Filling In From Yesterday

Thank you for those of you offering your prayers and support. Yesterday was an adventurous day - and around here that can have some different meaning!

We started the day going to the second als clinic in town to try and compare it to the other one, trying to see which was a better fit for us. Both clinics are very very well known and competent so we thought it prudent to make sure we were making the right choice for mommy. Basically it was a chance for us to interview them and get an idea of what they had to offer.

While talking about mommy's limitations, pains, etc. the doctor that we were interviewing said that she didn't think mommy's current pain was the type of pain most als patients experience and in fact she had some concerns. She immediately sent us over to get an ultra sound.

The ultra sound tech finished her leg (and in fact did her other leg too after his findings on the first.) He asked her not to move and told daddy "when that phones right there on the counter rings it will be the doctor wanting to talk to you" and went off to call the doc. The doctor told us that mommy had some pretty serious blood clots in her leg that were in danger of dislodging and causing an embolism. We needed to go directly to the Emergency Room.

In what can only be counted as a small miracle given the over flowing of the emergency rooms in this area with the swine flue, this major metropolitan emergency room was empty and we were seen immediately. Mommy was given in injection of Lovenox which is a pretty powerful blood thinner and we were sent home with 14 more shots to give mommy over the next 7 days. She was also started on oral coumadin (warfarin) which is another thinner. Apparently she will need to be the coumadin for a long time - possibly for life.

While the ER doc was talking to us about Frances he shared about a friend of his that has recently been diagnosed with a disease similar to what mommy has and the doc was pretty distraught about it. We talked with him quite a bit and shared stories as well as some information. The doc had been doing quite a bit of "grasping for straws" research and we talked about some studies going on in Italy. Interestingly enough mommy was familiar with this study not because of her issues but rather because of Rebekah's as the same study is thinking they might have some information relating to Ewing's Sarcoma as well as these neurological diseases. Over all we got some good information but I hope also shared some peace with the doc.

As we write this about mommy's issues we are reminding that we have diverged quite a bit from this blog being totally about kiddos and if that bothers you we are sorry but it is about our lives that some of you find interesting and we enjoy using to share God's love and strength.