November 2008 Archieve

November 19
Thanks for asking about our story...

*REPOST*RECAP*WITH NEW UPDATES*
First of all, thank you for being here. If you are here that means that you may want to become a part of the story that God is weaving us into, and we welcome that. I decided to start this blog because of the everyday life with 5 kids...we now continue to blog about them, but I also use this to vent through my journey. We are humbled and overwhelmed by the number of you who have contacted us, wishing us well, praying for us, bringing dinners on our behalf. What we are realizing, though, is that we are not able to keep everyone informed the way that we would like to. We are simply too tired, too overwhelmed and sometimes too sad to tell it over and over. This seemed like the best way to involve many of you who we love and need right now, and to update you as far as what is going on and how you can be in prayer for us. AS STATED BEFORE WE ARE NOT SEEKING ANYTHING FROM ANYONE, BUT WE DO BELIEVE IN THE POWER OF PRAYER AND THE MORE BEING SENT UP FOR US, THE MORE GRATEFUL WE ARE. There is a possibility that Brian and I will both be facing surgery at the beginning of the new year. Me, of course to have the tumor removed (still praying for medicaion therapy to help with the seizures) - and Brian of course, to have his left ring finger amputated.

It seems every few months I need to catch everyone up...I get new readers, friends of friends, etc. So if you know us already feel free to skip this post, if you would like to share our story - keep reading. Moments ago, I recieved an e-mail from an anyomous blog follower asking for our WHOLE story! SO, continue on to get a glimpse of our life. I've also updated along the way.
Hello and thank-you for landing on our family blog: I'm a 31 year old mother of 5 amazing children. My husband Brian and I have been married for 10+ years. We met shortly after he returned home from the Marine Corp - where he suffered a broken hip, pelvis, and multiple stress fractures to his feet.
Today, our children are Kennedy 9, Dawson 7, Cole 6, Aleigha 3, and Blake 2. Their energy keeps us on our toes. In Feb of 2007, I began working at Spectrum Health. Life was hectic, but fun. I loved my job, and our bills were being paid. 2 incomes made all the difference.

God's plan for us changed on December 8, 2007. After punching into work, I went to sit in the break room and began reviewing medical charts. I remember starting to feel very tired, and can recall nothing again until December 20. After spending several days in the Intensive Care Unit, I was moved to a step-down unit. It was than that my friends and family began telling me what was happening. I was having over 50 unexplained seizures a day. They were initially treating me like a stroke patient. In ICU my initial prognosis was bad, I could not even share a nurse. I had a nurse with me for constant care/monitoring. While my husband was juggling 5 kids, his job, our bills - he was trying to stay with me as much as possible. I was than transferred to St. Mary's Hospital, because they have an entire floor dedicated to seizure patients. Several more tests, several additional hospital stays and we were told that I had a small tumor on the pituitary gland. Treatment started with Radiation, during that time my tumor unfortunately grew :( I have now seen 3 Neurologists and one Nero Surgeon. Dr. Tanner (St. Mary's Epilepsy Clinic) Dr. Newman (Neurological Hospital intensivist), Dr. Varda (Neurological Associates) and Dr. Sullivan (U of M Neurosurgeon). As of today, I still suffer from 2-6 seizures a month. Following each seizure are days of confusion, blurred vision, terrible headaches and many days of sleeping through the postictal state. In a perfect World, I would simply have my tumor removed. The location creates a problem, this tumor is located on my Pituatory Gland - which is pressing on my optical nerve. The risk of blindness and complications of the surgery are the biggest threat. If this was a life/death situation they would have removed it months ago...My situation at this point is life altering, not like threating. (thank goodness!) My seizure medication was just increased, again (10/08) a 3rd anti-seizure medication was also just added to help with these break through seizures. My future options are to continue with medicine therapy and hope that we stumble upon the right dose, have the tumor removed and well at this point that is about it. I'm still unable to return to work. I was recently diagnosed wtih a Cognitive disorder which strongly affects my memory, most likely due to the medications that I take.

My first day of radiation was late February. The same day, I tore my ACL in my knee. Requiring extensive knee reconstructive surgery. The surgery was performed in April. I have recovered VERY well from this surgery!!

There have been times, MANY times in fact..when I thought that going through all this crap wasn't worth it. I know how that sounds. But it is true. What has gotten us through this has been the support of family, friends, neighbors, church and COMPLETE strangers offering to help. With a family of 7, on one income, we have had to swallow our pride several times and humbly except help from family, friends and strangers alike. I was told by my Dr. to apply for Social Security, which in July I did. Now we continue to wait....Because my case is not an easy cut dry case, I may have to go see a physician of their choosing to evaluate the prognosis and make a decision.

June 26, in a freak boating accident my husband injured his finger so bad that he had to have a 2.5 hour surgery to fix it. Even upon meeting with the surgeon recently he was told that amputating this finger (left ring) still may be in our near future. He was recently (10/08) placed on a new medication to try to stop all nerve pain in that finger - with little luck it appears that we will follow through with this amputation after the first of the year.

As you follow along our journey, you will notice that we continue to lead as normal of a life as possible. We have 5 kids who keep us going, and have truly been our saving grace through this! You may also notice that we have a "special needs" son. I say that lightly, as his challenges THANKFULLY are managable. He has recently undergone a battery of testing himself. He was diagnosed as a baby with MILD CP. In the later months we have found that he his deaf in his left ear, suffers from Epilepsy, ADD, Speech Delay and moderate learning disablilties....In March of this year, his OWN seizures changed from focal point seizures to grand mal...we are hoping this is a result of some growth and hormone changes and not a change in his brain. We should have some test results from him here soon to share. In the meantime, he is also on an additional anti-seizure medication.

We realize that life is full of challenges and ours may be just beginning. Most days we are not bitter or angry. We have learned to hug the ones we love a little longer and try to focus on the big picture. One big happy family! Our faith has been tried and tested but ultimately we realize that things are out of our control and we need to trust in our Lord. Please continue to visit as we welcome you to our little corner of the World.


November 17
Bus, BackPacks, Coats & Hair...
Some weeks are just harder than others....Brian has been gone hunting for a few days, thank HEAVENS he is home now. Bless Cole's heart, but he was given another notice from the bus driver. UGH. SO I made him write her an apology and threatened to make him sit in a carseat in front of all his friends if he can't keep his bum planted! I know, I'm mean...but he thinks he can float around the bus and he is getting in trouble for this.

In case you can't read his apology, it says: Ms. Kathy I am sorry - I will sit on the bus, if I don't sit I will sit in a carseat, Cole
As luck would have it, Kennedy ripped her winter coat and her zipper to her back pack broke today :(


AND last, this one has me sooo upset, it has taken me a full week to blog about. My sweet daughter cut her own hair. Aleigha has never had a professional haircut, and I never wanted my girls to have bangs. Well, as you can see she is holding a baggie full of hair...and she now has bangs :( She looks totally different. We had to cut her some UGLY bangs and trim off like 5 inches to even out.

I promise she is cuter than this still, but she knew she was in trouble, so she wasn't in the mood to smile. Thanks Missy for fixing her hair at 8 at night, while I was in a panic. Someday, I will laugh about this, right?!?!?

November 12
Cheerleader...Science Olympia
As many of you know and some of you even came to see...Kennedy did cheerleading for the second year in a row! Surprising to me, this is something that she REALLY enjoys and plans to continue next year. It has been fun to watch her grow and her abilities enhance over the course of one year. In Allendale, they combine the cheerleaders - 3rd-6th grade. As you can imagine last year as a 3rd grader was a little intimidating for her...this year seemed to come with a little more ease
A couple weeks back Kennedy was invited to attend an awards ceremony to celebrate the hard work that these girls have put in this year, and to say good-bye to the 6th graders moving on the middle-school team :) Kennedy you ROCK! You stuck it out for over 3 months, some weeks practicing 2x a week along with having a game on Saturday mornings
.

In addition this weekend we watched the neighbor boy, as his family attended to a family emergency. He was participating in the Science Olympia for the 4th-5th grade teams, so Kennedy and I brought him to spend the morning expecting to sit back and watch the events. Well ironically, when we arrived we were told that they had some events where they were short some kids and we were able to give Kennedy a last minute sign-up. (I'm thankful for this, as now she is encouraged and wants to sign up next year!) She recieved "Honorable Mention" in 3 events, and her and Spencer joined eachother on a team to guess correctly on the mass of a can of Pepsi!! They won that event!! (woohoo!) I don't know about you, but at 31 I'm not certain I could guess the correct mass of a can of soda. Can you??


November 05
Voting...

I was told by some friends not to let the lines at the polls intimidate me, that we were not in the same precinct as the LONG line. When I glanced at my voter registration card it appeared that I would be able to drop in and out...Well in typical DeYoung fashion our precinct had changed...and we were now grouped with the local College kids. They were being delievered in "Bus Loads" to vote. Seriously I wish I was joking, don't believe me travel to a friends blog who lives in the same area as I do and just blogged about the same thing... http://quickstartmyheart.blogspot.com/ So what choice did I have?? I stood in line, and laughed when I heard these voters telling people that they were voting for the first time, or confirming their date of birth...(yes, 1989?!?!?) I even had one sweet young man ask me if I was in his accounting class - because I looked familiar. HA! I chuckled and said, "No, I haven't been in a Grand Valley accounting class since 1996"..than I smiled and said, "I know you were 7!" When did I get so old??? I've refrained from talking politics on my blog, and I don't plan to start today. I realize that we are a Nation divided, for many good reasons. But what I am proud of is the personal research I did on each of these candiates; on the issues that are important and personal to me.

YES, my vote went to this man (It's ok if you don't agree, that is why this is America)...BUT, I can tell you that Kennedy had a vote at her Elementary school yesterday and she voted for McCain. When I asked her why she choose him, I didn't critize her, but rather listened to her 9 year old response. "Mom, Obama sounds like Lama..it just didn't work for me!" I laughed so hard, I cried...than I hugged her and thanked her for her opinion. She than asked who I voted for, and I wasn't sure I was going to answer her...But decided to give her the truth. "Sweetie, mommy voted for Obama, because in my opinion which is NOT shared by everyone - he offered optimism...and mommy feels that is what our country needs right now!" That was the easiest answer I had, and it still probably didn't help her understand why her Momma voted for Obama the Lama! I love these kiddos.

A lil' bit of costumes and a WHOLE lot of candy...
Halloween day came and went for us at the DeYoungs House. With any Holiday, and 5 children - there is excitement, planning, tension and smiles. Our day started a little rocky, (ok my day started a little rough) as I was going to wake the boys up for school in the morning, I knew that "something" was changing in my body...something well out of my control, something that I have felt way too many times, something that wasn't going to be fun, I had a seizure. Thankfully, I woke up 20 minutes later and with 15 minutes to get them ready for the bus. I called Brian home, as I was left with little funcitioning ability for the next SEVERAL hours... When Brian arrived, Aleigha was coloring (right where Kennedy had left her before getting on the bus) and I was sleeping everything off in the chair. I remember waking up in my bed 6 hours later. Realized that I had slept through a LOT, and still had lots to do to manage a great day with little hang-ups for the kids. For a second, I thought that maybe I slept for a month. I woke up and Brian had seriously covered our house with Christmas lights...I did a double take and realized that it was in fact still Halloween...but my husband decided to take advantage of the WONDERFUL weather so he wouldn't be climbing on the roof in the snow. (our lights will not be on UNTIL after Thanksgiving...well minus the occasional check our kids have to perform to assure that everything is still dandy!)

I'm pretty sure that I had the cutest witches on the block...sorry for anyone who lives in my neighborhood and was sporting a witch, I'm a little biased. My girls both told me that they were "good witches". Aleigha had a change of heart half way through trick-or- treating. Blake wore the same Tigger costume that all 4 of his older siblings wore when they were two! Dawson went as a skelton for the 3rd year running, and Cole decided last minute that the spiderman costume we bought him, would be better for "next year" and opted for one of Brian's scarey wigs!!