On Thursday morning (earrrly!) we headed to Riverton Hospital for Lexi's MRI on her brain. Her appointment was at 6:30 am and there was pretty much no one at the hospital at that time! :) We started out in the pre-sedation room where Lexi got a check-up to make sure things were a-okay to sedate.
They sedated through an IV, and I hated watching them put it in - I cried! That's my little BABY they're hurting! :( She didn't scream/cry as much as I thought she would, but it was still heart breaking for me nonetheless. After the IV was set, I was able to hold her which I was very happy about! They pumped a ton of IV fluid through her to make sure she was well hydrated, etc. and Lexi HATED that feeling! She cried more every time fluid was put through than she did while they set the IV!
They actually sedated her in the MRI room, so they could just transport her easily from me to the MRI bed, and I did not like watching my baby girl get put under, and carried away from me while she was strapped to a table! Needless to say, I cried again! Terrell was okay though, and so I was just a sob! :) We waited in the recovery room for about forty five minutes and they brought her back to us. They had her sleep for another hour and a half or so, and then we fed her Pedialyte, which she DOWNED, and then 4 oz of her formula which she DOWNED! Someone was hungry! She hadn't eaten anything for a long time!
We were discharged at around 10:00am, and decided to head back to Provo instead of staying in the SLC area. We took naps when we got home which of course, were not long enough! We were already beat by this time, especially cuz we got about zero hours of sleep the night before due to work (Terrell got home at 2am) and worries (Me).
We luckily had an appointment that same day at Primary Children's to meet with her neurosurgeon, so we were able to find out result just 5 or so hours afterwards, instead of days/weeks! We got lucky!
When we went to the doctor, we were able to view the pictures from her MRI, where we saw (her eyeballs, COOL!) her brain and the area of concern. What it was was scar tissue on her actual brain, with a cyst over that, and then fluid around it. It took up about a 1/4 of her brain (about half the left side) in total.
The verdict from the radiologist and neurosurgeon was that it was evidence of a past stroke (what we were originally told) that occurred either extremely late in the pregnancy or while she was a newborn (most likely the newborn). The damage from the stroke is what's causing her right hand/arm to not be as functional as it should be, and that is irreversible. That makes us pretty sad, because they're nothing they can do because the scar tissue is over the motor skill area affecting her right hand/arm. Don't worry, she doesn't have a "dead" arm or anything, it's just not up to par!
They won't be doing surgery to remove the cyst, because right now they don't feel the cyst/fluid is causing any further damage right now (besides occasional headaches, I presume). However, as she gets older, we will probably put her into some physical therapy to help along her hand and arm. We also presume that she will have occasional check ups at PCH to make sure her cyst/fluid isn't growing, causing further damage, etc.
We're grateful it's not a life threatening situation for Lexi, but we are sad that our sweet little baby had to go through a stroke, and is now permanently affected by it. We're hoping physical therapy, and encouragement of the use of her right hand will bring her motor skills of that area right up to where it needs to be!
Thanks so much for all your prayers, fasting, concern, support, and love! We appreciate you all so much, and are very grateful for you! Please keep checking back on our blog, as Lexi is the biggest GOOF ball ever!
