SURPRISES!!!

6:36:00 PM Atticus Army 0 Comments

Hey Army,

Well, we had some special wonderful surprises this afternoon!!! I think the pictures say it all.



 Ryker wanted to play ball with Atticus!


It was so cute, Ryker sat there staring at Atticus, and we asked what was wrong, he said, "I just really want to give him a hug."  It broke our little hearts.


And thank you all for the Goodies!! Atticus Loves all of it.











Also, we just had a meeting with the Chief Neurosurgeon, and we have just been so blessed and feel so great about being here.  Our Atticus is in such great hands, and between this amazing staff, and your prayers I feel he is going to do great on Friday!!!

Keep the prayers coming army!

Day 4

5:31:00 PM Atticus Army 0 Comments

Hey army,

Sorry for the lateness of the post.  Today has been a great day.  There were no procedures that were scheduled so it was a really good day for Atticus to just rest for the upcoming surgery.  We got our sweet boy last night around 8:30 pm after the angiogram, and they had to keep him on a constant drip of sedatives.  It's kind of hard because you have to lay flat for at least 6 hours after that procedure and Atticus is one feisty ginger!!  We were so grateful when 2 am finally came and we were able to hold our little bug again.  It was actually pretty comical because as soon as it hit about 1:45 he all of the sudden sat up and stared at us as if to say," I have been laying still long enough, come get me!" Over all we have been so impressed and grateful for his fighting spirit and are so hopeful it will continue for the long road ahead. 


We were greeted this morning by our medical team that all met and reviewed how he did and spoke with each other, as all of the different departments were present, and to confirm the plan for the day and discuss his case.  I am so grateful for my medical training thus far as I am able to understand what they are talking about and ask appropriate questions.  I am also grateful for such a supportive, caring, and loving wife that is so engaged and puts up with me working on explaining the plans to her. 



Atticus has had a great day, we have been able to get off monitors for a bit and go for a few walks around the track (the ICU loop).  He has had a great time letting us know which hall he wanted to go down next. 






The plan at this point is to let him continue to rest today, he will have to go off of food and drink tonight at some point in preparation for our MRI tomorrow.  They will be performing a stealth MRI as well as an entire CNS system one as well.  The stealth MRI will help to map out the nerves within the brain to better help the surgeons in planning the approach for their surgery.  All of the staff here are so amazed by Atticus and how well he has been doing, which we are so grateful for as it has allowed us time to do these "extra" things to make the surgery that much safer, how hopefully more of a success. 

Day 3 evening.

9:58:00 PM Atticus Army 2 Comments

Hey Army,

This afternoon as we prepared for our sweet boy to head to his angiogram and embolization we couldn't help but feel uneasy and nervous. Once again we had to send him into the trusting hands of a pediatric angiogram specialist as well as a brain embolism specialist.  We held him in our arms, ran our fingers through his hair and kissed his sweet face a thousand times! in these moments we thank our heavenly father for an amazing team up here in Seattle! Even though this situation is very difficult, just knowing the caliber of care Atticus is receiving is so comforting! We know with assurity that Heavenly fathers hand was the leading force to get us here and admitted to this incredible team and hospital.




WE were admitted here with no physicians referral. it was a phone call and sending them his MRI, once they received his MRI they requested that due to the seriousness of his case and size of the tumor we rush immediately here! We know it was not by coincidence that we are here and we know its from all the prayers and fasting on our behalf.

The specialist had come in prior and talked to us about risks of doing this procedure which included stroke and loss of some motor skills. True these things don't normally happen but anytime you are working near the brain there are definitely big risks. For those of you who don't know what it embolism entails, they will use the same catheter system that was in place for the angiogram imaging, and snake a smaller catheter type thing up into the tumor.  They will use real-time imaging to find appropriate vessels that they can place small particles to "block" the vessel and thereby embolizing it and cutting off the blood supply to the supported tissue.

This is a very risky procedure in the brain as with any tumor there are many shared blood vessels and you risk the placed embolism moving further down stream than desired and killing non-tumor associated brain tissue.  This is where the technical skill and expertise comes in from our wonderful staff here.  We had 4 specialists in on this procedure.  One was the Head IR (intervention radiologist) that was an expert in the embolizing of blood vessel's, He had a pediatric angiologist, or an expert in pediatric anatomy on vessels, whose job was to get the IR safely to the tumor in the brain.  We had a pediatric neurologist, whose job was to make sure he could assist the IR through the brain itself safely, and finally a pediatric anesthesia.  It was really amazing to see the care given to our little boy.
 After nearly 6 and a half hours of being at IR for his procedure, they finally brought our baby back to the ICU to us! Oh how incredible that feeling is to see your baby once again. Tears of joy and gratitude were flowing strong! Our hearts are so full tonight and we feel so loved and blessed! We can't hold him for at least 6 hours and he has to be completely flat and still so he is currently on medications to keep him relaxed. I want to just go grab him out of his hospital crib and love on him but not until 1:30 AM.



Caleb and I are just so grateful to have our sweet boy back in our room with us ! We felt so comforted today and at peace during his LONG procedure!! We know it was from all of your prayers, good thoughts, fasting and love! We have an incredible army of support behind us and we are forever grateful to each and everyone of you!  We feel your love and we want you to know we recognize it and your prayers and support is what is carrying us through!  Special thanks to both of our wonderful families that sat through this whole day, kept us company, and help ease our troubled souls while our baby was away from us.

Thank you all for being a part of ATTICUS'S ARMY! WE LOVE YOU! 

Day 3 morning

9:54:00 AM Atticus Army 3 Comments

Hey Army,

Well we survived the night, although we didn't really sleep.  Atticus is currently on fluids and steroids to help with some of the inflammation in his brain.  We met with our team this morning and the plan is that Atticus will receive an Angiogram with possible embolism a little bit later this morning.  If you don't know what that is they will have to sedate him and they will run a catheter, most likely starting the femoral artery, and snake it all the way up to the tumor in his brain.  They can then use that imaging modality to get a better view of the arteries that are supplying the tumor. 

Because Atticus is so small they are very worried about blood loss.  Doing this procedure will help to visualize the vasculature architecture of the tumor in real time and if there are any large vessels they can embolize them so that those vessels can be taken care of prior to surgery, and by doing so have less bleeding during the operation.  Blood loss in a baby this small is of great concern so we are so grateful that they have the means to do these things to help.  One caviot of doing this is that the Atticus has to be very still for close to 6 hours after the angiogram.  I don't know about any of your 20 month olds, but I know our doesn't like to lay very still, expecially in the ICU, so he may have to be on ventilation for up to 6 hours after the proceedure.

Thanks for all your prayers, and for supporting us and Atticus. 

Day 2

5:41:00 AM Atticus Army 1 Comments

Hey Army,

Well as many of you may have known we had a consultation appointment with a neurosurgeon this afternoon in Spokane Washington.  Long story short we are currently at the Seattle Children's Hospital ICU.   Maybe I should jump back a little bit and fill you in.

Our appointment in Spokane did not go well at all. We just really felt that the Doctor was not confident at all in doing the surgery.  After talking with him and discussing his background he only does about 10-15% of pediatric cases.  We did not find this very comforting so we felt that we probably should start looking else where.  We left this appointment very broken and feeling like we had no options.  We spoke with him about Seattle Children's and Primary Children's, and he said that he would try and email Primary Children's tomorrow and see if he could get us a consult.

You may or may not be aware, but you can't just walk into or call a facility like these and be like, "Hey, I need an appointment today"  Typically it takes a little bit, you need a referral, they then have to review your case, then sometime in the future you get an appointment.  However after our super exciting appointment today I frankly was upset and very flustered.  So I immediately called Primary Children's Hospital in Salt lake city.  They, unfortunately, were closed (curse you time zones!!!), and then I called Seattle Children's Hospital.  I was able to speak to a very nice front office lady in the neurosurgery department and she informed me that the doctors have "rounds" on Wednesday where they will go over any newly referred cases and determine the need for each case.  She said that I would need a referral and once they got my records they could submit them to rounds and we could go from there.  This explanation, however reasonable, was not a great option for a frustrated dad coming from an appointment where the Dr literally said, "well if you want me to I can give it a good go..."  I told her that a week just won't work and what had happened earlier that day and that I just wanted someone to at least look at the MRI.

For some miracle of a reason (all of your prayers) she put me on hold and next thing I knew I was speaking with the primary nurse practitioner over the tumor ward!!! YEY progress.  She was WONDERFUL, listened, took our history, I was able to get the MRI directly to her, and she bypassed all the loops and got us an appointment for Wednesday, and she promised they would review our case in their weekly rounds.  Needless to say, we were very happy and felt much better.  We felt that we should still pursue Primary Children's and then we could make our choice as to whichever one felt better.  Alas, it was not meant to be for a short 30 minutes later I got a call from a Radio-Oncologist from Seattle Children's Hospital.  She said that our wonderful nurse that I spoke with stopped her in the parking lot as she was going home and said you need to look at these images.  She informed me that she had already called back to our hospital and got the digital images sent directly to them and she was sitting with the Neurosurgeon going over our case.  WOW

As happy as we were.... it was a little disconcerting that it was happening so fast.  But she was very nice asked a bunch of questions, gathered our history, and she said,"let us keep going over this and I will call you back in about 10 minutes with a plan."  So effectively, somehow, we had now bypassed the required referral, the required rounds, and setting up an actual appointment for a consultation.  

Just as promised she called back and Emmie and I listened carefully as I put her on speaker phone.  The first thing she asked us was where we were, I said we were still in Spokane, and she said.... "well after reviewing your sons MRI, we are really concerned about the placement of the tumor, and the possible entrapment of CSF flow which could lead to encephalitis.  We need you to drive here tonight.  I have already spoken with the ER staff and the on-call neurosurgeon is here with me and we will be waiting for you when you get here."  There are no words to describe the amount of panic, concern, terror, and about every other feeling that immediately flooded through both of us. 

We quickly gathered our things and got in the car and started the 5-hour drive to Seattle, running the gambit of emotions the entire way. But thanks to our wonderful sister and mother for helping with our kiddos, that we just about forgot to tell we were leaving in our whirlwind of emotions and to my wonderful Vet school family for taking care of our furry kiddos as well.   





We arrived at Seattle Children's ER at about midnight, and WOW what a difference from our previous experience 9 short hours ago.  Since being here we have met both pediatric ER doctors, the neurosurgeon, both of our ICU doctors and countless other support staff.  We are currently in the ICU on neurology watch, later this morning between 8 and 10 all the doctors will be in and do their morning "rounds" and I will be able to sit in on them and get the plan for the coming days.  I understand it will entail an angiogram, blood work, possibly more imaging, and surgery later this week. 



It has been a crazy day and as I sit here at 5 am with not an ounce of sleep, somehow I feel a little bit of piece. 
Thank you for being a part of Atticus's Army, your prayers and supports have been felt today

Day 1

9:03:00 PM Atticus Army 4 Comments