Catching Up

Happy New Year everyone. Sorry I've been MIA for so long but I am starting to make my way back into the land of the living. Lots has happened around here since I started taking those little white pills...and good thing I was taking them because I don't think I would have coped had I not.

Just before Christmas we had to put our old dog Miss Molly down...it was time (she was nearly 19 years old) but it was not an easy decission and it broke our hearts to do it. She could barely walk and wasn't eating and it was cruel to see her go on like this. We sold all of our puppies...they were super cute and so full of energy...but we couldn't keep them.

We spent 10 days with them and my parents over Christmas...Christmas Day saw DH, Lolly and I spend 8 hours at the Royal Melbourne Childrens Hospital. In between opening presents and having breakfast, Lolly had a massive seizure. The doctors at the hospital spent the whole time monitoring her but nothing else was done as we were only there for a few days. We caught up with our doctor as soon as we got home and he sent us off for an EEG.

Lauren went for her EEG and we received a phone call from the doctor that did it requesting that she return for a follow up EEG that requires her to have not only fasted for 12 hours prior but also to be sleep deprived for those 12 hours. After a visit to her doctor and finding out that yes there is definite seizure activity happening in her brain we had a CT scan done and a whole mess of blood taken. The CT and the blood tests were clear...ruling out some potentially scary stuff. Thank God!

So off we go for the second EEG....We hadn't long left the neurologists and hit McDonalds when Lolly started having another seizure. I took her straight back to the neurologists and as we were pulling into their driveway it got really bad...again she stopped breathing on me...but luckily there were 3 doctors there to help. They took her straight back in and gave her another EEG which was beneficial in locating exactly where in the brain they are occouring. She came out of the seizure and straight into a very, very deep sleep....she slept 3 hours and came to with a major headache.

We left there with a referal for an MRI and a script for anti seizure medication. Our doctor refered her to a pediatrician and he really got the ball rolling on getting a diagnosis.

Well after two MRI/MRA's ...a few blood tests and quite a few more doctors visits we finally have a diagnosis. I'm still reeling and we aren't sure if it's good news or bad news....so for now it's just news. Lolly is having epileptic seizures, but they are symptomatic. It seems that sometime during her time in the womb, Lolly has suffered from perinatal hypoxaemia. This is where the blood flow to the brain is blocked or ceased. This has caused a small portion of her brain (the post gyral region of the right parietal lobe to be exact) to atrpohy or die. She has an area of scarring on her brain that is now causing all these problems. The doctors are amazed that she has never had a seizure before...but it does explain her learning difficulties and possibly her history of migraines. What we do know is that it will eventually get worse..the seizures will increase and when this happens she will require surgery to remove the area of her brain causing the problems. So what do we do until then? There isn't much we can do now...other than to continue on with the drugs and to change her lifestyle to reduce the seizure threshold.

In between all this the girls went back to school...Lolly off to the big wide world of high school...and Boo moved up into the middle stages of primary school. They have both settled in wonderfully and have had fun catching up with old friends and making new ones.

I'm back at work...but with the drop in numbers at our school it also meant a cut in hours. I am looking at doing some scrapbook teaching at one of the LSS. My scrapping mojo is back with a vengence and I have scrapped about 40 layouts already so far this year. (I'll update the slide show up the top there)

My baby Boo...well she's no longer really a baby...she turned 9 last week!!! NINE!!! It seems like only yesterday that we were bringing her home from the hospital!

Ok...so this post is a little long winded, so I'll shut it for now. I'll be back later with more.