The Next Step....

Cade had a checkup today with his doctor here in Nashville, Dr. Mawn. It is crazy now, that I have to specify which doctor he is seeing-Waner, Fay, Nerad, Holland, Mericle, Mawn, Heil. Anyway, she told us that it looks as if the VM is becoming more apparent in both eyelids. The next step is to wait for another scan, which could be a CT, CTA, MRI, or MRA from Dr. Mericle who helped with the previous surgery in February. After assessing the imaging they will go back in and remove what they can. The process of removing this VM completely looks like it will be a long term thing.

I think the hardest part of the visit today was finally realizing that this is something we could be dealing with for a long time. Vascular malformations/venous malformations grow as the child grows, which explains the growth in both eyelids. The great part about all of it, is that what has been removed in the past has not returned! So we will take one day at a time, one procedure at a time, one doctor visit at a time.

The most important part about all of this is that we continue to work on the amblyopia. Cade's vision in his bad eye is 20/50. So we will continue to use the Atropine drops in the good eye so that he will use the bad eye. Yes, that is how we refer to his eyes, "good" and "bad."
So with the strength from the Lord we will continue on this journey and we will "wait." We know He is the great healer and He has taught us so much!

On another note, Cade has been awesome through all of this and his conversations with us have been so cute. In our last visit to Ohio they upped the dosage of his drops to 6 times per day. We made a sticker chart for him and he gets a sticker for every drop. At the end of the week he gets a big surprise. This past week we took him to the "pizza place." This weekend we are taking him to the zoo. He has done great and he is looking forward to seeing all the animals.
I do have to share one more moment from Cade this week. Every morning he goes to early care and he is in there for about an hour with kids his age and some older kids. Before the kids leave for their classrooms for the day, Ms. Anna takes prayer requests from the kids and prays. Today Cade's teacher told me that he raised his hand and asked to "pray for his eye." So he and his buddy Christopher held hands and they prayed together for his eye. This made my day and brought tears to my eyes.
Yes Cade, Jesus will take care of you and your eye. You are getting so big and you are one tough kid!! I know the Lord has huge plans for your life and I can't wait to see what He has in store for you! I love you so much and so sad that you have to deal with all of this at a young age, but we know the Lord is going to use you in mighty ways!!