It Is What it Is

It's not common for me to be the optimistic one in our relationship...but tonight, Chris and I are taking our fair share of that responsibility as we swallow the news from today.

It's not that we weren't expecting this...we were...it's just hard to hear when for this full year and a half we've had such high hopes that it wasn't true....

Mason has Cortical Dysplasia. We knew it...we just didn't know the extent of it. Mason's cortical dysplasia is quite extensive. What this means is that many parts of his brain were affected when the neurons didn't go to the proper place in utero. Mason's brain is very underdeveloped. I asked if there were certain aspects of development that would be affected by this, or if it would be more generalized, and Dr. Koehn answered that it would be more generalized...meaning that speech, physical development, learning, memory, everything...will be affected.

Dr. Koehn was shocked that Mason hasn't had more seizures with the extensiveness of the dysplasia. Because the dysplasia caused a lack in brain development and "white matter" in his brain, it is more common for seizures to occur due to the lack of "connections" being made. This being said, I asked if his seizure disorders were going to be life-long, and she said yes. Mason will always have a seizure disorder and it has the potential to get much worse. The positive side of this news is that Mason has the type of seizures that are more easily controlled with meds, diet, etc.

By the end of our meeting with her we were discussing things like wheelchairs, building a handicap accessible home, etc. This really put it in perspective for me...I couldn't even look at her for fear that I would cry, thus making me look weak. When we left, I turned to Chris, tears in my eyes and he simply said "It is what it is".

Mason is our first-born and this probably happened for a reason. He deserves all of our love and affection. Dr. Koehn also made a statement about the recurrence of this..and although VCFS was a random mutation, we aren't sure if this is genetically linked...meaning more of our kids could have Cortical Dysplasia. Likely this is related to Mason's underlying chromosomal condition, but we don't know that for sure. And there is no test for this...so I will make a call to Genetics tomorrow just to see if they can find out any additional information.

We are so lucky to have a happy boy. Mason's personality and the joy it brings makes this so much easier. We know it's going to be tough to raise him...but we're up for the challenge.

So, rather than bombarding all of Mason's blog readers with more medical mumbo jumbo...I'll leave it at that. Chris and I are convinced that our luck is going to change very soon...and maybe I'll win a trip to Mexico. :)