Henry has been a medical mess since Thanksgiving. Without giving out all the gory details, Henry is in the middle of being diagnosed with Crohn's Disease. I don't think I have discussed, on the blog that Henry also has an autoimmune disease. Everyone knows that in August of 2009 I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. Well, about 6 months later, Henry (finally) followed up on some back pain and neck stiffness he was having. Well, after much testing he was diagnosed with ankylosing spondylitis. Short explanation of this is that it is a form of arthritis where his spine is trying to fuse together. So, he takes a shot once a week and this prevents the disease from progressing.
If we were smart, we would of fully researched ankylosing spondylitis. The reason I say this is because around Thanksgiving Henry started experiencing some severe pain. After a few doctor visits Crohn's Disease was mentioned and I started doing some research on the internet. I found that ankylosing spondylitis and Crohn's disease have the same "marker". Roughly 10% of people with ankylosing spondylitis will develop Crohn's. We should have known that Crohn's was a possibility.
So here is Henry, struggling with digestive issue since Thanksgiving. He has had difficulty sitting or walking. He has had 2 biopsies, one which was done under anesthesia. He takes hydrocodone's supplemented with Advil, every day. He was a mess from Thanksgiving to a few days after the new year. He could not physically get to work some days and other days he could only get though 1/2 a day of work. He would spend some days in bed, all day. He was in constant pain for over a month. Some days he would try to "fake" that he wasn't in pain. But, how can you fake it? He would snap at the kids or 1/2 way through an errand he would be in such pain that we would have to come home. Everyday was a constant struggle for him. And for me. And for the kids. Talk about spinning into a depression. It sucks to be in pain. It sucks to watch someone you love in pain. It sucks (for the kids) to see their daddy in constant pain and not really understand what is going on. You can't fake normal. Henry felt really bad about everything going on. But I told him that we are going through it together - For richer or for poorer, In sickness and in health, Til death do us part.
With that said, Christmas kind of snuck up on us. This was the first year that we decided to hold Christmas at our house. Henry was not physically able to pull the decorations down from the attic. He did help put up the Christmas tree. We had to skip putting Christmas decorations up outside. We had planned to go to the River of Lights, starting our own Christmas traditions now that we wont be traveling for Christmas. However, Henry was in such pain that we could not go. When I explained all of this to a friend at AWANA he asked if it would be okay to tell Henry "I heard your Christmas was a real pain in the butt." Pretty funny in hindsight.
Around the new year Henry started feeling better. He was healing. For 2 weeks Henry was back. You could just hear it in his voice. The past few days he has started hurting more and definitely slipping back a little bit. He has had another test, basically an ultrasound/x-ray of his digestive track. He has an appointment with a gastro-internolgist this week. He will have a colonoscopy some time in the near future. We are trying to change his diet and stay clear of all nuts and seeds (tomatoes, cucumbers, popcorn, corn, green beans, and a whole lot more). We are also trying to stay away from tomato sauces (due to the acid). I say try because it is hard to break old habits.
So what is going on? We are still trying to figure that out.
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