Dear friends,
following our good news yesterday about Imogen's results staying stable, Murray went to the doctor's this morning to pick up some routine test results. The doctor told him that his iron is very low and as all other tests are normal he needs to investigate as he thinks there may be some internal bleeding somewhere. He is refering Murray for an endoscopy and a colonoscopy.
This leaves us very confused about what to do and we would really appreciate your prayer.
with love,
Murray, Karen, Jed and Imogen
xxxx

Hi there,

we have just got back from the John Radcliffe Hospital again following Imogen's MRI. It went well, apart from the anaesthetist's 3 attempts at putting in the cannula!!
The outcome was that there is no change and they do believe that the damage is old. Though we will probably will never know when or how it happened. As she is older now though it meant that it was all a bit bigger and clearer and they can see the damage clearly. Apparently it is partly in the basal ganglia, but also they think goes into the temporal lobe which probably accounts for the epilepsy.



So Imogen will have a scan again next summer to follow up, but in the meantime we just continue with the anti convulsive and reflux drugs plus physio and OT.



So our next step is packing and then off the Kg on the 17th August. In between now and then we have a holiday (27th July - 5th Aug) and have to obtain visas and have various vaccinations.


Please pray for the visas in particular as these have been problematic recently for others and for our stress levels!


with love and thanks,


M, K, J and I
xxxx

Hi all,
we spent the day at the John Radcliffe Hospital today and had a number of appointments. The first was neurology. They are happy with the anti-convulsive that she is on and that she is not having seizures now, so we will continue with that but on a larger night time dose rather than day time which will hopefully alleviate the tiredness in the day.
Then we saw the consultant from the gastroenterology dept as she had had a reaction while on the anti reflux drugs. He looked for other reasons for her sickness and diarrhea and wants us to try again with the same capsules as Immi was on antibiotics for an infected insect bite at the same time, and then we will have another chat after a couple of weeks.
The biggest appointment was the follow up with the psychiatrist. She showed me the results for the testing and it showed very strongly that she has ADHD. The psychiatrist however believes that this is not the whole story _due to some other behaviours that Imogen is diplaying - and wants to refer her to another psychiatric dept for more assessment as well as guidance on how to manage the ADHD.
So Immi's run down now looks like this: Dystonia, Epilepsy, ADHD and Reflux.
We now have to do a lot of thinking and praying about the future and whether we can realistically meet her needs longterm in KG, now throwing into the equation the need for psychiatric help. On the flip side, school in KG may well meet her needs better than mainstream school here in the UK, so we really need wisdom.
Thanks for all your prayer,
love,
Karen for us all
xxxx

As promised, the story so far......

we have booked tickets to return to KG on the 17th August and we now have soooo much to do before then, it is quite overwhelming. Immi has 2 appointments this week at the hospital one will give us the EEG results amongst other things. Next week on the 21st she has an MRI again. We are hoping for no change to last time.
It is with no small amount of fear and trepidation that we booked the tickets. Our human side would gladly stay in the UK, but we feel that we are being obedient and we asked for loads of things at Easter when we went back and they were all given...

So we will be like Caleb and Joshua

...rather than the other spies!! (An at times it really is down to a battle of the will rather than what we feel!)
Please pray for no more absences/fits for Immi and that they will find the right drug for Immi's sickness too. It would be great if it was one we could get over there too! Her dystonia in her arm has increased too and she is really tired from the anti convulsives to pray that her body will start to adjust to this as she is back to tantruming now.

We have no idea how the visa situation will work out - which is normally a major issue but has taken a back seat for us! The situation in KG has hardened and we know that we may struggle for a visa so please remember this.

Also, I(K) have been asked to teach in the school. I know they are desperate but we need wisdom in how much I help out as I don't want to gi e everything out at school and have nothing left for my own kids, especially Immi.

On Friday the kids finish school here and we are having a 'goodbye' party in the evening. We hope that this will be good especially for the kids in their transitioning again.

So that is where we are right now, I'll write again after the appointments this week,
with love,
M, K, J and I
xxxx

Dear friends,

this is the first entry in our attempt to be better communicators!! You have been invited to view our blog because you are either family, friend or are involved in keeping others up to date with our news [please note- you can come under more than one of those categories!! :-)]
This is where we will put updates of what is happening and what we are up to and also what we need prayer support for. We will be talking about our work and so we have kept the number of people able to view the blog to a very select few (yes, you are a chosen one!!!!) Seriously though, we need to know that information will be treated sensitively, especially regarding where we are in relation to the work we are doing.
We hope you enjoy hearing more from us and hopefully feeling closer to us though it...
love,
M, K, J and I
xxxx