Blood Clot Update

I am asking for prayer. Tomorrow (Friday) morning, I have the 'big' CAT scan to determine if the blood clot in my lung has dissolved. This is a big deal - I have been on multiple miligrams of blood thinners for 6 months now in the hopes of making this clot dissolve.

I cannot believe that it has been 6 months and 6 days since Ellyotte entered the world... And I cannot believe that it has been 6 months TODAY since I re-entered the hospital with a pulmonary embolism.

To date, 27 July 2010 was the worst day of my life. I will never, ever, never forget the loneliness and fear that I felt as they wheeled me into the heart unit into an empty hospital room and having to say goodbye to my newborn baby girl and my husband. In those first hours, we honestly didn't know if I would survive the clot and I was petrified that I wouldn't see them again. I wept openly on the phone with one of my best friends, Amy Henderson Hall, as she prayed for me and passed out updates to our friends and families. The memories of those hours spent alone in that hospital room are still as fresh and as raw as if the event happened yesterday.

But God is good and has a mighty plan for my life and for the lives of my children. We heard time and again that Ellyotte should NOT be alive - that due to the uterine damage I had (didn't know about till Ellyotte's c-section) and due to the fact that the blood clot likely developed while I was pregnant - she is by every meaning of the word, an absolute "MIRACLE."

Had my mom not been with me on 27 July 2010 and had she not lived through the same thing with her brother, my Uncle George, and known to send me right to the hospital, I wouldn't be here typing this today. My Uncle passed away following surgery from a pulmonary embolism so my mom was familiar with the symptoms - Dan and I were not.

I am anxious for tomorrow's procedure because we want nothing more than for this clot to be gone. I want to return to normal life: no more blood thinners everyday at 4:00 pm, no more trips to the hospital to get my blood tested every 10 days, no more visits with an internist I don't really like, and no more fear that this clot is dwelling in my lung and that any minute, I could "throw" it and drop dead. I am sick of the drama that has come with this clot and am ready to hear the words "It is gone."

Sometime within the next week, I will stop my thinner regimen long enough to be seen by a hematologist. He will do full blood testing to determine if this is a clotting condition or a one-time occurrence. Please join us in praying that this was a one time thing and that we never have to worry about this happening again.

I will let you know the results of the scan as soon as possible tomorrow. Thanks, everyone.