One Day at a Time

Emily is doing better now and is back out of the hospital again... we are just going to take things one day at a time. We have little plans for the remainder of our vacation, because we just need to see how things work out. Emily is on better anti-seizure medication now and I am making sure she gets it. The recovery from meningitis can take a while, especially if it gets as bad as hers did. She is weak and tired, but sick of laying around. It turns out her kidney is just fine, leaving us with one less thing to worry about. She does still have a significant amount of pain in her back, and it may take some time to resolve. She has set a goal to steer clear of all hospitals until Himaya gets a baby brother or sister... sounds like a good goal to me. We are again thankful for all the calls, messages and prayers, as well as the blessings from heaven. Emily will be okay, but it will take some time. Thanks again! -Branch

Round 3... and the scariest day of my life

First off, let me wish everyone a merry Christmas; cause if I don't throw it out now, I am likely to forget.
Round 3 you ask? Yes... round 3. Emily was released from the hospital Tuesday afternoon with only a prescription for anti-seizure medication, even though she was complaining of headaches and a lot of back pain. That night and the next morning the pain got worse and worse. We decided Em needed to go back to the hospital because she was in constant pain, and couldn't find a comfortable position. while getting ready to go she kinda blacked out, and wouldn't talk to us for about 10 seconds or so. So she went back to the hospital by ambulance. They tried morphine for the pain. When that wouldn't take the pain away they gave her dilated (about 10 times more powerful than morphine) which also didn't work. A little while later, they gave her caffeine which worked like a charm. She was let go with a prescription for red-bull, coffee, monster or whatever kind of caffeine she wanted.
Christmas day was a lovely hospital-free day, though Em had to keep up the red-bull and no-doze. She woke up this morning in extreme pain, and instead of waking me up, she layed moaning on the living room floor. The moaning eventually woke me up, and when I got out there I was sure she was just finishing up having a small seizure. *note: I have a few years experience working with people who have chronic seizures. I called the on-call neurologist, who said we should come to the ER later when she felt a little better... meaning after she got her caffeine fix. *another note: Emily had forgotten to take her anti-seizure meds last night. Emily had a pretty bad 10-20 sec. seizure on the couch, and after she recovered, we got ready to go. She said she felt ok, and she didn't want me to call for an ambulance. On the way to the ER (her dad drove while I sat in the back seat with Em) I experienced the scariest few minutes of my life. Emily had another smaller seizure, but she stopped breathing. After 5-10 seconds of completly losing my cool, I pinched her nose, tilted her head back and gave her a couple of breaths. She started breathing on her own again, but it was short shallow breathing. I kept my ear on her nose/mouth while I called 911. They wanted us to stop and wait for them to get to us, but the roads were HORRIBLE, and I kept telling them that they couldn't get to us and get Em to the hospital as fast as we could get her there if we kept driving. Emily stopped breathing again, and restarted after 2 more rescue breaths. We made it to the hospital, and she has had a bunch more tests an MRI and a couple of CT (cat) scans. They found that the back pain may be due to the compression fracture to one of her vertebrae. It was hypothesized that she may have arched her back so far during a seizure last Friday, that she damaged the T11 vertebrae. The MRI showed a few small infarctions in her left kidney (this means a few small parts of the kidney lost blood supply, and essentially died). They don't know exactly when it happened, or what caused it yet, but she just came back from another CT scan of that kidney, so we hope for more info in the morning.
They are going to keep her overnight, and we will see what they have to say when the CT and other test results come back. Thank you all for your prayers, calls, texts or thoughts. I know that Emily will be ok, and that the Lord is watching over her and our family. I will keep you in the know. -Branch

Much Better

The doctor cleared Emily, and we left the hospital just after noon. They were still not able to determine what virus caused the meningitis, but they ruled out the ones that require long-term antibiotics. Emily Himaya and I are staying with her dad in Murray Utah for a few days until Em recovers. Thank you all again for your comments, thoughts and prayers... It meant a lot, and it made a difference. -Branch

Improvements

Emily is doing better all the time. Today they moved her out of the ICU and into a room. She is still on a restricted diet for now (since she pulled out her ventilator tube and may have hurt her throat), and her back hurts from laying down for days. She is walking around some, and we may be looking at being released sometime tomorrow. I want to thank everyone again for all the help and the prayers. I am especially grateful to those who stepped in and took care of Himaya while I have been here with Emily... I can't thank you enough!

Doing a lot Better

Emily is doing better now, but not completely out of the woods. She had been on sedation (basically a medically induced coma) for 2 days, but this morning we got good news. The EEG showed no signs of seizure, and Em was doing almost all the breathing on her own (the ventilator was only kicking in when she took a breath). The doctors decided that they would cut her sedation medication by half and we would see how she does. Right after the nurses left the room, Emily pulled a gumby-like move and pulled out her breathing/feeding tubes. They are a little concerned that she may have damaged her throat by pulling the balloon through, but they haven't done a swallowing test yet. They have turned her sedation meds off completely now, and Emily is talking (through a raspy voice). She was a little confused and upset that she lost a couple of days, but things are looking up. Thank you all for your prayers and for keeping our family in your thoughts... It means more to me than you vould ever know. She is likely to be angry at me later for the pictures, but I wanted to show the improvement. -Branch

Here's The Scoop

Emily has been sick for a week and a half now. Here's the quick rundown of what has happened. She saw a doctor in Dallas and another in Green River who both thought that her vomiting, headaches and neck pain was due to fluid in her ears or a possible ear infection. Yesterday morning it got really bad though, and I took her to the University of Utah ER. She became unresponsive, and they had to put her on a ventilator and they then moved her to the ICU. She is being sedated so she doesn't try to pull the tubes out, and this also helps with the discomfort. Although the cultures take a few days, all signs point to viral meningitis. They are treating her with broad spectrum antibiotics and antivirals. There is still no timeline for removing the breathing tube, but we are trying to be optimistic. I am asking for prayers, or just keep her in your thoughts. I will blog when I can if we get new information. If you have my number, feel free to text or call and I will try to keep you in the loop. Thank you all, and have a merry Christmas!

Christmas Song

Em has posted the weekly question (though it was a little late). This week she wants us to all blog about our favorite Christmas song, and tell why it means so much to us. I love singing, and I especially love singing Christmas carols, but there is one that easily comes to mind as my favorite. Oh Holy Night. There are few arrangements of this song that don't make me feel warm inside, and make the hair on my arms stand on end. My favorite arrangement (for the past 9-10 years) is an a'capella version by a group called Voicemale on their first Chritmas CD called Jingles. If you click HERE when you are done reading, you can hear the first 30 seconds or so of this song. Favorite! If forced to pick my second favorite song, it would have to be Mary Did You Know? Though I am not sold on any one arrangement. The reason these songs are my favorite, is that they really help me feel the true meaning of Christmas. It isn't about snow or gifts... and it dang sure isn't about Santa. It's about the Lord.
Thanks for reading. -Branch

Big Little Stinker

Man... It seems like Maya is growing up too fast. I had always heard that from people, but I thought it was one of those things people just say when they look back. Here are the most recent developments. Last week Em wanted to make some brownies, but Maya doesn't always do well on the kitchen floor, plus her walker is just too big to fit in the kitchen. So (as we sometimes must) Em put her in her walker, and gave her toys while she ran in the kitchen to get the brownies going. This is about a 4 minute process, as they came out of a box. As usual, Maya started crying the second Em left the room. She was hurrying to get them in the oven, but as she was working she suddenly heard Maya getting closer to the kitchen door. This walker does move quite nicely across hard floors, but it hardly moves on the carpet, so when she heard the cries getting closer, Em was excited that Maya might just be pushing that thing across the room. Then Maya came crawling around the corner into the kitchen. That little stinker got out somehow, and we couldn't figure out how. Em's mom suggested that she might have pulled one foot up, and then gone down through the leg hole, but it is way too small. We watched her everyday, and gave her chances to repeat her Houdini act, but she didn't do it until earlier today. It would appear she pulls a foot all the way up ad out, then leans over the side. When she was trying, Em grabbed her phone to get a video. For any concerned, Em had ahold of her foot under the walker...we are not in the habit of letting her fall on her head.

Not all of her recent escapades are bad... Maya is also trying really hard to learn how to walk. She already spends more awake time standing than she does sitting, now she wants to go mobile. We got her an early Christmas present, which will turn into a car scooter thinggy after she is a little bigger. She loves to play with all the little things on the front, and if we hold it still she can stand up and walk away with it. Here is yet another cell-phone video. She is gonna be into EVERYTHING soon!

Christmas letter

Well... hmm. Em has posted the weekly question, but it is more like a request "write a letter to Santa". I wrote one so we could take them to Macy's today (they are donating money to the make a wish foundation for every letter to santa dropped off at a Macy's). Here is a scanned copy from before we went to the mall.