Sleep study!!!

Thought I would put a quick update as it has been a while.  Mitch continues to do ok. He will enter back into the hospital at University of Missouri on December 13th and they will do a sleep study and then on the 14th we will meet with his Dr. and set up surgery for the Vagus Nerve Simulator! I am also hoping they will be able to tell us how the sleep study was!  We are ready to get this all done and hopefully when Christmas break is over he will be feeling so much better.  Dave is doing good and he did do the home sleep study and it came back that he doesn't have sleep apnea but I'm still not convinced of that!!!!  He will go back to the Dr. after the first of year and see what or if they can do anything else, who knows!!!  We hope you are all getting in the hustle and bustle of the quickly approaching Holiday!  Thanks so much for the continued prayers for us, we really couldn't get through this without all of you!!!   I will let you know how the hospital stay & appointment go in December.  Love you all,   Theresa

We are home!

Well, I forgot to bring my login information to the hospital so I couldn't update this til now, Sorry!  Mitch was admitted to the hospital on Monday Morning for EEG monitoring! He had a few episodes just like we all knew he would! Today when Dr. Bandy came in he said they had seen enough episodes and data that they felt he should go home. So here is what we have learnt, Mitch is still having seizures but not near as many as before. Dr. Bandy said that the day before Mitch had his surgery in June he was having between 30 and 50 seizures an hour, today when we left the hospital he had had only 9 seizures in the three days we were there, now he isn't sure that he isn't maybe having more than that but they are so deep in the brain and the EEG won't pick them up. They do not want to do another surgery because they can't go any deeper in the brain without causing him motor function damage.  Mitch's main complaint is that he doesn't feel like he is getting sleep at  night so they are going to set him up for a sleep study to see if he needs to wear a machine at night and then he is going to get a VNS, Vagus Nerve Stimulator, and that will zap seizures every 3 minutes and if he would have one in between he would run a magnet over it and it would stop them too! They are still very impressed with how well Mitch gets along having the seizure activity all the time and they are all so proud of him for being in school still! We are hoping to get this all done before the end of the year! We so appreciate all the visitors we had, Kyler Farnan, Erma Mattson, Shannon Luke, Michelle, Robynn Gard, Trevor Johnson, Debbie Smith, Marilyn Jermain, Shelly Deen never a dull moment and big thanks to Erma Mattson for letting me crash at your place, and bringing us pizza, Debbie Smith thanks so much for steak and shake, Marilyn Jermain  thanks so much for the Sports Grill food, we cannot thank you enough! I will let you know when all of this is set up and we head back that way! Most of you know that Dave had a spell a couple weeks ago! He spent a couple days in the hospital in St. Joe. He also did a sleep study and we should find out the results of that in a week. Insurance wouldn't approve a over night in the hospital but they approved one he did here at home and then if that shows something they will approve the hospital one, if I can get him to go do it! We will be the family of sleep machines! On the way home from Columbia today I was talking to Tiff on the phone and all of a sudden she started Screaming and yelling "are you ok?" Then her phone went dead and I was screaming at her and crying I knew something very bad had happened but I had no clue what. Well she had stopped to let a car in front of her turn and a pickup rear ended her, it hit her pretty hard and Quincy was with her. Thank God they are both ok but let me tell you this family of mine is making my poor pacemaker work overtime. Thank you all for the continued prayers, as you can tell this crazy lady needs them. Love you all so much and I continue to ask God to watch over all of our family  and friends, we adore you all! Love you bunches,  Theresa

Back to the Hospital!

I am so sorry it has been so long since I have posted, I just don't really know what to say:( Mitch continues to have different problems and he continues to get more frustrated everyday! Last week he started in with his famous arm seizures, it only happened a couple days and then they were gone! This week his right leg and arm, which is his good side, started in with some different kind of spasms! His Dr would like me to capture them and send to him but I can't seem to!  Mitch will enter the hospital in Columbia on the 31st of October and will do the video monitoring for a few days. We had it set up to do over Christmas break but with all these new issues his Dr really wants to know what is going on. Mitch continues to tell us that he just doesn't feel good, he says he doesn't feel bad or hurt he just doesn't feel right. We are trying to be optimistic that he just doesn't know what it feels like to be seizure free after 15 years, and we are still praying that he is healing and that this is all normal. So for now we will continue to stay positive and pray that he is still just healing. I will try real hard to update this more often! Thank you so much for all the kind words and prayers you continue to give, you will never know how much they really do help!  There is so many little ones and big ones dear to our heart that are battling the beast, please keep all cancer patients and their caregivers in your prayers too. God Bless you all and hope you are ready for the cold, Brrrrrrrr!! Love ya, Theresa

Waiting, Waiting, Waiting!!

I'm not sure why after almost 15 years of dealing with Drs. that I am so impatient!!!! Dave took Mitch back yesterday and got all the electrodes off his head and now we are just waiting for them to call us with the results. They said it could be up to 10 days before they know!  Mitch did pretty good, he did hit the button 18 times, which means he thinks he had some seizure activity. We are praying it is just his brain trying to heal!  Thanks so much for all the messages and kind words, this is getting very long and tiresome for us all but we thank God for all of you that help us get through the day.  Can't believe summer is about over and school will start soon. We hope and pray that Mitch will be ready to go and finish up his Senior year of College. I just can't believe he is about done!  Again, thanks so much and I will let you know when we hear anything. Enjoy what is left of summer and try to stay cool and safe.  Love you all, God Bless!!!  Theresa

Trying to hang tough!!!

Sometimes life throws some pretty mean curve balls but you must stand in there, hang tough and take them and then fight back!!!  So Mitch's appointment was kinda what I thought it would be. When we got to the Dr, office yesterday morning Dave said "Mitch, I still haven't seen your arm do that twitching thing you have been telling me about"! Well Mitch said "just watch it cause it is going to do it now". Yep he had a seizure right there in the parking lot! We got him in the building and got him in a wheelchair and wheeled him to Dr. Lanigar's office and they came and got us and Dr. Lanigar was with another patient but we think she went and got him but by the time he got in there he was coming out of it. We think it lasted about 30 minutes. Dr. Lanigar told Mitch and us that Mitch, is defiantly his most challenging and difficult patient, of course Mitch isn't the text book type! He wanted to know if we thought his seizures were different than before and I said yes because before he was having so many and we never even knew it but now he is able to tell us when they are going to happen. he agreed with us on that.  He wanted to put Mitch back in the hospital and do the long term EEG but couldn't get him in until the end of August, so he decided to do a ambulatory EEG, which we will take him to the hospital on Monday and they will hook him all up and then we can go home and he will wear it until Thursday! If this doesn't show much then the end of August he will have to enter back in the hospital and do the other one. Dave asked Dr. Lanigar if he would have been hooked up if he thought it would have showed up as a seizure and Dr. Lanigar just isn't sure yet if these are seizures or healing! He did start Mitch on another seizure medicine and also gave us a prescription to have if he has a seizure to give him to bring him out of it sooner, now I just hope I am organized enough to have it with us when we need!  We were all pretty bummed yesterday and Mitch still claims he will not do another surgery but I told him I feel we need to get a second opinion and try to keep going, we have came this far lets not give up now. I also told Mitch that he hit his beautiful head so darn hard the day of the accident and dang it he is paying for it now.  So we will head back to Columbia on Monday and get all hooked up and pray that Dr. Lanigar will see what he needs to and all of this is just part of the healing process.   Thanks so much for all the prayers, kind words and encouragement, we really do appreciate them all! Thanks also to Traci and Robert Archer for bringing a piece of the NWMSU Bearcat Turf, Mitch was pretty excited to get it!  God Bless you all,  Theresa

Hanging in there!

Sorry it has been so long since I have updated!  I got anxious and called Dr. Lanigar's office on Monday just to let them know that Mitch was still having a few spells and not feeling the best and also I wanted to know about the EEG!  They called back and said the EEG was NORMAL!!!  First normal EEG they have seen from Mitch! We are thrilled but Dr. Lanigar wants to see us Friday, I wonder if he will want to put him in the hospital and do the extended EEG to make sure the night time activity is gone as well, That is me just thinking so that may not be it at all!!!  Dr. Lanigar still thinks his brain is healing so I hope and pray that is what is going on and Mitch will feel better soon.  I will update when we get home from Columbia Friday!  He continue to not feel the best in the mornings and he does still think that he has stuff going on at night and he is pretty sad the darn Royals are stinking up the field right now but he really seems more happy, alert and ornery to me and lets go ROYALS!!!  Thanks so much for the continued prayers, kind words and support, they really do help us get through this darn roller coaster ride we are on.   Love you all,  Theresa

Long Week!!!

It has been a Very Long week and it is only Thursday!  Between Mitch and I we have had 6 appointments in three different hospitals, good thing we have nothing better to do:)!  Mitch had an appointment in Columbia on Monday and he got his stitches out and had an EEG, we won't find anything out from that for 10 days! Dr. Tanaka was just like Dr. Lanigar and she wasn't concerned at all about Mitch's seizures he has been having, she too thinks it is part of the healing process!  Mitch hasn't been feeling the best in the mornings and he wanted me to watch him sleep and see if I noticed any seizure activity at night, so I did last night and I didn't notice anything. Dave and I are hoping he is just upset because of the activity he has had during the day, we all just want the seizures gone!!   I want to send a huge thank  you to my Aunt Cindy and Cousins Vicki and Becca for coming out this week and helping me get to all our appointments, and also to Mom and Aunt Trude for helping with Gia and Quincy, so I didn't have to drag them with me, they would have been so bored!!!! I had a shot in my eye in KC on Tuesday and Mitch had therapy in Maryville and then on Wednesday I had to see my heart Dr. in St Joe and then got my third shot in my knee in Maryville and today Mtich has therapy and I think tomorrow we have a free day so we will play, play, play before Joel and Tiff get home from Mexico!! So glad they are having a fun vacation but wish our life wasn't so crazy so we could have some fun with the kids but they aren't lacking for attention as they have spent some quality time with Steve, Vickie and their family at the lake, thank you guys for letting them hang out with you!! We have facetimed with Joel and Tiff in Mexico a couple times and also Dan, Mary and their family are on Hilton Head Island and we facetimed with them this morning and both places look beautiful!  We all continue to pray that Mitch is healing and all these seizures will soon be gone. Thank you all so much for sticking with us through this journey! We really appreciate all the prayers and encouraging words you are giving us. Love you all, Theresa