My Hero

I just want to tell my Dave how much I love him.  This seizure thing was scary and it kind of brought things into perspective . . . mainly how much I love my family and how much I love my man!  He is my hero!  Thanks for taking such good care of me, babe!  You deserve to lay in that hammock and eat HaagenDaz for as long as you want!  

And thanks to all of you for your prayers, flowers, treats, carpools, texts, calls, dinners, love, support and future rides.  We couldn't have gotten through this without you!  

First Day Missed

The little stuffed bunny she's holding was the one they gave

her in the ER when they took me there.

My little Andie finally had her first day of 2nd year pre-school!  She had been counting down the days for a Whole month!  She was so upset when Alex's school started 2 1/2 weeks before hers so everyday she'd ask . . .

"How many more days?"  

So anyway, it finally happened and unfortunately it was the day I had my freaky seizure so I missed all of it!   So we need to recognize her and give a cheer!  Hopefully she'll remember how much she couldn't wait for school to start when she's a teenager.  I love you, Andie.

Good News from a Taher-orist

Today Steph had a visit with Dr. Mohammed Taher (Tah -hair), a neurologist located here in American Fork. She was a bit apprehensive going in – not sure what we were going to find out. After filling out the fat stack of paperwork, we were ushered into an exam room plastered with posters describing Parkinson's disease and epilepsy. Comforting, but we'll pass. Thanks. 

After dozens of questions about her current and past medical history, and a whole slew of motor skills tests (all of which Steph passed with flying colors), the doctor gave us as much of a diagnosis as possible at this point. Basically, about 1% of the population will have a seizure some time in their lives. Once you've had a seizure, the probability you'll have another one is about 10%. Not too high. Once that second one comes, however, the probability of a third or more jumps to about 70%. So at this point, and in particular because Steph has no history of seizures or indications of a propensity for them, there's not a high likelihood she'll have another seizure. Doctor Taher also scheduled an EEG test for Steph next week. They'll gather data about her brainwave activity, and if the results are positive, that will cut her probability of another episode to less than 5%. If the results are negative, she'll be in the 5 - 10% area, and the doctor will order a full MRI. But we're confident that the results will be very positive, and do nothing more than confirm our feeling all along that this seizure was a crazy little fluke, or as Dr. Taher put it, an "electrolyte imbalance" brought about by something unknown but relatively harmless – fatigue, stress, etc. And he did say that there's no getting around the three months of no driving – it's the law.

Steph is doing well. Her spirits are high. But she's still trying to come to grips with the fact that this really happened. Like I mentioned before, she has no memory of the seizure, and has to rely on my descriptions of it. She's been wondering what would have happened if I hadn't woken up, if we would have both slept through it. Would we have even known anything occurred? She would have been sore (today is actually worse than yesterday in that regard), but probably would have assumed she had the flu or something similar. I can't imagine not knowing something like that was going on next to me, but she didn't convulse, and the noises she made aside from her initial yelp were not loud. It's possible I could have kept on snoring and never known. But as it happened, I had to go and call the ambulance and sentence her to three months of no driving. Sorry sweetie. Maybe I should have thought it through some more. ;-)

Thanks again to everyone for your sincere prayers and your willingness to help. The no driving thing is going to be the hardest part going forward, but so many people have stepped forward to offer their time to help us get through this huge inconvenience. We're so blessed to have the great friends and family that we do.

- Dave

P.S. To close this out, we stopped by Heather's for a quick visit. Steph climbed in bed next to her so they could look at a home design magazine together. To use a Heather-ism, it was "precious." I took a picture, but they asked me to Photoshop some makeup on them and remove their double chins. Ask and ye shall receive, ladies. You're welcome.

Here's the original for comparison purposes. I know. I'm a genius.

A Trip to the "Grand Mal"

Typically, going to the "Mal" would sound pretty appealing to Steph. "Is there a Forever 21 there?!" Not in this case, sadly. Last night at about 4:30 am, she experienced what seems to be an almost textbook version of a grand mal seizure. All muscles firing at once, eyes wide open, non-responsive to outside stimuli, etc. For both Steph and me, it was a pretty terrifying experience. Nothing like this had ever happened before to Steph, and I had never seen or dealt with anything like it either. The seizure itself lasted somewhere around 90 seconds, but the effects of it lingered for another seven minutes or so. Steph slowly progressed from totally unresponsive, to awake but disoriented and confused, before finally coming back around to her old self. She has no memory of the seizure. The first thing she does remember is waking up to me telling her that she had had a seizure, that she was going to be okay, and the eight paramedics hanging out around the bed staring at her were there to help. A bit jarring, to say the least.

After getting strapped onto a gurney, Steph was whisked off to the hospital. I packed up the girls and followed behind. We spent the next couple of hours jammed into a tiny room in the ER waiting for test results. At this point, everything (i.e. blood work, CAT scan, etc.) seems normal. There's no apparent cause of the seizure, which is actually pretty common in many cases. Often, a person will have a seizure like this once and then never have another one in their entire life. That's what we're hoping for here. We'll be visiting a neurologist tomorrow for an MRI and other tests. We're hoping that we'll get more information about what we are actually dealing with here. At this point, we're told that Steph cannot drive for three to four months. Yep, that's right. An active mother of three little girls with activities like pre-school, cheer clinic, school carpool, innumerable trips to Costco etc. can't get behind the wheel at all for at least three months. It's going to be fun scheduling this stuff out, but friends and family have graciously volunteered without hesitation to help make it work. Now Steph can join Heather (welcome home, girl!) in the private chauffeur club. A stroke and a seizure? It's Driving Miss Hazy.

Many thanks for all of your calls and generous offers to help. Steph has really been buoyed up talking to everyone. The dinner brought by the Taylors tonight was off the hook! The Smart Cookies Natalie Nelson delivered are contributing deliciously to our fat reserves. Marina Brown made it possible for me to take Andie to her first day of pre-school. Emily Evans made Andie and Avery disappear for a nice, quiet while. Mindy Christensen and Kim Copeland brought some rockin' treats. And there have been countless calls, texts, and gestures of support. Again, thank you to all.

I'll try to keep this updated, so check back when you can. Steph will probably get back in on the action here pretty quickly.

- Dave

C-H-E-E-R

Oh wow!  Alex wanted to do this cheer clinic and follow in the footsteps of her dad . . . love you, Dave.  Anyway, she got to perform at half-time at the Lone Peak high school football game.  I had a panic attack walking through all the hormones and cologne so I could watch . . . I don't think I'm ready to have a child in high school yet.  

Go Knights!

Training wheels

So it's the end of summer. . .  just in time to pull out the 2 wheeler so Andie can learn to ride a bike!  I'm so on top of things!  Hmmm, oh well there's always next summer since it's snowing already. . .  Fun pics anyway.

Avery joining in the fun.

Clean Ears

Avery is hilarious.  She really likes to clean her ears.  She actually does a good job at it.  I love her!