| |
On Monday Oct. 5, 2001, I got a call at work from my 9 year old
daughter's teacher. Hanna had had a seizure and they had called
the ambulance. I was in shock. Hanna was fine that morning and
had not been sick at all prior to that. When I got to the school
Hanna was lying on the floor. She was limp, her lips were blue
and she was unresponsive. The Ambulance had pulled up the same
time I had. They loaded her up and off we went to the hospital.
They kept asking me if she had been sick, had any head injury
etc. I told them the only thing that had happened to her was
a scratch from her Kitten. That was on Friday. Hanna start to
seize again on the way.
At the ER they did an emergency CT scan, normal. They had to
intubate her and load her up with Valium and Dilantin. They
had her transported by ambulance. They did a spinal tap, which
came back normal and also sent her blood to be tested for cat
scratch fever. She was put into a drug-induced coma and had
an emergency MRI the next morning. At first they told us this
was also normal but later that evening they said they saw a
swelling of the Thymus- Encephalitis.
We waited for her to come out of the coma. It took her until
Thursday to start responding to us. She would know who we were
one minute and then talk incoherently the next. She could walk,
brush her teeth, go to the bathroom but she was not my Hanna.
By Monday- one week from the day she seized at school, they
sent her home with us.
That was the toughest week of my life. Hanna did not know half
the time where she was, who we were. She would sing out everything
she would say. She would repeat herself over and over. It was
heart breaking to see this happening to her. Then on Saturday
it was like a switch had been flipped. She started calming down,
and remembering things. By Monday, 2 weeks from the onset, she
was so much better I took her to school to see her friends and
teachers!! She had forgotten some names but remembered everyone.
Her follow up appointment with the Neurologist was on Nov.1st
and he cleared her to go to school the very next day!! Hanna
has done great in school with catching back up. Her tests all
came back negative, even the cat scratch, so we will probably
never know what caused this to happen but we are truly grateful
to God and all the wonderful Doctors at UVA for getting her
through this. They had prepared us for the worst, which we know
they have to because of the nature of this disease but we never
gave up hope that she would be okay!!
Update Dec. 10, 2007:
It has been 6 year since that awful day in 2001. Hanna has faced
many trials due to the lingering short term memory loss she
suffered as a result of the encephalitis. She is now a sophomore
in high school. I have worked closely with her teachers every
year. I had to explain each and every year the difficulties
Hanna had with orginization and memory. We kept her in self
contained classes until the start of her freshman year in 2005.
I pushed for Hanna to begin regular classes with modifications
for her memory porblems. She ended last year ranking 23rd in
a calss of 312! She is now in all regular classes with 3 Advacned
classes as well. She continues to have a 504 modification in
place for her ADD. This means she is given more time for tests
if she needs it. She continues to do well and is now in place
for a regular or Advanced diploma instead of the modified diploma
given to children with her disability. We are thrilled with
Hanna's continued progress. We know we were very lucky that
she didn't suffer more severe learning disabilities and that
she has continued to progress each year. She is a caring, thoughful
cihld and has drawn from so much form her experience. She is
a gifted poet and artist and has hopes of one day working with
Autistic children. She has volunteered the past 3 summers at
a camp for Autistic and learning disabled children. We will
never forget the time we almost lost our precious daughter but
we give thanks to God and her wonderful doctors at the University
of Virginia for seeing Hanna through this difficult time. Keep
the faith. We did and we were truly blessed.
Never give up Hope! God Bless
Marina and Johnny Pillow
Lynchburg, VA. U.S.A.
Posted: February 7, 2002
|
|
 |
