Difficult Day, Difficult News

I'm not sure where to start and I'm not sure that I have the energy to tell the whole story so I am going to be brief as I can. This story is longer and more complicated than I am about to share.

When we went to my sisters house in December for Christmas we became aware that one of my nephews was ill. He had been sick for some time and the doctors were not able to give them any diagnosis. The doctor actually told the family that they believed that my nephew was faking it and that he was depressed. This did not make sense because he had been running a fervor for an extended period of time. He had many other symptoms and all were too real to be considered fake. While we were in LA for Christmas they almost put my nephew in the hospital. Instead they sent him home and said he should see his regular doctor at home. That Monday they returned to KY where he had a scheduled procedure done. After this procedure he became even more ill. The doctor said that it was normal and then sent him home. He continued to go down hill and came to a point where he was not able to eat at all and was loosing a lot of weight. He even began to loos muscle mass. Eventually he was sent to Children's Hospital where he spent almost a month. At the time he was admitted he could not walk or stand on his own. When he returned home they thought that he was doing better. They soon began to see that he was still not able to use his right leg and that he was delayed in speech and response. Over the last few weeks he has continued to go down hill again. At one point they believed that he had suffered a stroke.

Fast forward to the last couple of days; It is now believed that our 10 year old nephew had undiagnosed viral minigitus. He presented with all the symptoms but no spinal tap was ever performed. He now presents with all but one symptoms of post viral minigitus complications. Translated this means that because he went undiagnosed that he has developed complications from the minigutis. Some of the complications that they have found are brain damage, loss of speech, loss of full mobility and loss of eye tracking. He is unable to make eye contact and he has lost some of the use of his leg and arm. He continues to loss strength weekly and they have not been able to determine the extent of all the damage. He went through more diagnostics testing today and next Wednesday he will see a neurologist to see how much damage has been caused to the brain. Until then we will not know if any of these things are correctable.

We serve a mighty God and our hope is in him. We know that God can preform miracles in this little boys life but it was a difficult day and we are deeply filled with sorrow. Please pray for Austin and for his family. The past 8 months has been a difficult journey and it has only begun. He is very frightened by doctors and has already been through so much. Our family is discouraged and angry and trying to process this news. Please pray for answers, for comfort, and for peace.