It's been a while!

It has been a while since I have taken the time to update here. We have been busy with home school and a few other things. Brynn has finally tested at a 1st Grade level in all areas of Reading. We have worked really hard on Inferring, Context Clues and Reading Comprehension.

This has made a bigger impact than he has experienced to date in his learning. It is a beautiful thing to see he figure out a word based on context and his confidence has grown so much that he does not hesitate to guess a new word or one he can not decode. He seems to have lost some decoding ability along the way, so we will have to figure out how to get that balanced.  Brynn received a Hernando Bear, sponsored through Angels 4 Epilepsy and TG Bears. He loves his Hernando and sleeps with him. He is a good companion and as Brynn says he is his Epilepsy Fighting Bear. He was promised a bear through another organization months before his VNS surgery. He never got it, so I bought him another bear. He said he didn't want to take it to surgery because it was not an Epilepsy Fighting Bear. Hernando is so special to him... Monica, the beautiful woman who hand makes the bears, said she put extra fight in his Hernandos stuffing! He cut out the sticker from the box he came in and proudly displayed it on his memory shelf. That shelf is full of beautiful memories... 

  Seizure wise Brynn has experienced an awakening cognitively since the introduction of Onfi stopping a lot of the little seizures that you can not see. The bigger seizures are still there, just not as often, which has made a difference in our lives! He is spending a lot more time talking and has had spontaneous laughter more and more. Silly boy, we have really enjoyed having more of the real Brynn back these past few weeks. Just before his Children's visit last week, we saw a decline cognitively and an increase

in seizures. He had a runny nose, headache and was declining so quickly cognitively, I took him to the ER. It was decided there that it was an increase in seizures and allergies due to the high pollen count. We went to Children's Monday. His neuro increased the Onfi from 10 mg to 15mg 2X Daily. This has already made a difference, and we will not start the daytime dose until Monday! We also agreed it was time to l et go of the Klonopin, since he does not need to be on 2 Benzo type drugs regularly. He was only on .5 before bed and it has been two years since he started it. I haven't noticed a difference, except perhaps a little clustering, which seems to have been helped by the Onfi increase. I expect once we increase the daytime dose we will level out again. We also were able to attain the Zonegran Brand Name Medically Necessary again. I do wonder if he may have done better with the brand name when he started the Onfi. It was such a dramatic difference... I guess time will tell. This time when his VNS was adjusted he had no change in is voice, no hoarseness and no coughing at all. I kind of missed the robot voice all the way home... but I us am happy that he seems to have gotten use to the device. His VNS is set to 1.25 cycle and 1.5 magnet. Speaking of the VNS,

we bought this custom made band for his VNS Magnet from Kimberly's Crafts on Facebook. It's just what he needed as it fits his ankle instead of his wrist. The magnet will destrtoy any electronic devices, credit cards and so on that it comes in contact with. So we needed one for his ankle, when I could not find one I contacted her to make it! It came out great! His neuro once again said that we will likely not see seizure freedom with Brynnon, and that our goal is to keep seizures at a minimum for him while not affecting his cognitive ability negatively. I am anxiously awaiting seizure freedom, I will not loose hope that he will one day be seizure free. We are still only 6 months out with the VNS, perhaps before this honeymoon phase ends we will notice a difference. We will likely discuss trying to wean Vimpat next, as we are not sure what impact this medication has on his seizures either. No matter what we will not touch the Zonegran, having the month of August as a permanent reminder of just how much he needs that medication.
 

Brett is doing great with the Alpha Omega Life Pacs. It was a good decision to place him in that curriculum to allow more one on one time with Brynn, since Brett has the ability to work independently.
 

Abigail has begun to want to home school. We are working slowly on the Starfall books and preschool workbooks. Hard to believe she will be 3 in just two weeks. 


We had a wonderful day on Epilepsy Awareness day! Everyone wore PURPLE and it made Brynn feel so special that it was his day! So here are a few pictures of our lovely purple day!