Greg

Where to start....

Greg is currently in the CICU at Ridgeview Medical Center. He was admitted on Monday (June 14, 2010). This has been a very scary situation. So much has happened and fast. We are not exactly sure where it has all started.

Greg had a spinal tap on May 5th. The experience was not good. The results came back with nothing wrong -- no extra fluid on the brain & whatever tests they ran on the fluid came back clean.

About a week later I noticed an open wound on his backside. Concerned about it, went to our family practitioner and he stated that it is a cyst and we set up an appointment with a surgeon to look at it. It was infected so he was prescribed some antibiotics.

Greg was still having migraines. He also just didn't feel good. We thought it was just the infection and the antibiotics.

We went to his neurologist on June 3rd as a follow-up from his spinal tap. Due to Greg missing a number days of work, Greg ask his doctor to give him a "back to work pass". The doctor decided that he should not work for 4 weeks until we can get the migraines under control.

Well that night he ended up with diarrhea. He thought it was something he at. Well it went on for 5 days and he started getting a fever. Finally got him to go to the doctor and got an appointment for Friday, June 11th. They took some samples to run some tests and they said they would have the results back in a few days. Well, Saturday the fever got up to 103.7, he was having more of the hot and cold spells. I decided to take him to the ER, which he really didn't want to go, but new he needed to --- something just wasn't right.

The doctors gave him some fluids, ran tests and came back and said that he has colitis (infection of the intestines). They gave him a dose of antibiotics and some more pain medication, Oxycodone (he was already on Oxycontin - prescribed by his neurologist). The gave him the choice of either going home or stay. Greg decided to go home. He doesn't like staying at hospitals, plus he was feeling better.

Due to he was rehydrate, the diarrhea started back up. Fever came back as well as the hot and cold spells. He wanted to give it more time for the antibiotics to work and didn't want to go back to the hospital. Finally Monday night, things just weren't right. Greg was not waking up very well and not walking on his own. I called the ER to double check on taking him back in, mainly to show Greg that someone else said to go in, he didn't want to believe me. So I took him to the ER again. We got there and Greg could not get out of the car very well. The nurse was really surprised that I got him to the hospital and so was I.

After they examined him they came and told me that he had a narcotic over dose, kidney failure, liver damage, pneumonia, and the intestinal infection. He was very, very, very sick. Greg was going to be admitted into the CICU. Monday night was a rough night.

Tuesday: He was waking up more, but still sleeping a lot. He knew where he was, the month, year, and names. He was repeating things over and was just talking about stuff. Changing what he was talking about in mid sentence. The doctor thought this was due to the infections and withdrawal from Oxycontin. They started him back on the Oxycontin to help him.

Wednesday: Still sleeping a lot. This time he didn't know what date it was (thought it was October 9th), where he was, couldn't name his brother's or his dad's name. He did know who we were when we went to visit him, including his grandma (she just came to town from Utah). Greg wanted to get out of bed and leave the room when Elias started crying. He got very angry when we wouldn't let him get out of bed and didn't understand. The nurses had to distract him and we were able to leave.

Thursday: Up more, still didn't know what date it was, thought it was October 10th. He didn't know where he was - thought he was in a garage working on vehicles and was wondering why there were people in the other garage when he was looking out the room window. They have a nurses aid in with him so he doesn't try to take the IV's out and get out of bed without help. They have been wonderful help.

Greg had an EEG to make sure he wasn't having seizures. That came back stated no seizures. Greg was going to have an MRI and a lumbar puncture, but he worked himself up so much they couldn't do either. They are now scheduled for today (Friday, 6/18/10).

Thursday evening he was doing better with his memory. He had called me to ask to have me bring the boys up to see him, along with a blue Popsicle. :) When we got there, he was sitting up in a chair. He wanted to make sure he was awake when we got there. We talked for a little bit and Kimber was able to give him a hug and kiss.

Kimber was so happy to see his dad, but still very sad that he had all the IV's and that he couldn't come home with us. Kimber had stated on Tuesday that his dad needed flowers to get better. So our neighbor, Tracy, gave us some fake flowers to put in a vase to give to Greg. Greg loved it! Kimber misses his Dad so much.

We are going back up to the hospital today. Hopefully they will have run all the tests they need to today by the time we get up there.

I would like to thank everyone for the calls, the support, and all the prayers. I am trying to keep everyone updated as much as possible.

Brothers --- Kimber & Elias

Kimber & Elias have the greatest time being brothers!!!

Kimber loves to play with Elias. Kimber is learning how to share his toys with his brother. He does make sure the toy does not have sharp edges and isn't to small (or to big). A few weeks ago Kimber & I went to the grocery store. We happened to go pass a section with matchbox cars. Of course Kimber had to have one. While he was looking at them, he picked his out, put it in the cart, went back picked one more out, put it in the cart, and said "that is for Elias". I was so proud of him for thinking of his brother.

Kimber also loves to make Elias laugh. If Greg or I are playing with Elias and making him laugh, Kimber has to jump into the action and start getting Elias to laugh too. Kimber gets the biggest reaction out of Elias. When Kimber gets up to go get a drink of water or to go to the bathroom, Elias will watch him and as soon as Kimber is out of sight, Elias will start crying. Kimber will come back and say that he will be right back. That gets repeated a number of times.

Elias loves playing with Kimber too. Elias wants to play with whatever Kimber has. Elias will get upset if he can't have the same type of toy. He thinks he can have everything too. He still puts everything into his mouth so we have to be careful of what he plays with. Kimber is good to keep the Lego pieces out of the way.

Elias is getting around really well. He does a great job pulling himself with his arms with a little help with his legs. It shouldn't be much longer before he started crawling on "all fours". Because of this Kimber has now started putting up baricades around a section that Elias can't get into. It had started with just a small corner, but now it is almost half of the living room. I am going to try to get it back down to the small corner.

Kimber has been a wonderful big brother. He loves taking care of Elias.

Thank you Kimber!!

You have been a great big brother!

Next Step.....

I can't believe that Elias is now 5 months old. He is growing so much. When we were at his 4 month doctors appointing he now weights in at 18.2 Lbs.

He loves watching Kimber play and is wanting to grab everything he can get his hands on and put it in is mouth.

On the 3rd Elias rolled over onto his stomach for the 1st time. We were all so excited. He had been "practicing" for a few days now. He would get on his side and just end back up on his back. He hasn't figured out how to get back onto his back from his stomach, but that will come soon enough.

Picture of Elias just after he rolled over.

Elias is also starting to eat solid foods. He enjoys getting a hold of the spoon and tries to feed himself. He is not so sure about some of food, but he still tries them all that we feed him. We have figured that he loves to try to eat anything we eat. He really loves bread. He does a really good job at "gumming" it. He also loves to drink out of our glasses. While we are drinking he will try to grab the glass. When we do give him the cup he does a great job holding it and putting it up to his mouth. Now the job of getting all the drink to stay in his mouth. :)