Secrets

My infant niece had her MRI today.  There were 5 possible diagnoses going in to this, all of them serious.  The most likely was extremely rare and had numerous complications and a potential for cancerous growth.  In some ways I was hoping for a mild form of spina bifida (it was the 2nd most serious type of 3 but the location would have made it minor).  The final 2 options were unspeakably awful.

It is the first one.  I am not going to follow my usual policy of openness here because it is so rare that I'd get a hit from my family.  It's one of those things that surgeons see a few times in a career.  But, and this is a huge but, hers is relatively small and is not tangled with her spinal cord.  It still must come out and there's still a small chance of malignancy (they seem to think it's fine after the MRI) and she'll have mild ongoing health issues for the rest of her life but not of the sort we were afraid of initially.

The surgeons offered to do the procedure tomorrow but after talking to them further they decided to go home, rest, let her recover from the anesthesia today and surgery will happen soon.  They probably know more details but a text message only says so much and they had a long, hard, emotional day after being up with a hungry and crying baby most of the night.  (She wasn't allowed to eat for 5 hours before getting to the hospital).  This also lets them be the ones to explain to Anne what is happening to her baby and that's good.  Anne also could use  a little contact with Mama and Daddy.  Everything happening so fast after the baby was born has been a little overwhelming for everyone and especially her, and the baby's surgery will be even more difficult.  I hope she's back here so we can take care of her again.  With 2 of us we do pretty well even if she is difficult which she really hasn't been this time.  (Just pre-schooler independence stuff combined with stress).

So pretty much, new baby, scary but seeming to be on the right end of the good-bad scale tumor, too much stress and Aunt Jen can't sleep.  Dr. Brain said she'd get back to me about meds for anxiety and I think she forgot.  I am afraid to just take something because I don't wnat to be knocked out tomorrow.

I am just so thankful that none of the really bad complications is there.  This is something that usually progresses in the fetus and by birth is really bad so she has been very fortunate to have a small enough tumor that it wasn't even picked up on ultrasound.

Ongoing prayers are still appreciated,

Jen