Friday, March 25, 2011
Back to the Emergency Room
We spent last night in the emergency room until 1:30 this morning. We went home and I got a few hours sleep before going to work. Reluctantly, I left him home alone. Mid morning he called me and thing have gotten worse. He was taken by ambulance back to Mercy Gilbert Hospital. He is currently in the emergency room. He is very very swollen in his body. His blood count has changed since last night. All he knows so far is that they are thinking that the steroids are causing his body further problems. A Ct scan will be done this afternoon. He still needs dialysis today. He will probably be admitted to run further tests. Jeff needed the high doses of steroids to stop the hemoraging in his lungs. The question is yet to be answered as to what will happen when they decrease the steroids.
To God be the Glory
As you can see, the last 3 years have been very difficult for our family. We have watched Jeff suffer so greatly. I have spent most of the last 3 years standing by a hospital bed, or sitting in a surgical waiting room for one of the 14 surgeries he has had. I have received a few calls from the hospital in the middle of the night telling me that Jeff had coded and was now in ICU. The pain Jeff has suffered and the pain I feel as his mom has been the worst kind of pain any parent could ever feel. I am here today to tell you that Jeff is alive and I am still standing. We are survivors and it is all because of Jesus.
Jeff has been in and out of the hospital for the past 9 years. The last 3 years being the most challenging. Over the past 3 years, I (we) have praised our way thru the storm. I would leave the ICU or leave his bedside in the care of his dad and go to church. The music would begin and the hands would go up and I praised harder than I have ever praised and worshipped in my life. I would try and sing, but all that came out was groanings and pain. I would end up doubling over from the pain that was coming forth out of me. Crying, groanings and pain was something. my church family, I guess came to expect from me. No matter what, I praised God. Before I left each and every church service, I was smiling again and felt the peace and strength of God on me. I had the endurance to keep going from praising God and from the prayers of Gods people,
God has been there by Jeffs bedside. Over and over again God has raised him up. At times when Jeff coded he was not being monitored and a nurses timing was perfect as she would walk into his room only to see he was not breathing.
Jeff had a hole where infection had eaten the femoural artery and God kept him. He was given antibiotics that dropped his platlet count dangerously low and the hospital caught it. A surgeon almost cut into the femoural artery as it was exposed. God stopped him from cutting into it. The hand of God has repeatedly been on the hand of surgeons, lung specialist and various other Dr's. God's miracles have been seen over and over again. Jeff medically speaking should not be here with us today but Jeff is still with us and very much alive.
I believe that when the praises go up, the Glory of GOD comes down. I also believe that the battles are won when our hands our in the air. There have been times that I reached my breaking point that I just could not pray or praise and hardly had the strength to walk into the hospital one more times. It has been at those times that past prayers and the prayers of the saints have kept us. It is the prayers of Gods people that are keeping us when we can't pray. It is your prayers that is keeping us going and keeping us strong and your prayers that are keeping Jeff alive. For that I thank each and every one of you. I have my son today because of your prayers. I appreciate the prayers and support.
God is still a miracle working God. Jeff is truly a miracle!
Jeff has been in and out of the hospital for the past 9 years. The last 3 years being the most challenging. Over the past 3 years, I (we) have praised our way thru the storm. I would leave the ICU or leave his bedside in the care of his dad and go to church. The music would begin and the hands would go up and I praised harder than I have ever praised and worshipped in my life. I would try and sing, but all that came out was groanings and pain. I would end up doubling over from the pain that was coming forth out of me. Crying, groanings and pain was something. my church family, I guess came to expect from me. No matter what, I praised God. Before I left each and every church service, I was smiling again and felt the peace and strength of God on me. I had the endurance to keep going from praising God and from the prayers of Gods people,
God has been there by Jeffs bedside. Over and over again God has raised him up. At times when Jeff coded he was not being monitored and a nurses timing was perfect as she would walk into his room only to see he was not breathing.
Jeff had a hole where infection had eaten the femoural artery and God kept him. He was given antibiotics that dropped his platlet count dangerously low and the hospital caught it. A surgeon almost cut into the femoural artery as it was exposed. God stopped him from cutting into it. The hand of God has repeatedly been on the hand of surgeons, lung specialist and various other Dr's. God's miracles have been seen over and over again. Jeff medically speaking should not be here with us today but Jeff is still with us and very much alive.
I believe that when the praises go up, the Glory of GOD comes down. I also believe that the battles are won when our hands our in the air. There have been times that I reached my breaking point that I just could not pray or praise and hardly had the strength to walk into the hospital one more times. It has been at those times that past prayers and the prayers of the saints have kept us. It is the prayers of Gods people that are keeping us when we can't pray. It is your prayers that is keeping us going and keeping us strong and your prayers that are keeping Jeff alive. For that I thank each and every one of you. I have my son today because of your prayers. I appreciate the prayers and support.
God is still a miracle working God. Jeff is truly a miracle!
Jeff is a walking miracle
Jeff was diagnosed with a very rare Kidney disease called Wegeners Vasculitis about 9 years ago. The disease progressed and he ended up being put on dialysis 3 days a week. Many people don't know what dialysis is. He goes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday and sits for about 4 hours in a chair while a machine filters his blood. His blood is slowly filtered out, goes into a filter, cleanses it, and then it slowly is put back into his body. This procedure leaves him very tired, drained and heading straight to bed when he gets home. Usually, he feels better the next day but not always.
Jeff was fortunate to have a kidney transplant in April 06. The transplant lasted only a little over a year before he rejected the kidney and went back on dialysis. Usually, the kidney would just shrink in size and stay in his body. In his case, the transplanted kidney was sucking the life out of him. 6 months after rejecting the kidney the kidney had to be removed. After removing the kidney the worst kinds of infection took over his body. He was treated with high power IV antibiotics to try and get this infection under control. The infection was making him very ill and the antibiotics were not successful in getting this disease under control. After the kidney was removed is where our adventure begins. Jeff would go into the hospital and stay a week or 10 days, often having to have a surgical procedure to clean out the infection. Zap him with antibiotics and send him home. If we lasted 2 days at home before calling another ambulance we were doing good. Jeff spent months in the hospital. At one point during his illness, he only weighed 104 pounds and he looked like a skeleton. There were a few times that he coded while in the hospital and at times there was a big question if he was going to make it. At times being there almost 4 months before going home only to have to call another ambulance within days, This routine of in and out of the hospital living in a 911 mode went on for over a year and half before the infection ate a whole in the femoural artery. In doing a femoural artery by-pass they finally found the infection and were successful in cutting out the infection. Finally, the infection was gone and we thought we had blue skys ahead. Jeff was out of the hospital for over 4 months when he came down with pnemonia. This was the start of a new adventure. The hospital was doing a procedure that was suppose to drain the pnemonia. Instead of draining it, they punctured his lung causing him to start drowning in his own blood. Within less than an hour he was in the operating room doing emergency surgery. He came out of that surgery, not breathing on his own and he had chest tubes to drain any remaining blood from his lungs. The recovery from the lung puncture was a difficult one but he eventually recovered. During his recovery from the lung puncture Barbie (Jeffs sister) wanted to move back to AZ as she hated Houston so Jeff and mom said lets go as we too did not like Houston. So Jeff moved to Chandler, AZ with his mom. His sister Barbie, her husband Quinton, and Barbie's two boys Jordan and Jared. Oh, lets not forget Max, Zoe and Roscoe as they moved too. AZ is beautiful and it was most certainly a refreshing place to be. This was the start of a brand new life. A great new adventure in a beautiful place. Jeff had to have one more surgery on his by-pass as the arteries were narrowing. So, shortly after arriving in AZ the surgery was done and we thought we were in the clear and ready to begin this new life. Instead he started having new problems. Jeff started coughing up blood which started the hospitalization all over again. One brilliant dr. released him from the hospital while still coughing up blood, only to have him admitted to another hospital less than a week later. A few days after being admitted this time, Jeff coded and they were having a hard time keeping him breathing so they had to intubate him again. As the day progressed all odds were against him surviving. Family was called and the wait and see began. Jeff was now losing blood as fast as they put it in him, it was draining out. He had an extremely low platlet count and if they had to do surgery he would not have survived. He needed time and the more time that he had before they had to do surgery the better it would be for him. He was kept intubated and the lung Dr's had to put a dual tube down into his lungs so that blood from one lung would not destroy the other lung. Besides being intubated and lung tubes, he also had a feeding tube, heart rate monitors, and all the bells and whistles that could go on a patient. A little over a week after being put on the intubation, surgery was performed. His right lung was stuck to the chest wall. It had to be carefully removed from the chest wall and the lower right lobe of his lung was removed. It appears that this is all a result of the lung punture in Houston. The recovery from this has been very slow going and not without hurdles to jump. A few months ago, Jeff started throwing up blood. He threw up and threw up blood and once again the Chandler Fire Dept. was at my house transporting him to the hospital. Within a few days, he was transported from Gilbert, AZ to Tucson, AZ medical center. He was in Tucson for a little over a month only to be released from there on a Thursday and was admitted back to the hospital in Gilbert exactly one week later with Bronchitis. Currently, Jeff home and is on mega doses of steroids. The steroids are really starting to cause him some problems. He looks like a chipmunk and his face is so swollen it looks like he is about to pop. He feels awful on these steroids and he is doing his best to control his emotions, and angers that the steroids brings out in him. Last night we spent the night and early morning once again in the emergency room. He was sent home and told to call his pulmonary Dr's in the morning to see if they can start tapering him off those steroids. The question remains, if they taper him off the steroids will the hemoraging in the lungs begin again?
Jeff was fortunate to have a kidney transplant in April 06. The transplant lasted only a little over a year before he rejected the kidney and went back on dialysis. Usually, the kidney would just shrink in size and stay in his body. In his case, the transplanted kidney was sucking the life out of him. 6 months after rejecting the kidney the kidney had to be removed. After removing the kidney the worst kinds of infection took over his body. He was treated with high power IV antibiotics to try and get this infection under control. The infection was making him very ill and the antibiotics were not successful in getting this disease under control. After the kidney was removed is where our adventure begins. Jeff would go into the hospital and stay a week or 10 days, often having to have a surgical procedure to clean out the infection. Zap him with antibiotics and send him home. If we lasted 2 days at home before calling another ambulance we were doing good. Jeff spent months in the hospital. At one point during his illness, he only weighed 104 pounds and he looked like a skeleton. There were a few times that he coded while in the hospital and at times there was a big question if he was going to make it. At times being there almost 4 months before going home only to have to call another ambulance within days, This routine of in and out of the hospital living in a 911 mode went on for over a year and half before the infection ate a whole in the femoural artery. In doing a femoural artery by-pass they finally found the infection and were successful in cutting out the infection. Finally, the infection was gone and we thought we had blue skys ahead. Jeff was out of the hospital for over 4 months when he came down with pnemonia. This was the start of a new adventure. The hospital was doing a procedure that was suppose to drain the pnemonia. Instead of draining it, they punctured his lung causing him to start drowning in his own blood. Within less than an hour he was in the operating room doing emergency surgery. He came out of that surgery, not breathing on his own and he had chest tubes to drain any remaining blood from his lungs. The recovery from the lung puncture was a difficult one but he eventually recovered. During his recovery from the lung puncture Barbie (Jeffs sister) wanted to move back to AZ as she hated Houston so Jeff and mom said lets go as we too did not like Houston. So Jeff moved to Chandler, AZ with his mom. His sister Barbie, her husband Quinton, and Barbie's two boys Jordan and Jared. Oh, lets not forget Max, Zoe and Roscoe as they moved too. AZ is beautiful and it was most certainly a refreshing place to be. This was the start of a brand new life. A great new adventure in a beautiful place. Jeff had to have one more surgery on his by-pass as the arteries were narrowing. So, shortly after arriving in AZ the surgery was done and we thought we were in the clear and ready to begin this new life. Instead he started having new problems. Jeff started coughing up blood which started the hospitalization all over again. One brilliant dr. released him from the hospital while still coughing up blood, only to have him admitted to another hospital less than a week later. A few days after being admitted this time, Jeff coded and they were having a hard time keeping him breathing so they had to intubate him again. As the day progressed all odds were against him surviving. Family was called and the wait and see began. Jeff was now losing blood as fast as they put it in him, it was draining out. He had an extremely low platlet count and if they had to do surgery he would not have survived. He needed time and the more time that he had before they had to do surgery the better it would be for him. He was kept intubated and the lung Dr's had to put a dual tube down into his lungs so that blood from one lung would not destroy the other lung. Besides being intubated and lung tubes, he also had a feeding tube, heart rate monitors, and all the bells and whistles that could go on a patient. A little over a week after being put on the intubation, surgery was performed. His right lung was stuck to the chest wall. It had to be carefully removed from the chest wall and the lower right lobe of his lung was removed. It appears that this is all a result of the lung punture in Houston. The recovery from this has been very slow going and not without hurdles to jump. A few months ago, Jeff started throwing up blood. He threw up and threw up blood and once again the Chandler Fire Dept. was at my house transporting him to the hospital. Within a few days, he was transported from Gilbert, AZ to Tucson, AZ medical center. He was in Tucson for a little over a month only to be released from there on a Thursday and was admitted back to the hospital in Gilbert exactly one week later with Bronchitis. Currently, Jeff home and is on mega doses of steroids. The steroids are really starting to cause him some problems. He looks like a chipmunk and his face is so swollen it looks like he is about to pop. He feels awful on these steroids and he is doing his best to control his emotions, and angers that the steroids brings out in him. Last night we spent the night and early morning once again in the emergency room. He was sent home and told to call his pulmonary Dr's in the morning to see if they can start tapering him off those steroids. The question remains, if they taper him off the steroids will the hemoraging in the lungs begin again?
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