In the last post I wrote about Casey's stomach being in the wrong position and I had no clue what this meant. His stomach was literally up next to his heart!! We joke about this now; but it was not funny in the least back then. My poor husband would hold his chest and complain that his stomach hurt! We could not comprehend why he could feel his stomach up in his chest area!! After many tests, the doctors concluded that he had a Hiatal Hernia. Any time an internal body part pushes into an area where it doesn't belong, it's called a hernia. The hiatus is an opening in the diaphragm -- the muscular wall separating the chest cavity from the abdomen. Normally, the esophagus (food pipe) goes through the hiatus and attaches to the stomach. In a hiatal hernia the stomach bulges up into the chest through that opening. Leave it to Casey to get these off the wall sicknesses! Surgery was needed in order to repair the diaphragm and put the stomach back where it belonged. So back we go to our 2nd home, Baylor Medical Center, for about a week. The surgery went well and he recovered quite quickly. But he did mention that the surgery was so much more painful than his transplant surgeries. It's just amazing what surgeons can do these days! It was a very tricky procedure though. Due to his past surgeries, (liver transplants/cancer), the diaphragm wall was very thin, thus allowing his stomach to break through and float up into his chest. They had to repair the diaphragm wall with mesh. There is a possiblitly that the diaphragm wall will need to be repaired again in the future. So far so good! No more tummy problems thus far!
About a month or so ago, he went back to see his Oncologist for a final CT Scan to make sure that his cancer had not recurred. Everything was PERFECT and no cancer cells were found anywhere in his body. The labwork also stated that there were no cancer proteins in his blood! YAY! The doctor said if it had not recurred by now that it was more than likely not returning at all!!! Double YAY!! Everything was starting to look up...his tummy was fixed, no more cancer...BUT THEN...
About a month before his one year anniversary for his 2nd liver transplant, his labwork became abnormal. His liver enzymes sky rocketed above and beyond normal and only got worse as the days passed. When several lab tests come back abnormal the DREADED biopsy is needed!! OMG, there are no words to express how much Casey hates biopsies. He totally freaks out. I don't blame him! You should see the size of that biopsy needle!! YIKES!! The results of the biopsy said that Casey was in rejection; meaning his body was rejecting the new liver. When this happens, a 7 day hospital stay is in order. They pumped him up with an incredible amount of steroids and immunosuppressive drugs via IV and then tapered the dosages down as the week went along. It was really nothing to worry about, except that the medications gave him HORRIBLE headaches that brought him to tears!!! No amount of pain medicine would alleviate the pain! I felt so helpless not being able to help him! I was already feeling pretty helpless not being able to stay with him at the hospital; but I had exhausted my sick time and vacation time with all his other hospital stays! :-( His labwork got better and better as the week progressed so they let him go home!!! But not without having ANOTHER dreaded biopsy to make sure rejection was gone! :-(
A week after he got home, he had to go back for follow-up labwork with his family doctor. His liver enzymes had gone up a tad bit but nothing to be concerned about. The transplant surgeon told him to go back for more labwork in a few days to keep our eye on it. The next labwork he had done was worse than it was when he was first hospitalized for rejection!!! OMG...will this poor man ever catch a break?!?!?! It was way too close to Christmas time to be having to be hospitalized again! Soooo...it's Christmas Eve and Casey has to go back for more labwork and another dreaded biopsy!!! After the biopsy, they gave him a strong dose of IV steroids in hopes that it would help his liver enzymes go down. He felt fine so they sent him home. YAY!!! We got to spend Christmas Eve with his family as planned! BUT, we had to go back up to the hospital on CHRISTMAS MORNING for more labwork and to let a doctor look at him because they were afraid it could be some type of virus. Go figure, the doctor got very very busy with a sick patient so we had to wait HOURS before he came to see us!! This was not the way we wanted to spend our Christmas Day!! The doctor finally arrived and looked him over from head to toe; he opened up his mouth and said "ahhhhhhhhh." But doctor had nothing! Biopsy results said it was NOT rejection! (YAY!) The only thing left it could be was EBV (Epstein-Barr Virus). This sounds scary, right? Well, it scared us to death! But good ol' google came to the rescue. I researched it and if that is what he had; it was nothing to be concerned about!!! EBV is a lifelong dormant infection in the cells of the body's immune system. Almost everyone has this; it just lays dormant in your body. This virus is what causes Mono. There is nothing you can do about it but treat the symptoms...with steroids and antibiotics! Thank God that this is all it was! We were already thinking it was rejection again and that he was going to need another liver transplant! There were all sorts of ideas racing through my little head! And I wonder why I am stressed and anxious all the time!
Casey is fine now!! He has been back on steroids ever since the rejection episode and he is gaining his weight back!!! YAY! He's almost at 200 pounds again!!! He's getting his cute little (big) butt back and he's got "guns" again! :-)
