10 Weeks

Meeting Baby Bryson
Singing in Church
Putt Putt
Riding the Creekmore train (over and over and over)
Deer Acre's with the youth group
Children's Camp
NWA Botanical Gardens and Rick's Bakery fun day
Landen's Birthday
Leightyn's 5th Birthday (water slide party and Chuck E Cheese party)
Ava Grace's Birthday Party
Church functions
Snow Cones and Taco Bell every Wednesday with Grandad and Jo
Week in Tulsa
8 MOPS playdates
3 different Vacation Bible Schools
Beauty and the Beast Broadway Musical

This is how Leightyn spent the last 10 weeks of her life.

The following story is from a blog I have been following the last 3 or 4 months. I have always quickly read the posts and never thought much about them. Two weeks after Leightyn's death, the dad (who write this blog) posted "Our New Normal". This got my attention and I began to back track and see what all I missed the past few weeks.

His daughter is about 5 or 6. She started having headaches and their journey began....

"Well, Ava had started feeling bad a few days ago as you know. This morning she began acting really abnormal and having (what we found out later was) small seizures. We brought her into the ER and she was immediately raced to MRI where they discovered that her ICP (intra-cranial pressure) was dangerously high. She was operated on within 20 minutes of hitting the front door. They put in a shunt to relieve the pressure."

After doing several test, the doctors discovered a tumor on the brain stem. Sounds familiar...
This next post was written a few days later.

"The not good news was this... her tumor has grown and was blocking the flow of brain fluid which was the reason for the increased pressure. The docs are not hopeful at this point and have pledged their cooperation for anything we need from here forward. They do not expect Ava to make it 3 more months. While that news is terrible, we are still praying for a miracle. God is as capable now as he was when the tumor was smaller.

We are taking the next steps. Lisa and a friend will be taking Ava to a doctor this week (up north) who has had good success in treating GBM in kids. We just have to get her well enough to get there. The docs here expect that she will feel really great in the next few days because the pressure that has been building has been relieved. If she feels great, it will be a great trip."

His daughter then underwent 3 different brain surgeries to get rid of the tumor.

"It's so good to be home, but weird too. This is the first time they have sent us home and said, "medically there is nothing else we can do." So, we are home with Ava. She is not feeling bad. Just sleepy on and off. She nods a lot and gives thumbs up for approval. She is not concerned right now as far as I can tell.

It's nuts. 10 weeks ago Ava was running around playing with her cousins. Right now, she is 3 brain surgeries in and has been given very little time left by the medical professionals. It's very clear to us that we need miraculous healing. We've needed it all along. The biggest difference is I thought this part would come in 18 months, not 2. We are wrestling through it as any parent would. We wonder what in the world God is doing. We wonder what in the world we could have done different. We wonder what in the world. All we know is that God is big and mighty. There is nothing He cannot do. The tough part of that is there are some things He won't do this side of heaven. We just keep praying that healing Ava is not one of them."

When sent home, the Doctors said that there was nothing else to be done and that they would give her 18 months to live. The following blog was written 2 weeks later.

"The last 48 hours are a blur. We're home now, but without a piece of our family and a big piece of our heart. Our Ava went to be with Jesus. 10 weeks to the day of her diagnosis of GBM she was taken from here to heaven."

After I read this post, I couldn't help but feel better (in a bad kind of way). This little girl fought hard for 10 weeks. Every medical possibility was done and it didn't save her. She spent the last 10 weeks of her life fighting. My heart breaks for her family and for what all they went through. God knew that they could handle the treatments.....I don't know if we could have handled it.

Leightyn got to live life till her last breath. We made so many memories that last 10 weeks of her life. I praise God that He allow us to have Leightyn as we knew her....loving life and living it to the fullest. God knew that we probably couldn't handle fighting this horrible tumor and He didn't put us through that.