Busy Tues after the seizure

Hi everyone,
As I posted in the status update last night, Eric had a 3rd seizure on Monday night/very early Tuesday morning. It lasted about 3 minutes. It's very scary to watch. I can't believe Melissa has watched him go through this 3 times. Strangely, Eric says he remembers this seizure. He doesn't remember the other 2 seizures, which is good. After the seizure, Eric had a CT scan at 1:15 am. It didn't show any changes in his brain. Eric was pretty responsive and talking to us less than 45 mins after the seizure. He didn't get much sleep after this, due to all the activity and nurses checking on him.

Eric continues to improve in breathing and use of his body. He can now scratch his own nose. :)However, the stress of moving his weak body is causing tremors, especially in his left arm. The doctors feel these are not related to the seizure activity, but rather muscle exhaustion.

Eric had an ultrasound of his left arm at 10:30 AM to check on the clot in his armpit. The technician said it didn't show any changes in the clot area. This is good and bad. Good that the clot hasn't increased or move, but we would like for the clot to dissipate as soon as possible.

The neurologist visited about 11:45 am. He said Eric's seizures are not a concern for brain damage, unless they are a sign of some other problem. The doctor ordered a spinal tap for tomorrow at 10:00 AM. The objectives are 1) measure spinal pressure to determine if his double vision is caused by this 2) look for leukemic cells 3) look for infection (although they are not expecting to find infection). During the spinal tap, they plan to give a prophylactic chemo treatment. The previous chemo back in Dec did not enter his spinal fluid, and this "maintenance" chemo should stay within his spinal system - not enter the other systems. We are glad they can give some more chemo. They feel Eric's too weak right now to get the normal round of maintenance chemo, so this is an alternative way to give it.

Eric hasn't been able to get a good night's sleep in a week. The doctors feel the seizures he is having may be stress relate (not actually neuro related), and lack of sleep lowers your seizure threshold. So, we made a big point of letting Eric get has much sleep as possible after all the doctors came through today. He has slept since 5pm, waking occasionally, but then falling right back asleep. I'm hoping he'll get a good 10-12 hours of sleep.

We read everyone's postings/messages to him today. Made him really happy.

When Eric woke up around 11:30pm asking for ice chips, he asked if I had heard about his good friends that just had a baby. He was excited for them and wanted to share the news!! :) So amazing to have such a loving brother.

Love,
Sara