June 17th

Yesterday we met with Dr. Kelly the Neuro-surgeon. Both Dr. Snowden (the person who would do the next arteriogram) and Dr. Smith (the Dr. who did the last arteriogram) have been out of town. Dr. Kelly thinks after doing more research that it may be better and easier to do a type of radiation therapy instead of the coil they talked about before. He wants to talk to Dr. Snowden on Monday to see what she thinks. If they decide to go that way, we would not need to do another arteriogram. Dr. Kelly says that the risk of doing radiation is less than the risk of doing the coil or glue. He is going to send a CD with Eric's pictures to some Dr.'s at St. Anthony to see if they could do this kind of therapy and what they suggest. The blood in his brain is almost gone and would need to be completely gone to be able to do the radiation. Dr. Kelly well be visiting with us again on Monday.

On another note, they ran some blood tests on Eric because they were confussed on why he has two blood clots at such a young age. What they found was that he has something called Factor V (5 not the letter v) Leiden. This is a gene that you inherit from one of your parents that makes you pron to getting blood clots. They want us to go to OU med or another hospital when we get out and have everyone including Christopher tested since it is genetic. They also want to do genetic counseling with us. Whoever has it may have to go on a blood thinner. Eric cannot go on the medicine until the fistula in his brain is taken care of. The plus note to this is that since he has this, it is what stopped his brain from bleeding. It's funny how things can be bad and a blessing at the same time. Another funny things is that we may be visiting almost every hospital in OKC. So if you need to know what hospital to go to, you can just ask us.

As far as progress goes, Eric is really coming along. He is learning how to get out of bed mostly by himself. He is moving his arm and hand more. He is learning to do a lot of stuff by himself or with little assistance. His spirit is very positive. He even was able to minister to another young man in therapy. The other guy was down about his situation and say that Eric had a positive attitude and was cutting up. Eric and his mom were able to talk to him and be a good influence. God is doing a really good thing there.

It's funny that God can even speak through movies. I was watching one last night and the question was asked "Why do bad things happen to good people and how can you pray to a God that lets things happen?" It is something that I think we can all say we question. It was answered that God's promise to us isn't that he won't let bad things happen. His promise is that he will be there when they do. It's just like having kids. We can't prevent them from falling down and skinning their knee. But we can be there when they do. God is here, even in the bad situations. God promised Joshua, "I will never leave you." That is for us also.