Out of ICU

Ashley’s doctors decided that she is not a good candidate for surgery, so they will treat the blood clots in her lungs with heparin, an anti-coagulant, and hope that the blood clots break up and are reabsorbed by her body.

Radiation scheduled for today has been postponed until she is off of anti-coagulants. She moved out of ICU a little while ago and is in Methodist Dunn Tower’s cardiovascular unit.

She still has pain in her left leg, but is in a new and more comfortable bed. In this unit, they will work with her to get appropriate amounts of exercise and movement to prevent new blood clots while waiting for the old ones to break up.

In Cardiovascular ICU

Ashley now has blood clots in her lungs. She has moved to Cardiovascular ICU. Surgery to remove is under consideration.

Update on Ashley

Ashley’s doctors successfully inserted the inferior vena cava filter in her leg yesterday; this should stop the blood clots in her leg from moving to her lungs. The site where they inserted it (her groin) is very painful, as is her lower left leg where the blood clots are. They’ve started her on blood thinners (in low doses because they don’t want to cause bleeding in her brain) to break up the clots and bring relief to her leg.

At the moment, they have her nausea and dehydration under control, and she has been able to eat and keep down some solid food, so she is feeling a little bit better.

She is scheduled for radiation on Friday, and will begin Yervoy infusions next week. We aren’t sure yet how much longer she will stay in the hospital.

Thank you for your prayers and support.

Ashley back in Hospital

After a couple of difficult weeks, Ashley’s doctor re-admitted her to the hospital yesterday. She’s had problems with nausea, which defied various attempts to control, and was dehydrated. More concerning is that she has developed blood clots in her left leg — a pretty dangerous condition.

She will receive an inferior vena cava filter today which should prevent blood clots from traveling to places that we don’t want them to go.

She’ll also receive some blood thinners, but in low doses because we don’t want to cause more bleeding in her brain.

She is in quite a bit of pain right now and thoroughly miserable.

Radiation is scheduled for Friday.

Telling Secrets to Dolls

One more from grandma Peggy: Sometimes a sweet little girl likes to slip into the corner and tell secrets to her doll.

She is such a sweet little angel…..Keith and I had fun with her!

Boxing with Dad

More from grandma Peggy: This picture is of Josh and Lillian in her favorite “Box car”. She loves sitting on top of, sitting in, and wearing boxes on her head! Too cute!

Cousins & Pals

From Lillian’s grandma Peggy Denby: Keith and I went to Houston last Thursday night to help out while Ashley was in the hospital. Sunday while we were waiting for Ashley to make it home from the hospital, Elli, Lillian’s dad’s sister, her husband Josh Williams and their daughter Katelyn stopped by after dropping Josh’s mom off at Hobby Airport.

We decided to take the girls to the park so they could play together. They had a blast. Lillian was a little hesitant going down the slide, but Katelyn showed her the ropes and Lillian finally slid down by herself. They were definitely the cutest girls at the park. Lillian had fun chasing Katelyn!