Funny Little Man

Bethany said she wanted pictures of something other than Lincoln with his head wrapped up so I finally got around to finding some.

Josh's cousin Tom got married a week ago so here is our happy little (not so little me) family at the wedding!

This is our cute little man in the tub with a mohawk & cheesy grin.

Lincoln has been doing well. He has had a few seizures in the last couple of weeks, but nothing compared to what we were experiencing before. Plus most of them have been after he had been deprived of some sleep and they have told us that sleep deprivation can make him more susceptible to seizures. We haven't adjusted the medicine since we were at the Mayo for his follow-up visit on the 27th of November. We see his doctor here on Tuesday so we'll see if she thinks we should increase again or not. We are hoping to be able to get him transitioned into his new bed soon so that we are all ready for when the baby comes. He has been in our bed at night since the seizures started in October because we did not feel safe leaving him by himself and also for a while we had to write down every seizure. But now that he is not having them every night we feel better about putting him in his big boy bed.

He is back to his crazy self. He loves to run laps around the kitchen/living/dining room area with someone chasing him. His new favorite thing to do on the bed and/or couch is to jump up in the air, land on his bum and then see where he rolls to (makes Mommy slightly nervous). He is also climbing on everything whether he should or shouldn't. So for the most part we feel like we have our little boy back and it makes us very happy.

Good News...

Lincoln has not had a seizure since 9:30 on Saturday morning-that's 60 hours without a seizure!!! Life is getting back to "normal". Unless something changes this means that both medications are finally at the correct dosage. His body also seems to be accustomed to these doses as far as side effects. He is not dizzy, wobbly or tired anymore. He's playing just like he did a couple of months ago. We have the follow-up visit at the Mayo next Tuesday. They expect to have all of the test results back by then so that they can review them with us.


The "official" diagnosis is that Lincoln has Epilepsy with no known cause. According to the literature that we have read & what Lincoln's doctor has said the definition of epilepsy is someone who has had two or more seizures. Lincoln is definitely in the "more" category of that. We don't treat the situation any differently just because there is a name for what he has it just gives it a name. There is still the possibility that he will outgrow them someday and so that is what we keep on praying for. He will have to be on the medication for 2 years. At that point if he has not had any seizures we can start trying to take him off of the medication. If as we take him off of it the seizures come back we will have to continue with medication. But if we take him off the medication and the seizures don't continue then they would consider him seizure free. So hopefully before he goes to Kindergarten he will be seizure free without medication.


Thank you to everyone for your continued prayers & well wishes. We couldn't have made it through all of this without all of you.

Pictures & an Update

This might be the saddest picture ever-this was what poor Lincoln looked like for 24 hours while they did the EEG testing. He was not a fan of the gauze under his chin. The electrodes had to be glued to his head and we are still trying to get the glue out. As sad as we were there were times he would say the funniest things & Josh & I would burst out laughing because of how crazy he looked.
Lincoln has to take two medicines. One of them he takes 4 times a day and he likes it. The other one is a different story. He takes it two times a day and he does not like it and he tells us that every time we get that one out. This is the face that he makes as he says "I no like that medicine".



We are starting to see glimpses of our crazy little man since we've been home and it makes Josh & I so happy to see the difference. He is still making it through most of the night without any. During the day it is hit and miss. Sometimes they are still 10-15 minutes apart, but other times he will go an hour or two without one. They increased the medicine that he likes starting today so hopefully that will make them decrease even more. It is still hard & frustrating at times, but at least it is getting a little bit better. We are just stuck in a waiting pattern for the medicine to work. We appreciate everyone's continued prayers.

We put a few other posts below that we intended to get out there before our lives were turned upside down so keep on reading....

Pictures of our Sweet Boy

One of Lincoln's favorite things to do is to stand at the couch, make Josh stand back about 6 feet & then he runs full speed at him and tackles him. Of course we have not let him play this game for the last couple of weeks. But the best part of the game is that this is the face he makes every time and he also always puts his arms straight out behind him. We're not sure if he thinks it gives him extra speed or what.Lincoln was Yoda from Star Wars for Halloween. Much to Josh's dismay when I first put the costume on Lincoln he thought he was a butterfly! We think he was the cutest Yoda ever.

6 Months Down 3 to Go

These were taken on October 23rd-so exactly 3 months before my due date. For those of you who are looking-yes, that is my belly button sticking out! Also, I had a check up on Friday morning & the baby's heartbeat was strong & great. That made this pregnant lady breathe a little bit easier.

Heidi's Birthday

Before the craziness with Lincoln really kicked in I was happy to be a part of a totally different kind of craziness! My Dad, Mom & I went up in Calgary the first weekend in October to celebrate my bestest sister ever Heidi's 40th Birthday! The theme of the night was 80's and as you can see we totally rocked that look. Happy Birthday Big Sister!

We are home!

We just got home a little bit ago-big sigh of relief. We didn't get leaving as early as we wanted this morning because trying to get a urine sample from a 2 year old is not easy. Needless to say we gave up & are going to do it in Fargo & have it sent there because Lincoln was very hungry and we didn't want to get him too far off of his medication schedule.


The trip home was not so fun. On Monday night I did not feel too good and of course since I was sleeping in Lincoln's bed with him he ended up getting it...today in the car. So the car could use an air freshener to get rid of the vomit smell-not so pleasant. We had pulled over in Albertville so we could take his temperature and ended up sitting in a parking lot there for a while waiting to make sure he wasn't going to keep throwing up. Not that there was much in his system to throw up since he couldn't eat breakfast & by the time we could feed him he was starting to feel icky. We decided to stop at my Dad & Mom's because the pregnant lady had to go to the bathroom. Lincoln threw up right before we pulled up to their house. As soon as Josh carried him inside he said he wanted to "play with the balls"-he knows exactly where they are at Grandma's house. We had been trying to get him to eat something & he kept on telling us that he didn't like anything that we offered him. However, as soon as Grandpa offered him some crackers he was more than happy to eat. So he finally ate and we could slowly see the color returning to his skin & the sparkle coming back in his eyes. He played for a little bit at Grandpa & Grandma's (including asking Grandpa to do the cuckoo clock) and after that the drive went much better. Usually the drive from Fergus to Fargo seems to take forever, but tonight it seemed to fly by. Thank you for Grandpa & Grandma's!


Lincoln is very happy to be home playing with his toys again. We have a check up with the neurologist here next Tuesday. Until then we just keep an eye on him and hope & pray that the medicine continues to help the seizures improve.

We are being released from the hospital!!!

We had a great night last night. Between 9:30 last night & 6:30 this morning Lincoln only had one seizure-YEAH! From 6:30 -9:30 they were about every 15 minutes. Since 9:30 they have been one per hour. The fact that he had such a great night they said was a great sign. They increased one of his medications today (they said they can still increase both medications quite a bit, but they want to increase them slowly). We are waiting for all of the discharge papers and then we will be able to leave the hospital-YEAH! We are going to be staying with some friends of ours tonight here in Rochester. Tomorrow morning he has to have one more blood draw & they want to take a urine sample and then we will be able to go home-BIG YEAH! All of the tests that have come back so far have been good. A couple of the things that they were testing with the lumbar puncture take two weeks to get results from. Hopefully those tests all come back as good as the rest of the tests have. We have to come back here in three weeks for a consult with one of the doctors. By then they will be able to review all of the tests with us. Other than that we should not have to come back & visit here. We will do all follow up with Lincoln's Neurologist in Fargo. They are going to call her today to review everything with her and we have an appointment with her next Tuesday.

His back is a little bit sore today from the lumbar puncture yesterday, but they gave him Motrin so he seems to be doing a little bit better now.

It may take a while for the medication to get to the right dosage to get to the point where he isn't having any seizures at all. But we feel like we are on the right track and at least we know that they have ruled out anything serious. The doctors said that there are times that they are not able to find out what exactly causes the seizures. That part kind of stinks, but as long as there isn't something seriously wrong with him we are okay with not knowing the exact cause for the seizures. The doctors & nurses here have been great at answering all of our questions-we feel like we received top notch care while we were here.

Now we go home & hope that we can see our little boy return to his crazy self sooner than later. We'll keep you posted on how he is doing. Once again we want to thank everyone for all of your prayers, support, encouragement & well wishes. All of it has helped get us through this trying time.

An Answer to Prayers

Lincoln got back up in the room at about 4:00 this afternoon. They put him under general anesthesia (laughing gas) to do all of the tests. They had told us prior to the lumbar puncture that they sometimes have to poke them in a few different spots in order to get fluid out of the spine. But thankfully they only had to poke Lincoln once to get what they needed. Since he has been back up in the room he has been quite groggy and therefore content to lay in bed & watch movies. They had told us that is what he would need to do after the lumbar puncture to make sure everything healed properly and that the side effects would be minimal. That is an answer to prayer that we have been able to keep our two year old confined to a bed for two days without much of a fight! He had quite the appetite when he got back up here because he was not allowed to eat or drink anything since he woke up this morning. He even ate some of Daddy's supper. They were in a few hours ago to tell us that the results from the MRI & MRS were "impeccable"-his brain looks great. So far, so good. The results from the lumbar puncture may be back tomorrow, but they may also take a few days. As they rule out serious things or other things that may be the cause for the seizures they keep on monitoring his medication and the frequency of the seizures. They are still averaging about 15 minutes apart. He will not be released until the frequency diminishes so we are still here for a couple more days unless they suddenly decrease. As far as we are aware they are done with testing so now we just play the waiting game for the medication to do what it is supposed to do.

Thank you to everyone for your thoughts, prayers & well wishes for us. We appreciate all of it. We'll keep you posted.

For those of you who have expressed concern for the baby that is growing inside of me - the baby is still kicking me like crazy so he/she must be still doing great.

Monday Morning Update

They will be coming to get Lincoln in a few minutes for a MRI, MRS & a lumbar puncture. They want to do a more thorough & detailed MRI than he had before. The MRS is done on the same machine, but looks for different things. The lumbar puncture is to check for things that they cannot check for by drawing blood. He will be sedated for all of the procedures. We had a better night last night. He did not have any from 11-1, from 1-5:15 he had very few, but since 5:15 he has been averaging about one every 15 minutes. But at least we were all able to get a few hours of sleep. Their main concern is still to get the medications balanced correctly so that the seizures stop. However, they also want to try to figure out what is causing them so that is the reason for the additional tests. They are here for the tests so I will post more later.

Sunday's Update

We had a rough night last night. From 10:30-1:00 he was having them every 1/2 hour, but after that they were averaging 10 minutes apart. So none of us are rested this morning-and that extra hour of supposed sleep did not work in our favor. They took the electrodes off about 1/2 hour ago so now he will be able to go to the play room and at least leave his bed. They got 24 hours of surveillance so hopefully it helps them figure out what is going on with our sweet little man. They have been able to tell that all of the seizures originate in one section of his brain. That is a good sign that they are not spreading. He is still on the same two medications, but last night they increased the one by 50%. Since that did not decrease the seizures enough they are going to increase it by another 50% and they are also going to double the other medication that he is on. They are going to keep him in here until at least tomorrow to monitor how the increased medication works. So we keep on taking it one day at a time. I don't know how many more tears all of us can shed so we are praying that he gets better quickly.

Update

We are at the St Mary's Hospital unit of Mayo Clinic. We got here last night at about 6:30. He had a seizure outside on the sidewalk so now the poor little guy has a scraped up chin & nose. He is still having a seizure about every 15 minutes. We've met with a whole bunch of doctors and so far Lincoln has been a good sport-especially considering how many times he has been poked & prodded. At 11:00 this morning they hooked electrodes up to his head and then wrapped his head in gauze. We then came back to the room & they hooked him up to an EEG monitoring system. We have to keep him in the room because part of the process is to video him. He will have this video/constant EEG at least through the night tonight. They have not determined yet what other tests they mights run-they are waiting to see the results of this EEG monitoring & also are waiting for his MRI films from MeritCare in Fargo. We are here until sometime tomorrow for sure, but may be here longer. They are keeping him on the same doses of the same medicines for now. We'll try to keep you updated on our blog tomorrow if we find out anything more. We appreciate everyones prayers.

On our way to the Mayo Clinic

Yesterday was a bad day. 26 Seizures, max of one medicine, double the dose of another & a dose of Valium. As of 12:15 today he has had at least 10 so his doctor at MeritCare has referred us to the Mayo Clinic. We'll keep you posted-please keep us in your prayers.

Not so fun times for Lincoln

This picture makes us laugh every time we look at it, but it also shows how we have been feeling at our house for the last little while. We have been through an emotional roller coaster with Lincoln since the end of August, but the last 2 weeks have been especially hard on all of us. Lincoln has had an MRI, MRA, 2 EEG's & lots of bloodwork. Needless to say he is not a big fan of doctors, nurses or hospitals right now. We found out last Thursday that he is having partial focal seizures. They are "mild", but still quite scary for us to witness. He loses muscle control in his left arm & left leg during the seizures, but luckily he remains conscious during each one. So far they have only caused a couple of bruises which we are very thankful for. It is hard to keep a 2 year old boy who is usually very active somewhat contained. We can't let him climb things (including stairs) by himself right now because when he has a seizure he falls so it could be quite dangerous if we aren't right there to catch him when he falls. He had the first two seizures in August. We went the whole month of September without one. October has been the worst. He has had at least one per day since October 10th, but has also had as many as 10 per day. Josh put it best when he said, "I don't know how many more times in one day I can watch my son face plant." He started medication last Thursday, but it can take awhile for the medicine to work so we are not so patiently waiting for that. We don't know what it causing them or if there is anything specific that is causing them. Some kids that get them at a young age outgrow them, so we are praying that that will be the case for Lincoln too. Fpr those of you who have healthy kids don't let one day go by when you take that for granted. The worst thing is to watch your child suffer and not be able to do anything to help them. We also would appreciate prayers from everyone. Pray for strength for Josh & I to get through every day. But mostly pray for Lincoln. Pray that he doesn't get injured as a result of any of the seizures. Pray that this medication works and that it starts decreasing the frequency so that he can go back to being his wild, crazy, active self. We never thought we would miss seeing him climb everything and run everywhere at top speed!

2 Years Old!

We had Lincoln's birthday party on his birthday. There were 28 people here & 11 were 7 and under!

This is the face Lincoln makes when we ask him to smile for us. He opened his presents from Josh & I the night before his birthday.


He helped Daddy put together his new picnic table from IKEA.

One of his favorite new toys is his train set from Uncle Gary, Auntie Heidi, Kayla & Austin. After everyone left on his birthday he played with it for at least an hour.

Josh didn't get a picture of him eating his cake the "real" way. He tried using his fork, he tried picking it up with his hands. None of those methods seemed to work for him. So instead he left the piece on his tray, looked at us & smiled and stuck his face in the piece of cake and took a bite out of it! After the first "bite" that way, he looked at Josh & me and said "I not funny". And that is the way he ate the whole piece. Needless to say, he was a big mess.

Last year we did a baseball cake so this year we thought we'd try football. Thanks to both Grandma's for their help frosting this craziness.

Zoo

We went to the zoo in Wahpeton on Labor Day. Lincoln thought the monkey's were funny, but his favorite part of the day was feeding the ducks, goats & donkeys. I guess we could have just gone to a farm instead!

Prego!

Lincoln is going to have a baby brother or sister! The due date is January 26, 2008. We're going to drive you all nuts again this time by not finding out until he or she comes out. So these pictures of me at 16 weeks-the first sign of showing.

At the Park

Lincoln loves to go to the park that is down the street from our house. He usually wants to walk there by himself, so it was rare that he actually wanted to ride in his wagon. He loves to climb up everything that he can whether it is something you are supposed to climb up or not.

Catchin' Up

I am in trouble with my dear niece Kayla. She says it has been two months and that is far too long to not see any updated pictures of Lincoln. So here is what he has been up to for the last two months. Enjoy!

This was right after a hair cut. He likes his hair to be "spikey"!














At Kailyn's birthday party he got his first experience on a trampoline. He loved it because he loves to jump! Now he thinks he can jump on and off of anything!



He loved being able to lick all of the frosting off. Needless to say his face was blue after he was all done. He didn't want to eat the cupcake, but he did want more cupcake just to be able to eat the frosting.

Lincoln is definitely a water baby. I tried getting one of the video images on here, but I couldn't get it to work so I'll have to have Josh try it sometime instead. He loves to "dunk it hoop" and jumping in the pool (he has no fear)!

He got his own miniature golf clubs and he actually has a pretty good shot. But could he look any more like his Dad in these pictures?!?!?!?


Lincoln loves coffee. We do limit his intake, however, one day I had set the end of my coffee on the desk and went upstairs. Josh didn't realize where my cup was so Lincoln quietly helped himself. This is what I found when I came downstairs. Good thing it wasn't nap time!



When spaghetti is on the menu for dinner all of the clothes come off and he goes right in the bath when he is done eating.

He loves his sunglasses, but he needs to grow a little bit more so he can see over the steering wheel before he is ready to drive.

Waterpark Fun

The weekend after we got back from Calgary we went with my friend Amy & her family and Duane & Keith's families to a waterpark in Alexandria, Minnesota. They had a few water slides and a lot of other fun things for the kids.




All of the girls cuddled up on the couch on Sunday morning waiting for brunch.
Miah, Madeline, Kailyn, Halle & Alissa.


Lincoln is definitely a water baby! He wanted to keep on going down the slides (even when his lips were turning blue!)




Madeline & Kailyn (both already almost 7)



Alissa (3)













After we got packed up on Sunday we headed to Fergus Falls to Grandpa & Grandma's for Grandpa's 72nd Birthday! It's too bad we can't crop Kayla & Austin into the picture too!

Trip to Calgary

It was so much fun to spend a week with my sister Heidi, her husband Gary & their kids Kayla & Austin. The three of us girls spent a few days out shopping so it was a trip well worth it. Thanks so much for letting us stay! We can't wait to see you again!

The first night we were there Gary took Josh to his first professional hockey game. However, Josh wasn't very good luck when we were there because the Flames lost every game while we were in town. Austin has a full drum set & Kayla has an electric guitar...needless to say Lincoln thought it was the greatest place he had ever been to! Josh said Lincoln needs one now, but I said only if we build a sound proof room! Lincoln had fun tackling someone other than Daddy.

Kayla showed him all of her best dance moves. Most of them made him giggle, but I think she is an excellent dancer. I got to see my two girls Mary & Robynne. One night it was just the three of us, one morning Josh, Lincoln & I went out for breakfast with Mary's family, and one night Josh & Geoff joined us girls. It was so fun to see all of you.
On Easter Sunday, Kayla & Austin stuffed eggs (they even color coordinated the candy to match the egg!). They did an awesome job of hiding them and helping Lincoln find them. We wish we lived closer to them so we could see them more & Lincoln could play with them more often. In the picture below, Lincoln went to put his egg in the basket and it burst open. His eyes got as big as saucers when he realized that there was candy inside of the eggs!