9/19/2015
Update:
Friday morning I woke up to text messages from some of my best girlfriends - visiting NYC for an annual girls trip - at the Today Show with signs for Brodie. Talk about amazing. I was so touched and of course turned into an emotional basket-case - Brodie's own little PR squad! They even got on for 15 seconds of fame...
At 9AM we had a date with the best phlebotomist in town "Big John" downtown at Main Campus. This man is simply amazing - he draws Brodie's blood and fills the 5ML vial all within 45 seconds. He told me he has been doing this for 26 years and I am so grateful for his talent. One of the hardest things to watch has been Brodie poked and poked and poked by everyone and unsuccessfully come up with nothing. nada. no veins. I have give John the nickname - the vein whisperer and I am so thankful we found him. We will be seeing lots of him.
After that, we went down to the coordination teams office to talk through what we were thinking in regards to a live donor - we still had so many questions. They shared with us that the inbound phone calls coming were so extraordinary they have never seen anything like this before and they did not know how to respond. So they have been letting them all come in and storing them until we know how we are going to proceed.
As I have been sharing with you all - the unbelievable struggle I have been dealing with this decision. I was still toiling with it yesterday as I talked things out - I got great advice from the team - test and see if you are a match. If you aren't then you know. If you are then you know. We discussed more and then I decided you know what this is right. This is what I should do.
I shared with the team that I just wish that God would slam me with a 2x4 across the head on what the right thing to do is - to be the donor or the after caretaker and they said "Traci with the amount of people who are willing to help you and Brodie that have called in - I think he has." That really struck me.
We also chatted about the process of narrowing down potential donors besides myself. At this point we know we are over 80+ Call Ins (Ummm yes you read that right 80+ they have lost count and Still coming in!!!) - with people who are interested in learning more about the donor process. The team was going to work to narrow this down they use the following criteria – age, height, weight, etc.
At 12:30 our case was presented to the Cleveland Clinic committee in order for Brodie to be an organ recipient. At 2:45 I received the call from Donna - it was a success!!!! Now our case will be sent to state and then once state approves Brodie will be officially on the donor list.
We are now approved by the Cleveland Clinic which means we can start testing for a match.
Monday I will start 3 full days of testing to see if I a match - it will take up to 5 business days for the results to come back. I can choose to move forward or I can choose to opt-out and have them review the next best match. The surgeons will start working up a Top 3 - 5 Live Donor List and the coordination team will start reaching out to the Top Candidate(s).
As for our current situation - we are enjoying a fun family filled weekend. We have to enjoy them while we can... It is easy to forget that we are going through this… At moments there is laughter in the air – as well as toddler and infant screams. There is bustle in the house as we try to knock out what we can in the weekend. There is fun and shrill playing screams coming from the backyard swing-set with company over. There is planning for Halloween. There is Harper telling me about her new friend she met in Pre-School. There is Brodie smiling at me with nothing but baby love. There is Russ getting us excited for the Browns game tomorrow. And then I remember time is now ticking and every minute gets us one minute closer to transplant time.
#brodiesgoodvibetribe #tiguetough #sliverofliver
