Brady's Beginning

Brady was born Nov 29 2008 a happy and healthy 7 lbs. 10 oz.. We can't believe that we have been so blessed with this little boy. About a week after Brady was born we noticed that the left side of his face was turning pink and a few days later it became bright red. Our family doctor refered us to Children's Hospital to a dermatologist that specialized in birthmarks. Once she saw Brady it was determined that what he had was a large facial HEMANGIOMA. We had just entered the unknown...

It Keeps Growing and Growing

As the weeks went on the hemangioma became darker red and more swollen everyday. You can't describe the feeling of seeing this happen to your baby and not being able to help him. But regardless of what was going on, our love for Brady continued to grow and grow! Everything he did was cute and milestone was celebrated.

It's Christmas!

Christmas snuck up on us...Brady was only 3 1/2 weeks old and we had already been to a dozen doctor appointments. The plan this far was to wait to start any treatment until the hemangioma was causing problems, specifically with his left eye. If the swelling closed his eye, Brady could loose his vision. We knew it wouldn't be long before something was done, it was getting bad fast. But with Christmas here it helped lift our spirits. Santa brought Brady all kinds of fun toys...he must have been good!

The "C" Word

On Jan 2 2009 Brady had another appointment at Childen's Hospital, this was the day I feared. Doctors had determined that the swelling was becoming a danger and then they dropped the C word...chemo. The plan was to begin a chemotherapy called Vincristine. It is still in the testing phase of use so Brady joined the trial.

Week 1 of Treatment

We all drove down to Milwaukee the night before his 1st day of treatment. Aunt Sandy lives only a few miles from the hospital. She made us up a room to stay in for whenever we need to crash there. On the way down we stopped at Cabela's because Brady needed a present for being so brave through this whole thing. We found a dog that looked exactly like our dog Romey. In the morning a PICC line was put into his arm. Its a cathedar that will remain inserted throughout the 12 week treatment to give him his medications and to draw blood for labs. After that was placed he had an MRI done to see how much the hemangioma grew inside compared to the first MRI we had done. He has an MRI 3 times in this trial. Then he got his first dose of Vincristine. It was a long day for Brady.

After 6 Weeks of Treatment

Every week since Bradys been born hes seen some sort of doctor. We've seen at least a dozen doctors such as oncologists, dermatologist, ENT, cardiologist, optomologist, and so on. Finally we're gettin somewhere. After being on chemo for 6 weeks the results are amazing. The swelling is almost completely gone. Brady can open his left eye normally now and his left ear is completely open. The coloring will be there for a while but will go away after about a year of age. The chemo has some minor side effects like poor appetite, constipation, and nausea. But we give him medicine to take care of that. But all this aside, Brady is a very happy baby. He's starting to laugh when I tickle him. He is very alert. His bright blue eyes are always looking around. He spends alot of time on his tummy now. Pretty soon his little baby pushups will turn into crawling. The doctors are amazed at how well this is working so far. They were blown away at his latest MRI because the stuff wrapped around his optic nerve, his ear canal, and his throat is almost completely gone.