6/19/11

Hey all...

So we have some good news, and some bad. The good news is we're receiving answers! Yesterday those answers weren't thrilling, but they were answers... and had us coming home the end of this week. However we received MORE answers today which will definitely delay that process.

John's working kidney (the one that came from BJ) is no longer working. It has a decent amount of "scarring" which is irreverible damage. It needs to be removed because once the kidney goes bad it does more damage to the body. This was Friday -- we didn't share because BJ was driving up and didn't want that to be on his mind on the drive. Then Saturday the Dr.'s had more results... there was a clot in the kidney. This could have happened for multiple reasons. They want to take the kidney out and section it in order to do a full biopsy and figue out what happened to the kidney. The longer they leave it in his body, the more it dies and the less use it is to him. Once it is removed he is permanently on dialysis. This changes only if he can get another transplant. However the insurance needs to approve that. Which is why the biopsy is ooooo important because it will show whether what happened is something John's body will do again, or because of a virus. (One option is that he had a virus at first and his body created antibodies to fight it off... those antibodies recognized his kidney as foreign and began fighting that). IF that was the case, he could get another one potentially.
So that was the end of yesterday and with that they were planning on taking the kidney out ASAP which would be tomorrow, monday morning.

However, today we received some more news... There is a fungal infection in his lungs. He can't breath on his own. They cannot take him off the ventilator (which needs to happen for the surgery) Also, if they were to open him up with this infection it would be life threatening. Therefore we most likely will not be coming home this week. However they are trying to treat it as fast as possible because time is of the essence when it comes to removing this kidney.

So allow me to share another john john story from a previous hospital visit. His mom, the nurses and doctors, bj and I (us more as observers) were having a conversation in his room. And john was having a rough night... He raised his hand and said can I say something. And he said I feel like this is when I play my video game (i can't remember which one he said...) and I'm doing so good and I think I'm at the end of the level and a secret door opens, and It's like starting all over. Do you understand my metaphore. -- NO JOKE! and one of the nurses said... noooo? And John frustrated that she didn't get it said Everytime we feel like were at the end, like we have an answer, it's like starting all over.

That just made us all stop in our tracks. And mannn that is what I feel like today. They told us we were going home soon... and now we don't know. But pray for John. What's going on in his lungs is very serious for someone on so many immunosuppresent (sp?) medicines.

Thanks for all your support!