Hello Everyone!

Well it's been nearly six months since I filled you in out the latest with Mason. He just continues to amaze us all the time. Comprehension levels keep going up and he's been putting two word phrases more frequently. So much of it is baby steps, but we notice every detail of progress. We just take for granted that the girls continue to progress that we don't notice the details as closely.

Christmas was a blast! NOT! The neat thing was that Mason understood what the gifts were about! In the past we would let him play with his gift beforehand so that he could get excited when he recognized it when he opened it. All the excitement though, increased his seizures a bit, and made him VERY incorrigible!!! Cranky, uncooperative - stressful. All of it was progress, but difficult. That first Monday back to school was Christmas Vacation to me!!! Since then he's been doing a lot better in the behavior department.

I wanted to tell you a bunch of 'Mason stories' today, but I'm kinda thick with a head cold. Got it from Mason! He's a kid that next-to-never gets sick. But last week he did catch a cold and on Tuesday afternoon the fever came on. Then it triggered a status (seizure that doesn't stop) seizure . The seizure ended up lasting 3 hours that night. In him it was mostly staring off with watery eyes and a bit of eye rolling. Status increases body temp, so they feed off each other and that's when we need extra intervention. (The last time he had a fever, nearly 2 years ago, we needed IV fluids to get the temp down when the Tylenol didn't help at all.) It was a hard decision to make, because Mason didn't look like he was having a seizure. I knew the signs, so I had to explain over and over to the ambulance guys, nurses and doctor. I felt so sad for him because he was scared of the ambulance, then of the hospital. Because of his greatly increased level of awareness since surgery, he now gets scared, knows he's scared, and was saying "cared" all the way in. :-( Yet it was really neat to see him able to express his emotions! Bittersweet.

This time Advil worked at the hospital - they give a higher dose than we normally do at home. 15-20 minutes later I saw the "seizure look" on his face just go away. I touched his forehead and it was cool. No IV was needed!!!! That's a whole event that takes 4 people to get done. I called the ambulance around 7:30 and I called Daryl to pick us up at 8:40. Fast!!! There were a couple of people who knew and prayed. :-) I kept sane!!! And Mason was pretty good after a while at the hospital.

What I didn't expect was tears near the surface (me). It was a big flashback to what life used to be like on a daily basis. Not the hospital part, but the ongoing crisis or near-crisis. Always being on edge, watching. Emotions having to be set aside regularly to be able to function to help my baby. How amazing the last year and a half has been to not be dealing with that all the time!!!!

We also now have the Special Needs Bus come to our door!!!! It picks up Mason and Sydney every morning, and drops them off!! I'd been trying to get that for over two years! It's very exciting for Mason and much less stressful for me!

Well, I should try to get to bed earlier than usual today. Get over this cold........


www.masonm.blogspot.com

I also want to say thanks for praying for the people in trouble that I e-mailed about recently.
- Malcolm, my cousin's husband is at home and on the mend. (serious flesh-eating disease) He is able to walk, and they are doing skin grafts to fix that leg which was eaten away. He has been quite overwhelmed that you ( and a couple of other prayer groups) would pray for him!
- Daryl's aunt had surgery for shingles in her eye, but is still at risk to get that in her other eye as well as several other medical conditions flaring up, keeping her in the hospital.

New prayer request:
- I just have to ask this because my heart breaks for this family. The mom was a very close friend to my sister, as well as being our neighbors, growing up - small community - they still keep in touch:

Cailyn just turned 10 years old on Feb. 24.
Friday, Feb 23 Cailyn had a severe stomach ache so they took her to the Hospital. It was discovered that there was a large mass in her abdomen. Surgery was done on Wednesday when the larger than a grapefruit tumor was removed as well as one ovary. The one ovary was completely infected and the tumor was sucked on to a number of different organs but had apparently not infected them. It was also discovered that the tumor had ruptured as well, spilling tumor cells all over the inside of her abdomen. This happened probably at the time of the severe stomach pain the previous Friday or possibly even at the onset of surgery. Not all of the pathology reports are back but yes, this is cancer. It is a relatively rare one called germ cell cancer. Generally this is a very treatable type of cancer although the size of the tumor, the rupturing of the tumor, and even what the final lab tests determine may make it a bigger challenge. Starting tomorrow (Monday) they will be doing tests to determine if the cancer is anywhere else particularly the lungs and bones as that is what this cancer sometimes goes. They meet with the doctors again on Friday and the plan is to start chemo on the following Monday. She will be staying in the hospital for the first 3 weeks of treatment to keep an eye on her as well as help manage pain and nausea.

As for how she is doing now, she did great following the surgery and there was talk of letting her out of the hospital for a few days. That changed on Saturday when she ended up with a high fever and vomiting. Saturday was a rough day for her.

The family will be getting a family picture taken this week. After that, sometime on the weekend, they plan on buzz cutting her hair. They were told that is a lot less traumatic than having big chunks of it fall off and that will probably happen within the first 2-3 days of the start of the chemo.

Shirley

2 Corinthians 1:3,4 Message: All praise to the God and Father of our Master, Jesus the Messiah! Father of all mercy! God of all healing counsel! He comes alongside us when we go through hard times, and before you know it, he brings us alongside someone else who is going through hard times so that we can be there for that person just as God was there for us.