It Could Be Nothing...

...or it could be something.

That's the limbo we're currently living in.

On Wednesday, at Kieran's 2 month doctor's appointment, Dr. S noticed that his face is asymmetrical. His left eye socket and cheek are noticeably smaller than his right. When he mentioned it, I didn't think it was that big of a deal. Babies are constantly growing, so I figured it was just a growing pain of sorts, and would even out eventually.

My care free attitude changed when Dr. S had another doctor come in to make sure he wasn't "seeing things." She agreed that she could see the difference and they started throwing around terminology that I didn't understand and can't remember.

Dr. S said that the difference could be caused by any number of things, but the most common is a blood restriction to one side of his body. He threw around a bunch of other ideas, including something about the "strawberry" birthmarks Kieran has on his face and how they can occur inside the body as well (as opposed to just on the skin.) Unfortunately I didn't process much of what he was saying and came out of the appointment very confused and worried. Dr. S said that an MRA (similar to an MRI, but provides images of blood flow in the body,) is the best way to check things out, but that would mean Kieran would have to be sedated and it would cost over $1,500, so it would be a last resort.

This morning, I got a call from Dr. S's nurse who said an MRA is scheduled for Monday at 5:30 am. I want to think that Dr. S ordered it just so we can get the best idea of what's going on, but a tiny bit of me wonders if he thinks things are worse than he's letting on.

I've stopped myself from Googling anything because as we all know, Dr. Google will say that you have cancer no matter what the symptoms are. Thankfully my dad is much better at wading through the worse case scenarios and gave me some information about what might be going on.

The most common thing that causes blood restriction is blood vessels being too small, but it can also have to do with his heart or something in his brain. Of course there could be cancer or a mass, but that's a worst case scenario and I'm not letting myself go there.

We have to see what the MRA says before we can make a plan of action. If it is a worst case scenario, we're only 3 hours from St. Judes in Memphis as well as 3 hours from a wonderful hospital in Birmingham, so I'm not worried about being able to find good care.

So basically, we don't know a whole lot right now, but are hoping to figure things out on Monday. Dr. S said that the treatment of restricted blood flow is normally surgery, so I'm hoping that it won't have to be on his heart or in his head.

On Monday, if you could send us some good thoughts, prayers or juju, it would be very much appreciated.