the night at the hospital for recovery, but he doesn't have school on the 13th, so he won't be missing much (he was hoping to miss more!)
He's almost done - I can't wait for him to be able to not worry about whether he's going to bleed during an activity or not. It'll be nice to let him get back to being a kid! I'm so thankful for God's protection during this time - it's scary to think about all the things that could have gone wrong before we knew what a risk the AVM is.....but it also makes me thankful that God didn't show us what was going on until now. I can't imagine how I would have sheltered him if I knew sooner....it wouldn't have been a fun childhood! ;)
Please keep praying for God's protection and peace during this. It's a lot for a kid to take on - but Jake, being the amazing kid that he is, is taking it all in stride. Once again - I'm being taught by my son! from... --------------------------------
While ischemic strokes happen when the blood flow to a part of the brain is interrupted, a hemorrhagic stroke is caused when there is bleeding into brain tissue that kills blood cells.
A cerebral hemorrhage can take several forms:
• Intracerebral hemorrhages. This is bleeding inside the brain. The symptoms and prognosis of an intracerebral bleed vary depending on the size and location of the bleed. • Subarachnoid hemorrhages. This is bleeding between the brain and the membranes that cover the brain. • Subdural hemorrhages. This is bleeding between the layers of the brain’s covering (the meninges). • Epidural hemorrhages. This is bleeding between the skull and the covering of the brain.
Causes
Intracerebral bleeds are the second most common cause of stroke, accounting for 30–60% of hospital admissions for stroke. High blood pressure raises the risk of spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhage by two to six times. More common in adults than in children, intraparenchymal bleeds due to trauma are usually due to penetrating head trauma, but can also be due to depressed skull fractures, acceleration-deceleration trauma, rupture of an aneurysm or arteriovenous malformation (AVM), and bleeding within a tumor. A very small proportion is due to cerebral venous sinus thrombosis.
Symptoms
Patients with intraparenchymal bleeds have symptoms that correspond to the functions controlled by the area of the brain that is damaged by the bleed. Other symptoms include those that indicate a rise in intracranial pressure due to a large mass putting pressure on the brain. Intracerebral hemorrhages are often misdiagnosed as Subarachnoid hemorrhages due to the similarity in symptoms and signs.
Treatment
Treatment for intracranial bleeding varies, depending on the underlying abnormality that caused the bleeding, the location of the bleeding and the size of the blood clot.
The multidisciplinary team at the Stroke Program brings to the table the best of diagnostic radiology, interventional radiology, neurosurgery and neuromedical management.
Diagnostic radiology involves the use of various types of scans to precisely identify the nature and location of the hemorrhage. Interventional radiology involves treatments that include passing a catheter to widen or to close off blood vessels in the brain without surgery. Other types of interventional radiology involve using focused radiation to correct abnormal blood vessels that have bled into the brain.
Finally, microsurgical techniques can be used to treat abnormal or leaky vessels.
Time for a little me! I was out of it yesterday. I apologize. I feel better today. I had a headache. ALL DAY LONG! Today... it's better.
I'm real excited about starting work... I know it's a long shot that I will make any money... but it's fun, none the less.
So wish this AVM patience your best. oh by the way... I told someone that I don't work out... it is because I only have control of my left side. It makes doing curls hard. ha ha ha!
well i don't have a date... for head surgery or any thing else. My head hurts today... I gonna take some pills and try to get some sleep. but before that I will give you todays youtube stuff... ok?
and then...
and lastly...
Yea! Baby!
Well that did not help my headache... but it was fun to look up old Devo tunes.
Thank You, know that by giving me a small donation you have made a happy man.
I have had an AMV, a head bleed, and now have only my left hand to type with. I try. If you think that I try, please give.
