Life Interrupted
Something has come to rock our lives in a big way. Unfortunately, this is not happy news by any means. I will attempt to foreshadow what our life was like before twins. Here is the beginning. Ryan, my husband, was 17 when he suffered a concussion playing football with friends 8 years ago. This concussion led to the discovery of a tumor on the frontal right lobe of Ryan's brain. This tumor is called an oligodendroglioma. No one knows when this tumor started to grow, likely in adolescence, but it was by God's grace it was found. None of us would have known it's existence otherwise.
Ryan did not have any obvious side effects and continued with routine MRI follow ups. Unfortunately, the tumor started to grow after we got engaged in 2009. The growth led to the need for brain surgery. His first brain surgery took place in January of 2010, six months before we said "I do." Not all of the tumor was removed. That brings us to now.
I've been very lighthearted in my previous posts but, after Ryan's surgery, our marriage struggled greatly. There have been many substantial personality changes in Ryan, but we both thought he was just being a 24 year old guy with an overwhelming amount of new responsibilities on his plate. That is until this December 1st.
We were getting ready for church the way we always do. Ryan paused told me he was dizzy as I was bathing the boys. I heard a loud crash behind me and saw Ryan had fallen and was grand mal seizing on the floor in front of all of us. I can't describe what it was like watching my worst nightmare unfold right in front of me. I waited for the seizure to end, hoping Ryan would regain consciousness. He didn't. His breathing stopped and so did his heart. I watched every bit of life leave my husbands body. In my shock, I managed to perform CPR on Ryan in front of our screaming children. But God was good! He breathed life back into Ryan and the paramedics took him to the hospital.
Ryan has had a CT scan and an MRI and we have met with his neurologist and neurosurgeon since. Here is the simple consensus. Ryan is now having absent seizures on a regular basis. He is experiencing weakness on his left side, specifically in his hand and his leg. Short term memory, focus, and irritability are issues as well. These are all side effects indicating that the tumor has been changing for a long time. Now knowing what to look for, it's incredibly difficult to see the glaring truth of its progression, especially for Ryan himself.
Ryan will be undergoing a second brain surgery after the first of the year to remove as much of the tumor as possible. The head surgeon at University Hospital will be operating on Ryan because of the technicality of the tumors' location (it's near a large artery and crucial control centers). Surgery will alleviate some symptoms, but not others given that a large portion of the tumor is inoperable. The surgeon suspects the tumor is at stage III and that the chromosomal deletions have mutated into something more aggressive with the probability of anaplastic cells. Chemotherapy and radiation are imminent.
Life has taken quite the turn in a very short amount of time, although life leading up to this point has quite honestly been a living hell. Now we have an explanation. We are clinging to His grace and goodness, and have a peace about the outcome that is beyond understanding, despite hearing all we haven't wanted to hear. We have enough manna for one day at a time, that is all we need.
Ryan did not have any obvious side effects and continued with routine MRI follow ups. Unfortunately, the tumor started to grow after we got engaged in 2009. The growth led to the need for brain surgery. His first brain surgery took place in January of 2010, six months before we said "I do." Not all of the tumor was removed. That brings us to now.
I've been very lighthearted in my previous posts but, after Ryan's surgery, our marriage struggled greatly. There have been many substantial personality changes in Ryan, but we both thought he was just being a 24 year old guy with an overwhelming amount of new responsibilities on his plate. That is until this December 1st.
We were getting ready for church the way we always do. Ryan paused told me he was dizzy as I was bathing the boys. I heard a loud crash behind me and saw Ryan had fallen and was grand mal seizing on the floor in front of all of us. I can't describe what it was like watching my worst nightmare unfold right in front of me. I waited for the seizure to end, hoping Ryan would regain consciousness. He didn't. His breathing stopped and so did his heart. I watched every bit of life leave my husbands body. In my shock, I managed to perform CPR on Ryan in front of our screaming children. But God was good! He breathed life back into Ryan and the paramedics took him to the hospital.
Ryan has had a CT scan and an MRI and we have met with his neurologist and neurosurgeon since. Here is the simple consensus. Ryan is now having absent seizures on a regular basis. He is experiencing weakness on his left side, specifically in his hand and his leg. Short term memory, focus, and irritability are issues as well. These are all side effects indicating that the tumor has been changing for a long time. Now knowing what to look for, it's incredibly difficult to see the glaring truth of its progression, especially for Ryan himself.
Ryan will be undergoing a second brain surgery after the first of the year to remove as much of the tumor as possible. The head surgeon at University Hospital will be operating on Ryan because of the technicality of the tumors' location (it's near a large artery and crucial control centers). Surgery will alleviate some symptoms, but not others given that a large portion of the tumor is inoperable. The surgeon suspects the tumor is at stage III and that the chromosomal deletions have mutated into something more aggressive with the probability of anaplastic cells. Chemotherapy and radiation are imminent.
Life has taken quite the turn in a very short amount of time, although life leading up to this point has quite honestly been a living hell. Now we have an explanation. We are clinging to His grace and goodness, and have a peace about the outcome that is beyond understanding, despite hearing all we haven't wanted to hear. We have enough manna for one day at a time, that is all we need.
Copyright 2013 ->Renee Sunberg
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